84. The Book

[AITH OPENING THEME]

[SFX - PARTY SOUNDS: LAUGHING, TALKING, ETC. ]​​

Hello Everyone - welcome to Adventures in Theater History: Philadelphia! I’m Peter Schmitz, your host and the researcher of this podcast. Today, I don’t have the usual narrative episode for you, or even an interview. In fact, as you can hear, we’re having a little party around here! Well, quite a big party, really. . mind the chandelier there, Chris, wouldja? [SFX Chandelier crash] Whoops! Oh well, no worries. Have fun!

Folks, let me tell you, here in our AITH Studio and Entertainment Center World Headquarters high atop the Tower of Theater History, the whole staff - our suites of editors, our armies of researchers, our legions of fact-checkers, our audio production engineers and house orchestra, even our longtime cadre of loyal cafeteria workers and janitorial staff are all pretty damn giddy about a recent turn of events. 

Because, well, here the thing: ADVENTURES IN THEATER HISTORY: PHILADELPHIA is now a book! Yes, this is the book I’ve been dropping great big hints about for months now on the podcast, and even sharing with you some segments of the chapters. It is, as they say now Officially A THING! It exists! [SFX: CHEERS]

Thank you, thank you everyone! Really I couldn’t have done it without all you folks.

And as I speak, copies are rolling off the presses (somewhere in England, they tell me), and it will be officially available in the UK as of September 15, 2024.  And soon many other copies will be packed into boxes and shipped from the UK over here to the USA, where the release date is November 30th, 2024.

Whoops, well that was the grand piano in our ballroom here, but never mind . .  guys, don’t spill any champagne on the dance floor, okay? Makes it sticky. Yeah. Great. Thanks! 

For our listeners, let me just walk over to a quieter spot in our offices, so I can talk to you guys without so much background noise. Hold on. [SFX: DOOR CLOSING SOUND. FADE OUT PARTY SOUND]

Hoo, man! What a party! Where was I? Oh yeah. The Book.

Oh man, folks, this is not just some ordinary theater history book, no siree! Well sure, it's got an index, and endnotes and a bibliography and all that, but there’s so much more! It’s got a banging cool cover art, it’s packed with excellent and exciting and heartbreaking stories and has literally dozens of historic photos and illustrations. 

The book is NOT, I should say right away, just a rehash of scripts from the podcast. Not at all. In fact, these are not long-form narratives at all! Instead, there are eight sections of about 10 to 12 short chapters - each of them about three to eight pages long. Each chapter begins with an image or photograph and then have sharply focused stories and analysis about them.

It’s not, and I stress this, NOT a comprehensive history of Philadelphia Theater - it’s not meant to bore you to tears. But taken all together, these stories add up to a delightful and fascinating collage that helps to show why it’s such a fascinating topic to look into in the first place. And at the front of the book - there’s a MAP - an actual map of all the historic theaters and sites that I mention in the book - something you won’t find literally anywhere else.

If you’re either a longtime listener or even a recent listener to the show, a lot of the names and theaters topics in the book will be familiar to you: Fanny Kemble, Paul Robeson, Edwin Forrest, Louisa Lane Drew, Ethel Barrymore, the Walnut Street Theatre, the Academy of Music, censorship stories, and - but many others I’ve never addressed in the podcast at all, or anywhere else really.

The story about the World Premiere of Arthur Miller’s play Death of a Salesman, for example - really breaks new ground and reveals aspects of Philadelphia history that may change your whole idea about the early impact of that consequential play. And I discuss figures that you may not think are part of Philly theater history, but really are: Muhammad Ali, Billie Holiday, tennis great Big Bill Tilden, Pearl Bailey, William Penn, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Joe Papp - in fact the climactic section of the book shows you how the great New York producer Joseph Papp was connected to the Philadelphia born-and-raised movie actor Kevin Bacon and all the little-known and long-forgotten Manning Street Theatre Company back in the 1970s. These and many others like them are in the book.

If I do say so myself, it’s the most thoroughly researched and up-to-date book on Philadelphia theater history you’ve ever seen or ever are likely to see. In fact one reviewer who has already read a pre-production copy of it said that it was full of “delicious historical treats that add up to a thoroughly satisfying feast”!

Well! Seriously, folks. I gotta say, I’ve been researching working on this book for over six years - even before I started this podcast. Some of the chapters began as episodes of this podcast, but are now reshpaed and have even deeper research. Most of the book has never been shared or published anywhere before - and as a person who actually teaches writing at the college level, I really worked on making the prose of the text lively and readable and enjoyable for the reader. Creating it was a very different type of task than making a podcast - it was stories for the eye of the reader, instead of for the ears of the listener - which as it turns out, is quite a different thing. And I’m really proud of the way it turned out. I’m very grateful to all my friends, colleagues and editors that did so much to help me with bringing it to reality.

All right, so here’s my pitch: As many of you no doubt already know, it's the pre-order sales of any book - orders that come in before it is officially released - that these days really determine its overall success and visibility. And here’s where you come in. There are easy links to order the book on Amazon.comin the show notes for this podcast. So go to Amazon, search in there for “Adventures in Theater History: Philadelphia,” and it will pop up! There’s also a link right at the top of the home page of our website www.aithpodcast.com 

Or, another easier way - one that you can do right now: Just look at the information about this podcast on your phone - whatever app you're using, it should be there - scroll down a little bit, and you’ll see a little hypertext that says “to order the book GO HERE.” So, tap on those words GO HERE and you’ll go - right there to the page for ordering the book on Amazon.

Of course, it you prefer, you can also go to Bookshop.org and order it through your local bookstore - like the Narberth Bookshop in Narberth Pennsylvania, or if you’re a Philly person, support A Novel Idea on Passyunk in South Philadelphia, or Harriet’s Bookstore in Fishtown! If you’re elsewhere in the world - pick your own favorite local independent bookstore. We love independent bookstores! 

But I have yet another great idea for you. Get This: you can order the book directly from the website of the publisher, Brookline Books. In fact I am authorized to tell you that if you use the code 25PESC and checkout on the Brookline Books order form, you will save 25% off the price of the book! Again, that code is 25PESC - that’s “25” for 25 percent off, PE - as in the first two letters of my first name, Peter, and ‘SC” for the first two letters of my LAST name, Schmitz. So, put it all together, and “25PESC” will save you TWENTY FIVE PERCENT! Wow!

But in that first print run of the book, there are only a limited number of copies! And this code is only good until November 30th! But . . What if all this means you can’t find one when you get around to thinking about it at the end of November and you end up missing out on the fun? Well, guess what - you too can place a pre-order! My publisher tells me they will definitely see those pre-orders that go in now and print more copies now to fill the demand of all early birds! And that way the book gets more visibility and I am happy and my publisher is happy and more importantly YOU are happy because you are getting the book that  - and again I quote a wonderful person who has already read it - “all theater lovers will want to read and treasure.”

[PARTY SOUNDS BACK UP. MUSIC]

All right, I have to get back to the party - there’s an entire chorus of folks from the Adventures in Theater History Research Department, maybe a hundred of them, who have put together a song and dance routine on our rooftop amphitheater stage, and I really want to see it! I think it’s got something to do with the historic production of a show called “Miss Philadelphia” from the 1890s - it’s also in the book, I promise! Order today and find out! Thank you for supporting both the podcast and THE BOOK Adventures in Theater History: Philadelphia!

[AITH END THEME]