Public Radio for the Piedmont and High Country
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Two Neil Simon Plays Hit Winston-Salem Stage Before Broadway Runs

Neil Simon sitting on a windowsill at home pouring over a script of play he wrote. World Telegram & Sun photo by Al Ravenna.

Award-winning playwright Neil Simon died this weekend at age 91. The prolific writer was perhaps best known for “The Odd Couple,” which went on to become a hit movie and TV show.

Two of his other plays have a connection to Winston-Salem.

“Lost in Yonkers” was another of Simon's plays that made the leap from stage to screen. And before it ever got to Broadway, it was previewed for audiences at the Stevens Center in Winston-Salem, starting in late 1990.

The coming-of-age story set in the World War II-era went on to do well, winning a Pulitzer Prize for drama and four Tony Awards.

It ran for 780 performances on Broadway, according to the Internet Broadway Database.

In 1992, Simon's “Jake's Women” also premiered on the Steven's Center stage. The story focused on a man's conversations with the previous women in his life as he struggles with his failing marriage.

The play was not one of Simon's bigger hits, but it did give local audiences a chance to see actor Alan Alda - star of the M*A*S*H television series - on stage. The role of Jake later earned him a Tony nomination for Best Actor.

It ran on Broadway for 245 performances.

Both plays were part of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts' “Broadway Preview Series.”

Paul Garber is a Winston-Salem native and an award-winning reporter who began his journalism career with an internship at The High Point Enterprise in 1993. He has previously worked at The Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The News and Record of Greensboro and the Winston-Salem Journal, where he was the newspaper's first full-time multimedia reporter. He won the statewide Media and the Law award in 2000 and has also been recognized for his business, investigative and multimedia reporting. Paul earned a BA from Wake Forest University and has a Master's of Liberal Arts degree from Johns Hopkins University and a Master's of Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He lives in Lewisville.

Support quality journalism, like the story above,
with your gift right now.

Donate