Harrigan & Hart by Albert C. Lefman
date: label: Date made
content: n.d.
name: label: depicted
content: Harrigan, Edward
label: depicted
content: Hart, Tony
label: maker
content: Lefman, A.C.
notes: label: Description
content: This black and white print contains bust portraits of two young men in jackets and ties, Edward Harrigan and Tony Hart. A banner reading “Harrigan and Hart” runs vertically between the two portraits.
label: Description
content: The location of a performance was overprinted at the top of the print. The location and date are "Newark Opera House, Monday, April 29". The historic Newark Opera House was built in 1885 in New Castle County, Delaware.
label: Description
content: Edward Harrigan and Tony Hart forged one of the best-known theatrical partnerships of the 19th Century. Edward Harrigan (1844-1911), often known as Ned Harrigan, was an actor, producer, and songwriter born in New York. He apprenticed in the shipbuilding trade before running away from home and launching a theatrical career in San Francisco, where he performed in minstrel and variety shows. He met Tony Hart (1855-1891) around 1870 in Chicago, and the two formed a vaudeville team that would last for the next 14 years. Harrigan brought his baritone voice and talent for writing witty comic dialogue to the team, while Hart was distinguished by his falsetto singing style, energetic acting, and talent for female impersonations. Harrigan's future father-in-law, Dave Braham, composed music for the act.
label: Description
content: By the mid-1870s, Harrigan and Hart had relocated to New York, taken over management of their own theater, and begun moving away from variety shows to full-length musical dramas. The shows reflected the ethnic diversity of New York at the time, depicting how Irish immigrant characters interacted—and often clashed--with the growing population of blacks and German Americans in New York at the time. Harrigan led the company as actor-manager.
label: Description
content: In 1873, Harrigan and Hart scored a major hit with a song, dance, and comedy skit set on the Lower East Side called <i> The Mulligan Guard </i>. It chronicled the adventures of an Irish neighborhood militia, one of the pseudo-military groups popular at the time. Harrigan played guard leader Dan Mulligan, while Hart appeared as various characters, including the Mulligan son Tommy and the family's black maid Rebecca, a role he performed in a dress, wig, and blackface. They expanded on their success with some forty Mulligan Guard shows performed at Broadway's Theatre Comique, where they were co-managers. Many of the shows ran for over a hundred performances.
label: Description
content: Portraying everyday people with both humor and humanity, the Mulligan productions became especially popular among middle and working-class Americans. They won accolades from critics for their accurate rendering of ethnic dialects and slang, as well as their realistic costumes and stage designs. The shows were also innovative in format, drawing on minstrel, burlesque and variety show traditions but also making greater use of connected story lines. After the Theatre Comique was torn down in 1881, Harrigan and Hart moved to the New Theatre Comique, but it was destroyed by a fire. The partnership dissolved after a dispute in 1885.
label: Description
content: Edward Harrigan opened up Harrigan's Park Theatre in 1890 and continued to write and perform in plays until 1910. He has been hailed as one of the founding fathers of the American musical, whose productions helped pioneer the authentic portrayal of working-class life in America. His songs were among the most popular of the era, including "The Mulligan Guard March," "The Babies on Our Block," and "Maggie Murphy's Home."
label: Description
content: Tony Hart was born Anthony J. Cannon in Worcester, Massachusetts. He was said to be the shortest member of his Irish American family and fought back teasing so fiercely that he was sent off to reform school. He soon ran away to New York, where he sang and danced in saloons and performed with minstrel troupes and circuses before meeting Edward Harrigan. It was then that he changed his name to Tony Hart. Following the success of the Mulligan Guard series and the dissolution of his partnership with Harrigan, Hart performed in roles including Isaac Roost in <i> A Toy Pistol </i>(1886) and Upton Dodge in <i> The Maid and the Moonshiner</i> (1886). He became increasingly unstable and was eventually committed to a mental institution. He died of syphilis at the age of 36.
label: Description
content: A musical titled <i> Harrigan 'n Hart </i>opened in 1985 on Broadway.
label: Description
content: This lithograph was produced by A. C. Lefman. Albert Clarence Lefman (1855 or 1860-1893) was an American lithographer. He was the youngest child of Sarah Lenington Thorne Lefman and German Jewish immigrant and merchant Henry Lefman. Albert was brought up in Hoboken, New Jersey and attended the Dutch Reformed Church. The city directory lists him as a lithographer living in New York City in 1881.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: World
topic: label: Subject
content: Theater
setName: label: See more items in
content: Home and Community Life: Domestic Life
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content: Advertising
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content: Art
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content: Peters Prints
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content: Domestic Furnishings
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Harry T. Peters "America on Stone" Lithography Collection
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: DL.60.3057
label: catalog number
content: 60.3057
label: accession number
content: 228146
objectType: label: Object Name
content: lithograph
label: Object Type
content: Lithograph
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: paper (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: ink (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: image: 24 1/2 in x 20 in; 62.23 cm x 50.8 cm