Beautiful Mornin' : The Broadway Musical in The 1940s

The Broadway musical had been running on empty for too long, as a formula for the assembly of spare parts -- star comics, generic love songs, rumba dancers, Ethel Merman. In the 1940s, Rodgers & Hammerstein's Oklahoma!Ó & CarouselÓ brought a new approach -- start with strong characters & atmosphere. With vitality & occasionally outrageous humor, Mordden ranges through the Broadway classics of the 1940s -- Pal Joey,Ó Lady in the Dark,Ó On the Town,Ó Annie Get Your Gun,Ó Finian's Rainbow,Ó Brigadoon,Ó Kiss Me, Kate,Ó & South Pacific.Ó Also covers illuminating trivia -- Lute Song,Ó in which Mary Martin & Nancy Reagan were Chinese. The 1920s created the musical & the 1930s gave it politics. In the 1940s, it found its soul.Mordden, Ethan is the author of 'Beautiful Mornin' : The Broadway Musical in The 1940s', published 2005 under ISBN 9780756796723 and ISBN 0756796725.