The name Oscar Levant may not mean much to modern audiences. But in the hit play, Good Night, Oscar — opening Jan. 16 from the Franklin Theatrical Fellowship — we get an intimate look at the man who’s been called “one of the 20th century’s greatest wits.”
Penned by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Doug Wright (I Am My Own Wife), the story delves into Levant’s many complexities. A celebrated concert pianist and composer, Levant was considered to be the leading interpreter of George Gershwin’s music. He also was a successful character actor, starring alongside Gene Kelly in An American in Paris. But it was his quick wit and caustic humor that made him a favorite guest among popular television shows, such as What’s My Line?, The Celebrity Game and, perhaps most famously, The Tonight Show starring Jack Paar.
Still, Levant’s extraordinary talent often seemed to be overshadowed by his mental health struggles and erratic behavior. In fact, Wright’s play focuses on one particularly chaotic episode of The Tonight Show in 1958, during which Levant was on a four-hour release from a psychiatric hospital. And while the broadcast portrayed in Good Night, Oscar is something of an amalgam, based on several different episodes and guest appearances, it is loosely based on actual events and features many of Levant’s most famous quips and one-liners.
Good Night, Oscar premiered at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago in 2022, with Sean Hayes starring as Levant. It transferred to Broadway the following year, and would go on to earn three Tony nominations, with Hayes winning the Tony for Best Actor in a Play. Now, local audiences can check out the show at the Franklin Special District Performing Arts Center, as FTF becomes the first theater company in the nation to secure the rights and stage the play since its Broadway run.
“What I love about this play is that it blends the humor and the pathos so well,” says Melanie Sutton, artistic director and co-founder of Franklin Theatrical Fellowship. “Oftentimes, I feel like laughter really opens us up to other emotions, and that’s something that Doug Wright does beautifully. There’s just so much humor and sharp, witty dialogue. But that makes it all the more poignant as we start to see all of the things that Oscar Levant was struggling so deeply with. That’s part of Wright’s genius – he’s able to play both sides of the man, and both sides of the human experience, really well.”
Sutton has assembled a terrific cast, including Shawn Knight as Oscar Levant, along with Kay Ayers, Trey Smith, Jarvis Bynum, Josh Kiev, Hayden Jones, Sawyer Latham and Dan Kassis.
“Shawn Knight is just perfect as Oscar,” she says. “He has this incredible range – he does a beautiful job with the humor, delivering punchline after punchline. But then, there are these really interesting scenes dealing with Oscar Levant’s mental health struggles, and Shawn finds a way of making that all so relatable and heartbreaking. But what audiences may not realize is that Shawn is also a really talented pianist. So you’re going to see him play a good chunk of ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ live on stage. It’s such an incredible moment in the show, and I think audiences are going to be blown away. I’m so looking forward to seeing the audience reaction.”
Beyond the performance itself, however, Sutton is also interested in building community. And as with FTF’s inaugural production of Twelve Angry Jurors, which ran in July 2024, the company will once again host post-show talkbacks following each performance of Good Night, Oscar.
“FTF has a mission of bringing human beings together through the shared experience of live theater,” she says. “There’s just so much isolation and division in the world these days. So, in addition to delivering an excellent show, we want to provide some added opportunities to foster human connection and conversation. I want people to have the opportunity hang out after a show and talk about what they’ve seen, to learn to listen to each other and really think about what they’re feeling and connecting with. Or just chat about the making of the art itself, to have a window into what it’s like to make theater. It was fascinating to watch during Twelve Angry Jurors — people were so engaged, so eager to share their thoughts. It was wonderful, and we knew we wanted to continue those talkbacks with this production. It’s a big part of who we are as a company, and a great reminder of what the arts can do.”