Dedicated to mining the treasures of
20th century performing arts
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ESSAYS
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Non-traditional Casting
by Jack Marshall
In transferring the drama to Alabama and casting the play
with African American actors, The American Century Theater
and director Ed Bishop are to some extent changing the
author's intent and veering from the company's usual
production practice of trying to stay as close to the
spirit of the original show as possible. This is the
still-controversial realm of non-traditional casting, and
That Championship Season
is an excellent case study of the practice.
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rest of this essay
The One Hit Wonders of 1960-1975
by Andrew White, PhD.
Pop quiz:
What do Tad Mosel, Howard Sackler, Charles Gordone, Paul
Zindel and Jason Miller have in common?
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this essay
Making a New Play Out of Old Pieces
by Jack Marshall
Drama Under the Influence, the latest addition to
The American Century Theater's "Reflections" series,
demonstrates the stage director's creative and substantive
role in communicating ideas, subtext, historical
commentary and emotions that would not register on the
audience without his efforts.
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Women, the Theatre, and the Avant-garde
by Andrew White, PhD.
By the early 1900's, middle-class white women could adopt
the stage as a profession and enjoy respectable careers as
actors or playwrights. It was still a struggle, however,
for female playwrights to get their works produced. Some
of them simply shelved their plays; others responded by
creating their own small companies.
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essay
"Save Eugene O'Neill!"
by Jack Marshall
On January 2,the Washington Post reported that the Fairfax
County library system was dumping thousands of volumes
that had not been checked out in the last 24 months. Among
the classics tossed to make room for more novels by John
Grisham and Tom Clancy, the ghost-written autobiography of
Hillary Clinton and the fulminations of Bill O'Reilly and
Ann Coulter:
Gibbon's Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire;
Voltaire's Candide, Hemingway's
For Whom the Bell Tolls, and
To Kill a Mockingbird.
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