The First Year

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THE FIRST YEAR



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Comedy Success


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The First Year



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A Comic Tragedy of Married Life
By FRANK CRAVEN

The story of this clean-cut comedy relates to the first year of married life, its laughter and sorrow, its sunshine and shadow, as folks have lived it and are living it now in every American home.




A noted French philosopher once said, 
It is remarkable how we can endure with calmness the misfortunes of others.
 Often it is tragedy to those involved, but it's comedy to you—especially if the incident takes place upon the stage, surrounded by screamingly funny lines, situations and characters, as happens in that great American masterpiece of married, 
The First Year.




Tommy Tucker's bride had a quarrel with him, and packed up her things and went back to mother.  It hurt Tommy pretty badly, no denying that, but the way in which it worked out is a perfect scream, and you'll be rollicking in laughter, even at the sight of Tommy's woes.




In fact, all the haps and mishaps to the characters in 
The First Year
 are tragically serious to them, but each incident, as the play moves along, becomes funnier and funnier to you.  You may sympathize with Tommy, or you may sympathize with Grace.  You may even sympathize with both of them, but in spite of your sympathies, you just simply cannot help laughing.




The First Year
 is not only one of the funniest plays that recent years have brought forth, but it is also one of the most human comedies ever written.  That is what makes 
The First Year
 stand out as a pre-eminent production.  The people come to life on the stage, they talk, act and think as your friends do, and maybe as you do yourself.  As a human document, filled to the brim with laughter, 
The First Year
 stands in a class by itself—on a pinnacle that few plays have reached before, and that few will ever reach in the years to come.




The First Year
 is by Frank Craven, whose chief claim to fame before then had been as an actor of very human comedy roles.  This same human comedy note which distinguished his efforts on the stage was successfully transplanted into the play.




The First Year
 was produced by John L. Golden, the noted producer of 
comi-clean
 plays such as 
Lightnin,
 
Seventh Heaven,
 
Turn to the Right,
 and 
Three Wise Fools.
  The play was directed by Winchell Smith, noted author of 
Lightnin',
 
The Fortune Hunter
 and 
Turn to the Right.




Enthusiastic Praise Showered by Critics



The best comedy of our generation,
 said Heywood Broun, the noted dramatic critic of the New York Tribune, in tribute to Frank Craven's play, 
The First Year.




One of the best comedies, if not the very best ever written by an American,
 said Alexander Woollcott, eminent critic of the New York Times.




During the two-year New York run of 
The First Year,
 the New York public made this appraisal unanimous.  Why?  Because 
The First Year
 is life.  The characters are people you know—living next door—in your own family—perhaps even yourself.




When the play opened its long run in the world's metropolis, dramatic columns were full of its praise.




Every possible variety of laugh, from a refined giggle to a shout.—


Herald.




The most enjoyable comedy of the year.—


Times.




Equals 'Lightnin'' in dramatic value.—


Tribune.




Sure cure for the blues.—


Telegram.




Two laughs a minute.—


Sun.




Genuinely human, chuckling comedy.—


Post.




Those who are married and those who are not, had better see 'The First Year'.—


Daily News.




Season's laughing hit.  Is funny because it is true.—


Charles Darnton, Evening World.




Outdistances all competitors as a laughing success.  The most human comedy the theater has produced in a decade.—


Burns Mantle, Mail.




Uproariously funny from beginning to end.—


Globe.




Tremendous laughter.  The sort of play that un-jades the critic.—


Alan Dale, American.




Will settle down for several years' stay on Broadway.—


Evening Journal.




Here at last is the play for all of us.  It is written for the wide, wide world.—


Alexander Woollcott, Times.




An evening of sheer delight.—


Life.




Typical Golden Play



That clean plays are the plays the public wants, thereby proving that the great majority of Americans are clean-minded and do not care for dramatic material that has the tinge of suggestiveness, has been emphatically proved by John L. Golden, who has never produced a play with an unclean line or situation.




Lightnin',
 which was one of his hits, ran for three years and one day in New York, and 
The First Year
 ran for more than two years, and would have eclipsed even the world's record of 
Lightnin'
 only for the fact that previous contracts had to be fulfilled, taking the original company to Chicago.




You will laugh at practically every line in 
The First Year,
 and there are some moments of heart-gripping pathos that will get you, as they have gripped hundreds of thousands of others who have witnessed this play.  But when you are laughing, you will have nothing to be ashamed of, for 
The First Year
 is the greatest of all the great 
comi-clean
 plays which Mr. Golden has produced.