1.
Carl Van Vechten
–
Carl Van Vechten was an American writer and artistic photographer who was a patron of the Harlem Renaissance and the literary executor of Gertrude Stein. Born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, he was the youngest child of Charles and he graduated from Washington High School in 1898, and later the University of Chicago in 1903. In 1906, he moved to New York City and he was hired as the assistant music critic at The New York Times. His interest in opera had him take a leave of absence from the paper in 1907, while in England he married his long-time friend from Cedar Rapids, Anna Snyder. He returned to his job at the New York Times in 1909, at that time, Isadora Duncan, Anna Pavlova, and Loie Fuller were performing in New York City. The marriage to Anna Snyder ended in divorce in 1912 and he wed actress Fania Marinoff in 1914 and their marriage lasted until the end of his life, even while his relationships with men were an open secret. They continued corresponding for the remainder of Steins life, and at her death she appointed Van Vechten her literary executor, several books of Van Vechtens essays on various subjects such as music and literature were published between 1915 and 1920. Van Vechtens controversial novel Nigger Heaven was published in 1926 and his essay Negro Blues Singers was published in Vanity Fair in 1926. Biographer Edward White suggests Van Vechten was convinced that Negro culture was the essence of America, by the start of the 1930s and at age 50, Van Vechten was finished with writing and took up photography, using his apartment at 150 West 55th Street as a studio. After the 1930s Van Vechten published little writing, though he continued writing letters to many correspondents, Van Vechten died in 1964, at the age of 84, in New York City. Most of Van Vechtens personal papers are held by the Beinecke Rare Book, the Beinecke Library also holds a collection titled Living Portraits, Carl Van Vechtens Color Photographs Of African Americans, 1939–1964, a collection of 1,884 color Kodachrome slides. The Library of Congress has a collection of approximately 1,400 photographs, there is also a collection of Van Vechtens photographs in the Prentiss Taylor collection in the Smithsonians Archives of American Art, and a Van Vechten collection at Fisk University. The Museum of the City of New Yorks collection includes 2,174 of Carl Van Vechtens photographs, brandeis Universitys department of Archives & Special Collections holds 1,689 Carl Van Vechten portraits. Van Vechten also donated materials to Fisk University to form the George Gershwin Memorial Collection of Music, the album ’O, Write My Name’, American Portraits, Harlem Heroes was completed in 1983. That year, the National Endowment for the Arts transferred the Eakins Press Foundation’s prototype albums to the permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, dust Tracks on a Road, An Autobiography. Guide to the Carl Van Vechten papers, 1833–1965, manuscripts and Archives, New York Public Library. Carl Van Vechten collection of papers, 1911–1964, berg Collection of English and American Literature, New York Public Library
2.
Milwaukee
–
Milwaukee is the largest city in the state of Wisconsin and the fifth-largest city in the Midwestern United States. The county seat of Milwaukee County, it is on Lake Michigans western shore, Milwaukees estimated population in 2015 was 600,155. Milwaukee is the cultural and economic center of the Milwaukee–Racine–Waukesha Metropolitan Area with an estimated population of 2,046,692 as of 2015. Ranked by estimated 2014 population, Milwaukee is the 31st largest city in the United States, the first Europeans to pass through the area were French Catholic missionaries and fur traders. In 1818, the French Canadian explorer Solomon Juneau settled in the area, large numbers of German immigrants helped increase the citys population during the 1840s, with Poles and other immigrants arriving in the following decades. Known for its traditions, Milwaukee is currently experiencing its largest construction boom since the 1960s. In addition, many new skyscrapers, condos, lofts and apartments have been built in neighborhoods on and near the lakefront, the word Milwaukee may come from the Potawatomi language minwaking, or Ojibwe language ominowakiing, Gathering place. The first recorded inhabitants of the Milwaukee area are the Menominee, Fox, Mascouten, Sauk, Potawatomi, Ojibwe, many of these people had lived around Green Bay before migrating to the Milwaukee area around the time of European contact. In the second half of the 18th century, the Indians at Milwaukee played a role in all the wars on the American continent. During the French and Indian War, a group of Ojibwas, in the American Revolutionary War, the Indians around Milwaukee were some of the few Indians who remained loyal to the American cause throughout the