"Waiting for Lefty" By Clifford Odets

Directed by Judith Israel

WAITING FOR LEFTY premiered in 1935 at The Group Theatre (TGT) in New York. The play is written 

as a series of vignettes that spotlight characters trying to make their way during the economic 

struggles of the early 1930's, and it is loosely based on the events of a New York City taxicab drivers' 

strike in 1934. The play interweaves stories of corruption in industry with the personal stories of 

people trying to make a living wage.

Coming in the midst of the Depression and labor struggles of the 1930s, Waiting For Lefty was labeled 

as Communist propaganda by critics. Aided by the Federal Theatre Project, this leftist theater would 

sweep the nation, illuminating the potential power of arts in social criticism and reform. TGT sought to 

bring “social content” to the stage as they communed with and educated their audience. They strove 

to make theatre something more than a passive viewing experience, as the idea of a communion 

between actor and audience highlights. Harold Clurman, one of the founding directors of the TGT, 

wrote, “I loved to go to the theatre because the presence of the actors—their aliveness, the closeness 

of the audience, and the anticipation of a communion between all of them in terms of imagination.”

The public debate over Waiting For Lefty that ensued, showed how socially conscious theatre was seen 

as a powerful force in shaping American public opinion. As we find ourselves again in a time of 

economic and social turmoil, the themes and messages of Odets’s play are as relevant now as they 

were eighty years ago.