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[African Americana][Jazz]
Vintage Playbill, “Swingin’ the Dream”, 1939. Louis Armstrong, Benny Goodman, African-American cast
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Item Details
New York, Playbill, 1939, Stapled wrappers
1st ed, Fair
Vintage Playbill, “Swingin’ the Dream” [Midsummer Night’s Dream]
Opening night performance, Nov 29, 1939.
8vo, stapled wrappers. 24 pp. Full-page photos of Louis Armstrong, Benny Goodman. Cover design by Al Hirschfeld.
Based on Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night's Dream, the jazz musical placed Shakespeare in a decidedly modern atmosphere with a mostly African American cast – featuring Louis Armstrong as Bottom, Maxine Sullivan as Titania, and Butterfly McQueen who played Puck, (two weeks later she would appear as Prissy in Gone with the Wind). Also featuring comedian Moms Mabley, Dorothy Dandridge, and A chorus of more than fifty of Harlem’s best singers and dancers added to the festive performances.
The musical was set in New Orleans in 1890, “at the birth of swing.” It opened at the Center Theatre with fantastic credentials and great expectations. The show boasted a 50-piece orchestra, with Benny Goodman’s band on one side of the stage, and Bud Freeman’s band on the other. Walt Disney Productions gave special permission for their cartoons to be integrated into the set design. Agnes DeMIlle choreographed the dances, and Al Hirschfeld provided the advertising art that was featured on the playbill. Despite everything that the show had going right, it closed after only 13 performances, losing an estimated $100,000.
While the condition of this Playbill is not the best, because the show closed soon after opening, copies are scarce with only a partial copy currently online and only one in WorldCat. "Sadly, all complete scripts and footage of the production have now been lost, leaving only scant evidence of what this jazz-infused spectacle was truly like. Even so, Swingin' the Dream remains widely regarded as one of the most ambitious and intriguing Broadway musical adaptations of Shakespeare to ever take to the stage." [Royal Shakespeare Company / 'The History of Swinging' the Dream' / for a 2021 revival]
CONDITION: Fair; loose staples, pages 9-16 detached; 1 1/2x1/2” dampstain along upper margin. Covers lightly soiled, with 1” split at top spine.
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