

Happy New Year
Burt Shevelove
This classic romantic comedy became a beloved film starring Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn.
Free-spirited Johnny Case finds himself engaged to one girl but preferring another.
The wealthy Seton sisters are his intended: socially proper Julia and Linda, non-conforming and fresh.
Expecting his future son-in-law to toe the family line, patriarch Edward Seton realizes that Johnny cannot.
Johnny and Linda fall in love, and the two kindred souls take their “life-as-a-holiday” in the company of each other.
"Barry’s Jazz Age hit... The play’s disparaging portrait of that plenty-for-some, and Johnny’s objections to money worship and the rat race, certainly speak to our era of glaring inequality and pandemic-prompted career rethinks. It’s also nice to have an opportunity to admire Barry’s prescience: Predating the 1929 stock market crash, Holiday seems prophetic in its critical attitude to go-go business mind-sets and irrationally exuberant investing."
— The Washington Post
"A classic theatrical chestnut."
— DC Theatre Scene
| Character |
|---|
| Johnny Case 30, medium-tall, slight, attractive-looking, luckily not quite handsome. |
| Julia Seton 28 and quite beautiful. |
| Ned Seton 26. He is as handsome in his way as JULIA is in hers. His features are fine, a little too fine. He displaces very little, but no one minds: he is a nice boy. |
| Susan 30, smart and attractive. |
| Nick Potter About 34, with an attractive, amusing face. |
| Edward Seton 58, large, nervous, distinguished. |
| Laura SETON's wife, 32, a shade taller than SETON, with a rather handsome, rather disagreeable face. She is as smartly dressed as a poor figure will allow. |
| Seton Cram 36, somewhat bald, inclined to a waistline, but well turned out. |
| Henry 50, of pleasant appearance and manner. |
| Charles A younger man-servant. |
| Delia A housemaid of about 35. |
| Linda Seton 27, looks about 22. She is slim, rather boyish, exceedingly fresh. She is smart and pretty, but beside JULIA's grace and beauty, she seems a trifle gauche, and almost plain. |
Holiday is a comedy play written by Philip Barry and published by Samuel French .
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