Cheryl Crawford(1902 — 1986)
Cheryl Crawford
États-Unis
5 min read
Cheryl Crawford was an American theatre producer and a major figure of the 20th-century New York stage. A co-founder of the Group Theatre and later the Actors Studio, she helped spread the acting “Method” across the United States.
Frequently asked questions
Key Facts
- Born in 1902 in Akron, Ohio (United States)
- Co-founded the Group Theatre in 1931 alongside Harold Clurman and Lee Strasberg
- Co-founded the Actors Studio in 1947 with Elia Kazan and Robert Lewis, the cradle of the “Method”
- Produced numerous Broadway shows, including works by Tennessee Williams
- Died in 1986 in New York
Works & Achievements
A collective troupe of socially engaged theatre that she co-founded, revolutionizing acting in the United States.
A production that rescued Gershwin's opera from obscurity and carried it to national success.
A repertory company she co-founded with Eva Le Gallienne and Margaret Webster.
The legendary workshop where the greatest actors of the American Method trained.
An acclaimed production of a major Williams play, honored with a Tony Award.
A Broadway hit she produced, blending Scottish fantasy with popular music.
A memoir recounting her fifty years in American theatre.
Anecdotes
In 1931, Cheryl Crawford left the comfort of the Theatre Guild, where she worked as a casting assistant, to co-found the Group Theatre with Harold Clurman and Lee Strasberg. They wanted a troupe of actors living and working together like a family, far from the individual stars of Broadway.
In 1947, together with Elia Kazan and Robert Lewis, Cheryl Crawford helped create the Actors Studio in New York. This place, later led by Lee Strasberg, would become the temple of the “Method” and would train actors such as Marlon Brando, James Dean, and Marilyn Monroe.
In 1945, Crawford produced a revival of George Gershwin's opera “Porgy and Bess” that met with far greater success than the original 1935 production. Her pared-down version toured the entire country and restored the work's prestige.
As a woman producer in a world dominated by men, she also ran her own company, the American Repertory Theatre, in the late 1940s. She remained active on Broadway for nearly half a century, a rare feat for a producer of her era.
In 1950, she produced “The Rose Tattoo” by Tennessee Williams; she maintained a long collaboration with the playwright, helping to bring several of his major plays to the stage.
Primary Sources
Autobiographical account in which Crawford recounts her fifty years spent in American theatre, from her early days at the Theatre Guild to the founding of the Group Theatre and the Actors Studio.
Clurman, co-founder of the Group Theatre alongside Crawford and Strasberg, describes the troupe's collective venture and the central organizational role played by Cheryl Crawford.
Document from the premiere of George Gershwin's opera, a work that Crawford would later revive and turn into a triumph with her 1942-1945 production.
Key Places
Industrial city where Cheryl Crawford was born in 1902, into a middle-class family.
Women's college where Crawford studied and developed a passion for theater before heading to New York.
New York's theater district where Crawford produced dozens of shows over half a century.
Actors' workshop co-founded by Crawford in 1947, which became the home of the American "Method".
City where Cheryl Crawford died in 1986, after a long career at the heart of American theatrical life.
