Digital Resources

Digital content with theater materials represents worldwide artistic practices. These materials include digital collections, online exhibitions, recorded lectures and interviews with scholars and performers, filmed theatrical performances, and published articles and blog posts. The selected links below highlight single collections or unite items from various divisions of the Library of Congress that share a theatrical theme or theater-related materials.

Find additional online content using keyword searches on the Library's website.

The Library's digital collections represent worldwide traditions and practices in theater. The digital collections listed below highlight materials from various divisions within the Library that share focus on theater or include theater-related materials.

American Variety Stage: Vaudeville and Popular Entertainment, 1870-1920
This collection is a multimedia anthology selected from various Library of Congress holdings. This collection illustrates the vibrant and diverse forms of popular entertainment, especially vaudeville, that thrived from 1870-1920. Included are 334 English- and Yiddish-language playscripts, 146 theater playbills and programs, 61 motion pictures, 10 sound recordings and 143 photographs and 29 memorabilia items documenting the life and career of Harry Houdini. Groups of theater posters and additional sound recordings will be added to this anthology in the future.
Federal Theatre Project, 1935 to 1939
This online presentation includes items selected from the Federal Theatre Project Collection at the Library of Congress. Featured here are stage and costume designs, photographs, posters, playbills, programs, and playscripts, including productions of Macbeth and The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus as staged by Orson Welles, and Power, a topical drama of the period. Selected administrative documents from the project are also available.
Lars Schmidt Collection
Swedish theatrical producer, director, and publisher Lars Schmidt (1917-2009) spent over 50 years in the theater business. This collection focuses on Schmidt's efforts to bring English-language plays and musicals, mostly from the United States, to Nordic and Parisian stages. The correspondence, programs, photographs, posters, and scrapbooks selected from the Lars Schmidt Papers at the Library of Congress provide an introduction to the plays he staged, the people with whom he worked, and the methods he used in his transcontinental play work.
Posters: Performing Arts Posters
Contains approximately 2,100 posters in the online Performing Arts Posters category represent the entire contents of three collections: the Magic Poster Collection, the Minstrel Poster Collection, and the Theatrical Poster Collection.
Professional Organizations for Performing Arts Web Archive
Includes archived websites for organizations such as the Dramatists Guild of America, International Organisation of Scenographers, Theatre Architects and Technicians (OISTAT), Canadian Association for Theatre Research (CATR), and League of Professional Theatre Women.
Variety Stage Sound Recordings and Motion Pictures
The 61 motion pictures in the Variety Stage Sound Recordings and Motion Pictures include animal acts, burlesque, dance, comic sketches, dramatic excerpts, dramatic sketches, physical culture acts, and tableaus. The films represented date from copyrights of 1897 to 1920; the majority are drawn from the Library's extensive Paper Print Collection. The remaining films were produced by Hans A. Spanuth in Chicago from 1919 to 1920 for the series "Spanuth's Original Vod-A-Vil Movies." These motion pictures present a rare animated record of vaudeville acts from the turn of the century. Although not actually filmed on a theatrical stage, they sought to recreate the atmosphere of a theater performance by showing the types of vaudeville acts and performers that were popular at the time.
Yiddish-Language Playscripts
The Yiddish theater developed as a uniquely American form in the Eastern European Jewish immigrant community in New York City, and other urban centers, during the early twentieth century. The 77 unpublished manuscripts presented here include light comedies and dramas, and have been selected from the more than 1,290 copyright-deposit plays known as the Marwick Collection and housed in the Hebraic Section of the African and Middle Eastern Division.

Browse the Library's complete list of past exhibitions for materials relevant to theater. The following is a selected list of relevant past exhibits.