Revolution. After American independence, the Indians fought the United States in the Northwest Indian War as part of the Council of Three Fires, during the War of 1812, Indians held a council in Milwaukee in June 1812, which resulted in their decision to attack Chicago. This resulted in the Battle of Fort Dearborn on August 15,1812, the War of 1812 did not end well for the Indians, and after the Black Hawk War in 1832, the Indians in Milwaukee signed their final treaty with the United States in Chicago in 1833. This paved the way for American settlement, Europeans had arrived in the Milwaukee area prior to the 1833 Treaty of Chicago. French missionaries and traders first passed through the area in the late 17th and 18th centuries, alexis Laframboise, in 1785, coming from Michilimackinac settled a trading post, therefore, he is the first European descent resident of the Milwaukee region. Early explorers called the Milwaukee River and surrounding lands various names, Melleorki, Milwacky, Mahn-a-waukie, Milwarck, for many years, printed records gave the name as Milwaukie. One story of Milwaukees name says, ne day during the thirties of the last century a newspaper calmly changed the name to Milwaukee, the spelling Milwaukie lives on in Milwaukie, Oregon, named after the Wisconsin city in 1847, before the current spelling was universally accepted. Milwaukee has three founding fathers, Solomon Juneau, Byron Kilbourn, and George H. Walker, Solomon Juneau was the first of the three to come to the area, in 1818. He was not the first European settler but founded a town called Juneaus Side, or Juneautown, in competition with Juneau, Byron Kilbourn established Kilbourntown west of the Milwaukee River and made sure the streets running toward the river did not join with those on the east side
3.
Chicago
–
Chicago, officially the City of Chicago, is the third-most populous city in the United States. With over 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the state of Illinois, and it is the county seat of Cook County. In 2012, Chicago was listed as a global city by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. Chicago has the third-largest gross metropolitan product in the United States—about $640 billion according to 2015 estimates, the city has one of the worlds largest and most diversified economies with no single industry employing more than 14% of the workforce. In 2016, Chicago hosted over 54 million domestic and international visitors, landmarks in the city include Millennium Park, Navy Pier, the Magnificent Mile, Art Institute of Chicago, Museum Campus, the Willis Tower, Museum of Science and Industry, and Lincoln Park Zoo. Chicagos culture includes the arts, novels, film, theater, especially improvisational comedy. Chicago also has sports teams in each of the major professional leagues. The city has many nicknames, the best-known being the Windy City, the name Chicago is derived from a French rendering of the Native American word shikaakwa, known to botanists as Allium tricoccum, from the Miami-Illinois language. The first known reference to the site of the current city of Chicago as Checagou was by Robert de LaSalle around 1679 in a memoir, henri Joutel, in his journal of 1688, noted that the wild garlic, called chicagoua, grew abundantly in the area. In the mid-18th century, the area was inhabited by a Native American tribe known as the Potawatomi, the first known non-indigenous permanent settler in Chicago was Jean Baptiste Point du Sable. Du Sable was of African and French descent and arrived in the 1780s and he is commonly known as the Founder of Chicago. In 1803, the United States Army built Fort Dearborn, which was destroyed in 1812 in the Battle of Fort Dearborn, the Ottawa, Ojibwe, and Potawatomi tribes had ceded additional land to the United States in the 1816 Treaty of St. Louis. The Potawatomi were forcibly removed from their land after the Treaty of Chicago in 1833, on August 12,1833, the Town of Chicago was organized with a population of about 200. Within seven years it grew to more than 4,000 people, on June 15,1835, the first public land sales began with Edmund Dick Taylor as U. S. The City of Chicago was incorporated on Saturday, March 4,1837, as the site of the Chicago Portage, the city became an important transportation hub between the eastern and western United States. Chicagos first railway, Galena and Chicago Union Railroad, and the Illinois, the canal allowed steamboats and sailing ships on the Great Lakes to connect to the Mississippi River. A flourishing economy brought residents from rural communities and immigrants from abroad, manufacturing and retail and finance sectors became dominant, influencing the American economy. The Chicago Board of Trade listed the first ever standardized exchange traded forward contracts and these issues also helped propel another Illinoisan, Abraham Lincoln, to the national stage
4.
