Transposing Broadway
Subtitle: Jews, assimilation, and the American musical
By: by Stuart J. Hecht
Series: Palgrave studies in theatre and performance history
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Published: 2011
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 240
ISBN-13: 9780230113275
Subjects: Cultural assimilation; History; Jews; Ethnic identity; Musicals
Description: Over the last hundred years, musical theatre artists - from Berlin to Rodgers and Hammerstein to Sondheim - have developed a form that corresponds directly to the Americanization of the increasingly Jewish New York audience; and that audience's aspirations and concerns have played out in the shows themselves. Musicals thus became a paradigm which instructed newcomers in how to assimilate while correspondingly envisioning "American Dream" America as democratic and inclusive. Broadway musicals still continue to function today as "cultural Ellis Islands" for fringe populations seeking acceptance into the nation's mainstream - including women, blacks, Latinos, and gays - all essentially modeled upon the Jewish example. Stuart J. Hecht offers a fascinatingexamination of the relationship between Jews, assimilation, and the changing face of the American musical.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [221]-226) and index.
Table of contents: title: Introduction : Broadway as a cultural Ellis Island; title: Hello, young lovers : assimilation and dramatic configurations; title: The melting pot paradigm of Irving Berlin; title: How to succeed; title: Cinderellas; title: Turns of the century : dreams of progress, dreams of loss; title: Fiddler's children; title: Epilogue : loveable monsters.