Last night John Lennon was murdered at the Dakota apartment in New York City four blocks from where I am now living. I find it a strange and terrible coincidence that several years ago I started writing a play based on Lennon’s nonsenseIn His Own WriteandA Spaniard in the Worksin a studio at the top of the Dakota apartments and that the writing of that play led to my being involved in a mysterious and brutal death. A murder most unexpected.

My theatrical producers, who let me use the studio in the Dakota to write, put...

In 1981 when I was teaching at Berkeley, I decided to write a piece entitledPeople I’ve Met in the Theatre.I belonged a group of writers who met on Sunday evenings on college Ave. One evening they asked me about winning the Obie. They wanted to hear about off-Broadway in the sixties. They wanted to hear about my meeting the Beatles during my stay in London, one of them said what a “glorious past” you’ve had. I remembered a film producer in London had asked me to do a screenplay on my life there, as a Black in 1966...