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Reading Exercise 6:
Broadway
Broadway has been called the Street of
Lights, the Great White Way. Actors,
dancers and singers flock to Broadway
from all over the world in pursuit of their
dreams.
So what is this magical, mythical place?
Broadway is actually a street running
the length of Manhattan in New York
City. But when people talk about
“Broadway,” they are usually referring
to the section of Mid-town Manhattan
which is dotted with theaters of the
highest caliber in the world. Talented
performers come to Broadway to
complete for highly coveted roles in the
shows.
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Playwrights dream of having their
works performed on Broadway, it is the
chance of a lifetime for most performing
artists to be a part of “The Great White
Way.”
Many of the shows performed on
Broadway are stage plays. But the
shows that Broadway is known for are
the musicals—spectacles of music,
dance and acting which usually involve
the most elaborate of sets. Much like
the evolution of jazz music, this style of
theatre, which developed into what is
known today as a musical, is very much
an American art form. And, also like
jazz music, the origins of the American
Musical are very deeply rooted in
African American history and culture.
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Dance and music have been a part of
African-American culture since the days
slaves were imported for plantation
work. They brought with them the
rhythms and traditions of their homelands in Africa and the Caribbean.
From the start, slave owners were very
interested in the black songs and
dance. Before long, slave dances were
used as a form of entertainment for the
whites at social gatherings and formal
balls. Thus, African dance and music
became an important part of American
culture. And in doing so, it made
American styles of dance and music
into performance, not just social entertainment. Without this influence, the
birth of the American musical—theatrical performance integrating dance and
music into the plot—would never have
been possible.
Thanks to these beginnings, the allAmerican musical theatre made room
for many black performers—unlike
other performing arts which were primarily reserved for the whites. In the
first decade of this century, many
blacks enjoyed successful careers on
Broadway. In that decade, an all-black
musical, “In Dahomey,” even opened
on Broadway. But in 1910, after the
African-American heavyweight boxer
Jack Johnson beat the white heavyweight champion Jim Jeffries, antiblack riots broke out around New York
City. Most black performers left Broadway for Performance venues in the
black neighborhood of Harlem.
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The 1920s saw the return of AfricanAmerican influence in full force on the
Broadway stage. The musical, “Shuffle
Along,” was very successful on Broadway for over a year. The show’s very
successful on Broadway for over a
year. The show's popularity made stars
of many of its performers. The show
was very important in the development
of musical theatre because it used nontraditional styles of music, including
ragtime and other jazzy sounds taken
from the popular music of the times.
The show also included every popular
dance step of the time. Many critics and
theatre historians have said that “Shuffle Along” redefined musical theatre.
Rather than displaying a lot of dancers
in fancy costumes and songs in many
different styles of music, in “Shuffle
Along” the songs and dances were put
together in a style which told the story
of the production.
“Shuffle Along” was also a marker in
African-American history because it
made legitimate the idea of romantic
love between African-Americans. For
the first time on an American stage, two
blacks kissed. The people who made
the show were so nervous about the
risk of showing affection between
blacks that they planned the kiss to
occur right before the curtain so they
could make a quick getaway if the
audience got angry.
The musical also brought about a big
interest in black dancing as being
acceptable social dancing for whites.
“Colored dance studios” opened up all
over New York City to teach white kids
the moves of the black dances. The
popularity of African-American dance
led the way for many more black musicals on Broadway and opened a door
of opportunity for black choreographers—the creators of the dances.
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“Shuffle Along” not only helped to
create the theatre style we think of
today as American musical theatre, but
it also secured a place for AfricanAmerican performers and black shows
on Broadway—the Great White Way.
Black faces darkened the Great White
Way in such hit shows as “Porgy and
Bess”; “Bubblin' Brown Sugar”; “Showboat”; and “Ain't Misbehavin'.” These
shows are some of the most popular
and most successful ever to have
appeared on the Broadway stage. All of
these shows have had revivals in
community, regional, and school theatres and some even saw a second trip
to the Broadway stage.
