Subject Portal » Theater » Research Guides »
Need Help?
- Arleen Zimmerle, Media & Reference Librarian (BMC)
- Michelle Oswell, Humanities Librarian for Music and Literature (HC)
- Anne Garrison, Humanities Librarian (SC)
Related Subjects:
Databases A-Z:
Other:
Finding Theater Reviews
getting started:
This guide is intended to provide you with an overview of resources for finding both contemporary and historical play reviews. Play reviews generally appear soon after a production opens, and can have a tremendous impact on the success or failure of the play. Reviews give you insight into many aspects of the production, often including information on the director, costuming, scenery, etc.
Dramatic criticism, as opposed to basic play reviews, are generally more in-depth and can appear years after the production has folded. Thus, it is useful to know the kind of review you are looking for, as different search methodologies are necessary for each kind of review.
Play reviews can be found in popular sources such as the New York Times while scholarly journals such as Theatre Journal and New England Theatre Journal may include both general reviews and in-depth analysis.
When searching for reviews, it is useful to know the full name of the director, the year of production, and the play's complete name.
finding contemporary theater reviews:
LexisNexis academic
Provider: LN
Full-text of thousands of newspapers, magazines, news transcripts, reference works, and legal materials. Includes NY Times (1980-current). To search for play reviews, click on News tab, then "Select Sources" and choose Book, Movie, Music, Play, and Video Reviews. Please note that the default search is only for the previous 3 months.
ProQuest Research Library
Provider: ProQuest
Provides citations and full-text magazine and journal articles in a wide variety of disciplines, both scholarly and popular in scope. Covers 1971-present. Although a basic keyword search with the name of the play or director should turn up some results, you can also refine your search by clicking More Search Options and selecting Document Type: Performance Review. ProQuest indexes a good number of theater journals such as Theater Journal and the Journal of Performing Arts. It also includes the Village Voice, a good source for contemporary theater reviews in NY.
Literature resource center
Provides access to biographies, bibliographies, and critical analyses of authors from every age and literary discipline. Covers more than 120,000 novelists, poets, essayists, journalists, and other writers, with in-depth coverage of 2,500 of the most-studied authors. Includes Drama Criticism which is a multi-volume set offering brief summaries of plays, notes on their critical reception, reviews, and critical commentary.
International index to the performing arts
Publisher: [Alexandria, Va.] : Chadwyck-Healey, Inc.,
Provides abstracts and full-text to journal articles. Covers a broad spectrum of the arts and entertainment industry including dance, film, television, theater, opera, and broadcasting. Covers 1864-present. This is an excellent source for reviews and should probably be one of your first searches. The advance search options allow you to refine your search to Document Type: Performance Review - favorable, Performance Review - mixed, or Performance Review - unfavorable.
Arts & humanities citation index
Provider: FirstSearch
Citations to more than 1,300 arts and humanities journals and to relevant articles on arts and humanities in over 5,800 social science and science journals. Records include articles, bibliographies, editorials and reviews. Covers 1980-present.
MLA international bibliography
Provider: ProQuest
Provides citations to journal articles, books, working papers, conference proceedings, bibliographies, and other materials. Areas covered include literature, language, linguistics, film, theatre and folklore. Covers 1926-present.
finding historical theater reviews:
New York Times
Holdings:
1851 to three years before current date.
Publisher: [Ann Arbor, Mich.] : ProQuest Information and Learning,
Full-text of the New York Times going back to 1851.
A guide to critical reviews
Publisher: New York : Scarecrow Press, 1966-71.
In three volumes, all in the Reference Stacks. American Drama, 1909-1982, The Musical, 1909-1989, and Foreign Drama, 1909-1977. An index to reviews of plays and musicals produced in New York published in U.S. and Canadian periodicals.
Selected theatre criticism
Publisher: Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1985-1986.
This 3 volume reference set includes reviews, reprinted in their entirety, of New York plays from 1900-1950. The productions included cover dramas, musicals, and revues and were selected on the basis of their historical importance.
America's historical newspapers
Provider: Readex
If you are researching early American theater, try looking in America's Historical Newspapers The search would be most successful with specific proper names. Newspapers from 1690-1922!
On stage;
Publisher: [New York] Quadrangle [1973]
If you'd rather browse theater reviews from the New York Times rather than search them out individually online, take a look at this reference book. It includes reviews from the New York Times from 1920-1970 (thus picking up 20 years that the previous reference book misses). The reprints here include photographs.
Broadway bound
Publisher: Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1983.
A quirky reference book that reprints reviews of the plays that were meant for Broadway but never quite made it because they were, well, awful. The whole title of this books is Broadway Bound: A Guide to Shows that Died Aborning and is fully worth a look if just for laughs.
websites with theater reviews:
Aisle Say
A poorly designed but content rich website with theater reviews from about 17 different cities. It is updated bi-weekly.
Curtain Up
A free online theater magazine established in 1996 (and the design, unfortunately, reflects that) with reviews, features, and news. The coverage seems more international than Aisle Say, as it covers London productions.
New York Magazine
Lots of theater reviews under the Arts & Events section.
TheaterMania
From their About Us section: "Founded in 1999 to connect the theater industry with a mass consumer audience, TheaterMania.com features comprehensive listings, news, reviews, interviews, video content and online ticketing for Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway and theater nationwide."