In Dahomey
''In Dahomey: A Negro Musical Comedy'' is a landmark 1903 American musical comedy described by theatre historian Gerald Bordman as "the first full-length musical written and played by blacks to be performed at a major Broadway house."Bordman, Gerald, ''Musical Theatre: A Chronicle'' (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), p. 190. It features music by Will Marion Cook, book by Jesse A. Shipp, and lyrics by poet Paul Laurence Dunbar. It was written by Jesse A. Shipp as a satire on the American Colonization Society's back-to-Africa movement of the earlier nineteenth century. ''In Dahomey'' is regarded as a marquee turning point for African-American representation in vaudeville theater. It opened on February 18, 1903, at the New York Theatre, starring George Walker and Bert Williams, two iconic figures of vaudeville entertainment at the time. The musical ran for 53 completed performances and had two tours in the United States and one tour of the United Kingdom.Riis, Thomas ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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George Walker (vaudeville)
George Walker (1872 or 1873 – 1911) was an American vaudevillian, actor, and producer. In 1893, in San Francisco, Walker at the age of 20 met Bert Williams, who was a year younger. The two young men became performing partners. Walker and Williams appeared in ''The Gold Bug'' (1895), ''Clorindy'' (1898), ''The Policy Player'' (1899), ''Sons of Ham'' (1900), '' In Dahomey'' (1903), ''Abyssinia'' (1906), and '' Bandanna Land'' (1907). Walker married dancer Ada Overton, who later also was a choreographer. The two men set up an agency, The Williams and Walker Company, to support African-American actors and other performers, create networking, and produce new works. Early life George W. Walker was born in 1873 in Lawrence, Kansas, the son of a policeman and his wife. He began his career as a child performer, touring in black minstrel and medicine shows. George Walker and Bert Williams Walker and Bert Williams became two of the most prominent figures of the minstrel era and a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pike's Opera House
Pike's Opera House, later renamed the Grand Opera House, was a theater in New York City on the northwest corner of 8th Avenue and 23rd Street, in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan. It was constructed in 1868, at a cost of a million dollars (equivalent to about US dollars in ), for distiller and entrepreneur Samuel N. Pike (1822–1872) of Cincinnati. The building survived in altered form until 1960 as an RKO movie theater, after which it was replaced by part of Penn South, an urban renewal housing development.Pike was a German Jew, born in 1822 in Schwetzingen/Baden, Germany. His birth name was "Samuel N. Hecht"; his family changed the name in 1827 in the USA to "Pike". See: Rehs, Michael. ''Wurzeln in fremder Erde: Zur Geschichte der südwestdeutschen Auswanderung nach Amerika'' (Stuttgart: DRW-Verlag (de), 1984) ; . History Pike's Opera House was built on what had been the property of Clement Clarke Moore, whose home, "Chelsea", has given its name to the neighborho ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dahomey
The Kingdom of Dahomey () was a West African List of kingdoms in Africa throughout history, kingdom located within present-day Benin that existed from approximately 1600 until 1904. It developed on the Abomey Plateau amongst the Fon people in the early 17th century and became a regional power in the 18th century by expanding south to conquer key cities like Ouidah, Whydah belonging to the Kingdom of Whydah on the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic coast which granted it unhindered access to the tricontinental Atlantic slave trade, Atlantic Slave Trade. For much of the middle 19th century, the Kingdom of Dahomey became a key regional state, after eventually ending tributary status to the Oyo Empire. European visitors extensively documented the kingdom, and it became one of the most familiar African nations known to Ethnic groups in Europe, Europeans. The Kingdom of Dahomey was an important regional power that had an organized domestic economy built on conquest and Slavery, slave labor, si ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pantomime
Pantomime (; informally panto) is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment, generally combining gender-crossing actors and topical humour with a story more or less based on a well-known fairy tale, fable or folk tale.Reid-Walsh, Jacqueline. "Pantomime", ''The Oxford Encyclopedia of Children's Literature'', Jack Zipes (ed.), Oxford University Press (2006), Pantomime is a participatory form of theatre developed in England in the 18th century, in which the audience is encouraged and expected to sing along with certain parts of the music and shout out phrases to the performers. The origins of pantomime reach back to ancient Greek classical theatre. It developed partly from the 16th century commedia dell'arte tradition of Italy and partly from other European and British stage traditions, such as 17th-century masques and music hall. An important part of the pantomime, until the late 19th century, was the harlequinade. Modern pantomime is perfor ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Blackface
Blackface is the practice of performers using burned cork, shoe polish, or theatrical makeup to portray a caricature of black people on stage or in entertainment. Scholarship on the origins or definition of blackface vary with some taking a global perspective that includes European culture and Western colonialism. Blackface became a global phenomenon as an outgrowth of theatrical practices of racial misrepresentation, racial impersonation popular throughout Britain and its colonial empire, where it was integral to the development of imperial racial politics. Scholars with this wider view may date the practice of blackface to as early as Medieval Europe's mystery plays when bitumen and coal were used to darken the skin of white performers portraying demons, devils, and damned souls. Still others date the practice to English Renaissance theatre, English Renaissance theater, in works such as William Shakespeare's ''Othello''. However, some scholars see blackface as a specific pract ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Improvisation
