This book explores the vision and talents of a controversial group of artists who, depending on one's perspective, either revitalized or disfigured the standard dramatic repertoire by adapting canonical dramas for the contemporary American stage. Amy S. Green's critical history features the bold directorial ventures of JoAnne Akalaitis, Lee Breuer, Liviu Ciulei, Richard Foreman, Joseph Papp, Lucian Pintilie, Richard Schechner, Peter Sellars, Andrei Serban, Robert Woodruff, and Garland Wright. Green covers Greek and Roman drama, plays by Shakespeare and Moliere, and the operas of Mozart and da...

In this book, Susan Harris Smith looks at the many often conflicting cultural and academic reasons for the neglect and dismissal of American drama as a legitimate literary form. Covering a wide range of topics such as theatrical performance, the rise of nationalist feeling, the creation of academic disciplines, and the development of sociology, Smith's study is a contentious and revisionist historical inquiry into the troubled cultural and canonical status of American drama, both as a literary genre and as a mirror of American society.

Theatre Culture in America, 1825-1860 examines how Americans staged their cultures in the decades before the Civil War, and 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 theatres 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 views of the town, the city, and the frontier. Joining up-to-date...

The American Stage and the Great Depression: A Cultural History of the Grotesque proposes a correlation between the divided "mind" of America during the Depression and popular stage works of the era, which are interpreted as theatrical reflections of Depression culture's sense of being trapped between a discredited past and a nightmarish future. The author analyzes the 1930s as an era of the grotesque, in which the irreconcilable were forced into tense and dynamic coexistence.

This book is the first comprehensive attempt to assemble all that is currently known of theatre at the time of America's political birth. Jared Brown's extensive research coheres into an invaluable theatrical chronicle that should prove a useful resource for students, scholars, and the general leader.

Performing the American Frontier, 1870-1906 examines how the American frontier was presented in theatrical productions during the critical period from the end of the Civil War to the beginning of film. From famous personages such as Mark Twain and "Buffalo Bill" Cody to lesser known individuals such as Native American playwright and actress Gowongo Mohawk, Hall examines the plays, the players, and the playwrights who helped to define the American westward migration in theatrical terms and covers the complete dramatic experience including scenery, performance, and staging.

Theater has often served as a touchstone for moments of political change or national definition and as a way of exploring cultural and ethnic identity. Heather Nathans examines its growth and influence in the development of the young American Republic--from the Revolution through the election of Thomas Jefferson in 1800. Unlike many works on early American theater, this book explores the lives and motives of the people working behind the scenes to establish a new national drama.

A concert saloon is an establishment offering various kinds of entertainment, including alcohol, with some also providing gambling and prostitution. Brooks McNamara explores the concert saloon in New York from the Civil War to the early years of the twentieth century. He focuses on the theatrical aspects of the concert saloon and examines the sources of saloon shows, changes in direction during the century, performing spaces and equipment, and employees and patrons.

A landmark work in the study of Black theater and drama, African American Theatre offers the first comprehensive history of a major cultural phenomenon until now too often neglected. In this fast-paced investigation, Hay seeks out the origins of Black theater in social protest, as envisioned by W.E.B. Dubois, and as a formal branch of arts theater. Divided between these opposing forces--the activist and the artistic--Black theater, Hay argues, faced conflicts of identity whose traces still haunt the medium today. African American Theatre thus offers a means of locating Black theater in the...

John Barrymore's Richard III and Hamlet, first seen in New York during the 1919-20 and 1922-23 seasons, stand as high-water marks of twentieth-century Shakespearean interpretation. Michael Morrison reconstructs these historic performances through analysis of the production preparation, audience response, reviews, and memoirs. Tracing the Victorian and Edwardian antecedents of Shakespearean performance, this book situates Barrymore's distinctive contribution in light of past and ensuing tradition. As well, it provides a biographical sketch of one of the most revered and tragic actors of the...