Long before becoming one of the most revered and decorated artists in theater history — writing or starring in shows like Hairspray, La Cage aux Folles, and Torch Song Trilogy — Harvey Fierstein was simply a student at New York’s Pratt Institute, one who had no intention of pursuing a life onstage. “I didn’t want to be an actor. I didn’t want to be a writer. That was not in my vocabulary. Not in my wants at all.”
Fierstein had acted in small parts in community theater and school productions, but what, written by none other than Warhol himself, Fierstein went to the audition. “Not to get a role in the show but to meet him, and of course, who’s there? Not Andy Warhol.”
