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Author Davy, Kate.

Title Lady dicks and lesbian brothers : staging the unimaginable at the WOW Café Theatre / Kate Davy.

Publication Info. Ann Arbor : The University of Michigan Press, [2010]
©2010

Copies

Location Call No. OPAC Message Status
 Axe JSTOR Open Ebooks  Electronic Book    ---  Available
Description 1 online resource (xi, 233 pages, 10 unnumbered pages of plates) : illustrations
text txt rdacontent
computer c rdamedia
online resource cr rdacarrier
Series Triangulations: lesbian/gay/queer-- theater/drama/performance
Triangulations.
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index.
Contents Introducing WOW: "A miracle on E. 4th Street" -- Women are laughing again: allied faces -- Sex, drag, and rock 'n' roles: the festivals -- Feminist space and a system of anarchy: the storefront -- Staging the unimaginable: New York's East Village club scene -- Challenging whiteness: the fourth-floor walk-up -- "Learning to walk on our hands" -- Appendix: WOW Production history.
Summary "Out of a small, hand-to-mouth, women's theater collective called the WOW Café located on the lower east side of Manhattan, there emerged some of the most important theater troupes and performance artists of the 1980s and 1990s, including the Split Britches Company, the Five Lesbian Brothers, Carmelita Tropicana, Holly Hughes, Lisa Kron, Deb Margolin, Reno, Peggy Shaw, and Lois Weaver. The WOW (Women's One World) Café Theatre appeared on the cultural scene at a critical turning point in both the women's movement and feminist theory, putting a witty, hilarious, gender-bending and erotically charged aesthetic on the stage for women in general and lesbians in particular. The storefront that became the WOW Café Theatre saw dozens of excitingly original and enormously funny performances created, performed, and turned over at lightning speed--a kind of "hit and run" theater. As the demands on the space increased, the women behind WOW organized as a collective and moved their theater to an abandoned doll factory where it continues to operate today. For three decades the WOW Café has nurtured fledgling women writers, designers, and performers who continue to create important performance work. This book provides a critical history of this avant-garde venture whose ongoing "system of anarchy" has been largely responsible for its thirty-year staying power, after dozens of other women's theaters have collapsed. WOW artists were creating a wholly original cultural landscape across which women could represent themselves on their own terms. Parody, cross-dressing, zany comedy, and an unbridled eroticism are hallmarks of WOW's aesthetic, combined--importantly and powerfully--with a presumptive address to the audience as if everyone onstage, in the audience, and in the world is lesbian. The author's research included in-depth interviews with WOW veterans; newspaper reviews of the earliest productions; and rare, unpublished photographs. The book also includes a chronology of productions that have highlighted WOW's performance schedule since the early '80s."--Publisher
Note Print version record.
Subject WOW Café Theatre (New York, N.Y.)
WOW Café Theatre (New York, N.Y.)
WOW Café Theatre (New York, N.Y.)
Music-halls (Variety-theaters, cabarets, etc.) -- New York (State) -- New York -- History -- 20th century.
Lesbian theater -- New York (State) -- New York.
Feminist theater -- New York (State) -- New York.
Lesbians in the performing arts -- New York (State) -- New York.
Théâtre lesbien -- New York (État) -- New York.
Théâtre féministe -- New York (État) -- New York.
Lesbiennes dans les arts du spectacle -- New York (État) -- New York.
SOCIAL SCIENCE / LGBTQ+ Studies / General
Lesbian theater
Music-halls (Variety-theaters, cabarets, etc.)
New York (State) -- New York https://id.oclc.org/worldcat/entity/E39QbtfRvQh7864Jh4rDGBFDWc
LGBTQ+ theater.
Lesbian theater groups.
Lesbian culture.
Music-halls (Variety-theaters, cabarets, etc.) -- New York (State) -- New York -- History -- 20th century.
Lesbian theater -- New York (State) -- New York.
Chronological Term 1900-1999
Genre/Form History
In: Books at JSTOR: Open Access JSTOR
OAPEN (Open Access Publishing in European Networks) OAPEN
Other Form: Print version: Davy, Kate. Lady dicks and lesbian brothers. Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press, ©2010 (DLC) 2010007942 (OCoLC)550553840
ISBN 9780472904099 (electronic bk.)
0472904094 (electronic bk.)
9780472071227 (cloth ; alk. paper)
047207122X (cloth ; alk. paper)
9780472051229
0472051229
Standard No. AU@ 000074932580

 
    
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