What follows provides a brief background to my ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE NEW YORK STAGE, 1970-1975 project. It also includes a list of previous entries, which will continue to be updated.
"In Lieu of Reviews"
Around 40 years ago, I began a major
project that eventuated in the publication of my multivolume series, The
Encyclopedia of the New York Stage, each volume covering a decade. For some
reason now lost to the sands of time, I chose to start with the 1970s. After
writing all the entries through 1975 and producing a typed manuscript of 1,038
pages my publisher (Greenwood) and I decided it would be best to commence with
the 1920s. So the 1970-1975 material was put aside as I produced volumes for
1920-1930, 1930-1940, and 1940-1950. With those concluded, Greenwood decided it
was all too expensive and not sufficiently profitable, so the remaining volumes
were cancelled, leaving my 1970s entries in limbo.
To compensate, I used the research
I’d done on the 1970s to write a book for Greenwood called Ten Seasons:
New York Theatre in the Seventies, which described all aspects of that
era’s theatre, onstage and off. Many years later, in 2012, I began a
postretirement “career” as a theatre reviewer, which led to my creating this
blog as an outlet for my reviews. Over the past eight years or so I’ve posted
nearly 1,600 reviews, a substantial number having first appeared on other
websites: Theater Pizzazz, The Broadway Blog, and Theater Life.
Now, however, with the New York
theatre in suspension, and my reviewing completely halted, is probably the
perfect time to post as many as possible of the entries I prepared for the never-published
1970-1975 book. The entries that follow are in alphabetical order. Each entry
has a heading listing the subject categories of the work described: the author
(A), the director (D), additional staging (ADD ST), when credited; the producer
(P), the set designer (S), the costume designer (C), the lighting designer (L),
the source (SC), the theatre (T), the dates of the run, and, in parentheses,
the length of the run. The original entries also contained the names of all the
actors but I’ve omitted those here.
I will try to post at least one
entry daily. When time allows, I’ll provide more. The manuscript exists on
fading, fragile paper and, because no digital files exist, must be retyped.
Hopefully, the tragic health situation we’re all enduring will abate before I
get too far into posting these entries but, for the time being, devoted theatre
lovers may find reading these materials informative.
Previous Entries: This list will continue to be updated
Abelard and Heloise
Absurd Person
Singular
AC/DC
“Acrobats”
and “Line”
The Advertisement/
All My Sons
All Over
All Over Town
All the Girls Came
Out to Play
Alpha Beta
L’Amante
Anglais
Ambassador
American Gothics
Amphitryon
And Miss Reardon
Drinks a Little
And They Put
Handcuffs on the Flowers
And Whose Little
Boy Are You?
Anna K.
Anne of Green
Gables
Antigone
Antiques
Any Resemblance to Persons Living or Dead
Applause
Ari
As You Like It
Augusta
The Au Pair Man
Baba Goya [Nourish the Beast]
The Ballad of Johnny Pot
Barbary Shore
The Bar that Never Closes
The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel
The Beauty Part
The Beggar’s Opera
Behold! Cometh the Vanderkellens
Be Kind to People Week
Berlin to Broadway with Kurt Weill
Bette Midler’s Clams on a Half-Shell Revue
Black Girl
Black Light Theatre of Prague
Black Picture Show
Black Sunlight
The Black Terror
Black Visions
Les Blancs
Blasts and Bravos: An Evening with H,L.
Mencken
Blood
Bluebeard
Blue Boys
Bob and Ray—The Two and Only
Boesman and Lena
The Boy Who Came to Leave
Bread
A Breeze from the Gulf
Brief Lives
Brother Gorski
Brothers
Bullshot Crummond
Bunraku
The Burnt Flower Bed
Butley
Button, Button
Buy Bonds, Buster
The Cage
Camille
Candide (1)
Candide (2)
The Candyapple
Captain Brassbound’s Conversion
The Caretaker
La Carpa de los Raquichis
The Carpenters
The Castro Complex
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
The Changing Room
Charles Abbott and Son
Charley’s Aunt
Charlie Was Here and Now He’s Gone
Chemin de Fer
The Cherry Orchard
The Chickencoop Chinaman
The Children
Children! Children!
Children in the Rain
Children of the Wind
The Children’s Mass
A Chorus Line
The Chronicle of Henry VI: Part 1, Part
II,
The Circle
Clarence Darrow
Cold Feet
Conditions of Agreement
Coney Island Cycle
The Constant Wife
The Contractor
The Contrast
The Constant Wife
The Country Girl
Crazy Now
The Creation of the
World and Other Business
Creeps
The Crucible
Crystal and Fox
Cyrano
Dames at Sea
The Dance of Death
Dance wi’Me/Dance with
Me
A Day in the Life of
Just about Everyone
Dear Nobody
Dear Oscar
The
Desert Song
Diamond
Studs
Different
Times
The
Dirtiest Show in Town
The
Divorce of Judy and Jane
Do It Again!
Doctor
Jazz
A
Doll’s House (2)
Don
Juan
Don
Juan in Hell
Don’t
Bother Me, I Can’t Cope
Don’t
Call Back
Don’t
Play Us Cheap!
Drat!
The
Dream on Monkey Mountain
A Dream Out of Time
Dreyfus in Rehearsal
Dude: The Highway Life
The Duplex
The Dybbuk
Dylan
Earl of Ruston
Earthlight
Echoes
Elizabeth I
Earl of Ruston
Earthlight
Echoes
Elizabeth I
