Harvey Fierstein  (b. 1954) On Tidy Endings LINKS The Harvey Fierstein Website at Plump Records Online http://www.plump.com/plump/harvbio.htm This site, which is maintained by Plump Records, includes some biographical information in a section "About Harvey." G/L Almanac Late Revisions http://www.unm.edu/~wendellr/GLA.HTM This site offers a lengthy essay discussing the history of lesbian and gay theater: "Lesbians and Gay Men on Stage: A Necessarily Incomplete History" by Wendell Ricketts, reprinted from Out in All Directions: The Almanac of Lesbian and Gay America. BIOGRAPHY Harvey Fierstein (b. 1954) Fierstein was born in Brooklyn, New York. His father was a handkerchief manufacturer and his mother, a school librarian. He began his career in the theater at the age of eleven as a founding actor in the Gallery Players Community Theater in Brooklyn. He earned a B.F.A. from Pratt Institute in 1973, and added writing and producing to his early acting skills as he embarked on a remarkable career. He wrote the three one-act plays that constitute Torch Song Trilogy between 1976 and 1979—all were produced in small theaters. But when he starred in the production that opened in an off-off- Broadway house (1981), and later moved to Broadway, his considerable talents were widely recognized. In fact, he is the first person to win a Tony award for best actor and best play for the same production. Fierstein has characterized himself as the first "real live, out-of-the-closet queer on Broadway." He pointed out to one critic that Arnold, the homosexual central figure in the Torch Song Trilogy, is much like us all. "Everyone wants what Arnold wants—an apartment they can afford, a job they don't hate too much, a chance to go to the store once in a while and someone to share it all with." Fierstein wrote the book for the musical version of La Cage aux Folles, and a number of one-act and full-length plays and television dramas. His work has been recognized with numerous awards in addition to his Tonys. The original producer of Torch Song Trilogy illuminated the source of Fierstein's success when he pointed out that "what Harvey proved was that you could use a gay context and a gay experience and speak in universal truths."