Sign-In
Cart
Vaudeville and the Making of Modern Entertainment, 1890-1925
Paperback
20th Century United States HistoryGeneral MusicTheater History
Please select the version of book you would like to purchase.
ISBN10: 1469660555
ISBN13: 9781469660554
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Published: Oct 12 2020
Pages: 288
Weight: 0.97
Height: 0.64 Width: 6.14 Depth: 9.21
Language: English
ISBN13: 9781469660554
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Published: Oct 12 2020
Pages: 288
Weight: 0.97
Height: 0.64 Width: 6.14 Depth: 9.21
Language: English
Today, vaudeville is imagined as a parade of slapstick comedians, blackface shouters, coyly revealed knees, and second-rate acrobats. But vaudeville was also America's most popular commercial amusement from the mid-1890s to the First World War; at its peak, 5 million Americans attended vaudeville shows every week. Telling the story of this pioneering art form's rise and decline, David Monod looks through the apparent carnival of vaudeville performance and asks: what made the theater so popular and transformative? Although he acknowledges its quirkiness, Monod makes the case that vaudeville became so popular because it offered audiences a guide to a modern urban lifestyle.
Vaudeville acts celebrated sharp city styles and denigrated old-fashioned habits, showcased new music and dance moves, and promulgated a deeply influential vernacular modernism. The variety show's off-the-rack trendiness perfectly suited an era when goods and services were becoming more affordable and the mass market promised to democratize style, offering a clear vision of how the quintessential twentieth-century citizen should look, talk, move, feel, and act.
Vaudeville acts celebrated sharp city styles and denigrated old-fashioned habits, showcased new music and dance moves, and promulgated a deeply influential vernacular modernism. The variety show's off-the-rack trendiness perfectly suited an era when goods and services were becoming more affordable and the mass market promised to democratize style, offering a clear vision of how the quintessential twentieth-century citizen should look, talk, move, feel, and act.
1 different editions
Also available
Also in
20th Century United States History
Designed for Hi-Fi Living: The Vinyl LP in Midcentury America
Borgerson, Janet
Schroeder, Jonathan
Paperback
From $11.99
By the Light of Burning Dreams: The Triumphs and Tragedies of the Second American Revolution
Talbot, Margaret
Talbot, David
Hardcover
$27.54
The Sullivanians: Sex, Psychotherapy, and the Wild Life of an American Commune
Stille, Alexander
Hardcover
$12.99
A Manufactured Wilderness: Summer Camps and the Shaping of American Youth, 1890-1960
Van Slyck, Abigail A.
Hardcover
$12.99
Mary's Mosaic: The CIA Conspiracy to Murder John F. Kennedy, Mary Pinchot Meyer, and Their Vision for World Peace
Janney, Peter
Hardcover
$11.99
What Have They Built You to Do?: The Manchurian Candidate and Cold War America
Gonzalez, Gaspar
Jacobson, Matthew Frye
Paperback
From $10.99
Dangerous Games: Faces, Incidents, and Casualties of the Cold War
Wise, James E.
Baron, Scott
Hardcover
$8.99
1929: Inside the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History--And How It Shattered a Nation
Sorkin, Andrew Ross
Hardcover
From $19.99
American Scoundrel: Roy Cohn's Dark Journey from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump
Bird, Kai
Goldmark, Susan
Hardcover
$28.80
Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young: A Fugitive Family in the Revolutionary Underground
Dohrn, Zayd Ayers
Hardcover
$29.69
The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America
Rothstein, Richard
Paperback
$17.05
The Secret War Against Hate: American Resistance to Antisemitism and White Supremacy
Ross, Steven J.
