Beyond Broadway: The Pleasure and Promise of Musical Theatre Across America

by Professor Stacy Wolf

The idea of American musical theatre often conjures up images of bright lights and big city, but its lifeblood is found in amateur productions at high schools, community theatres, afterschool programs, summer camps, and dinner theatres. In Beyond Broadway, author Stacy Wolf looks at the widespread presence and persistence of musical theatre in U.S. culture, and examines it as a social practice--a live, visceral experience of creating, watching, and listening. Why does local musical theatre flourish in America? Why do so many Americans continue to passionately engage in a century-old artistic practice that requires intense, person-to-person collaboration? And why do audiences still flock to musicals in their hometowns? Touring American elementary schools, a middle school performance festival, afterschool programs, high schools, summer camps, state park outdoor theatres, community theatres, and dinner theatres from California to Tennessee, Wolf illustrates musical theatre's abundance and longevity in the U.S. as a thriving social activity that touches millions of lives.

Genres: Nonfiction, Audiobook, Theatre

390 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 15, 2019

Reviews

[Jeff Covello · Rating 2 out of 5]

I appreciate the story that this book is telling: that in gymnasiums, tiny theaters, outdoor amphitheaters, dining halls, and dance halls all over this country. There is musical theater. That the musical is truly a way of life in the United States is clear, and it’s also clear how much musicals mean to the author. As a piece of writing, I found this book to be bloated with minutia. There were a lot of repetitive facts and a fair amount of beating a dead horse. The introduction alone could have been cut by 75%. I found throughout that this book may have been better as a documentary film, which of course would be much more expensive to create! But flawed as the writing may be, the message and the individual experiences of people creating theater was heartwarming and engaging.

Throughout the book, there was an undercurrent of something… aggressive/bitter?… about the thought that people have to license the intellectual property of musicals to present to their community. That may be somehow it is immoral for Lin-Manuel Miranda to be paid if a community theater wants to put on a production of In the Heights. This concept, maybe more than the extreme need for editing in the writing, ultimately turned me off from the book. I’m not sure how many times I needed to be told that the musical licensing companies also create things like dance tutorial videos, and packages for inspiration for sets and costumes etc. for additional fees.

There is a great book somewhere in here, but just like The Sound of Music, the book is not the strong part.

[Aaron Thomas]

This is an ethnographic project – and frequently an autoethnographic project – detailing different places across the country that practice the Broadway musical theatre repertoire. I confess to wanting more from this book, though. It is filled with thick description – the meals served at the dinner theatres, the behavior of pet dogs, the materials used to construct prop livestock – but there is not much analysis in the book at all. What does this all mean for the Broadway musical as a form, with how audiences interact with it, for the indentities of the people who make these shows? It's an ambitious, rich book, filled with many interesting characters and with the germs of many interesting ideas. But the chief conclusion here seems to be that musical theatre is thriving all over the country and not only on Broadway. I am very fond of this claim, but what is our focus on Broadway obscuring? How might these non-Broadway performances help us think differently about the form? I feel like we just didn't quite get there.

[Neil · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author's appreciation for theater definitely comes through loud and clear. I was expecting something more about regional theater, but this is actually most prominently about children's theater camps and school theater, then next about community theater, then about dinner theater and other lower levels of professional theater. There's nothing wrong with that, I'm part of that world myself, but each of these kinds of theater is a very different world, each of which has its own tensions and connections with the others.

The author suffers from the brand of American optimism that doesn't really allow the problematic aspects of life to fully register. There are wonderful things going on in small theaters, but there are also problems, some of which come from a Broadway establishment and its licensing arm that cause as many problems as artistic successes, and some others that stem from unhealthy practices in youth theater. We need cheerleaders for theater, but we also need thoughtful analysis and action. This book is great at the former, kind of limited at the latter.

[MH · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wolf argues that the true heart of the American musical isn't on Broadway but in dinner theaters, community theaters, high school stages and summer camps in this energetic look at these often-ignored (or academically derided) theater institutions. Her love of the subject and enthusiasm for the many, many theaters she spends time at is infectious, and I think this book is best understood as a journalistic travelogue rather than an academic exploration - there's a near-total lack of criticism or questioning, and the only time she does either is when she writes about corporate entities like Disney or Broadway Jr. (and even then only very briefly, raising issues of gender or money for a few sentences in much larger chapters). There are a lot of other issues that go unaddressed (not every child who performs in musicals finds the experience so magical - some encounter cliquishness, heartbreak, or simple boredom with an often middle-class art form designed for middle-aged audiences; and it's a thin line between the 'backstage divas' who own pay-to-play private theater schools and 'cult of personality' drama teachers who play favorites, push agendas, and welcome back young adults who've aged out of the program but, to their detriment, can't let go). Wolf doesn't pursue questions like these, which is a little disappointing, but that's ultimately a minor complaint, outweighed by her engaging, useful introduction to these neglected amateur spaces.

[Chris Milligan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beyond Broadway offers a fascinating look at the world of non-professional musical theater—from high schools and Jewish girls camps to scrappy dinner theaters and sprawling outdoor productions. The author dives deep into the Junior Theater Festival and Disney musicals in particular. At times, the book feels a bit long—though I did find myself wanting a chapter on university or conservatory productions—but it’s ultimately worth the read (or listen). I went with the audiobook—narration is passable, if a bit chirpy and occasionally mispronounced. One key takeaway: nearly half of all musical theater attendance happens outside of Broadway, and these amateur productions play a vital role in sustaining the industry by generating royalties and building lifelong fans.

[Roberta]

This book is perfect for me and anyone else highly involved in local theatre. The level of detail is such that I don’t think it’s intended for a general audience, but highly recommend it to my fellow local directors and producers. I really appreciated the amount of research that went into this book.

[Lydia Newman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read for thesis. So good and just a cool concept.