Sorkin got the idea for the play from a phone conversation with his sister Deborah, who had graduated from
Boston University Law School and was serving a three-year stint with the
Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps. She was going to
Guantanamo Bay Naval Base to defend
a group of Marines who had come close to killing a fellow Marine in a
hazing ordered by a superior officer. Sorkin took that information and wrote much of his story on cocktail napkins during the first act of the musical
La Cage aux Folles while bartending at the
Palace Theatre on
Broadway. Several former Navy JAG lawyers have been proposed as the model for the character of
Lieutenant Daniel Kaffee,
USN,
JAG Corps. These include Donald Marcari,
David Iglesias, and Walter Bansley III. The court martial was Marcari's first big court case. However, in a statement released by his spokeswoman, Sorkin said, "The character of Dan Kaffee in
A Few Good Men is entirely fictional and was not inspired by any particular individual." Once Sorkin completed a draft, his theatrical agent sent it to producer
David Brown, who wanted the
film rights. Sorkin sold Brown the rights, getting Brown to agree to also produce
A Few Good Men as a play.
Premieres A Few Good Men had its world premiere at the Heritage Repertory Theatre at the University of Virginia's Department of Drama on September 19, 1989. It then transferred to the
Kennedy Center. The original Broadway stage production opened at the
Music Box Theatre in
New York on November 15, 1989, in a production directed by
Don Scardino, designed by Ben Edwards, and with music by
John Gromada. It starred
Tom Hulce as LTJG Kaffee;
Megan Gallagher as LCDR JoAnne Galloway;
Clark Gregg as Lt. Jack Ross;
Stephen Lang as Col. Jessup, and
Robert Hogan as Capt. Matthew A. Markinson. Replacement actors included
Timothy Busfield and
Bradley Whitford as Lt. Jack Ross (understudy for Kaffee),
Perry King,
Michael O'Hare, and
Ron Perlman as Jessep, and
Pamela Blair as Galloway.
Joshua Malina also appeared. Malina went on to appear in the movie adaption. The production ran for 497 performances.
Other performances A Spanish-language production titled
Hombres de Honor opened on January 10, 1991, at the Ferré Performing Arts Center in Puerto Rico, starring Cordelia González and Rafo Muñiz, directed by Pablo Cabrera. A national touring company performed through 1992 with
Michael O'Keefe as LTJG Kaffee,
Alyson Reed as LCDR Galloway, and
Paul Winfield as the judge. In January 1993
A Few Good Men had its premiere in German language at the Volkstheater, Vienna, Austria (translation: Gunther Baumann, director: Erhard Pauer, Daniel Kaffee: Alfons Haider). In the following years this production went on tour and was shown all over Germany, Switzerland and Austria (German title: Eine Frage der Ehre/A Question of Honor). A revival of the play starring
Rob Lowe in the role of LTJG Kaffee,
Suranne Jones as LCDR Galloway, and
John Barrowman as Capt. Ross opened at the
Theatre Royal Haymarket,
London, in late August 2005 for preview showings followed by a three-month run in early September 2005. The stage show was directed by
David Esbjornson. In 2006, the
Hudson Shakespeare Company of New Jersey staged a production as part of their second stage for modern shows. The tour was presented in city courtrooms, directed by Jon Ciccarelli and featured notable New York City actors such as Jon Crefeld as LTJG Kaffee and Charles J. Roby as Col. Jessup.
Jensen Ackles appeared as LTJG Kaffee alongside
Lou Diamond Phillips as Col. Jessup in a production of the play at the
Casa Mañana Theatre, in
Fort Worth, Texas, June 5–10, 2007. A Hungarian production of the play was performed at Madách Szinház, Budapest. It was directed by Imre Kerényi, starring Sándor Czvetkó, Éva Kerekes, and Gábor Koncz. Indian writer
Swadesh Deepak adapted the play into
Hindi as
Court Martial (1991) which served as the basis of the films
Shaurya (2008) and
Melvilasom (2011). By the Book Theatre produced the play November 25, 2014, to December 6, 2014 at the McManus Studio Theatre,
London, Ontario. The production won 4 Brickenden Awards including Outstanding Drama. In March 2016,
NBC announced its intent to broadcast a live television production of
A Few Good Men, starring
Alec Baldwin as Col. Jessup, in the second quarter of 2018, with a teleplay adapted by Sorkin from his original script. The broadcast would be executive produced by
Craig Zadan and
Neil Meron, and patterned upon NBC's ongoing series of live Broadway musicals. However, NBC has
yet to announce an airdate.
Variety reported that the availability of Sorkin, Zadan, and Meron may have had an impact, noting that Sorkin had to represent his 2017 film ''
Molly's Game'' during
awards season, while Zadan and Meron (who have produced all of NBC's live musicals) were committed to other projects (such as
Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert in 2018, and a later canceled production of
Hair in 2019) being produced by NBC in lieu of
Bye Bye Birdie, which had been delayed multiple times in order to accommodate
Jennifer Lopez's other projects. Zadan died on August 20, 2018, at the age of 69.
Awards and nominations The Broadway production earned
Megan Gallagher a 1990
Theatre World Award and a Best Actor nomination for
Tom Hulce at the
44th Tony Awards. ==Source material and legacy==