Theater Quiz 1

Victor Herbert

(1859–1924) was an Irish-American composer, conductor, cellist, and major figure in early American musical theatre. He wrote many popular operettas, including Babes in Toyland (1903) and Naughty Marietta (1910). He helped establish the tradition of the American musical before the dominance of composers like George Gershwin and Rodgers & Hammerstein.

George M. Cohan

was an American composer, lyricist, playwright, performer, producer, and dancer. Known as “The Man Who Owned Broadway,” he was one of the most influential figures in early American musical theatre. He wrote and starred in shows such as Little Johnny Jones (1904) and wrote famous songs including “Give My Regards to Broadway” and “Over There.” He helped shape the style and business of American musical theatre in the early 20th century.

Yankee Doodle dandy. Statue of him in broadway. Did all the work himself

Gilbert & Sullivan

were a famous British theatrical partnership:

• W. S. Gilbert – wrote the librettos (words/dialogue)

• Arthur Sullivan – composed the music

• They created popular comic operas, including H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance, and The Mikado.

• Their works influenced the development of modern musical theatre and operetta, especially through their combination of comedy, memorable songs, and spoken dialogue.

books and lyrics written first, then music second

Late 1800s

Florenz Ziegfeld

(1867–1932)

was an American Broadway producer best known for creating the Ziegfeld Follies, a series of lavish theatrical revues that ran from 1907 to 1931. He became famous for spectacular productions featuring elaborate sets, costumes, music, dancing, and glamorous performers. His productions helped establish the spectacle and star-driven style of early 20th-century American musical theatre.

"Glorifying the American Girl"

Fanny Brice

1891–1951) was an American comedienne, singer, actress, and performer who became one of the biggest stars of the Ziegfeld Follies. She was known for her comedic performances, singing, and distinctive stage personality. Her life later inspired the musical Funny Girl, in which she was portrayed by Barbra Streisand.

Not seen as the typical beautiful girl, known for her comedy.

Harrigan and Hart

Edward Harrigan and Tony Hart were a famous American theatrical team in the late 1800s. They created musical comedies featuring everyday American characters, humor, songs, and realistic settings. Their work helped develop an American style of musical theatre, moving away from European operetta.

Key point: They are important for helping create early American musical comedy.

Made fun of irish characters

Weber and Fields

were a popular comedy duo and theatrical producers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They became known for their broad physical comedy, exaggerated characters, jokes, songs, and comic stage productions.

• Joe Weber – comedian and performer

• Lew Fields – comedian, performer, and producer

• Their productions helped develop American musical comedy and vaudeville-style entertainment.

• They were especially known for their fast-paced, over-the-top comedy.

Made fun of dutch characters

Williams (Bert Williams) and Walker

were a pioneering African American comedy and musical theatre team in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They became major performers in vaudeville and musical comedy and helped open opportunities for Black performers on the American stage.

• Bert Williams – comedian, singer, and actor known for his distinctive comic style.

• George Walker – comedian, singer, dancer, and performer.

• They starred in successful shows such as In Dahomey (1902), one of the first major Broadway musicals written and performed by African Americans.

• Key point: They were important pioneers in the development and visibility of African American musical theatre.

• Came from the minstrel shows

Irving Berlin

(1888–1989) was a hugely influential American composer and lyricist who wrote hundreds of songs and helped shape American popular music and musical theatre.

• Wrote the music and lyrics for Annie Get Your Gun (1946).

• Wrote famous songs such as “White Christmas,” “God Bless America,” and “There’s No Business Like Show Business.”

• His songs became an important part of American musical theatre and popular culture.

• Key point: Berlin was largely self-taught and became one of the most successful American songwriters of the 20th century.

Marilyn Miller

(1898–1936) was a major Broadway musical star during the 1920s and early 1930s.

• She was known for her singing, dancing, acting, and charm.

• She became famous through Florenz Ziegfeld’s productions.

• She starred in popular musicals including Sally (1920), Sunny (1925), and Rosalie (1928).

• Key point: Miller helped establish the idea of the triple-threat musical theatre performer—someone skilled at acting, singing, and dancing.

Al Jolson

(1886–1950) was a major American singer, actor, and vaudeville performer who became one of the most famous entertainers of the early 20th century.

• Known for his energetic performance style and strong emotional connection with audiences.

• Starred in the Broadway musical Sinbad and became especially famous for The Jazz Singer (1927), the first feature-length film with synchronized spoken dialogue and singing.

• He was a major figure in the transition from vaudeville and stage entertainment to film.

• Key point: Jolson was one of the most influential entertainers of the early era of American musical performance, though his career also included blackface performances, which are now recognized as racist and harmful.

