Stairs to the Roof

This play is largely unknown yet holds a great message for people working the 9-5 grind. Reading it at different points in my life have reminded me that the “cage” can always remain opened and the wild at heart don’t have to be trapped.

Definitely worth the read. I bought the kindle version and couldn't stop reading.

One of the best Tennessee Williams plays in my opinion

Following closely upon the heels of NOT ABOUT NIGHTINGALES and SPRING STORM, this latest New Directions release is refreshingly optimistic for Williams. In this early play, he didn't feel confined to three acts, but instead wrote nearly twenty vignettes, some only a few lines long, to tell the story of Benjamin Murphy, employed at the Continental Branch of Consolidated Shirtmakers. Very impressionistic, this play opens with mechanistic technae in the background as Murphy's supervisors wonder where in the world Murphy is. He's literally found stairs to the roof! A place to smoke, but also a place to dream and to breathe fresh air. As the scenes proceed, the story becomes more and more fantastical and wild, with obsession and foxes and carnivals and millenial magic. Great fun--I'm teaching it to my high school freshman English students this year!