ABSTRACT
Shakespeare as Jukebox Musical is the first book-length study of a growing performance phenomenon: musical adaptations of Shakespeare’s plays in which characters sing existing popular songs as one of their modes of communication. John Severn shows how these highly allusive works give rise to the pleasures of collaborative reception, and also lend themselves to political work, particularly in terms of identity politics and a valorisation of diversity. Drawing on musical theatre history, adaptation theory, Shakespeare studies and musicology, the book develops a critical approach that allows jukebox-musical versions of Shakespeare to be understood and valued both for their political potential and for the experiences they offer to audiences as artistic responses to Shakespeare. Case studies from the USA, the UK and Australia demonstrate how these works open new windows on Shakespeare’s plays and their performance traditions, on the wider jukebox musical trend, and on adaptation as an art form.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
section Section 1|1 pages
Historical forebears
section Section 2|1 pages
Reception and structure
chapter 4|36 pages
Song placement and the carnivalesque
chapter 5|26 pages
Layered allusions, genre and medium
section Section 3|1 pages
Modes of reception
chapter 6|28 pages
The Shakespearean jukebox musical as interrogative text
section Section 4|1 pages
Engaging with Twelfth Night’s unstable identities