This play was written for these 11 actors just as 'Master Class' was written for Zoe Caldwell, or 'Frankie and Johnny' was written for Kathy Bates,

My first play was written when I was 23, and I'm 66 now, so that's 43 years of doing this where I sort of know where everything is. It doesn't mean I do everything right, but I know where everything is. Here, I'm very much a visitor. New York is my turf and I'm used to working with my actors.

[McNally's inspiration for the play came from the Manhattan Theatre Club who asked the playwright for a new work to mark the re-opening of the Biltmore Theatre, which had been derelict for 16 years.] It was so terrible a place, ... that people shuddered as they passed it. It's a miracle that it was left standing.

'American Playhouse' is very supportive of writers. That's really why writers like to write for 'American Playhouse' for very little money. They care about making your play, your script, not some network production. We're treated like playwrights, not like fodder for some machine.

The New York theater community is a place I know my way around in with some certainty,

It was a time of oppression and you spoke up -- and we won. Without you, I wouldn't be standing up here either.