- published: 03 Sep 2010
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Elizabeth Becker "Beth" Henley (born May 8, 1952) is an American dramatist and actress. She writes primarily about women's and family issues in the American South. She is also a screenwriter who has written many film adaptations of her plays. She is known for intertwining comic and serious moments in her pieces.
Her most famous play, Crimes of the Heart (1978), was her first produced professionally. It opened at the Actors Theatre of Louisville and then at the Manhattan Theatre Club. The play won the 1981 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, as well as the 1981 New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best American Play. The play also earned Henley a nomination for a Tony Award, and her screenplay adaptation for the 1986 film of the same name was nominated for an Oscar as Best Adapted Screenplay.
Henley adapted her 1984 play, The Miss Firecracker Contest, into a 1989 film starring Holly Hunter entitled Miss Firecracker. Henley's play Ridiculous Fraud was produced at the McCarter Theatre, Princeton, New Jersey, in 2006, and her play Family Week was produced at MCC Theater, New York City, in 2010, directed by Jonathan Demme.