Algonquin Round Table History,News Franklin P. Adams Day

Franklin P. Adams Day

FPA

Today is the natal day of Franklin P. Adams, born on this day in 1881 in Chicago. During his days in New York City, he famously had joint birthday parties with his pal and poker-playing friend, George S. Kaufman (Nov. 16). There are many, many stories about FPA online and in The Lost Algonquin Round Table and The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide. But there is news today, on his birthday.

FPA

Franklin P. Adams and his second wife, Esther Root, on their honeymoon, 1925.

Recently I was given the huge honor by the descendants of FPA to safeguard his papers and archives. Tony Adams, last surviving son of FPA and his second wife, Esther Root Adams, gave to me FPA documents, letters, photographs, and ephemera. I will be using some of that material for my next book, The Lost Algonquin Round Table 2, due out late next year. One thing about FPA, he saved everything. So on this birthday, raise a cocktail to FPA. He deserves to be remembered today and every day. Look for his books on eBay and in used book stores. He has been out of print since the 1960s, which is pretty sad to me. If you are a fan of FPA, drop me a line.

Also, be sure not to miss the post today from Trav SD about FPA.

Related Post

Divided By Three

The Flop of 1934, Divided By Three Fails to Find an AudienceThe Flop of 1934, Divided By Three Fails to Find an Audience

Eighty-five years ago the Algonquin Round Table members Peggy Leech and Bea Kaufman were licking their wounds after their debut collaboration flopped on Broadway. The two friends worked for about a year on a drama that failed to succeed. Divided by Three was the first play to open the Ethel Barrymore Theatre. It had a popular cast, led by megastar Judith Anderson, with a young Jimmy Stewart in a supporting role.

Divided By Three has not been published and is not available. It ran for just 32 performances in October 1934. Among the tepid reviews were this one from Time, 10/15/1934:

Divided by Three (by Margaret Leech Pulitzer and Beatrice Kaufman; Guthrie McClintic, producer) was written to make room for the superb abilities of smoldering Judith Anderson. It borrows the plot of Eugene O’Neill’s Strange Interlude and puts Miss Anderson back in the role she enormously enjoyed for a year. In Divided by Three again she is divided by: 1) her aggressive middle-aged lover (James Rennie); 2) her incredibly unsuspecting putterer of a husband; 3) her son (James Stewart). She finds it desirable and, until the second act curtain, possible to accept all three simultaneously.

It is her son who learns of her adultery, through the kindly offices of his priggish fiancée. As priggish as she, he calls his mother a whore and withdraws his love from both mother and fiancée. The last act allows everyone (still except the husband) to become readjusted to the situation. The son still feels that adultery is wrong; his mother is still determined to have what she wants. But just as she decides to come clean and divorce her husband, he comes home with the news that he has been wiped out in the stock market. Like the noble character she is, she drops the divorce plans. Her lover, after a minute’s anguish, decides after all to stay for dinner.

Only Judith Anderson makes this implausible story a moving and challenging affair. She bats her heavy-lidded eyes, settles her welterweight shoulders and makes her audience feel that something important is happening. Noteworthy are Donald Oenslager’s handsome settings.

Divided By Three

Judith Anderson rehearsing with director Guthrie McClintic for “Divided by Three” in his garden. ©The New York Public Library.


More newsworthy than their first play are Divided by Three’s authors.

Margaret Leech Pulitzer is the second wife of that studious, shy Ralph Pulitzer whom newspapermen have never forgiven for letting his late great father’s New York World be sold, and whom they howled out of accepting the post of administrator of the NRA newspaper code.

Beatrice Bakrow Kaufman is the wife of playwright George S. Kaufman (Of Thee I Sing, Once in a Lifetime, Dinner at Eight, Merrily We Roll Along), who lives on meat and chocolate peppermints, talks to himself on the street and is on the administration committee of the NRA theatre code.

