Dream Girl (play)

For clarity, only principal "real" characters are listed; featured and dream scene characters are omitted. Lead • Georgina Allerton called "Georgie", age 23, runs the Mermaid Bookshop and daydreams constantly. Supporting • Lucy Allerton is the stoutish and sneezy mother to Georgie and Miriam, and wife to William. • William Allerton is an attorney who specializes in pro bono cases; husband to Lucy. • Miriam Allerton Lucas is Georgie's married and pregnant sister, disenchanted wife to Jim. • Jim Lucas is a feckless publisher's reader, husband to Miriam and target of Georgie's dreams. • Claire Blakely is Georgie's colleague at the Mermaid Bookshop, also 23 but more practical. • Clark Redfield age 28, is a brash newspaper book reviewer who yearns to be a sports reporter. • George Hand is an older married book jobber, who keeps asking Georgie to go out with him. ==Synopsis==

Georgie Allerton wakes one morning to hear on her bedside radio a promotion for a personal advice program. Ignoring her mother's calls to get moving, Georgie imagines herself on the radio program, clutching her bedside lamp like a microphone while she reveals her love for her brother-in-law to millions. Her fantasy punctured by her mother's intervention, Georgie joins her parents at the breakfast table. There she reveals that the Mermaid Bookshop has lost less money this month than ever before. Her father William announces he's going to Washington D.C. to plead before the Supreme Court for another impecunious client. Lucy, sneezing from a cold, despairs about both their businesses and that of her hapless son-in-law Jim, who reads manuscripts for thirty dollars a week. Jim had rejected a manuscript called Always Opal that later became a runaway hit. Georgie jumps to Jim's defense, since he has recommended her own manuscript to his publisher. Her sister Miriam comes in the kitchen and reveals she is pregnant and fed up with her husband. Georgie goes into another fantasy where she lies in a hospital delivery room with twin newborns, while the doctor and nurse (looking a lot like her parents) and Jim Lucas praise her courage. Later at the bookstore, her colleague Claire Blakely agrees that without any copies of Always Opal the store will never prosper. The store's location is poor, and a better one will cost them $10,000, money they don't have. Georgie reverts to daydreaming her way out of this dilemma. Her reverie of financial success is interrupted by a stranger named Clark Redfield, who sells her some review copies of books. He doesn't need them since he never reads the books he reviews for his newspaper. Clark angers Georgie by telling her to stop dreaming and live life. Jim Lucas then pops into the shop to let her know that Miriam and he are divorcing. Georgie next has a lunch date with George Hand at the Canard Rouge. He wants her to go to Mexico with him. She launches into another fantasy where she gives in to him, then is abandoned in Mexico to become a streetwalker in which Clark figures as a villain. As the afternoon goes by, Clark's presence in her daydreams changes from bad guy to good, while Jim Lucas gradually disappears. Clark returns to the bookstore to take Georgie to dinner at Emilio's, a modest "spaghetti and red ink joint", where he has to snap her back to reality from another daydream. They go to see The Merchant of Venice; an usher seats George Hand and an expensively-gowned young lady next to them. As the play proceeds, Georgie imagines herself volunteering to take over the role of Portia when the star falters. She delivers the quality of mercy speech but the dream breaks when she sees Clark grinning at her from the audience. She and Clark wake up a Justice of the Peace at 2 am for a quick marriage ceremony, with a mutual promise that she can keep dreaming but will try to do so less often. ==Original production==

Background The first public notice of Dream Girl came in early July 1945 when it appeared on the Playwrights' Company schedule for the coming season. By late August columnist Sam Zolotow was able to get the details for the Playwrights' Company deal with Paramount Pictures. Paramount would contribute $50,000 towards the play's production costs, and make a $100,000 down payment to the Playwrights for the film rights with the total cost not to exceed $300,000. Zolotow also revealed that Betty Field would play the starring role when the play opened in December. There was one stationed on each wing of the stage that slid into the center, and one more in the center background that slid forward. The local reviewer was enthusiastic about the play, particularly the staging, set and lighting design, and Betty Field's performance. They expressed relief that the author eschewed the ideology of his recent plays in favor of "brilliant lines, high comedy, and delicious burlesque", and reported the "satire is delightful, and never malicious". Local critic Cyrus Durgin was impressed: "The whole production is distinguished by skill, imagination, good casting, and excellent taste. Dream Girl is urbane as well as amusing." Critical appraisal was positive. John Chapman of the Daily News called it "a captivating comedy" and aptly labelled his review a "love letter to the Playwrights' Company... and to Mr. and Mrs. Rice". Edgar Price in the Brooklyn Citizen declared Dream Girl to be "one of the most delightful comedies of this or any other season". but the producers evidently had second thoughts. Helen Marcy memorized the part overnight and performed it the next day. Thereafter, a permanent understudy, Haila Stoddard, was hired; she subbed for a week when Betty Field was again ill during March 1946, then took over the role in late April. Closing Dream Girl closed on Broadway exactly one year after its premiere, following a run of 348 performances. The Chicago company, which had starred Judy Parrish and Richard Widmark, had already closed November 30, 1946. Members of both casts were combined for a national tour to begin in Philadelphia. National tour The national tour opened at Philadelphia's Walnut Theater on December 23, 1946. ==Revival==

During May 1951 Dream Girl had a revival on Broadway, a limited engagement of two weeks at the City Center. The cavernous City Center main stage meant new set designer Eldon Elder could forego Mielziner's mobile platforms. The production was directed by Morton DaCosta along much the same lines as the original staging, according to reviewer John Chapman. ==Adaptations==

Film A 1948 screen version, directed by Mitchell Leisen, starred Betty Hutton, Macdonald Carey, Peggy Wood, and Walter Abel. Television In 1955 a televised version adapted by S. Mark Smith was presented in the Hallmark Hall of Fame series. It starred Vivian Blaine. ==Notes==