Bob Hope and American Variety
Bob Hope was among the 20,000 vaudeville performers working in the 1920s. Many of these performers were, like Hope, recent immigrants to America who saw a vaudeville career as one of the few ways to succeed as a “foreigner” in America. Throughout his extraordinary professional career of nearly seventy years, Bob Hope practiced the arts he learned in vaudeville and perpetuated variety entertainment traditions in stage musical comedy, motion pictures, radio, television, and the live appearances he made around the world in support of American armed forces. Today, the stage variety show is mostly a memory but its influence is pervasive thanks to the long and rich careers of vaudeville veterans like Bob Hope.
Coast to Coast: The Federal Theatre Project, 1935-1939
Explores a unique time in American history when the federal government organized and produced theater events in an effort to provide work for theater professionals who were out of work as a result of the Great Depression. The exhibition features materials from the Library’s Federal Theatre Project Collection.
Grand Illusion: The Art of Theatrical Design
This exhibition journeys from the Baroque courts of Europe to the Broadway stages of the United States. The exhibit draws from collections that document virtually all genres of theater: ballet, modern dance, opera, musical theater, comedy, dramatic theater, and the variety stage.
Roger L. Stevens Presents
This exhibition examines Stevens's career through the great number of stage productions that Stevens presented or fostered indirectly, for example, through the NEA. His achievements manifest Stevens's deep commitment to raising the quality of life for all Americans and his special place as one of the nation's foremost cultural leaders.
Stagestruck! Performing Arts Caricatures at the Library of Congress
During the early twentieth century, performing arts caricature came of age as an art form in the United States as celebrities of song, stage, and screen were transformed into popular icons of American culture. Caricatures played a prominent role in the dramatic rise in circulation enjoyed by numerous popular magazines and daily newspapers after 1900, when a new generation of cartoonists and illustrators transformed famous faces into vivid likenesses that set the standard for future creators.

Lectures and interviews with a theatrical focus created by multiple divisions within the Library have been recorded and made available online. The following links offer a representative sample. Search for more recorded lectures and interviews on the Library's website.

Featured Lecture

Alyssa Quint focuses on the early years of the modern Yiddish theater through the works of one of its best-known and most colorful figures, Avrom Goldfaden (1840-1908). Goldfaden was one of the first playwrights to stage a commercially viable Yiddish-language theater and his plays were performed frequently for Jewish audiences. Quint uses Goldfaden's theatrical works as a way to understand the social life of Jews in late Imperial Russia, exploring connections between artistic production and larger social structures during an important moment in Russian Jewish history. (Event date: November 21, 2019)

