The Spectacular Theatre of Frank Joseph Galati: Reshaping American Theatre in Chicago, Illinois

As a director, author, actor, and educator, Frank Galati has been a prominent American artist since the 1980s and continues to create new and innovative work for the theatre. The focus of this book is the remarkable Chicago years, between 1969 and 1996, in which Galati's values and commitments were embraced and enhanced by the new theatre that emerged in his home town-a style he helped shape even as he was shaped by it. By 1990, the city was widely perceived as ground zero for the next generation of significant innovation in American theatre. There were a great many iterations of the Chicago style in those years, but Frank Galati's theatrical inclinations, ensemble strategies, and brilliant showmanship touched them all. As this study explores, his reach extended well beyond the professional stage.

Featuring exclusive interviews with Galati, selections from his unpublished notes and speeches, the observations of colleagues on his rehearsal process, and in-depth case studies of productions written, conceived, and directed by Galati, including The Grapes of Wrath (1988–90), The Winter's Tale (1990), and The Glass Menagerie (1994), this work offers theatre historians, patrons, scholars, and students a unique source of primary information about a pivotal figure in a significant era of American theatre.

ISBN-13: 9781350286252

Media Type: Paperback

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC

Publication Date: 10-19-2023

Pages: 232

Product Dimensions: 9.21h x 6.14w x 0.49d

Julie Jackson taught theatre history and design at Columbia College in Chicago, USA for seventeen years and worked with Frank Galati as a professional costume designer in the city's off-Loop theatres. She has chaired theatre programs at Marshall University and Indiana University Northwest.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
Disclaimers
Author Preface

Introduction: A Pivotal Figure in a Stagestruck Town, 1969-1996

Part I. The Rise of Off-Loop Theatre: Frank Galati and the Chicago Style
Part I Introduction
1. Theatre Chicago Style: Second to None
2. One Who Was Working: 1969-1986
3. The Hottest Theatre Artist in Chicago: Goodman Theatre, Steppenwolf Ensemble, and Lyric Opera of Chicago

Part II. Staging Stein and Steinbeck: Two Case Studies
Part II Introduction
4. A Cubist Dramaturgy: She Always Said Pablo
5. The Telling Not the Tale: The Grapes of Wrath

Part III. Backstage Process and Onstage Themes: Maternal Projects
Part III Introduction
6. Rehearsing Ensemble: Working All Together All the Time
7. Mise-en-scene as Activism: Galati's Dangerous Women

Epilogue

Bibliography
Index

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