Nederlander Theater: A Case Study

This is a must watch Broadway show that makes your fine, terrible, or even boring day, an absolute blast. The Play That Goes Wrong has finally made its way to America and right at the heart of New York City near Times Square at the Lyceum Theatre. Therefore, the experience is a win-win situation for the audience. The Lyceum Theatre’s architecture is astonishing as it is filled with ornaments, I also realized the letter ‘L’ around the theater, but the most interesting fact is that it is a landmark. It has a proscenium stage while the audience is in the orchestra, balcony, or the mezzanine seats, like where I sat, and there is barely any space if you are a tall person. My seat was near the far end of mezzanine, I couldn’t see a part of the left side of the stage, so I found myself bending sideways to see what was going on, but I saw nothing. I found the side stage lights and a side balcony blocking my view and yet I had a great time.

The audience is seated, the lights dim, and all of a sudden, through wild anticipation, the music cues as a notification that the show is about to begin. Theater is a creative outlet for the soul to paint a picture towards showcasing a short story. This past weekend, I attended a play at Crabpot Players Theater to observe a parody of one of Shakespeare’s most famous pieces, A Midsummer Night’s Dream. As a whole the play was fairly decent, but there were a few minor issues that held the piece back. It is officially time to analyze the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The set used for Vernon God Little was highly symbolic and simplistic; when we walked into the theatre we could visually see that there were flowers, cards and memorable items attached on the audiences seats above our heads, which already created a sombre atmosphere around the theatre.

The Globe Theater was a theater that was built and owned by Shakespeare and the group he belonged to called the Lord Chamberlain's Men. Although it is not known exactly when the theater was built, the first record of it shows that it was built before the end of 1599. The Globe Theater was built using lumber from a theater that was not very far away. Even though the Globe Theater was built with wood from a dismantled theater, it was not the same as the previous theater. In fact the globe theater was much larger than the previous one. The theater was a great success for many years; nevertheless, it was burned down in summer of 1613 during a play of Henry VIII. During the performance something happened to a theatrical cannon to cause it to misfire

I’ve adored theatre for as long as I can remember. From writing plays throughout elementary school, to being involved in Drama Club in middle school, to performing in community theatre in high school, and to visiting the theatre as often as I could from the very beginning, theatre has always been a part of my life. Every aspect of it engages me: the directors working to bring their vision of the show’s scenes, choreography, or music to life, the actors transforming into different characters through their expression of dialogue, song, or dance, the costumers and set-builders transporting the audience into the setting and time period with their artistry, the backstage tech and crew working quickly and precisely to keep the show flowing to curtain call, and the orchestra bringing the show to life through music. There is nothing like the experience of live theatre, both as a member of the audience and as a member of the cast and crew.

Theatre and Musical Theatre has been a form of entertainment since before North America was “discovered”. Broadway shows have been dated back to the early 1920’s and 1930’s. By 2016, over 25,000 tickets are sold to Broadway shows in a week. Thousands of people enjoy the shows that are featured on Broadway but have no idea the work and process that brought it to life. The process of getting a show on to Broadway can be broken down into three phases: pre-production, staging, and performance/promotion.

The Globe Theatre became what it is today because of its history. What was its history exactly? Unfortunately, those are two questions many people don’t have an answer to. So, what is the history?

What did the globe theater look like and what plays had been shown here you might ask. There are many different things about the globe theater such as when was it built, what was it built out of? What were the different plays that were shown? The different kinds of audiences did the theater get and many more interesting facts on the theater. The Globe Theater is a cool old rustic building that everyone goes to, to enjoy plays.

"The Globe Theater's” beautiful building design and interesting former times have been a very notable element of our past, it had even held many of Shakespeare’s famous plays. “The whole world is a playhouse” and one of the most important playhouses in the world would have to be “The Globe Theater”. It is nearly impossible to think of our world without “The Globe Theater” and all the interesting occurrences that have happened involving it. This theater could have been nothing more than a building if it were for all the important history that was incorporated into it making it be such an important piece of history. Between 1597 and 1599, “The Globe Theater” was built and it officially opened in 1599.

I attended UCLA’s May 11th production of Carousel on a Wednesday night at the Freud Playhouse. Jeremy Mann and Dan Belzer directed the production. The musical opened on April 19th, 1945 (Hauser). Oscar Hammerstein II wrote the book and lyrics, while Richard Rodgers wrote the music in collaboration. In this paper I will expound on the history of Carousel’s writers, it’s historical significance in the world of American theater, as well as the plot of the play and it’s implications on the evolution of theater history.

In 1933, the Great Depression was at its peak. As people were struggling to find work and survive in a crumbling economy, President Franklin D. Roosevelt created a program called The New Deal to help alleviate some of the United States’ problems; such as helping the poor and unemployed, repairing the economy, and fixing the country’s financial issues. With it, another project was formed which would radically change the world of theatre. The Federal Theatre Project, sponsored by the Works Progress Administration, funded theatre projects, employed actors, and created meaningful art (Simkin).While The Federal Theatre Project was an important tool to keep theatre alive and people employed during The Great Depression, it also had much greater after-effects; altering the role and effect of theatre in the years to come.

My mom and I were seated on red felt wooden chairs in the opera box above downstage right; basking in the anticipation of the start of the musical. The smell of the theater was musty, almost like a library. It even had those rays of dust and light that you see in old libraries. Looking onward, I saw the monitor in which Alex Lacamoire, the conductor, directs the actors and musicians. Closer to the balcony, huge metal spotlights hung, all containing the magical power to change a minimalist wooden stage into a bar, then a field, then a closed room in a restaurant, and finally the Weehawken dueling grounds. The feeling of excitement and glee was palpable. I looked at my mother, whose eyes were glued to the stage. In that dim lit arena of instruments,

“Sure as the day, follows the night, sure as the sky turns to blue, this much I know, this much is true, above all else in whatever you do, to thine own self be true.” This quote, written by John O'Farrell and Karey Kirkpatrick for the musical Something Rotten, is a play off of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Carrying on Greek and European traditions of live theatre, Broadway entertains our current generation with two and a half overpriced hours of sitting in the dark surrounded by strangers. At least, that’s how my mother describes it, as she despises my expensive hobby.

“Shrunken perhaps by the vicissitudes and exigencies of the times, Broadway presented itself admirably throughout the Thirties. It not only managed to preserve the best, but also nurtured and expanded them. At the brink of the new decade, Broadway stood smaller but brighter”

The history of theatre in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries is one of the increasing commercialization of the art, accompanied by technological innovations, the introduction of serious critical review, expansion of the subject matters portrayed to include ordinary people, and an emphasis on more natural forms of acting. Theatre, which had been dominated by the church for centuries, and then by the tastes of monarchs for more than 200 years, became accessible to merchants, industrialists, and the less privileged and then the masses.