The Good Doctor is Neil Simon's tribute to Anton Chekhov combining the best of both styles: the dark humor of Chekhov and the one-liner humor of Simon. It has always received mixed reviews from the critics, largely, one suspects, because it represented a divergence from Simon's usual style and we all know that writers are not supposed to grow and develop! The leading character is a writer (Chekhov) whose opening monologue is an amalgam of Simon's own words and those of Tregorin from The Seagull. Only some of the scenes are based on Chekhov stories. Just under half are Simon's own inventions. One, The Audition, was written as a showcase for his wife Marsha Mason.

Stephanie's first encounter with The Good Doctor was in 1976 when she directed it as her Master's thesis at the University of Georgia. Since then, she has directed the play in every place she has lived with the only exception of Bristol, England, where she was too busy acting to do much directing. In each of the productions, Angus has played the writer. In this, New York version, Whtney Chapman took the young woman's roles and Kevin Benham, the young man's roles. Jane Reibel, who also appeared for us in Gamma Rays, played the character woman and Jack Cooper the charcter man. We brought in Dan Murphy to play the sexton in the all-Simon scene "The Surgery". Danny had worked lights for our very first production, Talley's Folly and was a Senior a Peekskill High School. He had recently done the same role in the school production and had been so good he was invited to reprise the role with us. The only other major deviation from the normal assignment of roles was that Stephanie and Angus took over "Too Late For Happiness", the piece about the old couple on a park bench trying to make contact. They had wanted to do this scene together for years and at last got the opportunity. The scene is part spoken and part sung to some lovely music by Simon's friend Peter Link.

We staged the show with more of a proscenium arch arrangement than usual, keeping most of the audience across the front to give us more width than we usually get with the three-quarters staging we normally use.