ABOUT THE PLAY

What you are about to see is a dramatized version of the Harper Lee novel, “To Kill a Mockingbird.” The novel was published in 1960 with a first edition of a mere five thousand copies. In 1961 the novel rocketed to the top of the bestseller list and won the Pulitzer Prize. Since then, sales of the novel number in the tens of millions, and “To Kill a Mockingbird” has become one of the most read and most influential books in America-rated by one survey as second only to the Bible.

It has been suggested that the core of the novel’s story is both a depiction of a way of life and of a passage from innocence into experience and then back toward innocence. “Lee captured something that everyone thirsts for: to reawaken what might have been, and might somehow still be.”

In keeping with the novel, the play is set in Maycomb, Alabama in 1935. The script maintains the primary themes of racial injustice and the destruction of innocence. As well, the script also addresses the novel’s issues of class tensions, courage and compassion, gender roles in the American Deep South, and-last but not least-it celebrates and retains the warmth and humor for which the novel is renowned.

Susanna Ritti