Directors and the New Musical Drama

Directors and the New Musical Drama

Author: M. Lundskaer-Nielsen

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2008-04-14

Total Pages: 234

ISBN-13: 0230611249

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This is one of the first books to offer a rigorous analysis of the enormous changes in the musical theatre during the 1980s and 90s. In addition, it focuses on the contribution of well-known, serious theatre directors to the mainstream Musical Theatre and it is the first book to offer a dual Anglo-American perspective on this subject.


Directors and the New Musical Drama

Directors and the New Musical Drama

Author: Miranda Lundskaer-Nielsen

Publisher: Palgrave MacMillan

Published: 2008-03-15

Total Pages: 248

ISBN-13:

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This is one of the first books to offer a rigorous analysis of the enormous changes in the musical theatre during the 1980s and 90s. In addition, it focuses on the contribution of well-known, serious theatre directors to the mainstream Musical Theatre and it is the first book to offer a dual Anglo-American perspective on this subject.


The Secret Life of the American Musical

The Secret Life of the American Musical

Author: Jack Viertel

Publisher: Macmillan + ORM

Published: 2016-03-01

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 0374711259

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

New York Times Bestseller: “Both revelatory and entertaining . . . Along the way, Viertel provides some fascinating Broadway history.” —The New York Times Book Review Americans invented musicals—and have a longstanding love affair with them. But what, exactly, is a musical? In this book, longtime theatrical producer and writer Jack Viertel takes them apart, puts them back together, sings their praises, and occasionally despairs over their more embarrassing shortcomings. In the process, he shows us how musicals happen, what makes them work, how they captivate audiences, and how one landmark show leads to the next—by design or by accident, by emulation or by rebellion—from Oklahoma! to Hamilton and onward. Beginning with an overture and concluding with a curtain call, with stops in between for “I Want” songs, “conditional” love songs, production numbers, star turns, and finales, Viertel shows us patterns in the architecture of classic shows and charts the inevitable evolution that has taken place in musical theater as America itself has evolved socially and politically. The Secret Life of the American Musical makes you feel like you’re there in the rehearsal room, the front row, and the offices of theater owners and producers as they pursue their own love affair with that rare and elusive beast—the Broadway hit. “A valuable addition to the theater lover’s bookshelf. . . . fans will appreciate the dips into memoir and Viertel’s takes on original cast albums.” —Publishers Weekly “Even seasoned hands will come away with a clearer understanding of why some shows work while others flop.” —Commentary “A showstopper . . . infectiously entertaining.” —John Lahr, author of Notes on a Cowardly Lion “Thoroughly interesting.” —The A.V. Club “The best general-audience analysis of musical theater I have read in many years.” —The Charlotte Observer “Delightful . . . a little bit history, a little bit memoir, a little bit criticism and, for any theater fan, a whole lot of fun.” —The Dallas Morning News


Blue Window

Blue Window

Author: Craig Lucas

Publisher: Samuel French, Inc.

Published: 1985

Total Pages: 78

ISBN-13: 9780573619540

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Depicts seven New Yorkers before, during and after a party.


The Oxford Handbook of the British Musical

The Oxford Handbook of the British Musical

Author: Robert Gordon

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 777

ISBN-13: 0199988749

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The first comprehensive academic survey of British musical theatre from its origins, The Oxford Handbook of the British Musical offers both a historical account of musical theatre from 1728 and a range of in-depth critical analyses of key works and productions that illustrate its aesthetic values and sociocultural meanings.


The Musical

The Musical

Author: William Everett

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2011-06-02

Total Pages: 333

ISBN-13: 1135848076

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The musical, whether on stage or screen, is undoubtedly one of the most recognizable musical genres, yet one of the most perplexing. What are its defining features? How does it negotiate multiple socio-cultural-economic spaces? Is it a popular tradition? Is it a commercial enterprise? Is it a sophisticated cultural product and signifier? This research guide includes more than 1,400 annotated entries related to the genre as it appears on stage and screen. It includes reference works, monographs, articles, anthologies, and websites related to the musical. Separate sections are devoted to sub-genres (such as operetta and megamusical), non-English language musical genres in the U.S., traditions outside the U.S., individual shows, creators, performers, and performance. The second edition reflects the notable increase in musical theater scholarship since 2000. In addition to printed materials, it includes multimedia and electronic resources.


Studying Musical Theatre

Studying Musical Theatre

Author: Millie Taylor

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2017-09-16

Total Pages: 275

ISBN-13: 1137270969

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This lively textbook provides a comprehensive overview of the history, theory and practice of this popular theatre form. Bringing critical theory and musical theatre together, Millie Taylor and Dominic Symonds explore the musical stage from a broad range of theoretical perspectives. Part 1 focuses on the way we understand musicals as texts and Part 2 then looks at how musical theatre negotiates its position in the wider world. Part 3 recognises the affiliations of various communities with the musical stage, and finally part 4 unravels the musical's relationship with time, space, intertextuality and entertainment. Written by leading experts in Musical Theatre and Drama, Taylor and Symonds utilise their wealth of knowledge to engage and educate the reader on this diverse subject. With its accessible and extensive content, this text is the ideal accompaniment to any study of musical theatre internationally: an essential tool for students of all levels, lecturers, practitioners and enthusiasts alike.


The Oxford Handbook of Sondheim Studies

The Oxford Handbook of Sondheim Studies

Author: Robert Gordon

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 517

ISBN-13: 0195391373

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This handbook presents a comprehensive introduction to all aspects of composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim's oeuvre. Chapters come from a remarkably wide range of disciplines as they offer new insights into Sondheim's work not only for the stage, but also for film and television, describing in full how Sondheim has re-shaped American musical theater.


The Cambridge Companion to the Musical

The Cambridge Companion to the Musical

Author: William A. Everett

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2017-09-21

Total Pages: 503

ISBN-13: 1107114748

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

An expanded and updated edition of this acclaimed, wide-ranging survey of musical theatre in New York, London, and elsewhere.


Musical Theatre, Realism and Entertainment

Musical Theatre, Realism and Entertainment

Author: Millie Taylor

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-04-29

Total Pages: 203

ISBN-13: 1317091361

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

What is it about musical theatre that audiences find entertaining? What are the features that lead to its ability to stimulate emotional attachment, to move and to give pleasure? Beginning from the passion musical theatre performances arouse and their ubiquity in London's West End and on Broadway this book explores the ways in which musical theatre reaches out to and involves its audiences. It investigates how pleasure is stimulated by vocal, musical and spectacular performances. Early discussions centre on the construction of the composed text, but then attention is given to performance and audience response. Musical theatre contains disruptions and dissonances in its multiple texts, it allows gaps for audiences to read playfully. This combines with the voluptuous sensations of embodied emotion, contagiously and viscerally shared between audience and stage, and augmented through the presence of voice and music. A number of features are discovered in the construction of musical theatre performance texts that allow them to engage the intense emotional attachment of their audiences and so achieve enormous popularity. In doing this, the book challenges the conception of musical theatre as 'only entertainment'. Entertainment instead becomes a desirable, ephemeral and playful concept.