Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958

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Rachel Crothers (December 12, 1878 – July 5, 1958) was an American playwright and theater director known for her well-crafted plays that often dealt with feminist themes. Among theater historians, she is generally recognized as "the most successful and prolific woman dramatist writing in the first part of the twentieth century." One of her most famous plays was Susan and God (1937), which was made into a film by MGM in 1940 starring Joan Crawford and Fredric March.

Crothers was born on December 12, 1878 in Bloomington, Illinois, to Dr. Eli Kirk Crothers and Dr. Marie Louise (de Pew) Crothers. Crothers' mother, an independent-minded woman whose father had been friends with Abraham Lincoln, went to medical school at forty and became one of the first woman physicians in Illinois, encountering and eventually overcoming much opposition to her practice in Bloomington. Though her parents were religious and conservative, with no particular interest in theater, issues of money, equality, risk-taking, and a woman's place in the world were a part of Crothers' life from her earliest years.

The family intended that their daughters should be educated, and Crothers graduated from Illinois State University High School in 1891, at the precocious age of thirteen. The following year, she attended the New England School of Dramatic Instruction in Boston, where her passion for the stage was nurtured. Her hopes of moving to New York to seek a career in theater were opposed by her parents, who insisted she return home to Illinois. Her interest in acting continued even there, however, and she was a founding member of the Bloomington Dramatic Club. (Her taste in plays was rather advanced for the time: Ibsen's still-scandalous A Doll's House was one of her suggestions for a Club production.) By the age of nineteen, five years after her father's death, Crothers was allowed to realize her dream and move on her own to New York. "I knew no one in New York," she later recalled, "but I had heard of David Belasco and Daniel Frohman, and they were kind enough to answer my letters." That was encouragement enough and, though the famous producers' help ended there, she left Bloomington for Manhattan (with the financial backing of her mother), enrolled in acting classes, and found small parts in stock and touring companies.

By 1899, Crothers was writing her own one-act plays, and over the next few years, as these plays received showcase productions and good notices, she gained a reputation as a young dramatist of serious potential with an interest in the Ibsen-style "social problem drama." Her big break came in 1906, at the age of twenty-eight, when her first full-length play, The Three of Us, was produced and enjoyed a 277-performance run at the Madison Square Theatre in New York City. The play received its London premiere at Terry's Theatre on June 10, 1908, with Fannie Ward playing the leading role.

From that time on, through the 1940s, Crothers was a major name in the Broadway theater world. Her commercial record was erratic—hits and flops, equally mixed—but she was a productive and respected writer with a considerable body of work to her name by the time she was middle-aged.

In 1917, during World War I, Crothers founded and led the Stage Women’s Relief Fund. In 1932, she helped found the Stage Relief Fund, a response to the Great Depression, and remained a director until 1951. In 1940, she led in organizing the American Theatre Wing, which operated the famed Stage Door Canteen, and remained its executive director until 1950.

Rachel Crothers' plays often dealt with contemporary social themes and moral problems affecting women, including the sexual double standard, trial marriage, "free love," divorce, prostitution, and Freudian psychology. Though some of her plays are clear, provocative expressions of sympathy for the challenges twentieth-century women had to confront and present young female characters of boldness and originality, others involve an element of comedy, even parody, and an implied criticism of radical feminism; thus, her work cannot be easily characterized in a political sense. In some plays, her free-spirited young women revert to traditional roles at the end, especially when they are in danger of losing a man they love, and in other plays "Crothers records a sense of disillusionment with the women's movement and a tendency to blame it for deficiencies in women's emotional life."

Crothers, who never married, died in her Danbury, Connecticut home in 1958 at age 79.

