Introduction
Matthew Lopez is an American playwright and screenwriter.He is most widely known for his 2006 play The Whipping Man, which garnered an Obie and Lucille Lortel Awardsas well as the John Gassner New Play Award by the Outer Critics Circle for its New York premiere.His 2018 play The Inheritance opened at the Young Vic Theatre in March 2018 before transferring to the West End in October 2018.Lopez's plays frequently examine American class structures, race, sexual identity and their relationships with American society at large.
Early life
Lopez was born in Panama City, Florida to two public school teachers. His father, born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, is the older brother of actor Priscilla Lopez.Lopez graduated from the University of South Florida with a bachelor's degree in theatre performance.
Plays
The Whipping Man
Lopez's breakout play The Whipping Man debuted at Luna Stage in Montclair, New Jersey in 2006 and premiered Off-Broadway at the Manhattan Theatre Club on February 1, 2011, directed by Doug Hughes and starring Andre Braugher and Andre Holland. The Off-Broadway production of The Whipping Man extended four times, and won the 2011 Obie Award, Performance (Braugher) and 2011 Lucille Lortel Award, Outstanding Lighting Design. Lopez won the John Gassner New Play Award.
The Whipping Man is set in Richmond, Virginia in the immediate aftermath of the American Civil War and concerns two recently freed slaves encountering their former master. The former slaves, like their former master, identify as Jewish. The play examines the unique occurrence of Passover in 1865 beginning the day after Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox.It explores the meaning of freedom and the various ways people are enslaved — to addictions, to prejudices.
In his The New York Times review Charles Isherwood called the play “emotionally potent, almost surreal in the layers of meaning it conjures.” Braugher and Holland both earned critical acclaim for their performances.
Between 2012 and 2016, The Whipping Man was one of most widely produced plays in America.
Somewhere
Somewhere premiered at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego in September 2011, before moving to Hartford Stage, Hartford, Connecticut. Matthew Lopez was the Playwright-in-Residence at the Old Globe Theatre. The play, featuring a majority Latin cast, concerns a theatrical family living in Manhattan in 1959, as West Side Story captured the zeitgeist.The proposed construction of Lincoln Center and the ensuing demolition of their neighborhood leaves the family to fight for their home and their dreams.Somewhere was directed by Giovanna Sardelli, and featured Matthew Lopez's aunt Priscilla Lopez. Critics lauded the production, comparing Lopez's writing to Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie.
The story of Somewhere has roots in Lopez's family history. His father was an extra in the 1961 film adaptation of West Side Story, and appears on screen in the playground, just after the prologue
Reverberation
Lopez's next play Reverberation premiered at Hartford Stage, Hartford, Connecticut running from February 19, 2015 to March 15, directed by Maxwell Williams and starring Luke Macfarlane. The story follows Jonathan, a young gay New Yorker, who spends increasingly more time holed up in his Astoria apartment following a violent attack that has left him afraid to go out into the world. He is befriended by his new upstairs neighbor, Claire, a Holly Golightly-like character who, despite her active social life, is just as afraid and lonely as Jonathan. The play examines how violence – against women, against the LGBTQ community – impacts the lives of those both directly and indirectly affected by it. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times writes that “the play is marked by a perceptiveness about the echoing loneliness that many urban dwellers live with.”
The Legend of Georgia McBride
The Legend of Georgia McBride debuted at Denver Center of Performing Arts in 2014, and premiered Off-Broadway at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in 2015. The play tells the story of Casey, a down-on-his-luck Elvis impersonator who is induced to turn his jumpsuits into dresses and become a drag queen. The play toggles between quippy comedy and show-stopping dance numbers, with Charles Isherwood of The New York Times commenting that the play was “full of sass and good spirits – along with a spritz or two of sentimentality.”
In February 2018, New Regency announced it was developing the film adaptation of the play in association with Jim Parsons' production company.
The Inheritance
In 2018, his two-part play The Inheritance opened at the Young Vic Theatre in London, before transferring to the Noel Coward Theatre in the West End. The production was directed by Tony and Emmy Award winner Stephen Daldry.
Set in New York three decades after the height of the AIDS epidemic, The Inheritance wrestles with what it means to be a gay man today, exploring relationships and connections across age and social class and asking what one generation's responsibilities may be to the next. The play is a loose adaptation of E.M. Forster’s novel Howards End.The premiere featured a cast that included Vanessa Redgrave, John Benjamin Hickey, and Paul Hilton as Forster himself.
The play received widespread critical acclaim and was hailed an instant modern classic by those who viewed it.The Daily Telegraph hailed it as “perhaps the most important American play of this century” and The Evening Standard declared the play “a work of rare grace, truth, and beauty.”
The Inheritance earned eight nominations at the 2019 Laurence Olivier Awards, winning for Best New Play, Best Director (Stephen Daldry), Best Actor (Kyle Soller), and Best Lighting Design (Jon Clark). Lopez received the Evening Standard Awardand Critics Circle Theatre Award for Best New Play as well.
The play will premiere on Broadway at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre on September 27, 2019 in previews, with the official opening on November 17.