The Night of the Iguana The Night of the Iguana The Night of the Iguana is a stage play written by American author Tennessee Williams, based on his 1948 short story. First staged as a one-act play in 1959, Williams developed it into a full-length play over the next two years, staging two different versions in 1959 and 1960, before arriving at the three-act version of the text which premiered on Broadway in 1961. Two film adaptations have been made, including the Academy Award-winning 1964 film directed by John Huston and starring Richard Burton, Ava Gardner, and Deborah Kerr. The other is a 2000 Croatian
The Night of the Iguana production. In 1940s Mexico an ex-minister, the Reverend T. Lawrence Shannon, has been locked out of his church after characterizing the Western image of God as a "senile delinquent", during one of his sermons. Shannon is not de-frocked, but he is institutionalized for a "nervous breakdown". Some time after his release, the Rev. Shannon obtains employment as a tour guide for a second-rate travel agency. Shortly before the opening of the play, Shannon is accused of having committed statutory rape of a sixteen-year-old girl, Charlotte Goodall, who is accompanying his current group of tourists. As the curtain rises, Shannon and