''Academy Theatre'' is an American drama

anthology series An anthology series is a radio, television, video game or film series that spans different genres and presents a different story and a different set of characters in each different episode, season, segment, or short. These usually have a dif ...

that aired on

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

in 1949. It ran for eight weeks as the summer replacement for '' Chevrolet on Broadway''.

Format

The series utilized a different cast each week who appeared in short works by established playwrights. The plays were broadcast live in 30-minute segments on Monday nights.

Selected episodes

Development

In April 1949, Charles R. Denny, NBC executive vice-president and a graduate of Amherst College, arranged for a production of ''

Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, ...

'' to be broadcast to 14 cities nationwide. The play was performed by the Amherst College Masquers and directed by F. Curtis Canfield, a professor at Amherst and director of Amherst's Kirby Theatre. The broadcast marked the first time that an entire play by Shakespeare aired on television. During the following summer, Canfield (who would later become the first dean of the

Yale School of Drama The David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University is a graduate professional school of Yale University, located in New Haven, Connecticut. Founded in 1924 as the Department of Drama in the School of Fine Arts, the school provides training in e ...

), again collaborated with NBC to bring a series of one-act plays to the network. ''Academy Theatre'' was the result. During a sabbatical as an NBC producer, Canfield convinced the network to create ''Masterpiece Playhouse'', one-hour productions of seven classic plays including ''

Hedda Gabler ''Hedda Gabler'' () is a play written by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. The world premiere was staged on 31 January 1891 at the Residenztheater in Munich. Ibsen himself was in attendance, although he remained back-stage. The play has been ca ...

'', ''

Uncle Vanya ''Uncle Vanya'' ( rus, Дя́дя Ва́ня, r=Dyádya Ványa, p=ˈdʲædʲə ˈvanʲə) is a play by the Russian playwright Anton Chekhov. It was first published in 1898, and was first produced in 1899 by the Moscow Art Theatre under the dir ...

'', and '' Othello''. Broadcast in 1950, each play was produced for the "heavy-budget" sum of $10,000."Noble experiment"
(September 4, 1950). ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, ...

''. Retrieved 2011-05-03.

References

External links

* 1949 American television series debuts 1949 American television series endings 1940s American anthology television series American live television series Black-and-white American television shows English-language television shows NBC original programming {{US-drama-tv-prog-stub