Le Cordon Bleu
–
Le Cordon Bleu is the worlds largest hospitality education institution, with over 50 schools on five continents serving 20,000 students annually. Its education focus is on hospitality management, culinary arts, the origin of the school name may come from the French Royal and Catholic Ordre des Chevaliers du Saint Esprit. This was a group of the French Nobility that had been knighted. The first creation of Royal Knights at the French Court was performed in 1576, the French Order of the Holy Spirit was for many centuries the most important highest distinction of the French Kingdom. Each member was awarded the Cross of the Holy Spirit, which hung from a silk ribbon. According to one story, this became known for its extravagant and luxurious banquets. At the time of the French Revolution, the monarchy and the Order were abolished, another theory has it that the blue ribbon simply became synonymous with excellence, and this was later applied to other fields such as cooking. The name was adopted by a French culinary magazine, La Cuisinière Cordon Bleu, the magazine began offering lessons by some of the best chefs in France. This grew to become a school that opened in Paris in 1895. The school closed during the German occupation of Paris, after the war, Madame Elisabeth Brassart relaunched the school both on rue du Faubourg Saint Honoré in Paris and at the Chateau de Montjean. Brassart managed the school until 1984, at the age of 87 she retired and she sold the school to the previous owner, André J. Cointreau, a descendant of both the Cointreau and Rémy Martin dynasties. In 1933, former student Dione Lucas helped to open a school under the Le Cordon Bleu name in London, England. Le Cordon Bleu was due to open its first rural outpost with partner UCOL in Martinborough, New Zealand in early 2009, in total, more than 20,000 students attend a Cordon Bleu school each year. Le Cordon Bleu has also expanded, issuing cookbooks and a line of kitchenware, in the United States,16 schools have operated under the Le Cordon Bleu North America name through a marketing relationship with the Career Education Corporation, a for-profit education company. Their deal in 2009 was estimated to be worth $135 million, however, in 2015 CEC attempted to sell the 16 campuses, but failed to find a buyer. It announced on 16 December 2015 that it will close all 16 Le Cordon Bleu campuses in the United States in September 2017, CEC also announced then that it will stop accepting new students in January 2016, and that its current students will be taught out by 2017. The North American campuses of Le Cordon Bleu generated $172.6 million in revenue, in June 2016, The Securities and Exchange Commission requested documents and information regarding Career Educations fourth quarter 2014 classification of its Le Cordon Bleu campuses. Apart from the programs, Le Cordon Bleu also offers hospitality management education with up to 2000 students studying bachelors or masters degrees
5.
Lynn Fontanne
–
Lynn Fontanne was a British-born American-based actress for over 40 years. She teamed with her husband, Alfred Lunt, Lunt and Fontanne were given special Tony Awards in 1970. They both won Emmy Awards in 1965, and Broadways Lunt-Fontanne Theatre was named for them, Fontanne is regarded as one of the American theaters great leading ladies of the 20th century. Born Lillie Louise Fontanne in Woodford, London, of French and Irish descent, her parents were Jules Fontanne and she had two sisters, one of whom later lived in England, the other lived in New Zealand. She drew acclaim in 1921 playing the role in the George S. Kaufman-Marc Connelly farce. Dorothy Parker memorialized her performance in verse, She soon became celebrated for her skill as an actress in comedy, excelling in witty roles written for her by Noël Coward. However, she enjoyed one of the greatest critical successes of her career as Nina Leeds, from the late 1920s on, Fontanne acted exclusively in vehicles also starring her husband. Among their greatest theater triumphs were Design for Living, The Taming of the Shrew, Idiots Delight, There Shall Be No Night, the duo remained active onstage until retiring from stage performances in 1958. Fontanne was nominated for a Tony Award for one of her last stage roles, Fontanne and Lunt worked together in 27 productions. They threw away lines, they trod on each others words, they gabbled and they spoke, in fact, as people do in ordinary life. Fontanne made only four films but nevertheless was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1931 for The Guardsman and she also appeared in the silent films Second Youth and The Man Who Found Himself. She and husband Alfred also were in Hollywood Canteen in which they had cameos as themselves, the Lunts also starred in several radio dramas in the 1940s, notably on the Theatre Guild programme. Many of these still survive. On that day the Lunts opened their new house with, The Visit, after 189 performances, The Visit would be their last appearance on Broadway. Twenty years later, on 5 May 1978, Lynn Fontanne, aged ninety, was honored at the Lunt-Fontanne Theater, during a performance of Hello. A reminiscence of that evening, An Evening with Lynn Fontanne, was published on-line by Martha Rofheart, in 1964, Lunt and Fontanne were presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by then-President Lyndon Johnson. Like Lunt, Fontanne was a member of the American Theatre Hall of Fame, Fontanne was also a Kennedy Center honoree in 1980. Some of her costumes are curated in the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Fontanne married Alfred Lunt in 1922
6.
