"This book employs the aesthetic principles of musical theater to consider the genre's politics, which can cut against the grain of dominant ideology to establish identities and communities in difference. The musical, a bastion of mainstream theatrical culture, always and already contains a fan culture of outsiders who dream themselves into being in the lineal timespaces of song and dance. This book employs an array of analytical approaches to the musical in which archival work is as essential as analysis of live ...
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"This book employs the aesthetic principles of musical theater to consider the genre's politics, which can cut against the grain of dominant ideology to establish identities and communities in difference. The musical, a bastion of mainstream theatrical culture, always and already contains a fan culture of outsiders who dream themselves into being in the lineal timespaces of song and dance. This book employs an array of analytical approaches to the musical in which archival work is as essential as analysis of live performance. It analyzes dramaturgical notes found in Larry Gelbart's papers in the UCLA Performing Arts Collections as well as old sheet music covers and pianola advertisements; equally important are investigations into Sins o' the Flesh, a Rocky Horror shadowcast based in Los Angeles, and interviews with audience members who warped time in Taylor Mac's 24-hour-long popular music extravaganza at St. Ann's Warehouse"--
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