Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 1982 - 30

~hakespeare to Houdini. Among the largest number of entries on
popular amusements are revues and the cinema. In the program file,
documents on late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century English and
American productions are supplemented by programs from German and
Austrian plays. One of the collections in the scrapbook tile contains rare
photographs of the cast of the 1870 Oberammergau Passion Play, while
another, compiled by Joseph Solomon, is composed of clippings,
programs, and photographs of productions by Max Reinhardt. Finally,
the playbill file contains bills and broadsides announcing New York and
London performances from 1750-1950.
In addition, the Jeanne D'Arc collection is located in the Rare Book
Reading Room. It is composed of books as well as scrapbooks and
picture postcards of festivals commemorating and re-enacting Joan's
martyrdom.
The Oral History Collection, also situated in Butler Library (221 M),
holds tapes and transcriptions of interviews with a cross-section of
twentieth-century performers, playwrights, directors, critics, dancers,
and filmmakers. Among the prominent memoirists on the arts are Walter
Gropius, Lee Strasberg, and Frank Capra.
The resources in Avery Archives include drawings, plans, prints, and
photographs of performance spaces and costumes. A project to inventory the materials transferred specifically from the Dramatic Museum
began in spring 1981. Among these items is a collection of English
theatre prints, principally from the nineteenth century, composed of
Pugin and Rowlandson aquatints of Astley's and Drury Lane, and
tearsheets of BritiSh provincial theatres from The Era Almanack. Other
unique holdings are a design for a set with an architectural perspective
of columns and arches, attributed to Guiseppe Galli da Bibiena; a
Leopold Eidlitz competitive design for the New York Crystal Palace; and
structural plans, elevations and details for a film center in New York City.
Masks, puppets, dolls, oil paintings, sculpture, lantern slides, and
other works of art which were originally part of the Dramatic Museum are
now under the custodianship of the Office of Art Properties (753
Schmerhorn Annex). In contrast to the other collections that have
concentrations mainly in Western theatre, this repository contains many
artifacts representing Eastern performance. For instance, there are
scores of puppets and masks from Japan, Siam, Burma, Turkey, and
Java along with English Punch and Judy figures and French ombres
chinoises.
Portraits of key nineteenth- and twentieth-century stage personalities
also in this collection include an oil of Katherine Cornell as Lucrece; a
handpainted lithograph of Fanny Eissler; and a caricature of Jose Ferrer
and Judith Evelyn in The Shrike. As well, there is a sculpture of Edwin
Booth and a fifteen-inch doll of Helen Hayes as Queen Victoria from the
original production of Victoria Regina.
The three-dimensional stage models first donated to the Dramatic
Museum and temporarily on loan to Barnard College from 1979 to 1981
are now on permanent exhibit in Dodge Hall on the Columbia campus.
There are thirty-two models, representing a variety of Western and
Oriental performance spaces. For example, there are models detailing
scenes from The Grand Hotel (1920) and The LiN/e Clay Cart (1924)
designed by Aline Bernstein, and sets from Abduction from the Seralgio
(1946) and Peer Gynt (1951) designed by Donald Oenslager.
The contents of the Speech Recordings Library, formerly administered by the English Department and housed adjacent to the Dramatic
Museum's exhibition rooms, was divided between the Barnard Library,
the college music library, and the Rare Book and Manuscript Library in
Butler. These records and tapes, dating from approximately 1925-1965,
include recordings of American dialects, political speeches, music, and
dramatic readings.
Thousands of movie stills and several film books collected by the
Dramatic Museum are now part of a new archive in the Film Department.
In short, the Columbia theatre collections' substantial holdings on
nineteenth- and twentieth-century performance in England, France, and
the United States as well as its unique collections of models, puppets,
prints, sculpture, photographs, records, and tapes merit the thorough
inspection of all researchers and professionals interested in these
areas.
For access to the above materials please note the following stipulations on their use and availability.
The Rare Book and Manuscript Library collections are available for
the use of Columbia University faculty and students, those in affiliated
institutions, and researchers not affiliated with Columbia who are
engaged in scholarly or publication projects. Readers are required to
register in the Reading Room, and to provide satisfactory identification
(student 10, faculty card, driver's license, passport, or the like). Use of
manuscripts will be facilitated by writing well in advance of a visit, which
is especially important in the cases of collections restricted or closed by
donors.

Theatre Design & Technology

For use of the Oral History Collection, permission forms are completed in the Oral History Office. The transcripts are read in the Manuscript
Reading Room. Research service may be arranged; there are no
interlibrary loans. Some material has been micropublished. A catalog,
The Oral History Collection of Columbia University is available in most
research libraries and may be purchased by individuals.
To use the materials in Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library a
valid Columbia 10 or library reading card is required. Library reading
cards are obtained from the Library Information Office, 234 Butler
Library, for individuals who are not part of the Columbia University
community.
For use of the materials in the Art Properties Office, contact the
Curator of Art Properties. In order to use the archive of movie stills,
contact the Film Department, and further information on the speech
recordings may be obtained from the university's music libraries and the
Rare Book and Manuscript Library.o

Photo Credits
Courtesy Clein and Feldman Public Relations-p.9
Courtesy Dramatic Library Collection, Rare Books and
Manuscript Library, Columbia University-p.2?
Robert Emerson-p.9 (Rosmersholm)
John T. Howard-p.13 (lower left)
Ken Howard-p.8
Theodore Shank-p.15
William Smith-ppA, 6, 9
Courtesy Theatre Techniques Associates, Inc.-p.?

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 1982