George Gershwin

(1898–1937) was an American composer and pianist who combined jazz, classical music, and popular music.

• He wrote the music for the musical Funny Face and the opera Porgy and Bess.

• Famous works include “Rhapsody in Blue” and “An American in Paris.”

• He often collaborated with his brother Ira Gershwin, who wrote many of the lyrics.

• Key point: Gershwin helped blend jazz and classical styles, greatly influencing American musical theatre and music.

• Amazing piano skills. "“Swanie"“

Oscar Hammerstein II

(1895–1960) was an American lyricist, librettist, and theatre producer who helped revolutionize musical theatre.

• Best known for his partnership with composer Richard Rodgers — Rodgers and Hammerstein.

• Their musicals included Oklahoma! (1943), Carousel, South Pacific, The King and I, and The Sound of Music.

• He helped develop the “integrated musical,” where songs, dances, and story work together to advance the plot and develop characters.

• Key point: Hammerstein helped transform musicals from primarily entertainment-focused shows into story-driven theatrical works.

Libretto and lyrics for showboat

Sunny with jerome kern

Jerome Kern

(1885–1945) was an American composer who played a major role in the development of the modern musical.

• Best known for composing Show Boat (1927), with lyrics/libretto by Oscar Hammerstein II.

• Show Boat was important because its songs were closely connected to the story and characters, helping advance the idea of the integrated musical.

• Famous songs include “Ol’ Man River” and “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man.”

• Key point: Kern helped move musical theatre from loosely connected songs and comedy toward musicals with stronger stories and character development.

Busby Berkeley

(1895–1976) was an American choreographer and film director known for creating spectacular, highly synchronized dance numbers.

• Famous for large-scale dance productions featuring dozens of dancers.

• Used creative camera angles, geometric patterns, and overhead shots to make dancers form elaborate shapes.

• Worked on musical films such as 42nd Street (1933) and Gold Diggers of 1933.

• Key point: Berkeley transformed musical dance numbers into visual spectacles designed specifically for the camera.

Cole Porter

(1891–1964) was an American composer and lyricist known for his sophisticated, witty songs and Broadway musicals.

• He often wrote both the music and lyrics for his songs.

• Famous musicals include Anything Goes, Kiss Me, Kate, and Can-Can.

• Famous songs include “I Get a Kick Out of You,” “Night and Day,” and “Anything Goes.”

• His work is known for clever wordplay, sophisticated lyrics, and memorable melodies.

• Key point: Porter was one of the major Broadway songwriters of the Golden Age of musical theatre.

Most successful composer/lyrcist of the 1930s.

Little Johnny Jones

1. Little Johnny Jones (1904) was a musical written by George M. Cohan.

   • It follows an American jockey, Little Johnny Jones, who travels to England to compete in a major horse race.

   • The show featured popular songs such as “Give My Regards to Broadway” and “The Yankee Doodle Boy.”

   • It helped establish Cohan's style of fast-paced, patriotic American musical comedy.

   • Key point: The musical is important in the development of early American musical theatre and helped make George M. Cohan a major Broadway figure.

Show Boat

(1927) is a musical with music by Jerome Kern and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, based on Edna Ferber’s novel.

• It follows the lives of performers and workers aboard a Mississippi River show boat.

• It dealt with serious subjects such as racism, interracial marriage, and social class.

• Songs include “Ol’ Man River,” “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man,” and “Make Believe.”

• Key point: Show Boat is considered a major step toward the integrated musical, where songs and dances help develop the story and characters rather than simply providing entertainment.

The Cotton Club

1. was a famous Harlem nightclub in New York City that became especially prominent during the 1920s and 1930s.

   • It featured performances by major Black musicians, singers, and dancers, including Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway.

   • Despite showcasing Black talent, the club primarily served a white audience and operated under racial segregation.

   • It was an important venue during the Harlem Renaissance and the development of jazz and popular entertainment.

   • Key point: The Cotton Club helped bring Black musical and performance styles to wider American audiences, while also reflecting the racial inequalities of its era.

The Hollywood Studio System

1. The Hollywood Studio System was the system used by major American movie studios, especially from the 1920s–1950s, to control much of the film industry.

   • Major studios such as MGM, Warner Bros., Paramount, 20th Century Fox, and RKO controlled film production, distribution, and theaters.

   • Studios often placed actors, directors, and other performers under long-term contracts.

   • Musicals became a major part of Hollywood filmmaking, with studios creating elaborate song-and-dance productions.

   • Key point: The system turned filmmaking into a highly organized industry and helped make movie musicals a major form of entertainment.

