First Monday in October: A comedy-drama in two acts

by Jerome Lawrence, Robert E. Lee

Book by Jerome Lawrence, Robert E. Lee

91 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1979

Reviews

[Lauren]

It’s the 1970s and the president has just named the first woman to the Supreme Court. The court’s longest-serving justice (and unofficial curmudgeon) is less than pleased with the nominee: Ruth Loomis, a judge from Orange County he refers to as Lady Purity, Mother Superior, and other equally morally sarcastic terms. He and Loomis instantly butt heads (in modern day political rhetoric, he’d be liberal and she’d be conservative), but they’re both brilliant jurists, and the play thrives on the tension between them. It’s nothing like the every-moment-is-watershed, from-on-high preaching of Sorkin – instead, this is an intimate story that just happens to involve politics and powerful people. It’s engaging and, after reading both this and The Gang’s All Here, I’m mystified by the lack of a recent revival of Lawrence and Lee’s plays (ignoring Inherit the Wind). Recommended (especially for feminists and/or attorneys).