Broadway theatre
–
Along with Londons West End theatres, Broadway theatres are widely considered to represent the highest level of commercial theatre in the English-speaking world. The Theater District is a popular tourist attraction in New York City, the great majority of Broadway shows are musicals. They presented Shakespeare plays and ballad operas such as The Beggars Opera, in 1752, William Hallam sent a company of twelve actors from Britain to the colonies with his brother Lewis as their manager. They established a theatre in Williamsburg, Virginia and opened with The Merchant of Venice, the company moved to New York in the summer of 1753, performing ballad operas and ballad-farces like Damon and Phillida. The Revolutionary War suspended theatre in New York, but thereafter theatre resumed in 1798, the Bowery Theatre opened in 1826, followed by others. Blackface minstrel shows, a distinctly American form of entertainment, became popular in the 1830s, by the 1840s, P. T. Barnum was operating an entertainment complex in lower Manhattan. In 1829, at Broadway and Prince Street, Niblos Garden opened, the 3, 000-seat theatre presented all sorts of musical and non-musical entertainments. In 1844, Palmos Opera House opened and presented opera for four seasons before bankruptcy led to its rebranding as a venue for plays under the name Burtons Theatre. The Astor Opera House opened in 1847, booth played the role for a famous 100 consecutive performances at the Winter Garden Theatre in 1865, and would later revive the role at his own Booths Theatre. Other renowned Shakespeareans who appeared in New York in this era were Henry Irving, Tommaso Salvini, Fanny Davenport, lydia Thompson came to America in 1868 heading a small theatrical troupe, adapting popular English burlesques for middle-class New York audiences. Thompsons troupe called the British Blondes, was the most popular entertainment in New York during the 1868–1869 theatrical season, the six-month tour ran for almost six extremely profitable years. Theatre in New York moved from downtown gradually to midtown beginning around 1850, in 1870, the heart of Broadway was in Union Square, and by the end of the century, many theatres were near Madison Square. Broadways first long-run musical was a 50-performance hit called The Elves in 1857, New York runs continued to lag far behind those in London, but Laura Keenes musical burletta The Seven Sisters shattered previous New York records with a run of 253 performances. It was at a performance by Keenes troupe of Our American Cousin in Washington, the production was a staggering five-and-a-half hours long, but despite its length, it ran for a record-breaking 474 performances. The same year, The Black Domino/Between You, Me and the Post was the first show to call itself a musical comedy, Tony Pastor opened the first vaudeville theatre one block east of Union Square in 1881, where Lillian Russell performed. Comedians Edward Harrigan and Tony Hart produced and starred in musicals on Broadway between 1878 and 1890, with book and lyrics by Harrigan and music by his father-in-law David Braham. They starred high quality singers, instead of the women of repute who had starred in earlier musical forms. Plays could run longer and still draw in the audiences, leading to better profits, as in England, during the latter half of the century, the theatre began to be cleaned up, with less prostitution hindering the attendance of the theatre by women
7.
