Show History

Violet is based on a short story called The Ugliest Pilgrim by Doris Betts, about the growth and enlightenment of an isolated young woman during the civil rights era who embarks on a bus trip to find a televangelist she believes can heal her scarred face - the result of an accident when her father's axe flew off its handle when she was 13.  Along the way, she meets two soldiers - one black and one white - who end up teaching her about life, love and inner beauty.  Betts, a Statesville, North Carolina native and member of the English Department faculty of UNC-Chapel Hill, where she served as Assistant Dean of the Honor Program from 1978-1981 and where she holds the title of alumni distinguished professor.

Ms. Betts has won three Sir Walter Raleigh awards, the Southern Book Award, the North Carolina Award for
Literature, the John Dos Passos Prize, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters Medal for the
short story, among other recognitions. "The Ugliest Pilgrim," is the most widely printed of her stories,
and in addition to being the basis of Violet, also became an Academy Award winner as a short film
entitled "Violet." Her Souls Raised from the Dead was on the New York Times list of top twenty best books in
1994. Among her many other acclaimed works are The Astronomer and Other Stories, Beast of the Southern
Wild and Other Stories, and The Scarlet Thread.

Ms. Betts lives in Pittsboro with her husband, retired judge Lowry Betts. The Writers' Network's annual Doris
Betts Fiction Prize is one more tribute to this extraordinary writer.

Composer Jeanine Tesori (Thoroughly Modern Mille, Caroline, or Change) and lyricist/book writer Brian Crawley discovered Betts' story and began working on VIOLET at the famed Lehman Engel/BMI Musical Theater Workshop. The show was initially developed at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Connecticut in 1994, and when Ira Weitzman, then the Director of Musical Theater at Playwrights Horizons first heard the score, he knew he had to see the show through to its first full production. To assist Tersori and Crawley in bringing VIOLET to life, he enlisted the talents of director Susan H. Schulman, choreographer Kathleen Marshall, lighting designer Peter Kaczorowski, and costume designer Catherine Zuber. The cast featured Lauren Ward in the title role, and Michael McElroy and Michael Park as the two suitors who accompany Violet on her journey toward self-acceptance.

The original production opened at Playwrights Horizons on March 12, 1997. It was awarded the New York Drama Critics Circle and Lucille Lortel Awards for Best Musical, as well as the prestigious Richard Rodgers Production Award.

In 2003, at the opening of the renovated Playwrights Horizons facility, the entire original company of VIOLET was reunited for a a series of bspecial concert performances of this joyously life-affirming musical.

(From Music Theatre International...for more information go to: http://www.mtishows.com/show_home.asp?ID=000194)

The Cassidy Theatre Production of Violet will be Musically Directed by Larry Goodpaster.  Larry is well-known  as one of the finest Musical Directors throughout Northeast Ohio.  Larry's recent credits include Beauty and the Beast (Beck Center for the Arts), A Man of No Importance (Beck), Sunday in the Park with George (Lakeland College) and Gigi (Cassidy Theatre).  Geoff is thrilled to be working with Larry on this project.