Anna Leonowens eccentric Victorian female traveler". The novel was adapted as a hit musical by Rodgers and Hammerstein, "The King and I" (1951), starring Gertrude Lawrence and Yul Brynner, which ran 1,246 performances on Broadway and was also a hit in London and on tour. In 1956, a film version was released, with Deborah Kerr starring in the role of Leonowens and Brynner reprising his role as the king. Revived many times on stage (with Brynner starring in revivals until 1985), the musical has remained a favourite of the theatregoing public. The humorous depiction of Mongkut as a polka-dancing despot, as well
Anna Leonowens reforms were goals established by his father. By 1869, Leonowens was in New York City, where she opened a school for girls for a brief period on Staten Island, and began contributing travel articles to a Boston journal, "Atlantic Monthly", including "The Favorite of the Harem", reviewed by "The New York Times" as "an Eastern love story, having apparently a strong basis of truth". She expanded her articles into two volumes of memoirs, beginning with "The English Governess at the Siamese Court" (1870), which earned her immediate fame but also brought charges of sensationalism. In her writing, she casts a