Drama

The more things change the more they remain the same; the more things change, the more they, well, change. Some changes are minor and perhaps transient. This year David Mamet and August Wilson replace Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller as the attractions. These cycles in scholarly fashion have happened before—Sam Shepard, for example, once recently raged as the prodigy apparent, only to pass even more recently from favor. Other alterations, however, are disconcerting. Stephen Greenblatt, president of MLA, dispatched a letter to organization members concerning the task of scholarly evaluation at university departments and the circumstances at university presses which might place in jeopardy a generation of young scholars in some areas of language and literature. Academic presses which cannot afford to publish some books have eliminated editorial positions in traditional disciplines; libraries have cut back on the number of books they purchase. We are advised the situation is difficult for junior faculty who will be reviewed for tenure in English departments.

Things they are a-changin'. The University of Minnesota Press features volumes on art house cinema, televised life, feminist film and video, classic Hollywood. SUNY Press advances books on gender in film. And, not to gnaw at the kindly paw that feeds me, Duke University Press, the safe haven of American literature, this year produces books on popular media and postwar suburbs but not on American drama. Let us hope that these trends too, like some scholarly tastes, are transitory. Those books and articles that did make the cut this year are itemized herein.

i Theater History

The intent of Thomas S. Hischak's American Theatre: A Chronicle of Comedy and Drama 1969–2000 (Oxford) is to continue Gerald Bordman's previous three volumes (see AmLS 1994, p. 366; AmLS 1995, pp. 406–07; AmLS 1996, p. 410). Like its predecessors, this volume may be a bit inconvenient for use as a research tool, although two indices will help scholars—a "Titles Index" (pp. 463–76) and a "People Index" (pp. 477–504). As well, the format is inconsistent. For example, the inclusion of random highlighted brief entries on Sam Shepard, John Guare, Terrence McNally, David Henry Hwang, off-Broadway director Gerald Gutierrez, and others seems superficial and questionable if not purposeless. The entries are heavy at the book's beginning, become less frequent as the volume moves along, and then disappear altogether after the Gutierrez piece, 89 pages before the volume's conclusion. These quibbles aside, this book is valuable as a history because Hischak does a remarkable job of cataloging the three-ring circus of Broadway, off-Broadway, and off-off Broadway that New York theater has become. Hischak covers nearly 3,000 plays, good and bad, moving season by season: "Act One, 1969–1975: Getting Through by the Skin of Our Teeth" (pp. 1–90); "Act Two, 1975–1984: Everything Old Is New Again" (pp. 91–235); "Act Three, 1984–1994: Playacting During a Plague" (pp. 237–361); and "Act Four, 1994–2000: A Modest Renaissance" (pp. 363–462). This is a convenient place to read of, to illustrate, the 1984–85 revival of Arthur Miller's After the Fall, the notices for Terrence McNally's It's Only a Play, the basics about Tennessee Williams's Not About Nightingales, or the vitriolic reception for director Ivo van Hove's 1999–2000 revival of Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire. This is Hischak's most ambitious and successful undertaking since his Stage It with Music: An Encyclopedic Guide to the American Musical Theater (see AmLS 1993, p. 315) and is as enjoyable as his The Theatregoer's Almanac (see AmLS 1997, pp. 374–75). If the present volume like its predecessors has small faults, it is wonderfully readable for people who love American drama.

While the scope of Hischak's book is wide and "plays with music" are dealt with, productions with enough songs for "musical numbers" to be listed in the program are considered musicals and are not included. Robert Emmet Long's Broadway, The Golden Years: Jerome Robbins and the Great Choreographer-Directors, 1940 to the Present (Continuum) will in some measure fill that...