More Lectures & Interviews

"Behind the Scenes with the Oscar Hammerstein Correspondence"
Senior music specialist Mark Horowitz discusses his one-year project examining, selecting, transcribing and editing the correspondence in the Library's Oscar Hammerstein II Collection. The project, under the auspices of the John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress, revealed insights into the life and work of this extraordinary American lyricist, librettist, theatrical producer, director and humanitarian. The collection, recently processed by archivist Nancy Seeger, allowed Horowitz to read through over 20,000 letters and ultimately to transcribe more than 4,600 of them, with plans for them to form a Library website.
András Visky's Barrack Dramaturgy
Playwright and essayist András Visky discusses his work and his concept of theater, as described in a recent book, "András Visky's Barrack Dramaturgy."
A Bibliographer Encounters the Muses: Reflections on the Yiddish Theater and Its Legacy
Zachary M. Baker delivers the eighth Annual Myron M. Weinstein Memorial Lecture on the Hebraic Book as part of the Library's celebration of Jewish American Heritage Month. The lecture is titled "A Bibliographer Encounters the Muses: Reflections on the Yiddish Theater and Its Legacy."
An Evening with David Ossman and Phil Proctor of the Firesign Theater
Phil Proctor and David Ossman, two of the four members of the comedy troupe Firesign Theatre, take to the stage in the Coolidge Auditorium to perform and discuss the history and impact of their work.
Experimental Shadow Theater in Contemporary Bali, Indonesia
In recent years, several dalang (shadow masters) in both Bali and Java have presented reinterpreted shadow puppet performances of ancient Indonesian texts as part of considering religious pluralism and tolerance. It is within these texts, produced between 1100 and 1400 A.D. by the Javanese Hindu-Buddhist sages Mpu Kunturan and Mpu Tantular, that the Indonesian national motto bhineka tunggal ika (unity in diversity) first appeared. Cosponsored with the Indonesian Embassy, Education and Culture Section.
The Fantastic Worlds of Chinese Opera Theater in North America
Nancy Yunhwa Rao discusses the musical history of Chinese immigrants to North America.
The Federal Theatre Project: Uncovering Changes in Playscripts of Popular Performances
Amy Brady discusses the Federal Theatre Project, America's first and only nationally subsidized theater, and how hyperspectral imaging helped to elucidate the history of some of the project's most popular performances.
Israel's Theatrical Scene: Welcome to Theaterland
Renowned Israeli actor Roy Horovitz discusses Israeli theatre, speaking directly to the experience of his recent staging of "The Timekeepers," a play which explores themes of homosexuality during the Holocaust.
Jews and Theater in an Intercultural Context
Dr. Edna Nahshon speaks about her book, Jews and Theater in an Intercultural Context.
Punch & Judy in America
Mark Walker (a.k.a. "Professor Horn") discusses the classic Punch and Judy puppet show. The earliest known Punch and Judy show in Maryland was by an itinerant conjuror noted in January 1783 in Fell's Point, Baltimore, offering sleight-of-hand skills and "a whimsical play starring Punchinello."
Shakespeare's Genealogies
William Shakespeare was fascinated with family dynamics, often using them to fuel his plots with familial jealousy, lust, murder, mistaken identity and long-lost siblings. Many of his works share characters that can be linked together by a common family history dating to pagan times. Vanessa James, professor of theater arts at Mount Holyoke College, unravels these lineages in a lecture at the Library of Congress. "Shakespeare's Genealogies: Plots and Illustrated Family Trees for All 42 Works," published by Melcher Media, is the follow-up to James' critically acclaimed book "Genealogy of Greek Mythology," in which she reveals the lineage of more than 3,000 mythical gods and mortals from ancient Greek texts. "Shakespeare's Genealogies" uses the same two-sided, accordion-fold, fully illustrated format as the Greek mythology volume. The accordion-fold allows one to read the book traditionally, page-by-page, or to unfold the work to 17 feet and view the intricacies of the lineages in their entirety. The book begins with a biography of Shakespeare, accompanied by his own family tree, and continues with charts organized according to category of play: Myths and Legends, Legends into History, Continental Plays, Roman History Plays and British History Plays. These categories diverge from the traditional grouping into tragedies, histories and comedies of the Bard's works. The unique reorganization of these plays is a product of James' own scholarship in order to better understand the bloodlines of Shakespeare's characters.
Stew
In a special appearance, Stew discusses his career as a playwright, songwriter, poet and lyricist. Adrien-Alice Hansel talks with him about the song lyric as poem and as a dramatic text, and takes a look at some interesting recent projects -- his song cycle "Brooklyn Omnibus" and a new show written for the 2014 Oregon Shakespeare Festival, "Family Album."
The Sufi Ritual in the New Theater
Sudanese actor and director Ali Mahdi discusses how theater, music and drama have an invaluable role in promoting dialogue and supporting peacekeeping processes.

Many filmed theatrical performances are part of the Variety Stage Sound Recordings and Motion Pictures digital collection. A handful of additional performances also included in this list are available through the Library's website.

Featured Video

This live performance tells the stories of Emma Lazarus, an immigrant's daughter who became known as Lady Liberty's poet, and Irving Berlin, an immigrant who became one of America's best loved composers. The original play, commissioned by the Hebraic Section and written and directed by Roberta Gasbarre, Director of The Discovery Theater, Smithsonian Associates, explores how the values of liberty, opportunity, and religious freedom shaped American history. The 45 minute presentation was one of the public programs related to the Library of Congress exhibition, "From Haven to Home: 350 Years of Jewish Life in America." (Event date: December 6, 2004)

