Dec 27, 2008-The playwright Dale Wasserman, best known for “Man of La Mancha” and the stage version of “One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, died of heart failure in Arizona. He was 94.
Wasserman, the recipient of many awards including Tony, New York Drama Critics Circle and Emmy recognition, wrote 80 plays and also penned magazine articles and a book, “The Impossible Musical.”
Wasserman's characters were usually outcasts, women as well as men. The scribe felt himself to be “not a member of the club” and was empathetic with those outside the mainstream.
Several of Wasserman's teleplays were rewritten for the stage including “I, Don Quixote,” which became “Man of La Mancha” and “The Stranger,” which became “Boy on Blacktop Road.”
Wasserman married his “beloved friend,” Martha Nelly Garza in 1984. His previous marriage to actress Ramsay Ames ended in divorce.
