We're Finally Back!

I know I said I'd start posting again on Oct. 22, but stuff to do with the book intervened. You may be tired of asking, by the way, "What's the book?" Well, here's the poop. Back in June, I was hired by a company called Turner Publishing to write a book profiling the Billy Rose Theatre Collection at the New York Public Library. The book, which is more or less a coffee table book, consists of 240 historical photos that will tell the story of Broadway from 1850 to 1970. Each image has a caption of 100-200 words, so it was, in the end, about a 36,000-word book and it took some time to complete, as you might imagine. Many of the library's images are already digitized and online. For example, the image below of Sarah Bernhardt can be found by accessing the digital galleries. Here, just for yuks, is the image:

Anyway, there are 239 other images, and while many of them were digitized and appropriate to the storytelling and accessible, many were not -- ultimately I spent the summer at the library pulling about 150 images.

In case you're curious, here's the list of the images:

Edwin and Junius Brutus Booth, The Black Crook, Niblo's Garden, The Black Crook chorus, Lydia Thompson, The Academy of Music, The Kiralfy brothers, Evangeline, The Shaughran/Boucicault, The Wallacks, Frank C. Bangs in Sardanapalus, Harrigan and Hart, Garrick Theatre, Augustin Daly and his company, Rehan/Drew/Dollars and Sense, Mrs. Gilbert, Henry E. Dixey/Adonis, The Black Hussar/Digby Bell, Monte Cristo, HMS Pinafore, Sarah Bernhardt, Edwin Booth, statue dedication, The Wife (DeMille and Belasco), Weber and Fields, Lillian Russell, The Amazons, Haverly's/Lyceum/Fourteenth Street, Civic Repertory, Minnie Maddern Fiske, Harrison Grey Fiske, Fifth Avenue Theatre, Broadway Theatre, Shenandoah/Allen/Henry Miller, Star Theatre, Clyde Fitch, Madison Square Theatre, Richard Mansfield, Charley's Aunt, Lady Windermere's Fan, William Winter, Maude Adams/Little Minister, Francis Wilson, Julia Marlowe, Joseph Jefferson and W.J. Florence, Nat C. Goodwin, Della May Fox, John Drew, Maude Adams in Christopher, Jr., George M. Cohan/The Four Cohans, A.L. Erlanger, J.J. Shubert, Oscar Hammerstein I, Mrs. Leslie Carter, Ben-Hur, Ziegfeld Follies of 1907, Liberty Theatre, Maxine Elliott, Maxine Elliott Theatre, Ferdinand Gottschalk, Amelia Bingham, Olga Nethersole in Sapho, Clara Bloodgood, Elsie De Wolfe, Ethel Barrymore, Empire Theatre, Sothern and Marlowe, Century Theatre, Florodora, Casino Theatre, Lyceum 45th Street, Maude Adams/Peter Pan, Babes in Toyland, The Merry Widow, New Amsterdam Theatre, Thalia/Bowery Theatre, In Dahomey, Bates & Arliss in Darling of the Gods, Girl of the Golden West/Bates, Frances Starr and Belasco, The New York Idea, Eleonora Duse, Sherlock Holmes, Within the Law, Eltinge Theatre, Androcles and the Lion, Lewis Waller, A Night with the Pierrots, L. Taylor/Peg O My Heart, Cort Theatre, Florenz Ziegfeld, Vernon and Irene Castle, Frank Tinney in Watch Your Step, Marilyn Miller, Passing Show of 1915, Rachel Crothers, Alla Nazimova, Nazimova's 39th Street Theatre, Very Good Eddie, Edgar Selwyn, Major Barbara, Playhouse Theatre, Oh, Lady! Lady!, Lightnin', Doris Eaton (Travis), Actors Strike of 1919, Clarence, Heartbreak House, Beyond the Horizon, Morosco Theatre, Sally, Charles Gilpin in The Emperor Jones, Katherine Cornell in the Age of Innocence, Shuffle Along, Sketch of the set of Richard III, John Barrymore in Hamlet, R.U.R., Jeanne Eagels in Rain, Owen Davis/Icebound, The Adding Machine, Moscow Art Theatre, The Show Off, Outward Bound, What Price Glory?, Plymouth Theatre, Beggar on Horseback, Rose-Marie, Imperial Theatre, The Student Prince, They Knew What They Wanted, The Guardsmen, No No Nanette, Marx Brothers, Oh, Kay!, Civic Repertory Theatre, Broadway, Strange Interlude, Show Boat, Alvin Theatre, A Connecticut Yankee, Dracula, Helen Hayes, Whoopie!, The Front Page, Times Square Theatre, Machinal, Strictly Dishonorable, Street Scene, Porgy, Guild Theatre, Once in a Lifetime, Music Box Theatre, Girl Crazy, Garrick Gaieties, Elizabeth the Queen, The Band Wagon, Of Thee I Sing, Private Lives, Katherine Cornell, The House of Connelly, Martin Beck Theatre, Mourning Becomes Electra, Ruth Draper, As Thousands Cheer, Design for Living, Men in White, Ethel Barrymore Theatre, Tobacco Road, Theatre Masque/John Golden, Four Saints in Three Acts, Anything Goes, The Children's Hour, Waiting for Lefty, Longacre Theatre, Winterset, Idiot's Delight, Shubert Theatre, Amphitryon 38, Jumbo, Victoria Regina, Hamlet, Red Hot and Blue, Federal Theatre Project or Living Newspaper, Orson Welles, On Your Toes, The Women, Susan and God, Our Town, The Philadelphia Story, The Little Foxes, Life with Father, The Time of Your Life, The Man Who Came to Dinner, Cabin in the Sky, The Corn is Green, Romeo and Juliet, Pal Joey, Arsenic and Old Lace, Angel Street, The Skin of Our Teeth, Lady in the Dark, The Voice of the Turtle, Oklahoma!, Othello, One Touch of Venus, Harvey, On the Town, Carousel, The Glass Menagerie, Born Yesterday, The Iceman Cometh, Annie Get Your Gun, Finian's Rainbow, A Streetcar Named Desire, Medea, Cole Porter in lieu of Kiss Me, Kate, Death of a Salesman, Guys and Dolls, The Member of the Wedding, Lili Palmer in Caesar and Cleopatra, The Crucible, Wonderful Town, Tea and Sympathy, Picnic, The Pajama Game, Damn Yankees, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, My Fair Lady, Long Day's Journey Into Night, West Side Story, Waiting for Godot, Gypsy, A Raisin in the Sun, Camelot, Barefoot in the Park, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Little Me, Fiddler on the Roof, Hello, Dolly!, Cabaret, A Delicate Balance, Hair.

And now you know all about my summer. I mean, there's lots of drama around the book, but it was and remains an amazing project. Estimated publishing date: early 2008.

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