More Filmed Performances

Black Pearl Sings!
A theatrical reading of the play "Black Pearl Sings!" followed by a discussion with director Tom Jones II and actors Roz White and Susan Galbraith from the Alliance for New Music Theater, facilitated by N.J. Mitchell. The discussion focuses on the ways in which the Library's extensive primary source collections inform creative artistic practice.
The Extra Turn
Camera is positioned as if in the audience of a vaudeville show. A man and two women, all in evening clothes, are seated in a theater box to the left of a stage with curtains and a painted backdrop of trees. A young woman in a white dress, identified by a sign as "Dolly Lightfoot," performs a simple dance with leg kicks. The audience in the box applaud as she finishes, takes a curtsy, and exits. When they continue to clap, the dancer returns for an encore bow, and the man in the box throws her a bouquet of flowers. After she again exits, a man comes on the stage and changes the sign to "Extra," indicating an extra "turn" or act. A man in evening dress and holding sheet music takes the stage, and begins to sing with broad gestures. The trio in the box grumble and angrily gesture at the stage, then they throw their fans and hats at the oblivious singer and cover their ears. More hats and other objects are thrown by the off-camera audience, until one succeeds in knocking down the vocalist. He runs off stage, but quickly returns with an umbrella and continues to sing undaunted, even when the man in the box throws his seat cushion. Finally, two stagehands enter and drag and push the offending singer off stage, to the relief of the theater patrons.
From show girl to burlesque queen
Opens on a dressing room set with a mirror, dressing table, and chair center stage and a folded dressing screen on the left. A smiling, dark-haired woman enters through the door on stage right, unbuttoning a full-length polka-dot costume. As she undresses, she frequently looks directly at the camera and smiles. She removes her sash or cummerbund, the top with its trailing sleeves, and her skirt, leaving her clothed only in a sleeveless chemise. Smiling directly at the camera, she mischievously slips a strap of the garment off one shoulder, then ducks behind the screen. After the chemise is thrown over the top of the screen, her arm furtively reaches out from behind the screen and grabs a slight garment from the back of the chair and some items from the dressing table. She then emerges wearing a risqué, decorated costume with cap sleeves and a very short skirt, gathered at the waist. Her legs appear to be bare. The woman brandishes a sword, grabbed from under the discarded dress, and strikes a seductive pose as the viewer glimpses a costumed man entering the room.
Living Pictures
Four previously released films, posed by artists and representing well-known works of art. Each film, comprised of two "living pictures" is shown as it would have appeared live in vaudeville theaters of the time. At the opening of each "picture", curtains are drawn aside by two pages. The models remain for a short interval in complete repose, and then the curtains are drawn closed.
Pity the blind, no. 2
Filmed version of a popular vaudeville gag, as if from the audience of a variety theater. A boy, holding a sign under his arm, leads a man onto a stage with a painted backdrop of a city street corner. With his dark glasses and cane, the man is apparently blind. He kneels down slightly left of center stage and lays down his hat and cane, while the boy turns the placard around so that it reads "Pity the Blind," places it around the man's neck, and exits the stage. A gentleman with a cigar crosses the stage, pauses to read the sign, and drops some money in the blind man's hat. He is followed by two well-dressed women in furs and long coats, who also leave coins for the beggar after searching their purses. As they start to exit, however, one of the women stops and raises her skirt to adjust her tights. Behind her back, the supposed blind man slides his dark glasses down his nose and ogles the woman's exposed leg. With the leggings in place, the women exit the stage none the wiser, leaving behind a smiling "blind" man.
Theaters
The Library of Congress and W.W. Norton & Company celebrated the publication of "Theaters" with a special program of music and entertainment. Featured were an illustrated overview of the book by the author, Craig Morrison; a performance by Ted van Griethuysen of the Shakespeare Theatre Company; a musical performance by Genevieve Williams featuring songs composed by Cole Porter, George and Ira Gershwin, Howard Dietz and Irving Berlin; and a performance by the noted Russian pianist Svetlana Potanina of compositions by Sergei Rachmaninoff and Robert Schumann.
Veterans Day Family Program: Diary of a WWI Soldier
In honor of Veterans Day, actor and playwright Douglas Taurel offered a dramatic presentation based on the diary of Irving Greenwald, a member of the famed "Lost Battalion" of World War I. Greenwald's diary is preserved by the Veterans History Project and on display in the Library of Congress exhibition "Echoes of the Great War."