Hardcover
$29.69
Ghosts of Sicily: The True Story of the Naval Intelligence Agents Who Courted the Mob to Fight Nazis in America and the Battlefields of Italy
Harmon, Mark
Carroll, Leon
Hardcover
$26.99
Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation
Kobes Du Mez, Kristin
Paperback
$17.06
The Hardest, Longest Race: Henry Ford and the Cross-Country Contest That Changed America
Moskowitz, Eric
Hardcover
From $19.99
The Housewives Underground: The Untold Story of the Women Who Made the JFK Assassination Our Most Enduring Mystery
Tiffany, Kaitlyn
Hardcover
$31.50
Shadow Before the Flame: The Hindenburg Disaster and the Prelude to War
Katz, Catherine Grace
Hardcover
$36.10
El Paso: Five Families and One Hundred Years of Blood, Migration, Race, and Memory
Ulloa, Jazmine
Hardcover
$27.00
Book and Dagger: How Scholars and Librarians Became the Unlikely Spies of World War II
Graham, Elyse
Paperback
From $11.99
The Last Full Measure: An American Family and How the United States Brought Home the Dead of World War II
Clarke, Kim
Hardcover
$27.95
Liberation Summer: The Moment That Changed the Women's Movement and the Future of American Politics
McElya, Micki
Hardcover
$30.40
Transgender History, Third Edition: A Resource for Today's Struggle--And Tomorrow's
Stryker, Susan
Paperback
$20.69
The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics
Brown, Daniel James
Paperback
From $11.99
The Steal: Four Right-Wing Hard-Liners, One Republican Presidency, and the Raid on America's Courts
Wagner, Alex
Hardcover
$26.99
Gerontocracy in America: How the Old Are Hoarding Power and Wealth--And What to Do about It
Moyn, Samuel
Hardcover
$27.00
Five Bullets: The Story of Bernie Goetz, New York's Explosive '80s, and the Subway Vigilante Trial That Divided the Nation
Williams, Elliot
Hardcover
$28.80
The Summer of Death: The Great Heat Wave of 1936 and the Making of Modern-Day America
Williams, Geoff
Hardcover
$33.25
An Inconvenient Woman: The Extraordinary Life of Lillian Smith, the Southerner Who Defied Jim Crow America
Merritt, Keri Leigh
Hardcover
$28.50
A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them
Egan, Timothy
Paperback
$16.20
Yuppies: The Bankers, Lawyers, Joggers, and Gourmands Who Conquered New York
Gottlieb, Dylan
Hardcover
$30.40
The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl
Egan, Timothy
Paperback
From $10.99
The Flag Was Still There: A History of the American Experiment in Five Anniversaries
McKean, David
Bennett, M. Todd
Hardcover
From $19.99
A Librarian's War: The Man Who Fought World War II with Books and Brought the Joy of Reading to Millions
Manning, Molly Guptill
Hardcover
$31.49
The Devil's Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the Cia, and the Rise of America's Secret Government
Talbot, David
Paperback
$21.84
When America Roared: How the 1980s Saved, Then Broke, the Country--And Led Us to Today
Kaufman, Jonathan
Hardcover
$31.50
1929: Inside the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History--And How It Shatteredâ a Nation (Large Print Edition)
Sorkin, Andrew Ross
Paperback
$35.15
Playmakers: The Jewish Entrepreneurs Who Created the Toy Industry in America
Kimmel, Michael
Hardcover
$31.34
The CIA Book Club: The Secret Mission to Win the Cold War with Forbidden Literature
English, Charlie
Hardcover
$33.25
Solo and Together: Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh, an Enigmatic Life and Marriage
Hansen, James R.
Hardcover
$38.00
How the South Won the Civil War: Oligarchy, Democracy, and the Continuing Fight for the Soul of America
Richardson, Heather Cox
Paperback
$22.99
Born in Flames: The Business of Arson and the Remaking of the American City
Ansfield, Bench
Hardcover
$30.39
This Nonviolent Stuff'll Get You Killed: How Guns Made the Civil Rights Movement Possible
Cobb, Charles E., Jr.
Paperback
$24.65
The Gods of New York: Egotists, Idealists, Opportunists, and the Birth of the Modern City: 1986-1990
Mahler, Jonathan
Hardcover
$30.40
The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and the Chicago Police Murdered a Black Panther
Haas, Jeffrey
Paperback
$17.09
The Most Awful Responsibility: Truman and the Secret Struggle for Control of the Atomic Age
Wellerstein, Alex
Hardcover
$30.40
The Last Flight: The Untold Story of the Search for JFK Jr. and the Race Against the Atlantic
Webster, W. Russell
Webster, Theresa M.
Hardcover
$28.49
Martyrs to the Unspeakable: The Assassinations of Jfk, Malcolm, Martin, and Rfk
Douglass, James W.
Hardcover
$36.10
The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb
Graff, Garrett M.
Hardcover
$33.25
An American Girl: How a Billion-Dollar Doll and Its Unlikely Founder Changed Girlhood Forever
Fitzsimons, Amanda
Hardcover
$28.50
Dear Senator: A Memoir by the Daughter of Strom Thurmond
Stadiem, William
Washington-Williams, Essie Mae
Paperback
$18.99
Kingmaker: Pamela Harriman's Astonishing Life of Power, Seduction, and Intrigue
Purnell, Sonia
Paperback
$20.90
Evidence of the Extraordinary: Discoveries from the Series the Proof Is Out There
Sancho, Miguel
Hardcover
$28.50
How We Get Free (Updated 2nd Edition): Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective
Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta
Paperback
$18.95
The Feather Detective: Mystery, Mayhem, and the Magnificent Life of Roxie Laybourne
Sweeney, Chris
Hardcover
From $19.99
The Azusa Street Mission and Revival: The Birth of the Global Pentecostal Movement
Robeck, Cecil M.
