The Glines

Founded in 1976 by John Glines, Barry Laine and Jerry Tobin, The Glines is an American not-for-profit organization based in New York City, New York, devoted to creating and presenting gay art to develop positive self-images and dispel negative stereotyping.

Awards

• In 1983, The Glines production of Harvey Fierstein's Torch Song Trilogy^[1] won Tony Awards for Best Play and Best Actor.
• The Glines/Circle Repertory Company co-production of William M. Hoffman's As Is^[2] won the 1985 Drama Desk Award for Best Play and was Tony-nominated for Best Play, Best Director and Best Actor.
• The Glines/PSX production of Howard Crabtree's Whoop-Dee-Doo!^[3] won the 1994 Drama Desk Award for Best Musical Revue and Best Costume Design.

Productions

Other notable successes produced by The Glines include:

• Jane Chambers’s^[4] Last Summer at Bluefish Cove,^[5] My Blue Heaven^[6] and The Quintessential Image^[7]
• Doric Wilson’s A Perfect Relationship and Forever After^[8]
• Victor Bumbalo’s Niagara Falls
• Richard Hall’s Love Match
• Sydney Morris’s If This Isn’t Love! and The Wind Beneath My Wings^[9]
• Arch Brown’s Newsboy^[10] and Sex Symbols^[11]
• Joseph Pintauro’s Wild Blue^[12]
• Anthony Bruno’s Soul Survivor
• Robert Patrick’s T-Shirts and Untold Decades^[13]
• Tom Wilson Weinberg’s musical Get Used to It!^[14]
• An Evening With Quentin Crisp^[15]
• a number of plays by John Glines, including On Tina Tuna Walk, Men Of Manhattan, Body And Soul and Murder In Disguise
• plus the First and Second Gay American Arts Festivals in 1980 and 1981.^[16][17]

A benefit in 1982 was given by The Glines was at The Town Hall, a performance space in New York City, consisting of three one-act plays: The Quintessential Image by Jane Chambers (with Peg Murray in the title role), Forget Him by Harvey Fierstein (with Harvey Fierstein, Estelle Getty and Court Miller), and A Loss of Memory by Arthur Laurents (with Richard DeFabees, who played Arnold in matinée performances of Torch Song Trilogy).^[18]

The Glines broke into television in 1986 with its acclaimed production of Hero of My Own Life, a documentary on the life of a person living with AIDS.^[19]

Artists

Among the many artists who have appeared (or whose work has appeared) with The Glines are:

Caroline Aaron Pat Bond Matthew Broderick Charles Busch Thomas Calabro Andrea Dworkin Harvey Fierstein Estelle Getty Allen Ginsberg Judy Grahn

Jonathan Hadary Lou Liberatore Audre Lorde Dan Lauria Armistead Maupin Mark Morris Park Overall Felice Picano James Purdy John Rechy

Ned Rorem Mercedes Ruehl Vito Russo Richard Skipper Jean Smart Fisher Stevens Robin Tyler Edmund White Jack Wrangler

References

1. Mel Gussow, "Theater: Fierstein's Torch Song", The New York Times, November 1, 1981.
2. Frank Rich, "Stage: 'As Is,' About AIDS, Opens", The New York Times, March 11, 1985.
3. Stephen Holden, "Theater Review: Dusting Off the Spirit of Ziegfeld", The New York Times, July 5, 1993.
4. The Eight Faces of Jane
5. The Purple Circuit, Old Plays are Gold
6. Beth A. Kattelman, Chambers, Jane (1937-1983) glbtq, a web-based "encyclopedia of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender & queer culture"
7. Stephen Holden, "Review/Theater; Comedy of Self-Acceptance And a Portrait of Its Writer", The New York Times, August 17, 1989.
8. On Forever After Doric Wilson website
9. If This Isn’t Love! Doollee.com
10. Arch Brown biography Arch Brown website
11. Sex Symbols Doollee.com
12. Stephen Holden, "Stage: Short Plays on Gay Themes", The New York Times, September 20, 1987.
13. Robert Patrick Doollee.com
14. Gary L. Day Weinberg’s "Get Used to It!" PGN March 27—April 2, 1992, Archived July 10, 2007, at the Wayback Machine.
15. Anita Gates, "Crisp, So Stylishly 89, Gets To the Point, Well, Crisply", The New York Times, June 26, 1998.
16. Happy Gay Day "Today in History (May 19) 1980" The Malcontent website
17. Gay and Lesbian Theatre Festival
18. Long Island Journal, The New York Times, October 10, 1982.
19. John Corry, Hero of My Own Life, Story of AIDS Patient", The New York Times, June 23, 1986.

External links

• the Glines website
• John Glines papers, 1971-1998, held by the Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
• Fascination Michael’s Thing, 1975
• Dancing for Our Lives Jennifer Dunning, The New York Times, January 12, 1986.
• Good Sense and Dancing on Ice James A. Lobata, oobr, Summer 1988.
• Thor’s Day Edward Crosby Wells (author) website
• Meet Marvin D.J.R. Bruckner, The New York Times, April 29, 1993
• TOSOS and The Glines, glbtq, a web-based "encyclopedia of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender & queer culture"
• Info and pics on Gulp! One actor’s experience, Queer Music Heritage website, compiled by JD Doyle