Agency Sketch
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 1935 July | Harry Hopkins, director of the WPA* and former head of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA), advocated a "free, adult, uncensored theatre" and announced the founding of the Federal Theatre Project (FTP). The FTP was designed to re-employ theater workers on public relief; to conserve and develop the skills of administrators, clerical workers, writers, set and costume designers, directors, actors, technicians, and photographers; and to bring a theater, which would be national in scope and regional in emphasis, to thousands in the United States who had never before seen live theatrical performances. |
| 1935 August | Hallie Flanagan, director of the Experimental Theatre, Vassar College, took the oath of office as the national director of the FTP. Headquarters were at the McLean mansion in Washington, D.C. |
| 1935 October | Under WPA's Federal Project Number One, $27 million was budgeted for unemployed artists, musicians, theatrical people, and writers. FTP units were set in operation and productions were planned throughout the United States. |
| 1936 March | With 11,000 people on the payroll, production groups were operating in 22 states and the weekly audience was 150,000. |
| 1937 March | Hallie Flanagan moved the headquarters from Washington, D.C., to New York City and assumed the directorship there in addition to the national directorship. |
| 1937 April | George Bernard Shaw and Eugene O'Neill released their plays to the FTP for nationwide production at a $50 rental rate. |
| 1937 June-August | Caravan theater toured the boroughs of New York City to present free entertainment to the public. |
| 1937 December | Since its inception, the FTP had played to audiences of 16 million in 28 states in 158 theaters. Notable productions included Doctor Faustus, It Can't Happen Here, Macbeth, and Murder in the Cathedral. |
| 1938 February | Hallie Flanagan delivered a brief, outlining the progress of the FTP before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Patents. |
| 1938 March-April | Planning began for a nationwide touring program in an effort to expand performances in outlying communities. |
| 1938 December | Noteworthy productions to date included One-Third of a Nation, Pinocchio, Prologue to Glory, and a swing version of The Mikado. |
| 1939 June | A congressional joint resolution recommended that no funds be made available after June 30 for the operation of the FTP. |
During its four-year existence, the FTP mounted more than 8,000 performances in thirty states and the District of Columbia. Productions included classics, melodramas, comedies, circus performances, vaudeville, local pageants, foreign language plays, children's plays, dance productions, radio broadcasts, religious plays, Negro theater, and caravan plays. Notable persons associated with the project include: Bill Baird, Howard Bay, Eubie Blake, Marc Blitzstein, Joseph Cotten, Katherine Dunham, Abe Feder, Arlene Francis, Will Geer, Paul Green, John Houseman, John Huston, George Izenour, Burt Lancaster, Emmet Lavery, Norman Lloyd, E.G. Marshall, Arthur Miller, Arthur Peterson, John Randolph, Elmer Rice, Betty Smith, Virgil Thomson, and Orson Welles.
* Initially the Works Progress Administration, the name was changed in 1939 to Work Projects Administration.