Lanford Wilsonthe openly gay, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright behind works such as Burn This, Lemon Sky, Hot L Baltimore and Fifth of Julydied March 24 at the age of 73, according to an Advocate.com item. According to AFP, he died of complications from pneumonia at New Jersey's Kindred Hospital.
Wilson was one of the founders of off-off-Broadway theater, and won the Pulitzer for Drama for Talley's Folly, a one-act play about a heterosexual couple, in 1980.
He began his active career as a playwright in the early 1960s at the Caffe Cino in Greenwich Village, writing one-act plays such as Ludlow Fair, Home Free! and The Madness of Lady Bright. The Madness of Lady Bright premiered at the Caffe Cino in May 1964 and featured actor Neil Flanagan in the title role as Leslie Brighta neurotic aging drag queen. The Madness of Lady Bright is considered a watershed in the representation of male homosexuality.
Several of Wilson's works incorporated gay themes. Burn This, for example, is about how several people are affected by the death of a young gay dancer, Robbie.
Hot L Baltimore premiered at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company March 24; it is scheduled to run through May 29.