The Music Division has supported scholarship on theater research. Much of this research has been shared and made available on the Library's website. These articles include:

"The Play That Electrified Harlem": Shakespeare's Macbeth and the Federal Theatre Project
This Story Map explores a 1936 production of William Shakespeare's Macbeth by the Negro Unit of the Federal Theater Project, one of the most ambitious government-sponsored relief measures in American history.
Federal Theatre: Melodrama, Social Protest, and Genius
An article within the digital collection of the Federal Theatre Project
The Play That Electrified Harlem
An article within the digital collection of the Federal Theatre Project
Transatlantic Translations and Transactions: Lars Schmidt and the Implementation of Postwar American Theatre in Europe
An article within the digital collection of the Lars Schmidt papers
The WPA Federal Theatre Project, 1935-1939
An article within the digital collection of the Federal Theatre Project

Several Library blogs have published posts on theater-related research. These blogs include:

Folklife Today
American Folklife Center blog
In the Muse
Music Division blog
Picture This
Prints and Photographs Division blog

Search for additional Library of Congress blog posts on the main blog website. The following is a representative sample of theater-specific blog posts.

Arthur Miller: A View From the Field
This guest blog post by Matthew Barton about the playwright Arthur Miller is part of a series called “Hidden Folklorists,” which examines the folklore work of surprising people, including people better known for other pursuits. It was written soon after Miller’s death in 2005 for the publication Folklife Center News. Matthew Barton worked at the American Folklife Center at that time, and is now the Curator of Recorded Sound at the Library of Congress’s National Audio-Visual Conservation Center.
Asking Students to Re-Imagine a Living Newspaper Play with Playbills from the Federal Theatre Project
In the May 2019 issue of Social Education, the journal of the National Council for the Social Studies, our “Sources and Strategies” article discusses the Federal Theatre Project. The article focuses on one play, One Third of a Nation, a Living Newspaper production. Living Newspaper productions addressed social issues of the day, typically presenting factual information in mostly fictionalized ways to audiences.
Breathing Life into the Classics: How Suffrage Plays and Tennessee Williams Complicate 20th-Century Theater
Junior Fellow Rachel Tils discusses the American/Century Play Company Collection, which contains an array of some of the most acclaimed works of 20th-century American theater.
Gilbert Miller and His World
Senior Theater Specialist Walter Zvonchenko discusses Gilbert Miller, one of the most active and successful theatrical producers of the 20th century. The holdings of the Library of Congress include a collection of Gilbert Miller papers, primarily correspondence chronicling many of the highlights of modern theater history.
Miles White Costume Designs
Senior Theater Specialist Walter Zvonchenko discusses the career of Miles White, one of the most admired costume designers for the American stage in the 20th century.
Ready for Research: The Winold Reiss Collection
An invaluable record of modern design and art during the 1920s through 1940s is now available through the Winold Reiss Collection. Reiss also created designs for theaters, stages, and exhibitions, including the Music Hall and Applied Arts Building of the 1939 New York World’s Fair.
Sister Gregory Duffy: An Asset to the Abbey and the Theater
This blog post discusses correspondence from Sister Gregory, a Dominican nun and theater professor at Rosary College in Illinois (now Dominican University), with Oscar Hammerstein II held in his collection.
“Merry Christmas! Christine and Roger”
Archivist Anita M. Weber discusses the Christmas cards created and sent by animal welfare advocate Christine G. Stevens and her husband, theatrical producer and real estate executive Roger L. Stevens.

Theater Research at the Library of Congress

Performing Arts: Ask a Librarian

Digital Resources

Featured Lecture

More Lectures & Interviews

Featured Video

More Filmed Performances