American+Musical+Theatre

The American musical theatre has spent years making a unique name for itself. The first American production was in Charleston, South Carolina on February 8, 1735. He play was a ballad opera from England. This ballad, Flora, was a popular ballad opera for years in the colonies. There was also European The //Novelty, with the Laying of the Atlantic Cable//, which was produced after the civil war in New York in 1857 by the Ronzani troupe which is a European ballet company. Soon the US became an independent nation and ballads became less popular and the burlesque took the spotlight. A burlesque was a travesty or parody of a famous play. Hamlet was one of the first in 1828 with John Poole starring. Some other famous ones were La Mosquita and Tartantella. There are many things that began to become familiar in American musical theatre. B eautiful woman soon became another aspect of American musicals. //Ixion//, in 1869, in which Lydia Thompson and her English blondes shocked New York by having girls appear in skin-coloured tights. As the years passed by American musical theatre became more and more popular. The Black Crook in New York was the most successful theatrical production in America to date. It introduced some of the different new aspects of American musical comedy this includes chorus girls, complex production numbers, intricate costuming, songs offensive with sexual innuendos, large dance numbers and more. American musical theatre was unique though it still had been somewhat adapted from European extravaganzas that would sometimes play in the US. The first successful Americana operette was called the The Little Tycoon inspired by he European operetta the Mikado. The productions Robin Hood and Vicotr Herbert in 1894 opened up American musical theatre for many years. Mulligan plays soon added to the personality of American theatre. These plays presented life in New York. Individual behaviors and mannerisms contributed to these plays as many different races contributed to them. These play were simple and lifelike containing all the before mentioned known aspects that were contributing to American musical theatre. The most fmous one was Mulligan Guard’s Ball in 1879. By this time New York had already begun to be identified as a major entertainment area in the aspect of plays. A milestone in American Musical theatre was made when the outstanding write George M Cohan began to write his plays. They were purely American and highly entertaining. His musicals were exciting, brash, and confident. He framed American Musical theatre. It became that nomatter the plot as long as it could have song, dance, and humor it made a good musical. A new theory was to higher a star or a group of stars and makes a musical based on the talents of these certain performers. Many musicals began to be very alike and predictable like a childs movie the good wins and gets the girl. Many famous writers contributed interesting characters to theses predictable fun comedies that started to play in New York’s broadway. Americans musicals were characters. As the years went by American theatre became more open and mature. Now there were also plays on history, literature, and more. One of the greatest turns in American musical theatre was in 1927 with the production of Showboat. Unlike the plays of the past this play wasn’t focused on the actors talents but on the play itself. This play was also different from what is known as a musical comedy. The new type of plays were had depth and meaning. American musical theatre had shown itself to the world. Writers such as Rodgers and Hammer stein wrote plays such ad Oklahoma, Carousel, The Kind and I and South Pacific. People like these writers hit the big bucks as New York’s Broadway became one of the most famous places to date. Both the old American comedies as well as the new American musicals played day after day entertaining America.

[] [] [] Review from Jake:

Try and keep things in paragraph form, bullet points work but are choppy. Cite your sources. Use complete sentences. Otherwise, it's fine.