Whether moralistic or satirical, the plays of the American Revolution offer unique insights into the sympathies and fears of both loyal and dissident parties, and so serve as a telling document of a socially turbulent age. Brown's extensive research coheres into an invaluable theatrical and historical chronicle that should prove a useful resource for those working in the field.

Carnival, charivari, mumming plays, peasant festivals, and even early versions of the Santa Claus myth--all of these forms of entertainment influenced and shaped blackface minstrelsy in the first half of the nineteenth century. In his fascinating study Demons of Disorder, musicologist Dale Cockrell studies issues of race and class by analyzing their cultural expressions, and investigates the roots of still-remembered songs such as "Jim Crow," "Zip Coon," and "Dan Tucker." The first book on the blackface tradition written by a leading musicologist, Demons of Disorder is an important...

Carnival, charivari, mumming plays, peasant festivals, and even early versions of the Santa Claus myth--all of these forms of entertainment influenced and shaped blackface minstrelsy in the first half of the nineteenth century. In his fascinating study Demons of Disorder, musicologist Dale Cockrell studies issues of race and class by analyzing their cultural expressions, and investigates the roots of still-remembered songs such as "Jim Crow," "Zip Coon," and "Dan Tucker." The first book on the blackface tradition written by a leading musicologist, Demons of Disorder is an important...

This comprehensive analysis traces Sam Shepard's career from his experimental one-act plays of the 1960s through the 1994 play Simpatico. Concentrating on his playwriting, this book charts Shepard's various developments and shifts of direction, and the changing contexts in which his work has appeared. Engaging, informative, and insightful, The Theatre of Sam Shepard is the definitive source on the works of this innovative and original writer.

Theatre Culture in America, 1825-1860 advances the idea that cultures are performances that take place both inside and outside of playhouses. Americans imaginatively expanded conventional ideas of performance as an activity restricted to theaters in order to take up the staging of culture in other venues--in issues of class, race, and gender, in parades and the visits of dignitaries, in rioting and the denomination of prostitutes, and in the views of the town, the city, and the frontier. Joining up-to-date historical research with a firm and clear-headed grasp of contemporary critical theory,...

John Frick examines the role of temperance drama in the overall scheme of American nineteenth-century theatre, using examples from mainstream productions and amateur theatricals. Nineteenth-century America witnessed a major movement against alcohol consumption when the temperance cause became one of national concern. As part of the temperance movement, a new genre of theatrical literature and performance developed, professional as well as amateur, to help publicize its beliefs. Frick also compares the American genre to its British counterpart.

Huerta takes as his starting point 1979, the year Luis Valdez's play, Zoot Suit, was produced on Broadway. Huerta looks at plays by and about Chicanas and Chicanos, as they explore through performance, the community and its identity caught between the United States and Mexico. Through informative biographies of each playwright and analyses of their plays, Huerta offers an accessible introduction to this important aspect of American theater and culture. The book contains photographs from key productions and will be invaluable to students, scholars and general theatergoers.

For almost a hundred years before Uncle Tom's Cabin burst on to the scene in 1852, the American theatre struggled to represent the evils of slavery. Slavery and Sentiment questions how the text, images, and performances presented to American audiences during the antebellum period engaged with the debate over black participation in American society. The book reconsiders traditional comic stereotypes like Jim Crow, as well as familiar sentimental ones, such as Uncle Tom. Using plays, poetry, performances, popular novels, and political cartoons, Heather Nathans blends American history, theatre...

What does it mean to be an American man? Holmberg demonstrates how David Mamet's plays explore complex issues of masculinity.