The Adding Machine is a 1923 play by Elmer Rice

Elmer Rice

Elmer Rice was an American playwright. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his 1929 play, Street Scene.-Early years:...

; it has been called "... a landmark of American Expressionism

Expressionism

Expressionism was a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it radically for emotional effect in order to evoke moods or ideas...

, reflecting the growing interest in this highly subjective and nonrealistic form of modern drama." The story focuses on Mr. Zero, an accountant at a large, faceless company. After 25 years at his job, he discovers that he will be replaced by an adding machine. In anger and pain, he snaps and kills his boss. Mr. Zero is then tried for murder, is found guilty and hanged. He wakes up in a heaven-like setting known as "The Elysian Fields." Mr. Zero then begins to operate an adding machine until Lieutenant Charles (Louis Calvert

Louis Calvert

Louis James Calvert was a British stage and early film actor of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and an actor-manager...

), the boss of the Elysian Fields, comes to tell Zero that he is a waste of space and his soul is going to be sent back to the earth to be reused. The play ends with Zero following a very attractive girl named Hope (who may not actually exist) off stage.

The play was an influence on the Tennessee Williams

Tennessee Williams

Thomas Lanier "Tennessee" Williams III was an American writer who worked principally as a playwright in the American theater. He also wrote short stories, novels, poetry, essays, screenplays and a volume of memoirs...

 play Stairs to the Roof

Stairs to the Roof

Stairs to the Roof is a play by Tennessee Williams, the last of his apprentice plays. It was completed in December 1941, and premiered at the Pasadena Playhouse on February 26, 1947....

. Years later, it was adapted into a 1969 film

The Adding Machine (film)

The Adding Machine is a 1969 British fantasy drama film directed by Jerome Epstein and starring Milo O'Shea, Phyllis Diller, Billie Whitelaw, Sydney Chaplin and Raymond Huntley...

 of the same name, written and directed by Jerome Epstein and starring Milo O'Shea

Milo O'Shea

-Early life:He was born and raised in Dublin and educated by the Christian Brothers at Synge Street, along with his friend Donal Donnelly.He was discovered in the 1950s by Harry Dillon, who ran the "37 Theatre Club" on the top floor of his shop The Swiss Gem Company, 51 Lower O'Connell Street...

, Phyllis Diller

Phyllis Diller

Phyllis Diller is an American actress and comedian. She created a stage persona of a wild-haired, eccentrically dressed housewife who makes jokes about a husband named "Fang" while pretending to smoke from a long cigarette holder...

, Billie Whitelaw

Billie Whitelaw

Billie Honor Whitelaw, CBE is an English actress. She worked in close collaboration with Irish playwright Samuel Beckett for 25 years and is regarded as one of the foremost interpreters of his works...

 and Sydney Chaplin

Sydney Chaplin

Sydney Chaplin was an English actor. He was the elder half-brother of Sir Charlie Chaplin and served as his business manager, and the half-uncle of the actor Sydney Chaplin , who was named after him.-Early life:...

.

In 1989, Chicago's Hystopolis Productions adapted Rice's play for puppets; the production was hailed for its visual design. In September 1992 this production went on to be featured at the First International Festival of Puppet Theater presented at The Public Theater in New York which was a co-production of Joseph Papp

Joseph Papp

Joseph Papp was an American theatrical producer and director. Papp established The Public Theater in what had been the Astor Library Building in downtown New York . "The Public," as it is known, has many small theatres within it...

 and the Jim Henson Foundation

Jim Henson Foundation

The Jim Henson Foundation was founded by puppeteer and Muppet creator Jim Henson to promote and develop puppetry in the United States. It is the only grantmaking institution with this mission. The Jim Henson Foundation has bestowed 440 grants. Its president is Cheryl Henson, Jim Henson's...

. The Adding Machine remains part of Hystopolis' professional repertoire.

Musical adaptation

In 2007, the play was adapted into a musical

Musical theatre

Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...

 entitled Adding Machine

Adding Machine (musical)

Adding Machine is a musical adaptation of Elmer Rice's 1923 play The Adding Machine, with music by Joshua Schmidt, and book and lyrics by Jason Loewith and Joshua Schmidt. The show opened in 2007 in Illinois before moving Off-Broadway in 2008...

with a score by Joshua Schmidt and book by Jason Loewith and Schmidt. The musical debuted in Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

 at the Next Theatre Company in 2007. It then opened Off-Broadway

Off-Broadway

Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...

at the Minetta Lane Theatre on February 25, 2008, after previews that started February 8.