{"id":51118,"date":"2021-11-24T03:05:26","date_gmt":"2021-11-24T03:05:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jurn.org\/tentaclii\/?p=51118"},"modified":"2022-04-11T06:30:16","modified_gmt":"2022-04-11T06:30:16","slug":"the-theaters-of-providence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/2021\/11\/24\/the-theaters-of-providence\/","title":{"rendered":"The Theaters of Providence"},"content":{"rendered":"

Small State, Big History<\/em> has a long introductory article “The Theaters of Providence, Part 1 \u2013 The Early Years”<\/a>. Not especially focused on the key ‘Lovecraft period’ of 1894-1924, since there is much to say about Providence theatre before that, but at the end there is survey of key sources. Which may interest some new Lovecraftian researchers looking into Lovecraft’s theatre connections and theatre and cinema-going …<\/p>\n

The next publication of note was an article that appeared in the Providence Magazine<\/em> in October 1916. \u201cPopular Amusements \u2013 The Drama in Providence\u201d was a fifteen-page account of the theaters of the capitol city [both ancient and modern]. What differentiates this article from both the Blake and Willard books is that it focused less on the performances and the actors and more on the theaters themselves. Numerous pictures of the theaters were displayed. Also much had changed since the printing of Willard\u2019s book in 1891 [History of the Providence Stage, 1762 \u2013 1891]<\/em> and the appearance of the magazine article in 1916 \u2014 drama now shared the stage with vaudeville and some theaters like the Modern on Westminster Street were built more for movies than live performances. [Then] In 1976 Roger Brett wrote Temples of Illusion: The Golden Age of Theaters in an American City<\/em>. This account brings the story of the theaters of Providence up to the late 1940s and is most useful.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The latter book does not appear to be online, but the 1916 article is online at Hathi<\/a> and with UK access.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

There are a good number of pictures of frontages, but it only gives the modern Opera House a paragraph. The place is especially important because that was where the young Lovecraft had “slung from the stage” great slabs of Shakespeare, and he once recalled…<\/p>\n

What a second home the old Opera House used to be to me!” \u2014 Lovecraft in Letters to Family<\/em>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The details of the Opera House acoustics are then interesting, if only to give a small additional bit of new data about Lovecraft’s performance there.<\/p>\n

He would have had perfect acoustics. The remarkable building-time is also notable. Who could build a large opera house with perfect acoustics in 90 days, these days, which could then stand for 60 years and ably serve a city as its best theatre throughout that period? Yet that was what they did in 1871. Today such a project would no doubt take decades to grind through committees, planning offices, obstructionists and red-tape. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Early years of the Providence Opera House.<\/em><\/p>\n

Researchers should also note that the Keith-Albee Collection<\/a> is now fully transcribed and publicly searchable. This has the precise manager reports about exactly what was playing at key Providence theatres each week across the early ‘Lovecraft years’ when he was frequenting these theatres, and even how it was received and by which sections of the audience. Entries go along the lines of…<\/p>\n

WORMWOOD’S DOGS. 20 mts. Full Stage. Eight monkeys and ten dogs from Great Dane to the tinest poodle, and all well trained. The comedy work of the monkeys got constant laughter. An act for children that could not be surpassed. The finish with the bicycle-riding monkeys and dog race is a scream. KINETOGRAPH [short early cinema film]. A Family of Cats. Rather interesting for the women and children.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

These being the openers for a summer vaudeville show at Keith’s in the hot summer of 1908, Lovecraft aged about 17.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Small State, Big History has a long introductory article “The Theaters of Providence, Part 1 \u2013 The Early Years”. Not …<\/p>\n

Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51118","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-historical-context"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51118","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51118"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51118\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53315,"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51118\/revisions\/53315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jurn.link\/tentaclii\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}