Moss Hart

Tony Award-winning American playwright/lyricist Moss Hart was born Oct. 24, 1904, in New York City to a poor Jewish family and raised in what he described as a "drab tenement" on 107th St. in the Bronx. He was educated in the city public school system. He showed a knack for writing at an early age--he wrote his first play at age 12--and would stage his plays at the local YMHA (Young Mens Hebrew Association). It wasn't long before he joined the Thalian Players, a little-theatre group, which won a citywide little-theatre competition sponsored by the Belasco theater organization. He worked for a clothing retailer, and he would write and direct the annual company shows. He began directing little-theater groups in the New York/New Jersey area, and found work as the social director at various summer camps in rural Pennsylvania and Vermont, writing and staging plays for the camps' clients.

His first "professional" play, "The Hold-Up Man", premiered in Chicago in the late 1920s, but was a failure.

However, his play "Once in a Lifetime" (1930) was a major hit--it was made into a film, Once in a Lifetime (1932)--and was the start of a productive, and profitable, collaboration with writer George S. Kaufman (the royalties he received from the play made him a wealthy man at 26). Kaufman and Hart had a string of successful plays, ranging from wild farces to dark, serious dramas.

In 1937 the team received a Pulitzer Prize for their comedy "You Can't Take It With You", which was made into a hugely successful film (You Can't Take It with You (1938)) the next year.

Hart also worked by himself on occasion, and collaborated with Kurt Weill on "Lady in the Dark" (1941), which they wrote specifically for Gertrude Lawrence.

In addition to his work as a playwright on Broadway, he also directed several stage productions ("Camelot", "My Fair Lady", for which he won a Tony Award)) and wrote the screenplay for A Star Is Born (1954).

Won Broadway's 1957 Tony Award as Best Director for "My Fair Lady."

Had suffered at least one heart attack prior to his fatal one. This was on October 14, 1960, while in his hotel room in Toronto, where he was holding an out-of-town audition and generally working on revisions for the soon-to-open Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe Broadway musical "Camelot," which he was to direct.

His autobiography, "Act One", was made into a film (Act One (1963).

Inducted into the United States Croquet Hall of Fame in 1979.

His play, "Merrily We Roll Along", co-written with George S. Kaufman, was adapted into a 1982 Broadway play by Stephen Sondheim. A subsequent London production was awarded the Laurence Olivier Theatre Award in 2001 (2000 season) for Best Musical.

His musical "Lady in the Dark" was awarded the 1997 London Evening Standard Theatre Award for Best Musical.

He was nominated for a 1998 Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for "Lady in the Dark" performed at the Royal National Theatre: Lyttelton, as Best New Musical of the 1997 season.

Pictured on a 37¢ USA commemorative postage stamp issued 25 October 2004, one day following the centenary of his birth.