Trilogy: LuAnn Hampton Laverty Oberlander, 1973-1985

This series is organized into 3 subseries: Unproduced Writings; A Texas Trilogy; and Post-Trilogy plays. Many of the files reflect Mary Sue's filing system but the material has been consolidated and reorganized by play in chronological order.

The group Unproduced Writings contains manuscripts of Preston Jones’ unproduced plays. Included is his thesis adaptation of The Night of the Hunter.

The three plays of the trilogy in the second subseries were performed together for the first time at the Dallas Theater Center in 1975 as the Bradleyville Trilogy. They played again as A Texas Trilogy in May 1976 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D. C. and at the Broadhurst Theater in New York in September 1976. The first set of files refers to the three plays as a unit and contains playbills, posters, set designs, reviews, clippings and screenplay drafts. There is considerable documentation of the Washington and New York productions--promotional articles, photographs, reviews, playbills, congratulation notes, memorabilia (t-shirts, Algonquin hotel mementos) and interviews. Preston's Teddy Bear collection is included here. His favorite was a small teddy bear named Fred, an ever-present good luck talisman that was buried with him.

Knights was the first completed play of the Trilogy, premiering at the Down Center Stage in the Dallas Theater Center on December 4, 1973. This subseries contains the handwritten versions of the play along with successive drafts and rewrites. Also included are props, costumes, playbills, programs, clippings, reviews, and interviews. The material is arranged by format (scripts, props, programs, clippings) in chronological order.

Preston Jones began LuAnnbefore the other two plays of the Trilogy, inventing as he did so the connecting thread, the town of Bradleyville. LuAnn was the second of the three plays to be completed, premiering in February of 1974. This subseries contains scripts and rewrites, programs, clippings, reviews, photographs and a video of the University of Minnesota 1980s production.

After Knights and LuAnnhad been presented, Preston Jones wrote the final play of the Trilogy, The Oldest Living Graduate. It premiered at the Down Center Stage November 1974. In 1980, Graduate was presented live on television costarring Henry Fonda, Cloris Leachman, George Grizzard, and Harry Dean Stanton. This set of files contains the scripts and rewrites, clippings, reviews, and photographs. Included is a video of the 1980 telecast along with clippings and reviews.

Preston Jones turned to his native New Mexico as the inspiration for the three plays written after the Trilogy. In 1975, Jones began writing A Place on the Magdalena Flats, also titled The Plains of St. Augustine, which examines the relationship of two brothers working their New Mexican ranch during the 1956 drought. Santa Fe Sunshine is a comic play about an artist's colony. Remember concerns an actor reminiscing on his past during a visit to his boyhood home. Included here also are records on Juneteenth, a one-act play commissioned by the Actor's Theatre in Louisville, and a tribute to Lady Bird Johnson on her 65th birthday, scripted and staged by Preston. This subseries contains handwritten and typed drafts and rewrites, programs, photographs, set designs, memorabilia, clippings of reviews and publicity, and audio and videotapes.