The Thermidor lobster at the movies? The Montclair History Center shares the history of the Bellevue Theater
The Bellevue Theater, 1922, with a canopy entrance The Montclair History Center gave a presentation…
Browsing: Theatre history
It’s time for the solo musical show! Will document 100 years of musical theater history
UnsungMusicalsCo., the nonprofit production entity that celebrates the historical legacy and cultural impact of American…
RetroIndy: History of the Circle Theater
Just after the Circle Theater opened on August 30, 1916, all 3,100 seats were filled,…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: September 2
1918 A stage adaptation of Booth Tarkington’s popular Penrod stories proves a bust. Opening at…
AMERICAN THEATER | This Month in Theater History (August 2016)
DeLanna Studi at the World Premiere of “Te Ata” at Oklahoma University of Science and…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: June 7
1909 Broadway star’s birthday Jessica Tandy, who created many notable roles including Blanche DuBois in…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: September 1
1898 Birthday of one of Broadway’s most endearing performers of the 1920s, Marilyn Miller, whose…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: August 31
1897 John Drew and Billie Burke (in her Broadway debut) star in the new play,…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: December 7
1879 The composer Rudolf Friml was born in Prague. He emigrated to the United States…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: June 15
1894 Birthday of Robert Russell Bennett, orchestrator of Broadway classics, including the original Sunny, Show…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 14
1903 Opening night of The little PrincessFrances Hodgson Burnett’s play about a child, in the…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: December 18
1907 Playwright Christopher Fry, author of Ring Around the Moon and The lady is not…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 11
1903 In runaways, with a book by Addison Burkhardt and a score by Raymond Hubbell,…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 28
Happy birthday, Alan Alda. 1908 J. Lucifer Mephisto tempts a sculptor to be unfaithful to…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 5
1894 Henrik Ibsen’s American premiere Ghosts, with Ida Jeffries Goodfriend, at the Berkeley Lyceum Theater.…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: November 16
1889 Playwright and director George S. Kaufman was born in Pittsburgh. Former journalist, Kaufman makes…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 6
1768 Birthday of John Durang, identified by scholars as one of the first American-born professional…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: February 11
1901 A man marries his bride Quiet because his parents want him to finish Yale.…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 29
1951 Interpreter Fanny Brice dies in Hollywood at the age of 60. Her showbiz career…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: December 26
1904 Maude Adams returns to Broadway with a revival of JM Barrie The little minister.…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: December 2
1912 firefly sparkles the Lyric Theater with music by Rudolf Friml and lyrics and a…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: November 28
1923 Lionel Barrymore plays in David Belasco Laugh, clown, laugh!, the Pagliacci-like story of a…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: October 29
1882 Birth of the French playwright Jean Giraudoux, author of La Folle de Chaillot, Ondine,…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 14
1931 Playwright and producer David Belasco dies in New York. He began his theatrical life…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 18
1923 Sweet Nell of old Drury opens at the 48th Street Theater in New York.…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: December 12
1902 There are two beginnings in Each man: Edith Wynne Matthison makes her American debut,…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 29
1860 Birthday of Anton Chekhov, one of the fathers of modern theatre, whose relatively small…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: November 24
1849 Birthday of writer Frances Hodgson Burnett, author of several Broadway plays in the early…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: November 6
1854 Birthday of John Philip Sousa, composer of countless marches, who also found time to…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 4
1905 Shaky-voiced actor Sterling Holloway was born in Cedartown, Georgia. It becomes a Broadway staple…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 28
1940 Victor Moore, William Gaxton and Vera Zorina star in Purchase in Louisiana. The musical…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: February 20
1893 Birthday of the playwright and producer Russel Crouse, whose prodigious output of scripts -…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 7
1920 Vincenzo Scognamiglio was born in Naples, Italy. Sound unfamiliar to you? To try Vincent…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 23
Happy birthday, Chita Rivera! 1922 It’s alcohol, jazz and The National anthem. J. Hartley Manners’…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: December 30
1907 In The Comet, Alla Nazimova plays a woman who falls in love with her…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 3
1909 Birthday of Victor Borge, pianist and actor whose 1953 musical comedy runs 888 performances,…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 30
1868 Producer, director and manager Birth of Charles Dillingham. Dillingham’s dozens of productions include Like…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 21
1929 Highlights of A night in Venice include Ted Healy’s wrestling bears and Busby Berkeley’s…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: March 10
1925 Ernest Truex is The fell guy for a group of dealers. The James Gleason-George…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: March 9
In 2008, In the heights opens on Broadway. 1856 Comedian Eddie Foy was born. He…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: July 6
1939 A young Hollywood hopeful is forced to see her own career sparkle as her…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: April 29
1899 Happy birthday Edward Kennedy Ellington, who, taking the surname “Duke”, becomes one of the…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: June 2
1954 Rodgers and Hammerstein Carousel is relaunched for a 10-week run at the New York…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 20
1919 Guy Bolton and PG Wodehouse call it Time to fuck at the Winter Garden…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: February 14
1882 Birthday of John Barrymore, actor in the grand style and descendant of the Barrymore…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: April 28
1900 Cho-Cho San and her passionate and tragic love illuminate David Belasco’s adaptation of John…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: November 10
1900 Opening night of the legendary musical Floradora at the Casino Theater for a run…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: June 21
1903 Cartoonist Al Hirschfeld was born in St. Louis, Missouri. His distinctive looping line drawings…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: June 17
1943 George Marion, Jr. and Thomas “Fats” Waller’s Goes to bed early opens on Broadway…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: June 1
1914 The Ziegfeld follies of 1914 stars Ed Wynn. Leon Errol dances and co-directs with…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 12
1905 Theater producer Sam S. Shubert dies in a train accident. His brothers Lee and…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: November 21
1694 Birthday of French author François Marie Arouet, better known as Voltaire, whose satirical novel…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: June 25
1887 Anniversary of legendary director George Abbott, whose long life (107 years) and colossal catalog…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: September 14
1910 Birthday of Lehman Engel, the award-winning Broadway conductor who founded the BMI Musical Theater…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 2
1887 Birthday of Vernon Castle who, along with his wife and dance partner Irene Castle,…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: July 28
1920 Two of Broadway’s greatest songwriting talents make their Main Stem debut: lyricist Lorenz Hart,…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: July 12
1895 Birthday of Oscar Hammerstein II, scion of a notable theatrical family who became its…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 13
1907 Writer-playwright Daphné du Maurier was born to actors Gérald and Muriel du Maurier. Daphne…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: January 27
In 1991 Stephen Sondheim killers opens Off-Broadway. 1885 master tunesmith birthday Jerome Kern, who wrote…
Playbill Vault’s Today in Theater History: May 5
1955 Baseball, ballet and Gwen Verdon provide the slugging power in Cursed Yankees. Adapted by…
A Lost History of Musical Theater
Recently, I purchased a rather remarkable piece of equipment. For less than two hundred dollars,…