But these four shows, though perhaps
the most influential black shows, were
not the only successful black shows to
appear on Broadway. In the 1970s,
black theatre had great success. Two
of the stand-out shows were “Dreamgirls”—a story based on the career of
Diana Ross and the Supremes, and
“The Wiz,” a jazzed up version of “The
Wizard of Oz.” These two shows
started a trend of using funky disco
beats and dancing in musicals, and a
movie version was even made of “The
Wiz” featuring the young Michael
Jackson.
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The late Twentieth Century saw the
creation of even more successful
African-American musicals. “Sarafina!,”
“Black and Blue” and “Five Guys
Named Moe” all hit Broadway and/or
toured America. In addition, black
dancers and choreographers made
their mark on the history of musical
theatre. Tap dancer Honi Coles won
awards for his performance in the
Broadway show, “My One and Only,”
and the tap dancer and choreographer
Gregory Hines met success on Broadway in addition to launching a film
career. In 1980 he appeared in a historical event, “Black Broadway,” a tribute to the black Broadway musicals of
the past. (Many other important black
theatre talents assembled for this
special show including: Honi Coles;
Nell Carter; and many other AfricanAmericans who helped to shape the
entertainment industry.)
In 1996, a new type of black musical
opened to rave reviews on Broadway.
This show, called, “Bring in 'da NOISE,
Bring in 'da FUNK,” was a standout in
the long line of African inspired musicals because this show tries to cross
ethnic boundaries through the pulsating
style of tap dance. The musical is
subtitled “A Tap/Rap Discourse on the
Power of the Beat.” The show explored
the history of the African-American by
trying to find out what history really is.
The plot and themes of the show unfold
under the inspiration that history does
not happen to race or cultures, but to
people. And in doing so, it attempted to
reach not just a black following or
display a black culture, but share the
stories of different African-American
individuals, from the times of slavery to
hip-hop.
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Imagine that you have been given a
ticket to the opening night of “Bring in
'da NOISE, Bring in 'da FUNK.” You are
about to join the hundreds of excited
theatre goers about to share in a little
piece of history. You put on your best
outfit and go to the Ambassador
Theatre in Mid-town Manhattan. The
bright lights of the marquis above the
front entrance announcing the grand
opening are nearly blinding. You hand
your ticket to an usher clad in a plush
red jacket. You can smell a mixture of
perfumes, chocolates and dusty theatre
curtains. You can feel the excitement in
the air as another usher directs you to
your seat. You sit down on the velvet
cushioned chair just as the lights dim
and the musicians spring into action
with the overture—the pre-performance
music.
The heavy, velvet curtain lifts and you
are pulled into a world of dance, noise
and funk for the next two hours. The
nine dancers take you through episodes in the lives of many different
African-Americans. In the first scene
you join the dancing slaves on Eighteenth Century ships sailing toward
America. It was on these ships that the
art of tap dance began, and you can
almost feel the life-pulse of those first
slaves as you watch the dancers beat
and drum. In another scene, you feel as
though your own life is being wrenched
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away as you watch actor Baakari
Wright dance away the last seconds of
his life before the rope around his neck
pulls the life out of him in the soultouching routine, “Lynching Blues.” In
“The Whirligig Stomp,” you are taken
back in time to Harlem in the 1920’s,
where big bands and the high life were
where it was at. And you can almost
feel the dancers sweat as your heart
beats with the hip-hop rhythms as the
show returns you to the streets of modern day New York City where rap and
street dance were born.
To summarize, there was such a level
of commitment in these shows that they
took theatre to a new level. These,
along with others of the shows mentioned in this article, were unrestrained
in their creative energy. The creators
and performers invested themselves in
each performance and they brought
about the one-of-a-kind experiences
that make going to the theatre a special
experience. These shows have helped
to bring American theatre to a higher
level of excellence by doing more than
entertaining, by finding ways to touch
souls. It is understandable, when sharing the experience of one of these
shows, that the roots of what you are
watching run deep—they run all the
way back to ships full of enslaved men
and women who only shared one language—the language of music and
dance. (bbc.co.uk)
Total number of words in 1 minute: _______