Improvisation, often shortened to improv, is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. The origin of the word itself is in the Latin "improvisus", which literally means un-foreseen. Improvisation in the performing arts is a very spontaneous performance without specific or scripted preparation. The skills of improvisation can apply to many different faculties across all artistic, scientific, physical, cognitive, academic, and non-academic disciplines; see Applied improvisation. Skills and techniques The skills of improvisation can apply to many different abilities or forms of communication and expression across all artistic, scientific, physical, cognitive, academic, and non-academic disciplines. For example, improvisation can make a significant contribution in music, dance, cooking, presenting a speech, sales, personal or romantic relationships, sports, flower arranging, martial arts, psychotherapy, and much more. Technique ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Imperialism
Imperialism is the maintaining and extending of Power (international relations), power over foreign nations, particularly through expansionism, employing both hard power (military and economic power) and soft power (diplomatic power and cultural imperialism). Imperialism focuses on establishing or maintaining hegemony and a more formal empire. While related to the concept of colonialism, imperialism is a distinct concept that can apply to other forms of expansion and many forms of government. Etymology and usage The word ''imperialism'' was derived from the Latin word , which means 'to command', 'to be sovereign', or simply 'to rule'. It was coined in the 19th century to decry Napoleon III's despotic militarism and his attempts at obtaining political support through foreign military interventions. The term became common in the current sense in Great Britain during the 1870s; by the 1880s it was used with a positive connotation. By the end of the 19th century, the term was use ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Portland, Oregon
Portland ( ) is the List of cities in Oregon, most populous city in the U.S. state of Oregon, located in the Pacific Northwest region. Situated close to northwest Oregon at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, Columbia rivers, it is the county seat of Multnomah County, Oregon, Multnomah County, Oregon's most populous county. Portland's population was 652,503, making it the List of United States cities by population, 28th most populous city in the United States, the sixth most populous on the West Coast of the United States, West Coast, and the third most populous in the Pacific Northwest after Seattle and Vancouver. Approximately 2.5 million people live in the Portland metropolitan area, Oregon, Portland metropolitan area, making it the List of metropolitan statistical areas, 26th most populous in the United States. Almost half of Oregon's population resides within the Portland metro area. Named after Portland, Maine, which is itself named aft ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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San Francisco
San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of 2024, San Francisco is the List of California cities by population, fourth-most populous city in the U.S. state of California and the List of United States cities by population, 17th-most populous in the United States. San Francisco has a land area of at the upper end of the San Francisco Peninsula and is the County statistics of the United States, fifth-most densely populated U.S. county. Among U.S. cities proper with over 250,000 residents, San Francisco is ranked first by per capita income and sixth by aggregate income as of 2023. San Francisco anchors the Metropolitan statistical area#United States, 13th-most populous metropolitan statistical area in the U.S., with almost 4.6 million residents in 2023. The larger San Francisco Bay Area ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Buckingham Palace
Buckingham Palace () is a royal official residence, residence in London, and the administrative headquarters of the monarch of the United Kingdom. Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is often at the centre of state occasions and royal hospitality. It has been a focal point for the British people at times of national rejoicing and mourning. Originally known as Buckingham House, the building at the core of today's palace was a large townhouse (Great Britain), townhouse built for the John Sheffield, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby, Duke of Buckingham and Normanby in 1703 on a site that had been in private ownership for at least 150 years. It was acquired by George III in 1761 as a private residence for Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Queen Charlotte and became known as The Queen's House. During the 19th century it was enlarged by architects John Nash (architect), John Nash and Edward Blore, who constructed three wings around a central courtyard. Buckingham Pala ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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George V
George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until Death and state funeral of George V, his death in 1936. George was born during the reign of his paternal grandmother, Queen Victoria, as the second son of the Prince and Princess of Wales (later King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra). He was third in the line of succession to the British throne behind his father and his elder brother, Prince Albert Victor. From 1877 to 1892, George served in the Royal Navy, until his elder brother's unexpected death in January 1892 put him directly in line for the throne. The next year Wedding of Prince George and Princess Victoria Mary, George married his brother's former fiancée, Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, and they had six children. When Death of Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria died in 1901, George's father ascended the throne as Edward VII, and George was created ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |