Your search for: subjects:"American Drama 20th Century Stories Plots Etc"

This book concludes Gerald Bordman's acclaimed survey of American non-musical theatre. It deals with the years 1930 to 1970, a period when the number of yearly new plays was shrinking, but a period during which American drama as a whole entered the world stage and became a dominant force. With works ...

This book concludes Gerald Bordman's acclaimed survey of American non-musical theatre. It deals with the years 1930 to 1970, a period when the number of yearly new plays was shrinking, but a period during which American drama as a whole entered the world stage and became a dominant force. With works like Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night, Tennessee William's A Streetcar Named Desire, and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, American theater finally reached adulthood both dramatically and psychologically. Bordman's lively, authoritative study covers every Broadway production, as well as every major off-Broadway show. His discussion moves season by season and show by show in chronological order; he offers plot synopses and details the physical production, directors, players, theaters, and newspaper reviews. This book and the preceding volumes of American Theatre stand as the premier history of American drama.

This three-volume work will accomplish for the American non-musical theatre what Bordman's American Musical Theatre did for our song-and-dance entertainments: it chronicles, in order by opening, every Broadway comedy and drama, show by show, season by season, offering a plot synopsis, principal ...

This three-volume work will accomplish for the American non-musical theatre what Bordman's American Musical Theatre did for our song-and-dance entertainments: it chronicles, in order by opening, every Broadway comedy and drama, show by show, season by season, offering a plot synopsis, principal players, and important statistics. Scenery and costumes are described where they might be of interest, and comments of the plays' contemporary critics are quoted. In many instances, extended excerpts from the play are included to give the reader a fuller understanding of its nuances and its period dialogue. Also included, and worked chronologically into the text, are details about cheap-priced, cliff-hanging melodramas, such as Bertha, the Sewing Machine Girl and His Sister's Shame, which were among America's most popular diversions in theatres catering to blue-collar playgoers until silent films drew away their audiences. Examples of shows produced and designed for other than New York are included. This volume deals with the great expansion of American theatre after the Civil War, the careers of such prominent actors and actresses as Edwin Booth, Mrs. Fiske, the Drew and Barrymore families, the first important American playwrights like Clyde Fitch, producers like David Belasco, and the influence of foreign plays and players. This stage history, besides giving a sense of each production, touches on the literary worth of the plays, provides brief biographies of major figures, and sets all of this against the economic and social backgrounds of the time. Readers will close the book feeling they, like their parents and grandparents, have sat through performances of these shows of another era.