Who is Tracy Letts?

Tracy S. Letts (born July 4, 1965) is an American actor, playwright, and screenwriter. He started his career at the Steppenwolf Theatre before making his Broadway debut as a playwright for August: Osage County (2007), for which he received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony Award for Best Play.

(T)he genesis of August: Osage County can be traced to my deliberate desire to write for an extant acting ensemble – in this case, Steppenwolf Theatre Company. The hope of any playwright is that he or she can, through narrative, tap into universal themes. My first goal was to construct a narrative that holds a bushel of interest and a kernel of truth for the actors of this ensemble. When reviewing the biographies of the actors who comprise Steppenwolf, I was struck by a nearly common denominator: place of birth. From Lincoln, Illinois to Council Bluffs, Iowa, from Mankato, Minnesota to my hometown of Tulsa, Oklahoma, the majority of ensemble members are small-town Midwestern people. Their stories are my stories. We share the history of families – mainly descendants of Irish or German or Dutch homesteaders – who forged their ethos from hardscrabble Depression years through the Baby Boom. We share the multi-generational conflict that inevitably arises when Those Who Have Nothing have willed their pride and guilt to Those Who Have Wanted for Nothing. August: Osage County is my attempt to explore this generational schism and the Midwestern sensibility with an ensemble of like-minded artists. My play is a family story. (As Sam Shepard – still to this day Steppenwolf’s most produced playwright – said when asked why he writes so much about family: “What else is there?”) And after thirty years of intense artistic collaboration, the Steppenwolf ensemble is another kind of family. The politics of tribalism are common to both. It is my hope that August: Osage County will provide an artistically viable opportunity for Steppenwolf to learn how the dynamics of “family” continue to mold us and our approach to the world.

Tracy Letts on writing August: Osage County

As a playwright, Letts is known for having written for the Steppenwolf Theatre, Off-Broadway and Broadway theatre. His works include: Killer Joe, Bug, Man from Nebraska, August: Osage County, Superior Donuts, Linda Vista, and The Minutes. Letts adapted three of his plays into films, Bug and Killer Joe, both directed by William Friedkin, and August: Osage County, directed by John Wells. His 2009 play Superior Donuts was adapted into a television series of the same name. As a stage actor, Letts has performed in various classic plays with the Steppenwolf Theatre since 1988. He made his acting Broadway debut as George in the revival of Edward Albee’s play Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, which earned him a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play. He continued acting on the Broadway stage in The Realistic Joneses, All My Sons, and The Minutes.

In film and television, he is known for his portrayal of Andrew Lockhart in seasons 3 and 4 of Showtime’s Homeland, and pyramid-scheme con-artist Nick on the HBO comedy Divorce. In 2017, Letts starred in three critically acclaimed films: Azazel Jacobs’ The Lovers, Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird, and Steven Spielberg’s The Post. The latter two films were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. Lady Bird earned Letts a nomination for the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. In 2019, he portrayed Henry Ford II in James Mangold’s Ford v Ferrari and Mr. Dashwood in Gerwig’s Little Women, the two also receiving Best Picture nominations.