After Miss Hellman's death in 1984, many of her papers and those of Mr. Hammett were deposited at the University of Texas.
Miss Hellman, she said, was in terrible shape, and was probably dying.
Miss Hellman's Regina was written with such definition that it could only be played one way.
He writes, "Miss Hellman's voice in these discourses does not fall upon my ear as coming from someone I should want overmuch as a comrade."
He continued, "Miss Hellman's play tends to be somewhat static in its early stretches on the screen.
However, Dr. Rollyson recently discovered a letter from Miss Hellman saying that she was indeed a member of the Communist Party from 1938 to 1940.
He found the letter in the papers of Joseph Rauh, the Washington lawyer who defended Miss Hellman in her appearance before the committee in 1952.
When Miss Hellman sent the final version of her letter to the committee chairman, she made no mention of her having been a Communist.
In her appearance before the committee, Miss Hellman invoked the Fifth Amendment.
Although Miss Hellman's monochromatic melodrama can still be powerful in its old-fashioned way, Mr. Blitzstein's music gives it emotional color and heightened tension.