The single most publicized event of the American stage during the 1940s was the return of Eugene O'Neill. O'Neill had not allowed any of his new work to be produced in twelve years when The Iceman Cometh opened in New York on 9 October .1946. It was an international event. O'Neill was and is still considered America's greatest playwright. Life magazine reported that O'Neill was the "second most widely read playwright ever" behind William Shakespeare. He had dominated the American stage in the 1920s and won the Nobel Prize in 1936, topping off a career that had earned him three Pulitzer Prizes. O'Neill had lived quietly on the West Coast during his absence from the public eye. He wrote prolifically. The Iceman Cometh had actually been finished in 1939. O'Neill returned to New York in May 1946 to prepare the production. The pre-opening ticket sales...