Cocktails with George and Martha: Movies, Marriage, and the Making of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

An award-winning writer reveals the behind-the-scenes story of the provocative play, the groundbreaking film it became, and how two iconic stars changed the image of marriage forever.

From its debut in 1962, Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? was a wild success and a cultural lightning rod. The play transpires over one long, boozy night, laying bare the lies, compromises, and scalding love that have sustained a middle-aged couple through decades of marriage. It scandalized critics but magnetized audiences. Across 644 sold-out Broadway performances, the drama demolished the wall between what could and couldn't be said on the American stage and marked a definitive end to the I Love Lucy 1950s.

Then, Hollywood took a colossal gamble on Albee's sophisticated play-and won. Costarring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, the sensational 1966 film minted first-time director Mike Nichols as industry royalty and won five Oscars. How this scorching play became a movie classic-surviving censorship attempts, its director's inexperience, and its stars' own tumultuous marriage-is one of the most riveting stories in all of cinema.

Now, acclaimed author Philip Gefter tells that story in full for the first time, tracing Woolf from its hushed origins in Greenwich Village's bohemian enclave, through its tormented production process, to its explosion onto screens across America and a permanent place in the canon of cinematic marriages. This deliciously entertaining book explores how two couples-one fictional, one all too real-forced a nation to confront its most deeply held myths about relationships, sex, family, and, against all odds, love.

Author: Philip Gefter
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 02/13/2024
Pages: 368
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.45lbs
Size: 9.06h x 6.30w x 1.42d
ISBN: 9781635579628

Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 12/01/2023
Publishers Weekly 12/11/2023
Library Journal 02/01/2024 pg. 77

About the Author
Philip Gefter is the author of What Becomes a Legend Most: The Biography of Richard Avedon; Wagstaff: Before and After Mapplethorpe, which received the 2014 Marfield Prize for arts writing; and an essay collection, Photography After Frank. He is a regular contributor to the New Yorker's Photobooth, Aperture, and the New York Times, where he was an editor and photography critic for over fifteen years. Gefter produced the award-winning documentary, Bill Cunningham: New York. He lives in New York City.