Academy Awards
–
The various category winners are awarded a copy of a golden statuette, officially called the Academy Award of Merit, which has become commonly known by its nickname Oscar. The awards, first presented in 1929 at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, are overseen by AMPAS, the awards ceremony was first broadcast on radio in 1930 and televised for the first time in 1953. It is now live in more than 200 countries and can be streamed live online. The Academy Awards ceremony is the oldest worldwide entertainment awards ceremony and its equivalents – the Emmy Awards for television, the Tony Awards for theater, and the Grammy Awards for music and recording – are modeled after the Academy Awards. The 89th Academy Awards ceremony, honoring the best films of 2016, were held on February 26,2017, at the Dolby Theatre, in Los Angeles, the ceremony was hosted by Jimmy Kimmel and was broadcast on ABC. A total of 3,048 Oscars have been awarded from the inception of the award through the 88th, the first Academy Awards presentation was held on May 16,1929, at a private dinner function at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel with an audience of about 270 people. The post-awards party was held at the Mayfair Hotel, the cost of guest tickets for that nights ceremony was $5. Fifteen statuettes were awarded, honoring artists, directors and other participants in the industry of the time. The ceremony ran for 15 minutes, winners were announced to media three months earlier, however, that was changed for the second ceremony in 1930. Since then, for the rest of the first decade, the results were given to newspapers for publication at 11,00 pm on the night of the awards. The first Best Actor awarded was Emil Jannings, for his performances in The Last Command and he had to return to Europe before the ceremony, so the Academy agreed to give him the prize earlier, this made him the first Academy Award winner in history. With the fourth ceremony, however, the system changed, for the first six ceremonies, the eligibility period spanned two calendar years. At the 29th ceremony, held on March 27,1957, until then, foreign-language films had been honored with the Special Achievement Award. The 74th Academy Awards, held in 2002, presented the first Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, since 1973, all Academy Awards ceremonies always end with the Academy Award for Best Picture. The Academy also awards Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting, see also § Awards of Merit categories The best known award is the Academy Award of Merit, more popularly known as the Oscar statuette. The five spokes represent the branches of the Academy, Actors, Writers, Directors, Producers. The model for the statuette is said to be Mexican actor Emilio El Indio Fernández, sculptor George Stanley sculpted Cedric Gibbons design. The statuettes presented at the ceremonies were gold-plated solid bronze
8.
Academy Award for Best Actor
–
The Academy Award for Best Actor is an award presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. It is given in honor of an actor who has delivered a performance in a leading role while working within the film industry. The 1st Academy Awards ceremony was held in 1929 with Emil Jannings receiving the award for his roles in The Last Command and The Way of All Flesh. Currently, nominees are determined by single transferable vote within the branch of AMPAS. In the first three years of the awards, actors were nominated as the best in their categories, at that time, all of their work during the qualifying period was listed after the award. The following year, this unwieldy and confusing system was replaced by the current system in which an actor is nominated for a performance in a single film. Starting with the 9th ceremony held in 1937, the category was officially limited to five nominations per year, since its inception, the award has been given to 79 actors. Daniel Day-Lewis has received the most awards in this category with three Oscars, spencer Tracy and Laurence Olivier were nominated on nine occasions, more than any other actor. As of the 2017 ceremony, Casey Affleck is the most recent winner in category for his role as Lee Chandler in Manchester by the Sea. In the following table, the years are listed as per Academy convention, and generally correspond to the year of release in Los Angeles County. For the first five ceremonies, the eligibility period spanned twelve months from August 1 to July 31, for the 6th ceremony held in 1934, the eligibility period lasted from August 1,1932 to December 31,1933
9.
Booth Tarkington
–
Newton Booth Tarkington was an American novelist and dramatist best known for his novels The Magnificent Ambersons and Alice Adams. He is one of only three novelists to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction more than once, along with William Faulkner, Booth Tarkington was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, the son of John S. Tarkington and Elizabeth Booth Tarkington. He was named after his maternal uncle Newton Booth, then the governor of California and he was also related to Chicago Mayor James Hutchinson Woodworth through Woodworths wife Almyra Booth Woodworth. Tarkington first attended Shortridge High School in Indianapolis, but completed his education at Phillips Exeter Academy. He attended Purdue University for two years, where he was a member of the Sigma Chi Fraternity and the universitys Morley Eating Club and he later made substantial donations to Purdue for building an all-mens residence hall, which the university named Tarkington Hall in his honor. Purdue awarded him an honorary doctorate, some of his familys wealth returned after the Panic of 1873, and his mother transferred Booth from Purdue to Princeton University. At Princeton, Tarkington is said to have known as Tark among his fellow Eating Club members. He was active as a student-actor and served as president of Princetons Dramatic Association, according to Triangles official history, Tarkington made his first acting appearance in the clubs Shakespearean spoof Katherine. This was one of the first three productions in the Triangles history that was written and produced by Princeton students, Tarkington established this Triangle tradition for productions of students plays, and it remains to the present day. Tarkington returned to the Triangle stage as Cassius in the 1893 production The Honorable Julius Caesar and he gained prominence that year at Princeton as a co-author of the play. In addition to his role as a member of The Triangle Club, he was also among the earliest members of the Ivy Club. He edited the Princetons Nassau Literary Magazine, known more recently as The Nassau Lit, while an undergraduate, he is known to have socialized with Woodrow Wilson, an associate graduate member of the Ivy Club. Wilson returned to Princeton as a member of the science faculty shortly before Tarkington matriculated. Tarkington failed to earn his degree of A. B. because of missing a single course in the classics. Nevertheless, his place within campus society was determined. In his adult life, he was asked to return to Princeton for the conferral of honorary degrees, an A. M. in 1899. The conferral of more than one honorary degree on an alumnus of Princeton University remains a university record, while Tarkington never earned a college degree, he was accorded many awards recognizing and honoring his skills and accomplishments as an author. He won the Pulitzer Prize in fiction twice, in 1919 and 1922, for his novels The Magnificent Ambersons, in 1921 booksellers rated him the most significant contemporary American author in a poll conducted by Publishers Weekly
10.
