About the Authors

110 in the Shade is a musical with a book by N. Richard Nash, lyrics by Tom Jones, and music by Harvey Schmidt.

N. RICHARD NASH published two books on philosophy, The Athenian Spirit and The Wounds of Sparta. Nash wrote his first play, Parting at Imsdorf, in 1940, which won the Maxwell Anderson Verse Drama Award. He next penned the Shakespearian-themed comedy The Second Best Bed, produced on Broadway in 1946. The highly acclaimed drama led to him writing more shows, including The Young and Fair (1948), See the Jaguar (1952, for which he won the International Drama Award in Cannes and the Prague Award), and The Rainmaker (1954, starring Geraldine Page; revived on Broadway in 1999). The Rainmaker, a full-length play, had originally been a Philco Television Playhouse one-act 1953 television production. It was translated to over 40 languages and made into a 1956 Hollywood film starring Burt Lancaster and Katharine Hepburn, and a 1982 full-length TV production. The play was made into a Broadway musical, 110 in the Shade.

In the 1950s, Nash moved from New York to Hollywood to write the screenplay for The Rainmaker.^[1] However, it was the 1972 Broadway failure of Echoes (1972) and the novelization of a screenplay that led Nash to transition from writing screenplays to writing novels.^[1] After working onEchoes, he developed a screenplay entitled Macho which he could not sell.^[1] In overcoming this, Nash noted:

It occurred to me to do a quick novelization. I got a $10,000 advance and completed it as Cry Macho in two weeks. It got surprisingly good reviews and the instant they appeared, three studios, all of which had rejected the screenplay, started to bid for this awful, little thing. I sold the rights to one. When they asked me to do the screenplay, I gave them what they had rejected -- didn't change a word -- and they loved it!^[1]

Nash turned Cry Macho into a 1975 book^[2] and filming the movie Cry Macho began in Mexico in 1991.^[3] After selling Cry Macho, Nash began to write what he called "real novels" and discover that writing a novel was more flexible than writing a play and received much less criticism than writing a play.

Nash wrote a number of screenplays, novels and more plays, including the screenplays for the 1947 Ann Sheridan film noir vehicle, Nora Prentiss, The Sainted Sisters (1948), Dear Wife (1949), Mara Maru (1952), Helen of Troy (1956), Porgy and Bess (1959), and later One Summer Love) (1976) and Between the Darkness and the Dawn (1985). Other Broadway shows include Girls of Summer (1956), Handful of Fire (1958), Wildcat (1960, starring Lucille Ball), 110 in the Shade (1963; revived in 2007), The Happy Time (1968, nominated for the Tony Award for Best Musical), andSaravà (1979). Nash's novels include East Wind, Rain, Radiance, The Last Magic, and an unpublished novel, The Wildwood. Under the pseudonym of John Roc, he wrote a play, Fire!, and a novel, Winter Blood.

TOM JONES (born 1928, in Littlefield, Texas), is an American lyricist (and often librettist) of musical theatre. His best known work is The Fantasticks, which ran off-Broadway from 1960 until 2002, and the hit song from the same, "Try to Remember". Other songs from The Fantasticks include "Soon It's Gonna Rain", "Much More" and "I Can See It". He also wrote the screenplay for the 1995 feature film adaptation.

Jones acted in a New York City revival of The Fantasticks which he also directed. He played the part of the Old Actor, which he played when the musical opened in 1960, from April 26, 2010, to June 6, 2010. He was credited as an actor in the show as Thomas Bruce.

Jones is also the author of Making Musicals: An Informal Introduction to the World of Musical Theater, about which Elyse Sommer wrote on January 15, 1998 in CurtainUp:

Extremely well organized and packed with interesting information, the first half of the book deals in broad and general terms with the growth and development of the American musical. The second half focuses on the practical "how-to" of putting together a musical, using Jones' own career and shows he's worked on as a springboard...Since only half the book falls within the category of how-to I'm glad to report that this advice is stick-to-the-ribs solid. No hyperbole. No gratuitous name dropping.

All of Jones' major musicals were written with Harvey Schmidt, whom he met at the University of Texas at Austin.

HARVEY LESTER SCHMIDT (born September 12, 1929) is an American composer for musical theatre and illustrator. He is best known for composing the music for the longest running musical in history, The Fantasticks, which ran off-Broadway from 1960 - 2002.

Schmidt was born in Dallas, Texas. He attended the University of Texas to study art, but when he met Tom Jones at the University he started to accompany the drama students on the piano. They soon started writing musicals together, the first being a revue. However, after serving in the Army, Schmidt moved to New York and worked as a graphic artist for NBC Television and later as an illustrator for Life, Harper's Bazaar, Sports Illustrated, and Fortune.^[1][2]

All of Schmidt's major musicals were written with lyricist Tom Jones. The work the duo is known for is the musical The Fantasticks which ran off-Broadway from 1960 - 2002 for a total of 17,162 performances. He also collaborated on the 1995 feature film adaptation. In 1992 he received theTony Award, Tony Honor for "The Fantasticks," then in its 33rd year.

The team followed with the Broadway musical 110 in the Shade in 1963, which ran for 330 performances on Broadway and earned a Tony Award nomination for Best Composer and Lyricist for Schmidt and Jones. I Do! I Do! followed in 1966, which brought Mary Martin and Robert Preston to the Broadway stage in a 2-person musical and ran for 560 performances. Jones and Schmidt were nominated for the Tony Award for Best Composer and Lyricist and Best Musical.

They both appeared in a revue of their songs, The Show Goes On, at the York Theatre Company in 1997. The run was extended several times and the show was recorded on the DRG label.

Schmidt was inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame.

His recording, Harvey Schmidt plays Jones and Schmidt was released in 2005.^[3]

Schmidt and Jones wrote a musical of Thornton Wilder's Our Town and it took them thirteen years to write, only to have the rights pulled by Wilder's nephew.^[4]

Schmidt and Jones were both inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in July, 2012.