Philip Barry

(Bio as of January 2026)

Philip Barry (1896 – 1949) (Playwright) is the acclaimed American playwright best known for his ability to write sophisticated high comedy blending wit, romance and the tension between material success and emotional fulfillment. Often his plays highlight the charms and flaws of America’s elite; something he learned of firsthand with his marriage to Ellen Semple in 1922. Barry is the third most prolific American playwright with twenty original Broadway productions. Only Neil Simon with 49 and Eugene O’Neill with 25 had more.

Born in Rochester, New York to blue collar Irish Catholic immigrants, his father was a successful stone mason but died when Barry was but a year old. Under probate law at the time, the infant Barry was entitled to a share of his father’s estate which enabled him to attend Yale University. Following Yale, he enrolled in George Pierce Baker’s famed “47 Workshop” at Harvard. Other Baker alumni included Eugene O’Neil and Thomas Wolfe.

By the time Barry headed to Cambridge for Baker’s Workshop, he had fallen in love with Ellen Semple, the daughter of a wealthy New York attorney and businessman. The agreement Barry struck with his fiancée, her father and himself, was that he would submit one of the plays he wrote during his time at Harvard for the Herndon Prize; a prestigious competition that included a $500 prize and a professional production. If Barry won the Prize, he would make his living as a playwright; if not, he would pursue an advertising career in New York. Barry’s play You and I did indeed win the Prize. A professional life on Madison Avenue was not to be.

Barry’s next Broadway hits included Paris Bound (1927) and Holiday (1928). Katherine Hepburn was an understudy in Holiday and went on to star in the 1938 film adaptation directed by George Cukor. Also in 1938, Barry would write his most famous work, The Philadelphia Story, with Katharine Hepburn in mind.  She starred in the play on Broadway and, prior to opening, acquired the film rights from Barry with the financial assistance of her then suitor Howard Hughes.

Other notable plays included Hotel Universe (1930), The Animal Kingdom (1932), and Without Love (1942) and High Society (1987), the musical adaptation of The Philadelphia Story which was first done as a film musical in 1957 starring Grace Kelly, Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra.

Barry’s influence on American theater is profound as he helped shape the genre of sophisticated romantic comedy. He left behind a legacy of plays that continue to captivate audiences and inspire generations of playwrights including Richard Greenberg who penned the current adaptation of Holiday.