The Taming of the Shrew
–
The Taming of the Shrew is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1592. The nobleman then has the play performed for Slys diversion, the main plot depicts the courtship of Petruchio and Katherina, the headstrong, obdurate shrew. The subplot features a competition between the suitors of Katherinas younger sister, Bianca, who is seen as the ideal woman, the question of whether the play is misogynistic or not has become the subject of considerable controversy, particularly among modern scholars, audiences, and readers. The 1999 high school comedy film 10 Things I Hate About You is also based on the play. Prior to the first act, an induction frames the play as a kind of history played in front of a drunkard named Christopher Sly who is tricked into believing he is a lord. The play is performed in order to distract Sly from his wife, who is actually Bartholomew, in the play performed for Sly, the shrew is Katherina, the eldest daughter of Baptista Minola, a lord in Padua. Numerous men, like Gremio and Tranio, deem Katherina an unworthy option for marriage because of her notorious assertiveness and willfulness, on the other hand, men, like Hortensio and Gremio, are eager to marry her younger sister Bianca. The plot thickens when Lucentio, who moved to Padua to attend university. In the meantime, Petruchio, accompanied by his servant Grumio and he explains to Hortensio, an old friend of his, that since his fathers death he has set out to enjoy life and wed. Hearing this, Hortensio recruits Petruchio as a suitor for Katherina and he also has Petruchio present Baptista a music tutor named Litio. Thus, Lucentio and Hortensio, attempt to woo Bianca while pretending to be the tutors Cambio and Litio, to counter Katherinas shrewish nature, Petruchio pretends that the harsh things she says or does are actually kind and gentle. After the wedding, Petruchio takes Katherina to his home against her will, once they are gone, Gremio and Tranio formally bid for Bianca, with Tranio easily outbidding Gremio, however, in his zeal to win, he promises much more than Lucentio actually possesses. When Baptista determines that once Lucentios father confirms the dowry, Bianca and Tranio can marry, Tranio decides they will need someone to pretend to be Vincentio, meanwhile, Tranio persuades Hortensio that Bianca is not worthy of his attentions, thus removing Lucentios remaining rival. In Verona, Petruchio begins the taming of his new wife, back in Padua, Lucentio and Tranio convince a passing pedant to pretend to be Vincentio and confirm the dowry for Bianca. The man does so, and Baptista is happy for Bianca to wed Lucentio, Bianca, aware of the deception, then secretly elopes with the real Lucentio to get married, however, when Vincentio reaches Padua he encounters the pedant, who claims to be Lucentios father. Tranio appears and the pedant acknowledges him to be his son Lucentio, in all the confusion, the real Vincentio is set to be arrested when the real Lucentio appears with his newly betrothed Bianca, revealing all to a bewildered Baptista and Vincentio. Lucentio explains everything, and all is forgiven by the two fathers, meanwhile, Hortensio has married a rich widow. In the final scene of the play there are three newly married couples, Bianca and Lucentio, the widow and Hortensio, and Katherina and Petruchio
11.
