Few people have helped to define the American musical today more than Harold "Hal" Prince. His resume includes some of the most important titles of the past century: West Side Story, Fiddler on the Roof, Cabaret, Company, Sweeney Todd, and Phantom of the Opera. Prince's impact on Broadway stemmed from his reinvention of musical theatre from the script- and score-based model to a more visual, almost cinematic art form in which the director is auteur. But it also stemmed from his appreciation for collaboration and his trusted collaborators--talented friends and colleagues who could help achieve his singular vision for a production.
In the new free exhibition
In The Company of Harold Prince: Broadway Producer, Director, Collaborator, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts will explore Prince's creative trajectory, and showcase the team of designers, stage managers, press agents, composers, and writers he assembled to create so many history-making shows. In The Company of
Harold Prince just opened September 18, 2019 in the Library's Donald and Mary Oenslager Gallery and will be on display through March 31, 2020.
Curated by
Doug Reside, the Lewis B. and
Dorothy Cullman Curator of the Library's
Billy Rose Theatre Division, the exhibition will display original costumes, set models, and archival video, and borrows from the aesthetic of immersive theatre, inviting visitors to pick up, examine and interact with reproductions of documents and objects from the Library's unparalleled collections. Facsimiles of the paperwork for Pajama Game and Damn Yankees will be scattered over a recreation of Prince's desk for visitors to look through. Digital recreations of stage manager
Ruth Mitchell's scripts will be linked to thousands of never-before-seen photographs from the Library's collections. The exhibition will end with an open cabaret stage will allow visitors to perform songs from his shows or record their own stories about their experience with Prince's theatrical work.
Below, we're taking yo inside the exhibit for a peek at everything In the Company of Harold Prince has to offer!
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