Archival Resources
Role Title Holding Repository
creatorOf Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958. The captain of the gray horse troop : a play / by Rachel Crothers and Louise Morgan Sill ; founded on the novel by Hamlin Garland. University of Missouri -- Columbia, MU Libraries; University of Missouri; MU; Ellis Library; University of Missouri Columbia
referencedIn Souvenir programs for theatrical productions, 1906-2005. Harvard Theater Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard College Library, Harvard University
referencedIn Friedman, Philip Allan. Correspondence to Philip Allan Friedman, 1952-1953. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
referencedIn Theatre Arts Monthly, collection of portraits, ca., ca., 1924-1939 (bulk), 1916-1964 (inclusive). Harvard Theater Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard College Library, Harvard University
referencedIn American Women Writers, 1850-1936 Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America‏
referencedIn Driscoll, Emily,. American women writers, 1850-1936 (inclusive). Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America‏
creatorOf Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958. Correspondence to Van Wyck Brooks, 1953. University of Pennsylvania Library
referencedIn Stark, Samuel. Theatre scrapbook collection, 1860-1950. Stanford University. Department of Special Collections and University Archives
referencedIn Roman Bohnen papers, 1918-1976 The New York Public Library. Billy Rose Theatre Division.
referencedIn John Mason Brown papers, 1922-1967. Houghton Library
referencedIn Shinkman, Paul A. Papers, 1924-1969. Wisconsin Historical Society, Newspaper Project
creatorOf Barringer family. Letters received by Paul B. Barringer and Anna Barringer, 1900-1955. University of Virginia. Library
creatorOf Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958. Young wisdom, n.d. New York Public Library System, NYPL
referencedIn Beals, Jessie Tarbox. Photographs, 1896-1941 (inclusive). Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America‏
creatorOf Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958. Correspondence with H. L. Mencken, 1916. University of Pennsylvania Libraries, Van Pelt Library
referencedIn John Phillips Marquand correspondence Houghton Library
creatorOf Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958. Letter, New York, N.Y., to Mrs. Charles F. Marble [manuscript] May 17. University of Virginia. Library
creatorOf Ballou, Ellen Bartlett, 1905-. Letters : from various correspondents, 1926-1927. Houghton Library
creatorOf Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958. The Herfords: typescript, n.d. New York Public Library System, NYPL
referencedIn Gertrude Wolf, papers, undated, 1899-1944 American Jewish Historical Society
referencedIn Kauser, Alice, ca. 1872-1945. Papers of Alice Kauser, ca. 1895-1940 (inclusive). Houghton Library
creatorOf Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958. Correspondence with Mr. Goodman, Nov. 27 and Dec. 30, 1940 / Rachel Crothers. University of Wisconsin - Madison, General Library System
referencedIn Personality files, [ca. 1800]-1986, 1900-1986 (bulk) New York State Historical Documents Inventory
referencedIn Photographs, 1896-1941, n.d. Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America‏
creatorOf Crothers, Rachel, 1878-1958. Myself Bettina: typescript, n.d. New York Public Library System, NYPL
referencedIn Ellen Bartlett Ballow letters from various correspondents, 1926-1937. Harvard Theater Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard College Library, Harvard University
referencedIn John Golden papers, 1874-1971, 1925-1954 The New York Public Library. Billy Rose Theatre Division.
referencedIn Stark, Samuel. Theatre scrapbook collection., 1860-1950 Stanford University. Department of Special Collections and University Archives
Role Title Holding Repository
Relation Name
associatedWith Ballou, Ellen Bartlett, 1905- person
associatedWith Barringer family. family
associatedWith Beals, Jessie Tarbox, 1870-1942 person
associatedWith Bohnen, Roman, 1894-1949 person
correspondedWith Brown, John Mason, 1900-1969 person
associatedWith Cairns Collection of American Women Writers. corporateBody
associatedWith Driscoll, Emily V. person
associatedWith Friedman, Philip Allan. person
associatedWith Garland, Hamlin, 1860-1940. person
associatedWith Golden, John, 1874-1955 person
associatedWith Goodman, Jules Eckert, b. 1876. person
associatedWith Kauser, Alice, ca. 1872-1945. person
associatedWith Marble, Charles F., Mrs., person
correspondedWith Marquand, John P. (John Phillips), 1893-1960 person
associatedWith Museum of the City of New York. corporateBody
associatedWith Shinkman, Paul A. person
associatedWith Sill, Louise Morgan. person
associatedWith Stark, Samuel person
associatedWith Wolf, Gertrude, -1966 person
Place Name Admin Code Country
Danbury CT US
Bloomington IL US
New York City NY US
Boston MA US
Subject
American literature
Broadway
Women writers
Occupation
Playwright
Theater Director
Activity

Person

Birth 1878-12-12

Death 1958-07-05

Female

Americans

English

Information

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