Who is sophie treadwell

Her relationship with her mother, Nettie, was strained at best. Although she initially had her sights set on acting, it was after graduating from the University of California and working as a reporter that Treadwell's sense of justice, of silenced voices and of the dramatic forces in everyday life came to the fore. Often inspired by the inequity experienced by 'ordinary' women in extraordinary situations, Treadwell was an activist of sorts.

Working at The Bulletin in San Francisco in , she reported on everything from baseball games through to issues of homelessness and prostitution. In one of her most famous assignments, she went undercover as a young homeless prostitute to expose the lack of financial assistance available to unemployed, unmarried young women. This established Treadwell as a female writer who was prepared to push the boundaries.

In , Treadwell moved out east to New York, where she maintained separate living conditions from her husband. It was in this time and place that Treadwell encountered the communities she would mainly be associated with for the rest of her life: namely, the Provincetown Theater Players, the Lucy Stone League, and the modernist clique of young artists which included Marcel Duchamp.

It was also here that she dove into her journalism career in earnest, earning a reputation for her daring deeds in the name of getting a good story, in the same vein as other up and coming female journalists like Nellie Bly. When World War I began, Treadwell travelled to the front lines to cover the action, but was denied access because she was a woman. Treadwell drew upon her journalism career to write her most famous and successful play, Machinal , based on the conviction and execution of Ruth Snyder for the murder of her husband.

Machinal was a critical success, and at the time of its release was hailed as one of the finest Expressionist dramas of its time, in a time when Expressionist dramas were at the peak of its emergence in American theater.

In a hundred years it should still be vital and vivid. Although she continued to write well into her 70s, by that time she had shifted to short fiction, and in these later years she spent some time in Vienna. Upon moving back to the States, she lived in Arizona with her adopted son. Show Guides Show Guides. Search all shows. Monologues from Plays. Search all monologues from plays. Search all monologues. Scenes from Plays. Search all scenes from plays.

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