Artist Profile
Arthur Kopit (1937-2021), throughout a career spanning seven decades, authored an extraordinary string of admired, acclaimed and award-winning stage works, beginning with Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma’s Hung You in the Closet and I’m Feelin’ So Sad, which Jerome Robbins directed on Broadway while Kopit was still an undergraduate at Harvard. His other works include Indians (Tony Award Nominee, Finalist for Pulitzer Prize); Wings (Tony Nominee, Finalist for Pulitzer Prize); End of the World, with Symposium to Follow; a new translation of Ibsen’s Ghosts; the book for the musicals Nine and Phantom (both with scores by Maury Yeston); the book for the musical High Society; Road to Nirvana; Because He Can (originally entitled Y2K); A Dram of Drummhicit (written with Anton Dudley); and numerous one-act plays.
His most recent projects include Discovery of America, a play based on the journals of the Spanish conquistador, Cabeza de Vaca; and two new plays, Secrets of the Rich and The Incurables. Mr. Kopit was a member of the Dramatists Guild and the Lark Play Development Center, where he headed the Lark Playwrights’ Workshop, influencing and mentoring countless young playwrights. He was, right up to his death, a tireless advocate for playwrights, theater makers, theater companies, and especially The Lark.