American Plays and Musicals on Screen »

Award winner Thomas S. Hischak is Professor of Theatre Arts at the State University of New York College at Cortland. He is the author of twelve books on theatre, film and Tin Pan Alley and has several published plays.

As the popularity of film grew and audiences demanded longer stories, Hollywood began borrowing plots as well as actors and directors from Broadway-some of these play-to-films were triumphs and others were inexplicable duds. This reference work is an annotated guide to American stage productions remade for film and television, with works ranging from late 19th-century American plays and musicals, through silent and sound films, to made-for-video productions by PBS, A&E, HBO, and others.

Each alphabetically listed entry provides complete credits for the play or musical: date, theatre, playwright, cast (with characters) and crew, length of run, along with choreographer, song titles, and authors of the score where available. The screen versions follow, listing alternate titles, date, studio, screenwriter, cast (with characters), director, and producer. Each entry concludes with detailed commentary on the productions; it describes what changes occurred between the formats, determines the strengths and weaknesses of each, judges the success of the transition, and describes how the end product was received. A bibliography and name and title indexes complete this cross-referenced work.