Paperback
$16.14
The Distance Between Our Names: The Untold History of America's War on Japanese Immigrants
Richter, Paul
Hardcover
$27.00
Season of the Witch: Enchantment, Terror, and Deliverance in the City of Love
Talbot, David
Paperback
$20.89
The Martians: The True Story of an Alien Craze That Captured Turn-Of-The-Century America
Baron, David
Hardcover
$28.49
Who Killed Jfk?: Solving America's Greatest Murder Mystery
Russell, Dick
Reiner, Rob
Hoffman, David
Hardcover
$28.50
A Treacherous Secret Agent: How Literature Spoke Truth to Power During the Red Scare
Garber, Marjorie
Hardcover
$28.50
You Can't Catch Us: Lady Bird Johnson's Trailblazing 1964 Campaign Train and the Women Who Rode with Her
McKenna Schmidt, Shannon
Hardcover
$25.19
Guerra Contra Todos Los Puertorriqueños: Revolución Y Terror En La Colonia Americana
Denis, Nelson A.
Paperback
$20.89
The Forgotten 500: The Untold Story of the Men Who Risked All for the Greatest Rescue Mission of World War II
Freeman, Gregory A.
Paperback
$20.90
A Place Called Yellowstone: The Epic History of the World's First National Park
Wilson, Randall K.
Paperback
$18.95
Every Time a Bell Rings: The Legacy of It's a Wonderful Life, America's Most Beloved Holiday Film
St James, Emily
Theisen, Lauren
Hardcover
$30.40
A Shadow Over the World: Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Rise of Fascism, and the Making of America's World War II
Hitchcock, William I.
Hardcover
$33.25
The Radical Fund: How a Band of Visionaries and a Million Dollars Upended America
Witt, John Fabian
Hardcover
$33.25
The President and the Oligarch: Roosevelt, Mellon, and the Triumph of Big Government
Steinmetz, Greg
Hardcover
$28.50
Ghosts of Honolulu: A Japanese Spy, a Japanese American Spy Hunter, and the Untold Story of Pearl Harbor
Harmon, Mark
Paperback
$18.99
Out Where the West Begins: Profiles, Visions, and Strategies of Early Western Business Leaders
Anschutz, Philip F.
Hardcover
$33.20
The Silver Snarling Trumpet: The Birth of the Grateful Dead--The Lost Manuscript of Robert Hunter
Hunter, Robert
Paperback
$19.79
True Blue: The Dramatic History of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Told by the Men Who Lived It
Delsohn, Steve
Paperback
$14.24
The Feather Detective: Mystery, Mayhem, and the Magnificent Life of Roxie Laybourne
Sweeney, Chris
Paperback
$18.00
The Church Committee Report: Revelations from the Bombshell 1970s Investigation Into the National Security State
Hochman, Brian
Guariglia, Matthew
Paperback
$21.84
Rolling Stone and the Rise of Hip Capitalism: How a Magazine Born in the 1960s Changed America
Ponce de Leon, Charles L.
Hardcover
$28.50
Banished Citizens: A History of the Mexican American Women Who Endured Repatriation
Ramírez, Marla A.
Hardcover
$35.94
Voices of Freedom: An Oral History of the Civil Rights Movement from the 1950s Through the 1980s
Fayer, Steve
Hampton, Henry
Paperback
$32.00
Those Angry Days: Roosevelt, Lindbergh, and America's Fight Over World War II, 1939-1941
Olson, Lynne
Paperback
From $10.99
Myth America: Historians Take on the Biggest Legends and Lies about Our Past
Kruse, Kevin M.
Zelizer, Julian E.
Hardcover
$12.99
Pre-Code Essentials: Must-See Cinema from Hollywood's Untamed Era, 1930-1934
Luperi, Kim
Reid, Danny
Paperback
$24.69
Days of Rage: America's Radical Underground, the Fbi, and the Forgotten Age of Revolutionary Violence
Burrough, Bryan
Paperback
$20.90
The War They Won: The Story of World War II, as told by Those Who Were There
K. Kistler, Lt Hobart
Hardcover
$49.99
Bubble in the Sun: The Florida Boom of the 1920s and How It Brought on the Great Depression
Knowlton, Christopher
Paperback
$19.95
A Place Called Yellowstone: The Epic History of the World's First National Park
Wilson, Randall K.
Hardcover
$32.30