Milton Williams

Railroad laborer Duff Anderson struggles to maintain his dignity and marriage to a preacher's daughter in the racially segregated South.

A crooked real estate tycoon tricks a trusting young woman out of her small candy store. When he is found dead, the girl is suspected of the crime.

Timeless traditions and contemporary anxieties clash musically and theatrically in Leonard Bernstein's powerful but rather neglected "Theatre Piece for Singers, Players and Dancers," The dancers are omitted in this semi-staged performance, produced for the Vatican's Jubilee 2000 celebration, but the show's eclectic musical brilliance, its adept mingling and clash of musical styles, its contrasts of hope and anxiety, faith and unbelief, ancient serenity and modern dissatisfaction are all brilliantly conveyed. More than 30 years after its premiere, for the opening of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., Mass still has the impact of this morning's newspaper headlines.

Night club singer Nelle Hill has many suitors an escaped convict, a piano player and a newspaper man. One is killed. With musical shorts such as “Murder in Swingtime,” “Black and Tan Fantasy,” “Symphony in Black,” and “Ain’t Misbehaving.”

American Playhouse is an anthology television series periodically broadcast by Public Broadcasting Service in the United States.