NTQ Book Reviews

edited by Ann Featherstone

doi:10.1017/S0266464X09000098

Sheldon Patinkin
No Legs, No Jokes, No Chance:
a History of the American Musical Theater
Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University
Press, 2008. 553 p. $45.00.
ISBN: 0-8101-1994-3.
Developed as a text for college students majoring
in musical theatre, this book presents the history
of American musical theatre from La Bohme to
Rent. A major feature is its hypertextual design,
which allows Patinkin to handle a wealth of
material in an efficient and impressive way. At
page level, the musical theatre narrative is supplemented in the margins by text-boxed information about specific productions: music, lyrics,
book, director, producer, choreographer, designer,
key cast, and number of performances. Further
boxes provide key facts about significant composers, dramatists, and producers from each historical period. Set below the musical theatre narrative
is the Backdrop to each historical section, which
is sub-divided into national, international, new
developments, sports, art, music, dance, publications, radio and TV, popular culture, stage, and
screen. Thus, the page design embeds musical
history within the political, social, cultural, and
media history of America and provides a visual
recognition of their interdependence.
The hypertextual design is mirrored at book
level by the division of the material into an overture and seven parts. For example, in the section
entitled The Golden Age of the Broadway Song,
19251939, each part is subdivided into bite-sized
modules that conclude with an extensive Suggested Watching and Listening section, which
foregrounds the pedagogical function of the book.
The hypertextual structure works also at the conceptual level, for Patinkin begins his history in
1943, with a discussion of Oklahoma! generally
accepted as the first fully integrated musical in
order to highlight the importance of the creative
team of Rodgers and Hammerstein II, who produced fully rounded characters operative within
an integration of book, music, lyrics, and dance.
This enables the reader to appreciate more
fully the difference between Golden Age of the
American Broadway Musical Theater, 194664,
with its American musical film counterpart in
Hollywood, and all their antecedents: the fragmented form of the operas and operettas, minstrel
shows, vaudeville, and burlesque that made up
the social and cultural history of the early musical.
ntq 25:1 (february 2009) cambridge university press

The arrival of the concept musical epitomized by

Sondheim and Princes Company (1970) is seen by
Patinkin as the next landmark production in the
development of the form. There follows a critical
analysis of what he calls the demise of American
musical theatre by the designer-driven super-productions of the 1980s and 1990s. He concludes
with an analysis of recent small-scale productions
and a rallying call for the creative team to remain
the life-blood and centrifugal force for contemporary American musical theatre.
This book is a welcome addition to the field,
which provides a very useful model for university lecturers delivering undergraduate courses
on its subject, and given the extensive suggestions
for self-directed study it will also be extremely
useful to research students and scholars.
freda chapple
doi:10.1017/S0266464X09000104

Dee Reynolds
Rhythmic Subjects: Uses of Energy in the
Dances of Mary Wigman, Martha Graham,
and Merce Cunningham
Alton, Hants: Dance Books, 2007. 316 p. 20.00.
ISBN: 978-185273-112 0.
This is one of a new generation of books of dance
scholarship that reconsiders well-known dancers
and established ideas. Dee Reynoldss monograph
considers the key works of its three subjects in turn,
applying an interdisciplinary approach overall.
Energy in movement is a focus of the book, where
each dancer is viewed from the point of view of
how they used energy in their work. Consequently Rudolf Labans ideas are crucial, notably his
analysis based on effort. Thus, Wigmans modern
work of the 1920s is considered in terms of spatial
energies; Grahams virile rhythms of the 1930s are
said to demonstrate empowering energies, and
Cunninghams punctual rhythms of the post-war
period show life energies.
Each of the subjects is well-contextualized and
individual works are considered in clear and descriptive accounts. Reynolds has brought some
formidable historical research into this scholarly
work, evidenced by over a thousand detailed endnotes and an impressive bibliography, uncovering
many underused German sources, in particular.
An introduction and a chapter on kinesthetic
imagination bracket the three individual chapters on the dancers. Here Reynolds lays out and
lays claim to her new approach to these three very
well-known artists and their work. The thesis on

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