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John Wexley (1907 – February 4, 1985) was an American writer, best known for his play The Last Mile. Early life and career [ edit ] Wexley was born in New York City . [1]
John Wexley was born on 14 September 1907 in New York City, New York, USA. He was a writer, known for Angels with Dirty Faces (1938), The Last Mile (1932) and Hangmen Also Die! (1943). He died on 4 February 1985 in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, USA.
- Writer
- September 14, 1907
- John Wexley
- February 4, 1985
The Last Mile is a Broadway play by John Wexley that ran for 289 performances from February 13, 1930, to October 1930 at the Sam H. Harris Theatre. It was produced by Herman Shumlin and staged by Chester Erskine. It is set in the death row wing of a prison. The lead role of John "Killer" Mears was first played by Spencer Tracy, and it was the ...
- February 13, 1930
- John Wexley
- Keystone State Penitentiary death-house in Keystone, Oklahoma in late May and June
- Sam H. Harris Theatre, New York City, New York
Feb 6, 1985 · John Wexley, author of ''The Last Mile,'' one of the most famous of prison dramas, died of a heart attack Monday. He was 77 years old and lived in Doylestown, Pa. First produced on Broadway in ...
Feb 14, 1985 · John Wexley, an author, screenwriter and playwright, whose "The Last Mile" made a Broadway star of Spencer Tracy in 1930, is dead at age 77.
John Wexley’s They Shall Not Die, produced at the Royale Theatre on West 45th by the Theatre Guild in 1934, was a response to the 1931 case of the “Scottsboro Boys,” nine African-American teenagers arrested for allegedly raping two white women in Alabama. The eight defendants sentenced to death were not executed, but five of them served ...
In 1929, in the wake of the Great Depression and widespread interest in social justice, writer John Wexley built a Broadway play about several prisoners suspended between life and death, waiting together for their respective trips down The Last Mile. A young Spencer Tracy played the lead role of John Mears, a hardened soul who has earned the ...
