Theatre and Celebrity in Britain 1660-2000

Download or read book Theatre and Celebrity in Britain 1660-2000 written by Mary Luckhurst and published by Springer. This book was released on 2005-10-18 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Theatre has always been a site for selling outrage and sensation, a place where public reputations are made and destroyed in spectacular ways. This is the first book to investigate the construction and production of celebrity in the British theatre. These exciting essays explore aspects of fame, notoriety and transgression in a wide range of performers and playwrights including David Garrick, Oscar Wilde, Ellen Terry, Laurence Olivier and Sarah Kane. This pioneering volume examines the ingenious ways in which these stars have negotiated their own fame. The essays also analyze the complex relationships between discourses of celebrity and questions of gender, spectatorship and the operation of cultural markets.