Both Mrs. Pulitzer and Mrs. Kaufman are ringleaders of Manhattan’s first-nighting, croquet-playing, waggish literary-theatrical-social set. Mrs. Pulitzer has a two-year-old daughter; Mrs. Kaufman has a nine-year-old daughter. Mrs. Pulitzer graduated from Vassar, has written three competent novels, hates bridge, likes travel. Mrs. Kaufman quit Wellesley after a year; quit the University of Rochester to marry Mr. Kaufman. She is convinced she is No. 1 woman croquet player of the U. S.

Last week Manhattan critics tried to like their friends’ first play but only half of them succeeded.

Walk in the Footsteps of the Algonquin Round Table in New Guide Book to Jazz Age Writers & WitsWalk in the Footsteps of the Algonquin Round Table in New Guide Book to Jazz Age Writers & Wits

Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide (Lyons Press)

Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide (Lyons Press)

New York—Retrace the steps of the legendary wits that convened at the Algonquin Hotel in 1919 who called themselves the Vicious Circle. THE ALGONQUIN ROUND TABLE NEW YORK: A HISTORICAL GUIDE is the first book to fully explore the whole group and their world. It’s packed with photos and maps.

“That is the thing about New York,” wrote Dorothy Parker in 1928. “It is always a little more than you had hoped for. Each day, there, is so definitely a new day.”

Now you can journey back there, in time, to a grand city teeming with hidden speakeasies, luxurious Broadway playhouses, and dazzling skyscrapers. In these places, Parker and her cohorts in the Vicious Circle sharpened their wit, polished their writing, and captured the energy and elegance of the time. Robert Benchley, Parker’s best friend, became the first managing editor of Vanity Fair before Irving Berlin spotted him onstage in a Vicious Circle revue and helped launch his acting career. Edna Ferber, creator of bestselling melodramas, wrote the Pulitzer-winning So Big as well as Show Boat and Giant. Jane Grant pressed her first husband, Harold Ross, into starting The New Yorker. Herman Mankiewicz was a Times wage slave who soaked up the atmosphere, later pouring it into his screenplay for Citizen Kane. Parker wrote for Vanity Fair and Vogue before ascending the throne as queen of the Round Table, earning everlasting fame (but rather less fortune) for her award-winning short stories and unforgettable poems. These are a few of the thirty figures from backstage Broadway to newspaper city rooms in the book.

Explore their favorite salons and saloons, their homes and offices (most still standing), while learning about their colorful careers and private lives. Packed with archival photos, drawings, and other images—including never-before-published material—this illustrated historical guide includes current information on all locations. Use it to retrace the footsteps of the Algonquin Round Table, and you’ll discover that the golden age of Gotham still surrounds us.

About the Author
Kevin C. Fitzpatrick (author), president of the Dorothy Parker Society, is the author of Under the Table: A Dorothy Parker Cocktail Guide (Lyons Press). He has been leading walking tours from the Algonquin Hotel for 15 years. Visit him at fitzpatrickauthor.com.

Anthony Melchiorri (foreword) is the creator and host of Hotel Impossible on the Travel Channel. A former general manager of the Algonquin Hotel, he has twenty years experience at the top hotels in the industry.

To Pre-Order: The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide, by Kevin C. Fitzpatrick, (Lyons Press January 2014; ISBN: 978-1-4930-0757-8)

Video From Talk About Vicious Circle WomenVideo From Talk About Vicious Circle Women

For the centennial of the first meeting of the Algonquin Round Table, author Kevin C. Fitzpatrick presented a brief talk at the Algonquin Hotel. He presented the women of the Vicious Circle–the ones not named Dorothy Parker and Edna Ferber. In this talk, learn about Jane Grant, who co-founded The New Yorker; Ruth Hale, who fought to preserve her maiden name after marriage; Neysa McMein, the popular magazine illustrator & artist; Beatrice Kaufman, the editor not ashamed of her husband’s cheating; Margaret Leech, the 2-time Pulitzer Prize winner; and the popular actresses Margalo Gillmore and Peggy Wood, both of whom were onstage for 50 years. Thank you Michele Gouveia for filming this.

For more about this subject, read the 2015 article 6 Women You Didn’t Know Were Members of the Algonquin Round Table.