Abie's Irish Rose

Few works in American popular theater history have been as successful and as vilified as first-time playwright Anne Nichols's 1922 sentimental comedy, Abie's Irish Rose. Despite critical carping over its low-brow slapstick, fluffy plot complete with stale jokes and hokey dialects; and manipulation of ethnic stereotypes, the play ran for more than five years (2,327 performances), making it at the time the longest-running play in Broadway history. Beyond that New York run, the play found long-term national success in touring companies and in both film and radio adaptations.

The 1920s were an extraordinary time for American theater. Following World War I, after Broadway had long stagnated, recycling formula burlesque shows and vaudeville sketches, lightweight musical theater, and heavy-handed melodramas, young playwrights tested experimental ideas imported from Europe with bold plays that explored provocative social issues and reimagined the stage space itself; these plays have become that decade's defining achievements.

In contrast, Abie's Irish Rose excites little contemporary interest save as a period artifact. A young man (Abraham “Abie” Levy) returns home to his strict Jewish father, Solomon, a successful businessman and widower, to introduce his new bride, Rosemary Murphy, a singer he had met overseas during the war. The two have already been married by a chaplain but, uncertain of the reaction his father will have to his marriage to a Catholic, Abie decides to tell his father that Rosemary is a nice Jewish girl he wants to court, certain the old man will fall under Rosemary's charms. The father does—and he too quickly facilitates a traditional Jewish wedding to be held within the week. Rosemary's father, Patrick, a staunch Catholic with a deep aversion to the Jewish people, arrives from California for the wedding, accompanied by the family priest. Rosemary has told her father that she is marrying a nice Irish boy. But Patrick arrives too late—the ceremony is over. Both fathers discover their children's elaborate hoax and bemoan such chicanery and the betrayal of their religions, all the while exchanging derogatory ethnic barbs. The priest and the rabbi, both chaplains during the war, react far more tolerantly. To mollify Patrick, the couple is married for a third time by the priest.

The play's last act offers a most sentimental resolution—largely disowned by both fathers, Rosemary and Abie have set up a modest apartment and have apparently been blessed with a child. They are preparing to celebrate Christmas, an obvious expression of how the two have found common ground. Perhaps coaxed by the holiday season, both fathers in turn show up to meet their grandchild—Solomon promises, if it is a boy, to leave him his fortune while Patrick makes a similar promise if it is a girl. The fathers—and audiences—are charmed when the couple introduces their twins, a boy and a girl. As the curtain falls, the fathers soften their rhetoric, giving hope that the families can be brought together.

At a time when the Jews and the Irish were the dominant urban ethnic groups and clashed over politics, religion, culture, and jobs, Nichols's play explores the dilemmas facing both immigrant groups who must adjust to the cultural diversity of their adopted homeland by using farce, a genre that lacks the psychological nuance of the era's more respected social realists such as Eugene O'Neill and Elmer Rice. Certainly, both fathers exaggerate familiar stereotypes: Solomon Levy is educated, wealthy, and considers business acumen a measure of moral worth; he manipulates guilt expertly; he meddles in his grown child's love life; he mistakes strict observance of religious customs for faith; and he has a conservative suspicion of change. Patrick has a fondness for drink; he is street smart and good with his hands; he is a fierce proponent of Irish nationalism; he is prone to maudlin emotions; he mistakes religion for blind obedience to the institutional church; and he is given too quickly to fisticuffs.

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