Research Catalog

Details

Additional authors

1. Wilk, Max
2. Kantor, Michael, 1961-
3. Hunt, Mead
4. Broadway Film Project, Inc, donor.
5. Thirteen/WNET, donor.

Description

1. 2 videocassettes (VHS) (51 min.) : sd., col. SP; 1/2 in.

Summary

1. Raw interview footage used for the documentary Broadway, the American musical. Playwright, screenwriter and author Max Wilk discusses the American musical. Wilk cites Irving Berlin as the musical's preeminent composer, and the Broadway musical as a distinctly American art form. He goes on to discuss the problems Richard Rodgers had with his songwriting partner Larry Hart, and how Rodgers finally turned to Oscar Hammerstein to write the lyrics for Oklahoma!. The show changed the musical theater by unifying the book, music and lyrics. The choreography of Agnes De Mille made ballet a staple of the musical. The show, created amid skepticism during wartime, "stunned" audiences at its tryouts in New Haven. Afterwards getting tickets to it became next to impossible. Other topics of discussion include the musical comedy shows of the 1920s, which emphasized songs over story; the lyric writing of Oscar Hammerstein in Carousel; Berlin's songwriting for the show Annie get your gun, during which he almost discarded the song There's no business like show business; Hammerstein's lyric writing for South Pacific, which featured the song You've got to be carefully taught; the creation of Rodgers and Hammerstein's blockbuster hit The sound of music, whose success restored the financial health of Broadway as well as that of 20th Century Fox which made the hit movie; the Depression era production The cradle will rock by Marc Blitzstein, which was staged in an improvised performance after government authorities locked the theater in which it was to open; the "deft and dirty" brilliance of songwriter Cole Porter; Rodgers and Hart's Hollywood stint in the early '30s writing songs for the Al Jolson movie Hallelujah, I'm a Bum, followed by their Broadway comeback producing stage shows like Jumbo starring Jimmy Durante; reasons for going to the theater during the 1920s in comparison with the '30s. Interview is followed by audio-only discussion for last five minutes on the lasting popularity of Rodgers and Hammerstein, whose musicals continue to be produced everywhere.

Alternative title

1. Broadway, the American musical
2. Broadway: the American musical

Subject

1. Berlin, Irving, 1888-1989
2. Rodgers, Richard, 1902-1979 > Sound of music
3. Musical theater > New York (State) > New York
4. Hart, Lorenz, 1895-1943
5. De Mille, Agnes
6. Unedited footage
7. Berlin, Irving, 1888-1989 > Annie get your gun
8. Musical theater > Production and direction
9. Wilk, Max > Interviews
10. Rodgers, Richard, 1902-1979 > Oklahoma!
11. Theater > New York (State) > New York
12. Broadway (New York, N.Y.)
13. Composers
14. Musicals
15. Documentaries and factual works
16. Lyricists
17. Rodgers, Richard, 1902-1979 > Carousel
18. Rodgers, Richard, 1902-1979 > South Pacific
19. Blitzstein, Marc > Cradle will rock
20. Hammerstein, Oscar, II, 1895-1960

Genre/Form

1. Documentaries and factual works.
2. Musicals.
3. Unedited footage.

Call number

1. NCOX 2146

Note

1. The first interview with Max Wilk conducted for this documentary is available on NCOX 2104.
2. This interview is one of a group of interviews with 90 individuals used in making the documentary Broadway, the American musical. The completed production is available on NCOX 2058.
3. Credits for completed production from pbs.org: A film by Michael Kantor ; produced by Jeff Dupre, Michael Kantor and Sally Rosenthal ; written by Marc Fields, Michael Kantor, Laurence Maslon, and JoAnne Young ; directed by Michael Kantor.
4. Time code on frame.
5. Contains various takes, at occasional brief intervals, audio continues without sound.

Credits (note)

1. Cameraman: Mead Hunt.

Performer (note)

1. Interviewer: Michael Kantor. Interviewee: Max Wilk.

Event (note)

1. Videotaped in New York, N.Y. on March 15, 2003.

Biography (note)

1. Broadway, the American musical, which aired on PBS in October 2004, is a documentary chronicling the entire history of a unique American art form, the Broadway musical. Each of its six episodes covers a different era in American theater history, and features the Broadway shows and songs which defined the period. The series draws on feature films, television broadcasts, archival news footage, original cast recordings, still photos, diaries, journals, first-person accounts, and on-camera interviews with many of the principals involved in the development of the genre.

Title

1. [Interview with Max Wilk : raw footage] [2003-03-15] [videorecording] / [directed by Michael Kantor]

Imprint

1. New York, 2003.

Credits

1. Cameraman: Mead Hunt.

Performer

1. Interviewer: Michael Kantor. Interviewee: Max Wilk.

Event

1. Videotaped in New York, N.Y. on March 15, 2003.

Biography

1. Broadway, the American musical, which aired on PBS in October 2004, is a documentary chronicling the entire history of a unique American art form, the Broadway musical. Each of its six episodes covers a different era in American theater history, and features the Broadway shows and songs which defined the period. The series draws on feature films, television broadcasts, archival news footage, original cast recordings, still photos, diaries, journals, first-person accounts, and on-camera interviews with many of the principals involved in the development of the genre.

Local note

1. Gift of Broadway Film Project, Inc. and Thirteen/WNET, 2005.

Connect to:

1. Request Access to Theatre on Film and Tape Archive Special Collections material

Added author

1. Wilk, Max, interviewee.
2. Kantor, Michael, 1961- interviewer.
3. Kantor, Michael, 1961- director.
4. Hunt, Mead, cameraman.
5. Broadway Film Project, Inc, donor.
6. Thirteen/WNET, donor.

Research call number

1. NCOX 2146