11,744 stories by "Trav S.D."
Today is the birthday of Ed Sullivan (for the full story on the great television showman, go here.) Sullivan was among other things a former sports columnist. To prove it, see how he conduct…
More info: Coneyisland.com
I find myself inspired and rejuvenated since the arrival in my mailbox yesterday of the two volumes that comprise The Art of Mollycrabapple. Or, to say it plainer and broader, I am simply in…
The Gaiety Theatre, managed by Izzie Herk during its burlesque heyday. If you squint, you can see that the top line on the marquee reads “Girlie Follies”. Chaplin’s “…
Today is the birthday of Star of Vaudeville #237: Carl Ballantine (for my full squib on this comedy magician go here). This clip from the PBS Vaudeville doc, features a snippet of an intervi…
Opens today and runs through Sunday at such top NYC venues as BB King’s, the Highline Ballroom, and Brooklyn Bowl. For full information, schedule, tic etc go to http://www.thenewyor…
No, not for President, although the Countess definitely presides over “Travyland”…but vote for her swell new shirt design. If enough folks give her Zombie Mermaid shirt hig…
Today is the birthday of the great George Gershwin (1898-1937). His own career bypassed vaudeville entirely, going from being a teenage song plugger to composing songs for Broadway revues. H…
Today is the birthday of Star of Vaudeville #363: Ella Shields (see full article here). Here she is in a Pathe short from 1933Â doing a bit of her male impersonation act. Not sure who the …
Today is the birthday of Star of Vaudeville #235: Winsor McCay: for his full article go here. Now here’s his creation “Gertie the Dinosaur” in a film from 1914. The titles …
Today is the birthday of Star of Vaudeville #236, George Raft (for more on him go here). This clip from 1934 of him doing the Bolero with Carole Lombard is just the sort of thing he used to …
This is one in a series of posts on the hundreds of performers I have presented at the American Vaudeville Theatre . I met the excellent Noah Diamond through our mutual friend Mart…
Tons about burlesque impresario Sam T. Jack can be learned from his 1895 biography How He Does It: Sam T. Jack Twenty Years a King in the Realm of Burlesque by one M.J. O’Neill (availa…
As promised, here’s a few seconds of the Circus Amok band on Sunday, summoning the People to the Big Show
A little photo record of yesterday’s performance of Circus Amok’s show Moo yesterday in Tompkins Square Park, the last performance of their summer 2012 citywide tour. It wa…
Congratulations to our pal Jim Moore who won “Best Silent Film” in the Coney Island Film Festival over the weekend for his comedy The Ridiculous Romantic. The award pictured a…
Billy K. Wells was one of the top comedy sketch writers of burlesque, vaudeville and Broadway revues. Starting out as a comedian on one of M.B. Leavitt’s shows in the 1890s, within a f…
This is part of a series inspired by the centennial anniversary of the founding of Keystone Studios. For more on the topic, look for my new book Chain of Fools: Silent Comedy and Its Legacie…
This is a big day! (For me) A century ago Mack Sennett’s Keystone Pictures released its first comedy to theatres, Cohen Collects a Debt, starring Sennett, Mable Normand, Fred Mace and …
Today is the birthday of second generation vaudevillian Joe Yule Jr, better known as Mickey Rooney (Star of Vaudeville #234 — for more info on him see my article here). Here’s a …
Premiering today at 1pm in the Coney Island Film Festival: Exotic World and the Burlesque Revival. Shot between 2001 and 2010, Exotic World and the Burlesque Revival is the story of a goat f…
My completionist mania obligates me to go see this (over and above my desire to support Metropolitan Playhouse). I have read about a dozen of Maxwell Anderson’s plays (out of the 4 doz…
“Rain likely” reads the hilariously under-stated forecast. Before you know it, we are into Buster’s most famous film sequence…the brilliantly staged hurricane, culmin…
This is one in a series of posts on the hundreds of performers I have presented at the American Vaudeville Theatre . I met Josh Hartung when we were fellow cast members in Ian W. H…
