A look back at Black vaudeville, an anthology of dramatic criticism by women writers, and the 600-year history of Latinx performing arts in America have been named the best theater books of the year by The Theatre Library Association, which will present its TLA Book Awards at a virtual ceremony on YouTube via the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts on October 18, from 6:30 to 8 p.m. EST.
The Theatre Library Association, founded in 1937 to support librarians and archivists affiliated with theater, dance, performance studies, popular entertainment, motion picture and broadcasting collections, also gives awards for books about “recorded performance” (ie. the movies.)
Below a brief description of each of the five awarded books, with links for more information, to read an excerpt, or to purchase:
T.O.B.A. Time: Black Vaudeville and the Theater Owners’ Booking Association in Jazz-Age America by Michelle Scott (University of Illinois Press, 282 pages) by Michelle R. Scott: Black vaudevillians and entertainers joked that T.O.B.A. stood for “tough on black artists.” But the Theater Owner’s Booking Association (T.O.B.A.) played a foundational role in the African American entertainment industry and provided a training ground for icons like Cab Calloway, Bessie Smith, Ethel Waters, Sammy Davis Jr., the Nicholas Brothers, Count Basie. The author explores its 11-year history (from 1920 – 1931)
Dr. Michelle R. Scott joined the History Department at the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) after earning her B.A. at Stanford University and her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees at Cornell University
The Routledge Anthology of Women’s Theatre Theory and Dramatic Criticism, edited by Catherine Burroughs and J. Ellen Gainor (Routledge, 652 pages). The first wide-ranging anthology of theater theory and dramatic criticism by women writers, with essays by and about eighty-nine women over two thousand years.
Both editors teach performance and media arts at Cornell; Professor Burrough is also a member of Actors Equity Association.
A History of Latinx Performing Arts in the U.S.: Volume I (Routledge, 362 pages) and Volume 2 (Routledge, 412 pages) by Beatriz Rizk. A comprehensive overview of the development of the Latinx performing arts in what is now the U.S. since the sixteenth century.
Dr. Rizk is the Educational Director of the International Hispanic Theatre Festival of Miami.
The two movie book winners:
Charlie Chaplin vs. America: When Art, Sex, and Politics Collided by Scott Wyman (Simon and Schuster, 428 pages). The story of Charlie Chaplin’s years of exile from the United States during the postwar Red Scare, and how it ruined his film career,
How the Movies Got a Past: A Historiography of American Cinema, 1894-1930 by Dimitrios Latsis (Oxford University Press, 408 pages). A survey of the way people thought and talked about the cinema as a technology, form of art, and source of entertainment, from its inception up to 1930.