The Jazz Singer

(1927) was a landmark American musical film starring Al Jolson.

• It is famous for being the first feature-length film with synchronized spoken dialogue and singing.

• It marked an important transition from silent films to “talkies.”

• Jolson performs songs including “Dirty Hands, Dirty Face” and “My Mammy.”

• The film also contains blackface, a racist performance practice that is now widely recognized as harmful.

• Key point: The Jazz Singer helped demonstrate the commercial potential of sound in movies and accelerated the decline of silent films.

The Broadway Melody of 1929

1. (1929) was an early Hollywood musical film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).

   • It was one of the first major all-talking, all-singing, all-dancing films.

   • It helped establish the movie musical as a popular Hollywood genre.

   • The film won the Academy Award for Best Picture at the 2nd Academy Awards.

   • It featured elaborate song-and-dance numbers and helped demonstrate the possibilities of synchronized sound.

   • Key point: The Broadway Melody helped launch the early Hollywood musical era after the transition from silent films to sound.

ancestors/antecedents

Opera

 European Operetta(French and Viennese)

 Minstrel Shows

 The Black Crook

 Ethnic Variety Shows

 Farce Comedies

 Vaudeville

 Gilbert & Sullivan

 American Burlesque

 George M. Cohan and early musical comedies

 Victor Herbert and American Operetta

 Revues

Opera

is the earliest true ancestor of the musical. It originated in Italy at

the end of the 16th Century.

• Greeks used choral interludes (5th Century BC)

• Music was involved in medieval mystery plays (1300-1500s)

• Songs in Shakespeare plays break action and set mood (late

16th, early 17th Century)

Opera, however, integrates story, music, words and spectacle.

European Operetta

French and

 Clever, racy and lightweight (as opposed to grand opera

sponsored by the government)

 Lighter in terms of its music, orchestral size, length of work, and at

face value, subject matter.

 Socially/politically satiric farces that used mythology, but with

contemporary references

 Through-composed

Minstrel Shows

The first uniquely American entertainment form

 Northern white men blackened their faces,

adopted heavy dialects and performed what

they claimed were black songs, dances and

jokes, to entertain white Americans

 No one took minstrel shows seriously. They were

meant to be light, meaningless entertainment

 Minstrel Shows were flat-out racist

 Blackface turned prejudice into profit

 Minstrel shows developed in the 1840’s, peaked

after the Civil War and remained popular into the

early 1900s.

 Only entertainment form born out of blind bigotry.

 A shameful chapter in the history of Musical

Theatre.

The Black Crook 1866

Opened Sept 12, 1866 at Niblo’s Garden

at Broadway and Prince St. (3200 seats)

 Its origin was an accident

 Melodrama with no music and a French

ballet company with lavish sets and over

100 scantily-clad female dancers,

merged

 Faust story – Story of a man who sells his

soul to the devil.

 The dancing girls: “immodest dress, short

skirts, flesh-colored tights and

exceedingly indelicate attitudes.”

 Created a mild scandal

 16 month run, revived on Broadway 8

times, toured for over 40 years

Ethnic Variety Shows

Entertainment for working-class

men in working-class

neighborhoods.

 Assortment of acts with a

headliner. Performed in saloons

with bawdy waitresses.

 Booze remained a crucial

presence in these variety houses

 Entertainment kept the regular

customers drinking

Farce Comedy/Comedy Duos

An extension of the minstrel

afterpiece with a semblance

of a plot.

 These comedy duos featured

characters and situations

taken from the everyday life

of New York’s lower class.

 Harrigan and Hart were the

most popular figures in the

development of the farce-

comedy. Lovingly made fun

of Irish personalities and

traditions.

 Weber and Fields disguised

their obvious Jewish roots by

taking on the “Dutch”

characteristics of 2

knockabout comedic

immigrants named Mike and

Meyer. They Made fun of

popular plays or novels of the

day (parodies)

Vaudeville

Tony Pastor opened variety music hall in the Bowery in

1865

 In 1881, he moved uptown (14th St) to start clean

entertainment for the carriage trade (middle-class

families).

 Featured almost a dozen different artists or acts at a

time, performing all kinds of material in programs called

Bills.

 Other producers followed and called these shows

vaudeville.

 Ticket prices were cheap, but the variety was

enormous.

 From 1890s-1920s Vaudeville was the most popular form

of entertainment

vaudeville circuits

vaudeville circuits

A Vaudeville

Circuit was a

chain of theaters

that were booked

by the season.

