Before he was a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, Lanford Wilson grew up in Southwest Missouri. On a recent episode of Thinking Out Loud, KBIA's Trevor Harris talked with Dr. David Crespy. The University Press recently published MU Department of Theater professor Crespy's collection of Wilson's early works. Crespy explained why Wilson donated his papers to MU Ellis Libraries' Special Collections. He also detailed what life was like for the young playwright Wilson and read excerpts from the new collection, Lanford Wilson: Early Stories, Sketches, and Poems.
Crespy's MU Department of Theater is planning a conference on the life and work of Missouri playwright Lanford Wilson. Marshall W. Mason, Wilson's long-time stage director will be the guest artist at the late April conference, which will also feature a staging of Wilson's play, The Rimers of Eldritch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fRASSvwtKo
This interview originally aired on January 2, 2018.
New episodes of Thinking Out Loud air most Tuesday evenings at 6:30 on KBIA.