THE OUTSIDERS - Synopsis

Christopher Sergel’s play is a faithful adaptation of S.E. Hinton’s coming-of-age-novel about rival teenage gangs in 1960s Tulsa, Oklahoma. The Greasers come from troubled working-class backgrounds, contrasted with the Socials, whose members are from upper-middle-class families. Like the novel, the play centers on 14-year-old Ponyboy Curtis, a member of the Greasers gang, as he recounts the violent aftermath after his friend Johnny fatally stabbed Socials member Bob. 

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About S.E. Hinton

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Susan Eloise Hinton grew up in a working-class neighborhood in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Her mother worked in a factory and her father was a door-to-door salesman. Hinton attended Will Rogers High School and graduated in 1966. While she was a student there, she wrote her first book, The Outsiders, which was published in 1967. Following the suggestion of her editor, she wrote it under the name S.E. Hinton, in order to deflect attention from her gender. Centering on a confrontation between rival groups of teenagers and its fallout, the novel was inspired by an incident that happened to one of her friends. The book was immediately successful with critics and young readers, and it won several awards. Though the level of violence in the novel and in some of her subsequent works aroused controversy, Hinton was praised for her realistic and sometimes explosive dialogue.