James Kirkwood
(1924-1989)James Kirkwood was the son of two Hollywood silent screen stars. Best known for co-writing the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical A Chorus Line, he was also an actor, comedian, playwright and prolific novelist whose works won praise for their warm humour and frank depictions of queer desire.
James Kirkwood was born in Los Angeles in 1924, the son of silent film stars Lila Lee and James Kirkwood Sr., whose circle of friends included Gloria Swanson and Rudolph Valentino. By the time he was seven, his parents had divorced, their marriage undone by bitter quarrels, alcoholism, and dwindling fortunes. To escape the chaos, Kirkwood spent much of his early childhood living with his aunt in Elyria, Ohio.
In 1935, at the age of twelve, he discovered the decomposing body of his mother’s fiancé, Reid Russell, who had shot himself in their garden. The trauma haunted him for the rest of his life. The ensuing press scandal destroyed his mother’s career and later inspired his first novel, There Must Be a Pony! (1960).
After serving in the Navy during the Second World War, Kirkwood moved to New York to study acting. There he met Lee Goodman, a former child star who had once performed with Noël Coward on Broadway. The two created a nightclub comedy act that won admiration from Tallulah Bankhead and Bob Fosse. Their romantic relationship, however, had to remain hidden, since homosexuality was still punishable by imprisonment.
James Kirkwood with Lee Goodman. Photo: Sean Egan.
When he wasn’t touring nightclubs, Kirkwood was appearing on television, most notably as a regular on the CBS soap Valiant Lady. His matinee-idol looks helped him rack up more than 500 TV appearances, but by the late 1950s he was feeling creatively unfulfilled. At 36, after enrolling in a short story course at UCLA, he turned to fiction.
His debut novel, There Must Be a Pony! (1960), was hailed by critics as a modern classic and likened to The Catcher in the Rye, published just a few years earlier. His second book, Good Times/Bad Times (1967), was another success, again drawing heavily on his own life. It became known as “the bible for gay teenagers in the ’60s” for its tender portrayal of a close bond between two teenage boys.
Kirkwood never concealed his bisexuality from friends and wrote queer characters throughout his career, but in the media he tended to draw a curtain over his private life.
Artwork for various productions of P.S. Your Cat is Dead!. Designed by and courtesy of: Arthur Beckenstein.
P.S. Your Cat is Dead! was written in 1972. Its protagonist, Jimmy Zoole, is modeled on Kirkwood himself: a struggling actor worn down by endless commercial auditions whose frustration drives him to start writing novels. The play also drew on other episodes from Kirkwood’s life. In 1961 he had moved into the top floor of a building on West 58th Street, and over the next fourteen months endured three increasingly brazen burglaries.
The character of Vito Antonucci—the Bronx-born bisexual thief who wins Jimmy’s heart—also had a real-life inspiration. Gino Marino, an ex-convict turned restaurant waiter, entered Kirkwood’s life in the 1960s. Kirkwood once described him as “a real hustler-hooker, into everything wrong and a real pussy cat...” Little else is known about Marino, though friends have suggested that he and Kirkwood were lovers.
Kirkwood with Gino Marino, the inspiration behind the character of Vito Antonucci. Photo: Sean Egan.
When P.S. Your Cat is Dead! premiered in 1975, critics condemned it as “distasteful” and “homosexual wish fulfilment.” They resented its male nudity, allusions to gay sex, and, worst of all, the fact Jimmy’s head is turned by Vito, which - in the words of The New York Magazine - gave air to the “ever-popular homosexual fantasy that any heterosexual is ultimately available for homosexual purposes.” Though Kirkwood’s sharp dialogue and the comic performances of actors Tony Musante and Keir Dullea were widely praised, the production played lasted only sixteen more performances before closing.
That same year, Kirkwood found far greater success with A Chorus Line, which he co-wrote with director Michael Bennett and dancer Nicholas Dante. Developed through a series of workshops, the musical was built from the real testimonies of Broadway dancers about the grueling, intimate realities of auditioning for the chorus. Its debut was an immediate triumph, earning twelve Tony nominations and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The acclaim helped soften the blow of P.S. Your Cat is Dead!’s swift demise. In 1983, after 3,338 performances, A Chorus Line became the longest-running musical in Broadway history.
Kirkwood (left) with Michael Bennett and Nicholas Dante during the production of A Chorus Line.
Kirkwood’s later novels, Hit Me With A Rainbow and Some Kind of Hero, were less celebrated than his earlier work, but they continued to incorporate queer characters in unexpected ways. Set during the Vietnam War, Some Kind of Hero depicts a romance between its protoganist and his fellow prisoner-of-war, drawing comparisons to Saul Bellow and Ernest Hemingway.
His 1986 play Legends! is the comedic story of two feuding movie stars manipulated by a scheming producer into appearing together on Broadway. Kirkwood cast Mary Martin and Carol Channing for the premiere and national tour, a pairing that proved as chaotic offstage as on. At one performance, Channing even began taking taxi dispatch calls through the earpiece meant for her lines. Kirkwood later immortalised the fiasco in Diary of a Mad Playwright, his caustic and enduringly popular memoir of the tour.
The years that followed were marked by loss. Many of Kirkwood’s friends and collaborators were claimed by HIV/AIDS, including Michael Bennett in 1987 and Lee Goodman the following year. Most of the original creators - and much of the first company- of A Chorus Line died before the show ended its Broadway run. After suffering from AIDS-related cancer, Kirkwood passed away in April 1989, at the age of 64.
Plays
U.T.B.U., 1966
P.S. Your Cat is Dead!, 1975
A Chorus Line, 1975
Legends!, 1986
Stage Stuck, 1989
Resources
Alastair Curtis in conversation with Arthur Beckenstein, October 2024.
A 1952 TV recording of James Kirkwood and Lee Goodman, July 2021.
‘Ponies and Rainbows: The Life of James Kirkwood’ by Sean Egan, December 2011.
Kirkwood with Nicholas Dante. Photo: Sean Egan.