The Seagull
–
The Seagull is a play by Russian dramatist Anton Chekhov, written in 1895 and first produced in 1896. The Seagull is generally considered to be the first of his four major plays, though the character of Trigorin is considered Chekhovs greatest male role like Chekhovs other full-length plays, The Seagull relies upon an ensemble cast of diverse, fully developed characters. In contrast to the melodrama of mainstream 19th-century theatre, lurid actions are not shown onstage, characters tend to speak in ways that skirt around issues rather than addressing them directly, in other words, their lines are full of what is known in dramatic practice as subtext. The opening night of the first production was a famous failure, Vera Komissarzhevskaya, playing Nina, was so intimidated by the hostility of the audience that she lost her voice. Chekhov left the audience and spent the last two acts behind the scenes, when supporters wrote to him that the production later became a success, he assumed that they were merely trying to be kind. When Konstantin Stanislavsky, the seminal Russian theatre practitioner of the time, directed it in 1898 for his Moscow Art Theatre, the play was a triumph. Stanislavskis production of The Seagull became one of the greatest events in the history of Russian theatre and one of the greatest new developments in the history of world drama. After purchasing the Melikhovo farm in 1892, Chekhov had built in the middle of a cherry orchard a lodge consisting of three rooms, one containing a bed and another a writing table. In spring, when the cherries were in blossom, it was pleasant to live in this lodge, Chekhov eventually moved in and in a letter written in October 1895 wrote, I am writing a play which I shall probably not finish before the end of November. I am writing it not without pleasure, though I swear fearfully at the conventions of the stage and its a comedy, there are three womens parts, six mens, four acts, landscapes, a great deal of conversation about literature, little action, tons of love. Thus he acknowledged a departure from traditional dramatic action and this departure would become a critical hallmark of the Chekhovian theater. Chekhovs statement also reflects his view of the play as comedy, after the plays disastrous opening night his friend Aleksey Suvorin chided him as being womanish and accused him of being in a funk. Chekhov vigorously denied this, stating, Why this libel, after the performance I had supper at Romanovs. Then I went to bed, slept soundly, and next day went home without uttering a sound of complaint, I acted as coldly and reasonably as a man who has made an offer, received a refusal, and has nothing left but to go. Yes, my vanity was stung, but you know it was not a bolt from the blue, I was expecting a failure, and was prepared for it, as I warned you with perfect sincerity beforehand. He is the brother of the famous actress Arkadina, who has just arrived at the estate for a vacation with her lover. Sorin and his guests gather at a stage to see an unconventional play that Arkadinas son, Konstantin Treplyov, has written. The play-within-a-play features Nina, a woman who lives on a neighboring estate
12.
John Barrymore
–
John Barrymore was an American actor on stage, screen and radio. After a success as Hamlet in London in 1925, Barrymore left the stage for 14 years, in the silent film era, he was well received in such pictures as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Sherlock Holmes and The Sea Beast. During this period, he gained his nickname, the Great Profile and his stage-trained voice proved an asset when sound films were introduced, and three of his works, Grand Hotel, Twentieth Century and Midnight have been inducted into the National Film Registry. Barrymores personal life has been the subject of attention before. He struggled with alcohol abuse from the age of 14, was married and divorced four times, Much of his later work involved self-parody and the portrayal of drunken has-beens. His obituary in The Washington Post observed that with the passing of the years – and as his life became more public – he became, despite his genius in the theater. Barrymore was born John Sidney Blyth in Philadelphia, and was known by family, although the Barrymore family bible puts his date of birth as February 15,1882, his birth certificate shows February 14. He was the youngest of three children and his siblings were Lionel, and Ethel. Barrymores mother, Georgie Drew Barrymore, was born into a prominent theatrical family, Barrymores maternal grandparents were Louisa Lane Drew, a well-known 19th-century American actress and the manager of the Arch Street Theatre, and John Drew, also an actor whose specialty was comedy. Barrymores maternal uncles were two more thespians, John Drew, Jr. and Sidney, Much of Barrymores early life was unsettled. In October 1882, the family toured in the US for a season with Polish actress Helena Modjeska, the following year his parents toured again with Modjeska but left the children behind. Modjeska was influential in the family, and she insisted that all three children be baptized into the Catholic Church, in 1884 the family traveled to London as part of Augustin Dalys theatrical company, returning to the US two years later. As a child, Barrymore was sometimes badly behaved, and he was sent away to schools in an attempt to instill discipline, the strategy was not always successful, and he attended elementary schools in four states. He was sent first to the annex of the Convent of Notre Dame in Philadelphia. I wanted to be an artist and he was expelled from the school in 1891 and was sent to Seton Hall Preparatory School in New Jersey, where Lionel was already studying. Barrymore was unhappy at Seton and was withdrawn, after which he attended several public schools in New York. In 1892, his grandmother Louisa Drews business began to suffer, the loss of their mothers income prompted both Ethel and Lionel to seek work as professional actors. Barrymores father was absent from the family home while on tour, and when he returned he would spend time at The Lambs
