The Routledge Companion to Musical Theatre

Global in scope and featuring thirty-five chapters from more than fifty dance, music, and theatre scholars and practitioners, The Routledge Companion to Musical Theatre introduces the fundamentals of musical theatre studies and highlights developing global trends in practice and scholarship.
Investigating the who, what, when, where, why, and how of transnational musical theatre, The Routledge Companion to Musical Theatre is a comprehensive guide for those studying the components of musical theatre, its history, practitioners, audiences, and agendas. The Companion expands the study of musical theatre to include the ways we practice and experience musicals, their engagement with technology, and their navigation of international commercial marketplaces. The Companion is the first collection to include global musical theatre in each chapter, reflecting the musical's status as the world's most popular theatrical form. This book brings together practice and scholarship, featuring essays by leading and emerging scholars alongside luminaries such as Chinese musical theatre composer San Bao, Tony Award-winning star André De Shields, and Tony Award-winning director Diane Paulus.

This is an essential resource for students on theatre and performance courses and an invaluable text for researchers and practitioners in these areas of study.

List of contents

Foreword
Diane Paulus
Part 1: What
Introduction: On Musicals
San Bao

1. Musical Theater Mobilities: Around the World in Eighty Years

David Savran


2. An American in Tokyo? Musical Theatre Dance's Transnational Movements

Ryan Donovan


3. "How a World Can Seem So Vast": The Craft of Musical Theatre Dramaturgy

Lindsey R. Barr and Laura MacDonald


4. The Singing Voice

Masi Asare


5. "The Song Is You": Song Types and Genres in Musical Theatre

William A. Everett
Part 2: When
Introduction: Dark Primal Energy, Ancestor Memory, and American Exceptionalism
André De Shields with Kenneth J. Cerniglia


6. From Ballad Opera to Minstrelsy and Back: Social Class, Race, and Gender on the North American Musical Stage

Kristin Moriah


7. From the 1870s through World War I: The Spectre and Spectacle of the Human Body

Maya Cantu


8. Boom to Bust: Genre Borders, Color Lines, and Women Stars in the Musical between the World Wars

Todd Decker


9. World War II and the Cold War: Reflections and Refractions of Ourselves, Then and Now

Dominic McHugh


10. Since the 1980s: The Global Musical Theatre Ecology

Kelsey Blair
Part 3: Who
Introduction: Who Makes a Musical?
Georgia Stitt


11. Musical Theatre Training in the Twenty-First Century: A Primer

Amy S. Osatinski and Bud Coleman


12. "Forget About the Boy": Women and Creative Collaborations in Musical Theatre

Arianne Johnson Quinn and Clare Chandler


13. Good Gals Wear Black: Offstage Labor and the Musical

Christine Snyder


14. Mediated Taste: The Role of Critics

Paul R. Laird


15. From Stage Door to Cyberspace: The Digital Evolution of Musical Theatre Fandom

Adam Rush and Stephanie Lim
Part 4: How
Introduction: How Musicals Work: A Press Representative's View
Chris Boneau


16. Fitting the Slipper: The Art of Adaptation for the Musical Stage

William A. Everett


17. Harnessing Technology: The Evolving Labor of Design in Musical Theatre

Virginia Anderson


18. Humming the Scenery: The Aesthetics of Musical Theatre Spectacle

Douglas L. Reside


19. "That's Showbiz, Kid": Casting as Process and Product

Ryan Donovan


20. The Foundation, Function, and Future of the Musical Theatre Director

Mary Jo Lodge and Anne Healy


21. How Dancers and Choreographers Work: The Laboring Bodies of Musical Theatre

Joanna Dee Das


22. "The Name on Everybody's Lips": Marketing Musical Theatre

Laura MacDonald


23. A Critical Guide to Code-Meshing, Multilingualism, and Musicals

Samuel Yates
Part 5: Where
Introduction: Scenes from a Showbiz Couple's Travelogue
Kim Varhola


24. Centers of Musical Theatre

Alex Bádue, Jennifer C.H.J. Wilson, Laura Milburn, Leesi Patrick, and Sir Anril P. Tiatco


25. Pilots and Petticoats: Original Musicals in Continental Europe

Jeroen van Wijhe and Jacek Mikolajczyk


26. The Broadway-Style Musical in/and Global Asias: 1920-2019

Sissi Liu and Rina Tanaka


27. "One of the best ways to please the locals is to go to New York": US American Regional Theatres and New Musical Theatre Development

Claudia Wilsch Case


28. "We're All in This Together": Student and Amateur Performances

Kenneth J. Cerniglia


29. Mediated Musical Theatre

Sam O'Connell
Part 6: Why
Introduction: Into the Theatre
Yilun (Della) Wu


30. Journeys to the Past: The Uses of Memory and Nostalgia in Musical Theatre

Bryan M. Vandevender


31. What's in a Name? The Multiplicities of the Musical

John Koegel


32. Interrogating America's National Myth Onstage: Case Studies on the Individual and the Community in U.S. Musical Theatre

Katie Welsh and Stacy Wolf


33. Translating Race in Musical Theatre

Ji Hon (Kayla) Yuh and Emilio Méndez Rios


34. "Art Isn't Easy" (and Neither is Commerce): The Musical Stays in the Money

Michael Schwartz


35. "World"-Traveling, Diversity, Inclusion, and the Making of Musicals in the Twenty-First Century

Trevor Boffone

About the author

Laura MacDonald is Assistant Professor in the Residential College in the Arts and Humanities at Michigan State University. With William A. Everett, she edited The Palgrave Handbook of Musical Theatre Producers (2017). She writes about long-running musicals on Broadway, in Europe, and in East Asia.
Ryan Donovan is Assistant Professor of Theater Studies at Duke University. He is the author of Broadway Bodies: A Critical History of Conformity (Oxford) and Queer Approaches in Musical Theatre (Bloomsbury), and he co-edited the special issue of Studies in Musical Theatre on musical theatre dance.

Summary

Global in scope and featuring thirty-five chapters from more than fifty dance, music, and theatre scholars and practitioners, The Routledge Companion to Musical Theatre introduces the fundamentals of musical theatre studies and highlights developing global trends in practice and scholarship.

Product details

• Assisted by: Ryan Donovan (Editor), Donovan Ryan (Editor), Laura Macdonald (Editor), MacDonald Laura (Editor)
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 04.10.2024
• EAN: 9781032394107
• ISBN: 978-1-0-3239410-7
• No. of pages: 626
• Dimensions: 174 mm x 33 mm x 246 mm
• Weight: 1160 g
• Illustrations: 23 SW-Abb., 22 SW-Fotos, 1 SW-Zeichn., 8 Tabellen
• Series: Routledge Companions
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Art > Theatre, ballet; Musicals, PERFORMING ARTS / General, PERFORMING ARTS / Theater / General, PERFORMING ARTS / Theater / Broadway & Musicals, Theatre Studies