The most famous

was the Orpheum

Circuit run by

Keith & Albee

Early American Burlesque

Burlesque means “to spoof”

 More than hip grinding strippers and suggestive jokes

 Burlesque performers formed troupes that spent a full

season traveling together to theatres organized as wheels

(as opposed to Vaudeville circuits)

 Offered the same kind of acts found in Vaudeville-singers,

dancers, comics, skits, and specialty acts. Burlesque also

featured a female chorus

 Burlesque comedy appealed to the working and lower

class audiences-lots of physical gags

 Not about sex. It was about the hilarious lengths men go in

pursuit of it

 Burlesque wheels declined on the 1920s. To revive audience

interest, strip-tease dancers became a new staple

 21st Century has brought an upsurge of alternative “new

burlesque” (Naughty fun has not gone out of style)

Victor Herbert and American Operetta

• He was influenced by European operetta, especially the works of composers such as Johann Strauss II.

• He helped adapt the operetta tradition for American audiences.

• His works combined romantic stories, comedy, memorable melodies, and elaborate orchestration.

• Important operettas include Babes in Toyland (1903), Naughty Marietta (1910), and The Red Mill (1906).

• Key point: Herbert helped establish American operetta and influenced the development of later American musical theatre.

Revues

are theatrical productions made up of a series of separate songs, dances, comedy sketches, and other acts, rather than one continuous story.

• Often featured large ensembles, elaborate costumes, and popular performers.

• They were especially popular in American theatre during the early 20th century.

• Famous examples include the Ziegfeld Follies, produced by Florenz Ziegfeld.

• Unlike an integrated musical, the individual numbers in a revue usually do not need to advance a single plot.

• Key point: Revues focused on entertainment and spectacle rather than telling one continuous story.

Opening Number

is the first major song or musical number of a musical.

• It introduces the setting, characters, mood, or main ideas of the show.

• It can establish the style and energy of the production.

• Often performed by an ensemble, but may focus on one or more main characters.

• Key point: The opening number sets the stage for the story and introduces the audience to the world of the musical.

Overture

1. is an instrumental piece played before a musical begins, traditionally while the audience is taking their seats.

   • Usually features melodies from songs that will appear later in the show.

   • Helps establish the musical themes and mood.

   • Unlike an opening number, an overture is generally instrumental and occurs before the story begins.

   • Key point: An overture is a musical introduction to the show.

Libretto / Librettist

The libretto is the written story, dialogue, and stage directions of a musical or opera. The librettist is the person who writes it.

• Libretto = the script/book

• Librettist = the writer

• Key point: The libretto provides the story and structure of the musical.

Score / Composer

The score is the music written for a musical, including the songs and instrumental music. The composer is the person who writes the music.

• Score = the music

• Composer = the music writer

• Key point: The composer creates the musical elements of the production.

Lyrics / Lyricist

Lyrics are the words that are sung in a musical. The lyricist is the person who writes those words.

• Lyrics = sung words

• Lyricist = writer of the sung words

• Key point: The lyricist creates the words for the songs.

Director

responsible for shaping the overall artistic and dramatic vision of a musical.

• Works with actors on characterization and performance

• Determines staging and interpretation

• Collaborates with designers and other members of the creative team

• Key point: The director guides how the story is performed onstage.

Choreographer

creates and teaches the dance and movement in a musical.

• Designs dance numbers

• Works with performers on movement and technique

• Helps make choreography fit the music and story

• Key point: The choreographer is responsible for the show's dance and movement.

Producer

oversees the business and organizational side of a musical.

• Helps arrange financing and budgeting

• Coordinates the production team

• Oversees schedules, contracts, and other practical matters

• Key point: The producer helps make it possible for the musical to be produced and run successfully.

Tin Pan Alley

1. the name for the music-publishing industry centered in New York City, especially around West 28th Street, from the late 19th century into the early 20th century.

   • It was a major center for writing, publishing, and selling popular songs.

   • Songwriters and composers created music that was then promoted and sold as sheet music.

   • Many early musical theatre and popular-song writers were connected to Tin Pan Alley.

   • Key point: Tin Pan Alley helped create a commercial system for producing and distributing popular American music.

The Princess Theatre Musicals

1. a series of intimate American musicals produced at the Princess Theatre in New York City during the 1910s.

   • The creative team included Jerome Kern (composer), Guy Bolton (librettist), and P. G. Wodehouse (lyricist/librettist).

   • They used smaller casts and simpler sets than many large Broadway spectacles.

   • Songs were more closely connected to the characters and plot.

   • Important shows included Very Good Eddie (1915), Oh, Boy! (1917), and Leave It to Jane (1917).

   • Key point: The Princess Theatre Musicals helped move American musical theatre toward the integrated musical, where songs and story work together naturally.