About the Play:

A Breeze from the Gulf is a full-length drama by Mart Crowley. This unofficial, auto-biographical prelude to The Boys in the Band is about a father, mother, and son and tells of the destructive effects each has upon the other. The author takes us on a journey back to a small Mississippi town to watch a 15 year old boy suffer through adolescence to adulthood and success as a writer.

A Breeze from the Gulf centers around the character of Michael (noted to also be the character of Michael from The Boys in the Band) as a young man and his relationship to his drug-addled mother and alcoholic father. His mother is a frilly southern doll who has nothing to fall back on when her beauty fades. She develops headaches and other physical problems, while the asthmatic son turns to dolls and toys at an age when other boys are turning to sports. The travelling father becomes withdrawn, takes to drink; and mother takes to drugs to kill the pain of the remembrances of things past. She ends in an asylum, and the father in his fumbling way tries to tell the son to live the life he must.

A Breeze from the Gulf premiered in 1973 at the Eastside Playhouse off-Broadway in New York City and earned a second place vote for the prestigious New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play. Since then the play has produced at professional theatres across the US.

Cast: 1 female, 2 male

What people say:

"So honestly written that you cling to it for dear life. Mr. Crowley is a writer, as Boys in the Band made clear ... his ear for speech is sharp as before, his economy and candor with a line as cutting." — New York Times

"It is a sensitively written ... emotional experience that moved me deeply.... It is a play about a family in Mississippi and the pain of life and the struggle to survive the terrible things people do to each other in the name of love." — The Chicago Tribune

"The boy is plunged into a world of suffering he didn't create...One of the most electrifying plays I've seen in the past few years...Goes straight to the heart." — Sunday Times (London)

About the Playwright:

Mart Crowley, shortened to Mart Crowley, (1935-2020) was an acclaimed American playwright whose best-known work, The Boys in the Band, broke the mold of how gay life was depicted onstage. He went on to write many other plays, including a prequel to his seminal work, titled A Breeze from the Gulf, and work in television; he was a producer on the ABC series Hart to Hart.