James Shapiro Journalist Profile

Articles

Rebels Without a Cause | James Shapiro

Dec 26, 2024 | nybooks.com | James Shapiro

At a performance of Romeo and Juliet in Boston in the 1850s starring Charlotte Cushman, the most celebrated Romeo of the day, a spectator fake sneezed loudly and derisively during an intimate scene between the cross-dressed Cushman and her Juliet, Sarah Anderton.
Low-stress nonfiction

Sep 26, 2024 | missoulian.com | Emily Nussbaum |James Shapiro |Ben Greenman |Chris Nashawaty

BOOKS | REVIEWS'Cue the Sun! The Invention of Reality TV'By Emily NussbaumWith prose as bracing as a chilled Chardonnay tossed in your face, New Yorker critic Nussbaum delivers an essential book on the development of reality TV, which is not the faint praise it may sound like. Some pop-culture books can feel like overlong web posts, but Nussbaum digs deep into the genre's origins and often-queasy mix of high-flying rhetoric and lowdown showbiz chicanery.
Theater, Democracy, and the Making of a Culture War with James Shapiro

Sep 11, 2024 | johnbatchelor.substack.com | James Shapiro |John Batchelor

It is April 14th, 1936. It is chilly enough to wear an overcoat. Gathering at the Lafayette Theater in Harlem is an excited crowd wearing fedoras, and some people are in fancy dress. There is also a vehicle pulled up with a motion picture camera on top, taking footage as if it's the launch of an aircraft carrier. There are mounted police present. The crowd is excited and all looking at each other, looking at the opening of the doors. This is the premiere of Macbeth by William Shakespeare.
James S. Shapiro on the Federal Theatre Project & His New Book, "The Playbook"

Aug 29, 2024 | airmail.news | James Shapiro

On the last day of June 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt reluctantly signed into law a congressional bill that ended funding for the Federal Theatre Project. Overnight, its sets, costumes, scripts, and playbills were no longer needed. Since it began, in 1935, the Federal Theatre had staged more than a thousand productions, which meant that a lot of federal property, scattered over 29 states, needed to be disposed of quickly. Some of it found its way into local libraries. Some was sold off.
Book review: James Shapiro’s The Playbook narrates theatre and culture wars in 1930s America

Jun 8, 2024 | straitstimes.com | James Shapiro |Clement Yong

The Playbook by James Shapiro explores the birth and trajectory of the United States' Federal Theatre Project in the aftermath of the Great Depression. PHOTOS: FABER & FABER Updated Jun 08, 2024, 01:00 PM Published Jun 08, 2024, 01:00 PM The Playbook By James ShapiroNon-fiction/Faber & Faber/Hardcover/342 pages/$40.04/Amazon SG (amzn.to/3KvhqkD)4 starsSomething theatrically anti-theatre happened in 1939.
Book review: James Shapiro’s The Playbook narrates theatre and culture wars in 1930s America

Jun 8, 2024 | redhot.sg | James Shapiro

The Playbook By James ShapiroNon-fiction/Faber & Faber/Hardcover/342 pages/$40.04/Amazon SG (amzn.to/3KvhqkD)4 starsSomething theatrically anti-theatre happened in 1939. The ending of Pinocchio, the United States’ latest Broadway hit, was changed so the puppet boy dies, killed by an “act of Congress”. Stagehands knocked down sets in full view of the packed house.
THE PLAYBOOK | Kirkus Reviews

May 31, 2024 | kirkusreviews.com | James Shapiro |David Grann |Elie Wiesel |Marion Wiesel

Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil. During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited.
How Willa Cather Chronicled the Development of American Theater

May 28, 2024 | lithub.com | James Shapiro

It’s almost impossible to grasp how deeply theater was woven into the fabric of American life, from coastal cities to frontier towns, before the rise of Hollywood. It helps to see this through the eyes of a young woman, born in 1873, who grew up in Red Cloud, Nebraska, went to college in the state capitol, Lincoln, and as an undergraduate began reviewing local productions for the Nebraska State Journal.
The theater project that sparked a congressional probe-and culture war

May 26, 2024 | washingtonpost.com | James Shapiro

A police officer in front of a crowd of children and adults at a Federal Theatre Project performance in Central Park, New York. (Dick Rose/Library of Congress)CommentSaveThis article is adapted from “The Playbook,” which will be published Tuesday by Penguin Press. On Dec. 6, 1938, for the first and perhaps only time in U.S. history, the purpose of theater and its place in American democracy were hotly debated in a congressional hearing.
Theatre Kids: A True Tale of Off-Off Broadway

Mar 25, 2024 | publishersweekly.com | Tom McGrath |Charles Foster |Becky Holmes |James Shapiro

John DeVore. Applause, $27.95 (224p) ISBN 978-1-4930-7776-2James Beard Award winner DeVore debuts with a wry and boisterous account of his life in the theater.