Camping with Henry and Tom

by Mark St. Germain

Opens April 11 at

Palm Beach Dramaworks

West Palm Beach, Fla. (Wednesday, April 2, 2025) -Thomas Edison and Henry Ford met for the first time in 1896, when they had a brief conversation at the Association of Edison Illuminating Companies in New York. That encounter led to a lifelong friendship, and beginning in 1914 they took annual camping trips along with their friends John Burroughs, the nature writer and Harvey Firestone, the tire manufacturer. There was also an entourage who provided the finest creature comforts, ensuring them that roughing it wouldn’t be too rough. They drove to their destinations in a caravan of vehicles that, of course, included Model Ts.

The foursome called themselves the Vagabonds. And in 1921, they invited one of Firestone’s longtime friends to join them on their annual excursion: President Warren G. Harding accepted.

That trip was the springboard for Mark St. Germain’s Camping with Henry and Tom, which opens at Palm Beach Dramaworks on April 11 (7:30pm) and continues through April 27, with specially priced previews on April 9 and 10 (7:30pm). Producing Artistic Director William Hayes directs. 

Diane and Mark Perlberg are the sponsors of PBD’s 25^th Anniversary Season.

St. Germain was intrigued by the notion of Harding accompanying two of the most consequential American innovators on a trip to the great outdoors. What would the three men talk about? (Burroughs and Firestone are not characters in the play.) Stranded in the woods, they converse about politics, ambition, family, and fame, revealing three starkly different personalities and world views. The play deals with issues and ideas that remain as relevant today as they were 100 years ago. 

In an author’s note, St. Germain wrote, “This play is a fiction suggested by facts. That President Harding went camping with Henry Ford and Thomas Edison is fact; their evening ‘escape’ from the media-packed campsite is fictional. Conversations are fictional, but based on events, documented personal philosophies and the political climate of the time. Though many remarks are adapted from the actual words of these three men, there is no proof that such a dialogue took place. . . .”

PBD’s production features three popular company veterans: John Leonard Thompson as Henry Ford, Tom Wahl as Warren G. Harding, and Rob Donohoe as Thomas Edison. Rounding out the cast is another familiar face, John Campagnuolo as Colonel Edmund Starling, a secret service man. Scenic design is by Bert Scott, costume design is by Brian O’Keefe, lighting design is by Kirk Bookman, sound design is by Roger Arnold, and video design is by Adam J. Thompson.

Camping with Henry and Tom was originally produced at the Berkshire Theatre Festival in 1993, and premiered Off-Broadway in 1995 at the Lucille Lortel Theatre. The Off-Broadway production featured John Cunningham as Ford, Ken Howard as Harding, Robert Prosky as Edison, and John Prosky – Robert’s son, recently seen here in The Humans – as Starling. PBD produced the popular play for the first time during its second season (2001-02), with Hal Johnstone as Harding, Jim McConville as Ford, and Charles Newman as Edison. 

Mark St. Germain has written for the stage, film, and television. He is a recipient of the Outer Critics Circle Award, the Lucille Lortel Award, and the Off-Broadway Alliance Award. His plays include Freud’s Last Session, Camping with Henry and Tom, Forgiving Typhoid Mary (Time Magazine’s “Year’s Ten Best”), Becoming Dr. Ruth (the story of Dr. Ruth Westheimer), Best of Enemies, Ears on a Beatle, Scott and Hem, Dancing Lessons, Relativity, The God Committee, Out of Gas on Lover’s Leap, and The Happiest Man on Earth. The God Committee was made into a movie starring Kelsey Grammer and Julia Stiles in 2021, and the film of Freud’s Last Session, starring Anthony Hopkins and Matthew Goode, premiered in 2023. Mark wrote the screenplay for both. He also wrote the musicals The Gifts of the Magi, Johnny Pye, and Jack’s Holiday (Playwright’s Horizons) with Randy Courts, and created Stand by Your Man, the Tammy Wynette Story, for Nashville’s Ryman Theatre. In addition, he wrote The Fabulous Lipitones, a comedy with music, with John Markus. Television includes The Cosby Show and Dick Wolf’s The Wright Verdicts. Mark is a member of the Dramatists Guild, the Writers Guild East, and an associate artist at the Barrington Stage Company, where a theatre is named for him. Also an author, his books include Walking Evil: How Man’s Best Friend Became My Worst Enemy, and The Mirror Man: A Thriller.

The West Palm Beach Downtown Development Authority, the West Palm Beach Arts & Entertainment District, and The Palm Beach Post are additional sponsors of PBD’s 25^th Anniversary Season. 

Palm Beach Dramaworks is a professional, nonprofit theatre company founded in 2000 and located in the heart of downtown West Palm Beach. Each season, the award-winning company produces five shows and offers a wide variety of programs for students at the theatre and in schools. Committed to fostering the future of theatre, PBD has become a hub for playwrights in Florida and around the country to nurture their work through the Perlberg Festival of New Plays. PBD is a member of Theatre Communications Group, Florida Professional Theatres Association, the Cultural Council of Palm Beach County, and NNPN. In 2024, PBD was honored as Non-Profit of the Year by the Chamber of Commerce of the Palm Beaches. 

Evening performances are Wednesday through Saturday at 7:30pm. Matinee performances are Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday at 2pm. Post-performance discussions follow Wednesday and Thursday matinees.

Tickets for all performances are $92, except for opening night of each production ($107) and previews ($72). Student tickets are available for $15 with a valid K-12 or university/college ID, and anyone under 40 pays $40 (no additional fees) with a photo ID. Tickets for educators and active military are half price with proper ID (other restrictions apply). Tickets can be purchased through the box office, in person or by phone (561.514.4042 ext 2), and online 24 hours a day at palmbeachdramaworks.org. 

The Don & Ann Brown Theatre is located in the heart of downtown West Palm Beach, at 201 Clematis Street. For ticket information contact the box office at (561) 514-4042, or visit palmbeachdramaworks.org.

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