The Metropolitan Opera has been one of the world's premiere opera companies for well over a century. Its series of live Saturday matinee radio broadcasts began in 1931, featuring host Milton Cross. The Metropolitan Opera radio scripts date from 1933 to 1974, and hold Milton Cross's writings and correspondence in addition to scripts.
Content types:
Other
Repository/Collector:
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center
The WPA Radio Scripts consist of final drafts of radio plays and other texts produced by the Federal Theatre of the Air. Most scripts are from either the New York or Los Angeles offices of the Federal Theatre Project. In some instances copies of scripts for the same program but from different jurisdictions are included in the same series. Notable programs represented in the collection include adaptations of the plays of Henrik Ibsen and Oscar Wilde, operettas by Gilbert & Sullivan, a series called A CAPELLA IN BRONZE featuring the WPA Negro Radio Chorus and focusing on stories of particular interest to African-Americans, adaptations of books such as Dickens' PICKWICK PAPERS and plays such as Tolstoy's REDEMPTION, Goldsmith's SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER and Molière's TARTUFFE. A 1939 series celebrating Jazz entitled THE STORY OF SWING devoted episodes to Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, and the Dorsey Brothers. TURNING POINTS IN FAMOUS LIVES dramatized key moments in the lives of John Paul Jones, Sarah Bernhardt, Louis Pasteur, Isaac Newton, Billy the Kid, Joseph Stalin, and others. THE LIVING NEWSPAPER, adapted from a concurrent Federal Theatre Project stage series, dramatized contemporary problems facing listeners in daily life.
Content types:
Other
Extent:
73 boxes
Repository/Collector:
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center
The Radio Scripts collection consists of transcripts of radio programs, both serials and single broadcasts. Among the radio series are "Freedom's People" sponsored by the Federal Security Agency of the U.S. Office of Education (1941-1942); "Give me Liberty" sponsored by the American Committee for Democracy and Intellectual Freedom (1939); "Native Sons" written by Kirk Lord and Frank Griffin; "National Urban League" sponsored by the organization of the same name during its annual Vocational Opportunity Campaign (1941-1951); "Unity at Home; Victory Abroad" consisting of speeches and dramatizations of the lives of African Americans and whites (1943); "New World A-Comin'" (1944-1966), and "Within Our Gates" presented by the Philadelphia Fellowship Commission to deal with the problem of intolerance and bigotry and to provide all citizens equal opportunity and equal rights (1945-1948). The largest group of scripts in the collection is from the radio series "New World A-Comin'." There are also several single scripts including, "Speech of Paul Robeson," "Hampton Institute Forum of the Air, 1944," "Lincoln, Douglas and the Honor Roll In the Race Relations," and "Wings over Jordan."
Content types:
Other
Repository/Collector:
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center