The 1950s saw an explosion in the American musical theater. The Broadway show, catapulted into the limelight in the 1920s and solidified during the 1940s thanks to Rodgers and Hammerstein, now entered its most revolutionary phase, brashly redefining itself and forging a new kind…
Giving each of Stephen Sondheim's musicals its own chapter, Ethan Mordden applies fresh insights and analysis to consider Sondheim's place in modern art, addressing the newcomer and the aficionado alike.
"Flop Musicals of the Twenty First Century offers a provocative and revealing historical narrative a group of musicals that cost millions, were created by world-renowned writers and directors, and that had spectacular potential... but bombed anyway. Stephen Purdy asks the reader…
Alan Jay Lerner wrote the lyrics for some of the most beloved musicals in Broadway and Hollywood history. Most notably, with composer Frederick Loewe he created enduring hits such as My Fair Lady, Gigi, Camelot, and Brigadoon. In The Complete Lyrics of Alan Jay Lerner, editors a…
"'Blossom of snow may you bloom and grow, Bloom and grow forever' Often dismissed as kitsch sentimentalism, Rodger and Hammerstein's The Sound of Music has proven an enduringly popular and surprisingly influential cultural icon, both within the field of musical theatre and the w…
Bob Fosse (1927-87) is recognized as one of the most significant figures in the post-World War II American musical theater. With his first Broadway musical, The Pajama Game in 1954, the "Fosse style" was already fully developed, with the hunched shoulders, turned in stance, and …
