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R E S O L U T I O N
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WHEREAS, Devotees of fine dramatic writing across Texas and |
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around the nation and the world are mourning the loss of playwright |
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and screenwriter Horton Foote, who died on March 4, 2009, at the age |
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of 92; and |
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WHEREAS, Albert Horton Foote, Jr., was born in Wharton on |
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March 14, 1916, to Albert Horton Foote and the former Hallie Brooks; |
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at the age of 16, Mr. Foote moved to Dallas to study acting; he later |
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studied for two years at the Pasadena Playhouse in California, then |
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moved to New York, where he joined the American Actors Company; and |
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WHEREAS, After Mr. Foote performed an improvisation based on |
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his boyhood, someone suggested that he write about life in the small |
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town where he grew up; that evening, Mr. Foote began a one-act play, |
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Wharton Dance, about the Friday night dances of his youth; a few |
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years later, his first full-length play, Texas Town, was performed |
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in New York to good reviews; for the rest of his life, Mr. Foote |
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continued to write plays set in the fictional Texas town of |
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Harrison, based on Wharton; and |
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WHEREAS, To support himself at the beginning of his career, |
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Mr. Foote worked as a night elevator operator and a clerk in a |
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bookstore, where he met his future wife, Lillian Vallish; they were |
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married in 1945 and remained together until her death in 1992; as a |
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young couple, they moved to Washington, D.C., where he helped run |
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the King-Smith School of the Creative Arts and was the first to open |
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the school's theater to all races; and |
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WHEREAS, Returning to New York in 1950, Mr. Foote continued |
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to write plays while making his living writing for television; his |
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play The Trip to Bountiful was first produced for television, then |
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played on Broadway, and was later made into a film; his television |
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work included adaptations of stories by William Faulkner; and |
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WHEREAS, Mr. Foote began writing for the movies in the 1950s, |
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and he won his first Academy Award for the screenplay he adapted |
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from the novel To Kill a Mockingbird in 1962; he won his second |
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Academy Award for his script for the 1983 film Tender Mercies, which |
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he wrote for his friend, actor Robert Duvall; and |
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WHEREAS, Returning to stage writing in the late 1960s, Mr. |
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Foote began The Orphans' Home, a nine-play cycle based on his |
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family's history and spanning the first quarter of the 20th |
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century; with his wife as producer, two of the plays from the cycle, |
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1918 and On Valentine's Day, were made into films that were shot in |
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Waxahachie and starred Mr. Foote's daughter, Hallie; and |
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WHEREAS, Mr. Foote created critically acclaimed work until |
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the end of his life; in 1994 and 1995, the Signature Theater in New |
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York devoted an entire season to his plays, and one of them, The |
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Young Man from Atlanta, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1995; his 2002 |
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play, The Carpetbagger's Children, played to sold-out audiences, |
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and his recently rewritten play, Dividing the Estate, won glowing |
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reviews in the fall of 2008; and |
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WHEREAS, Along with his Academy Awards and Pulitzer Prize, |
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Mr. Foote received the National Medal of Arts from President Bill |
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Clinton; his contributions to Texas letters and film were |
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recognized with the Bookend Award from the Texas Book Festival, a |
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Texas Medal of Arts, and induction into the Texas Film Hall of Fame; |
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and |
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WHEREAS, A courtly and good-humored man, Horton Foote wrote |
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with great tenderness and insight about the struggles and small |
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triumphs of ordinary Texans, but so evocatively that audiences |
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around the world saw their own dreams and disappointments reflected |
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on the stage or the screen; the young man who departed Wharton in |
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1932 spent the rest of his life celebrating the resilience and |
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dignity he learned there, and wherever his success may have taken |
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him, in his heart and in his work, he never left Texas; now, |
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therefore, be it |
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RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives of the 81st Texas |
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Legislature hereby pay tribute to the life of Horton Foote and |
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extend sincere condolences to the members of his family: to his |
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children, Hallie, Daisy, Horton, and Walter Foote; to his two |
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grandchildren; and to his other relatives and friends; and, be it |
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further |
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RESOLVED, That an official copy of this resolution be |
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prepared for his family and that when the Texas House of |
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Representatives adjourns this day, it do so in memory of Horton |
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Foote. |
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Zerwas |
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______________________________ |
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Speaker of the House |
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I certify that H.R. No. 966 was unanimously adopted by a |
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rising vote of the House on April 27, 2009. |
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______________________________ |
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Chief Clerk of the House |
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