The Brothers Shubert

WITH OVER FIFTY PHOTOGRAPHS OF THEATRICAL PERSONALITIES AND PRODUCTIONS "There were three brothers: Samuel S. (S. for euphony) Shubert, Jacob J. (J. for nothing) Shubert, and Lee (really Levi) Shubert. They invaded New York City in 1900, armed with tireless energy, boundless confidence, a lust for money, power and fame, and fifteen thousand dollars, most of it borrowed." Hardly more than boys, they had already taken over Syracuse, having arrived there from nowhere with nothing. Between them and their objectives stood the Klaw-Erlanger trust, the most powerful theatrical monopoly yet known. "A quarter of a century later, their worth was estimated at almost half a billion dollars. They revolutionized that most glamorous of all businesses, the theater. . They bled it to anemia, and when it lay dying, they pumped back its life blood. They created their own mythology about themselves and became legends in their own times?" Today there are still theaters called Shubert strung across the nation, and Shubert Alley is still the heart and center of show business. To many persons, "Shubert" is even now an epithet, though the Brothers have departed. They fought everyone: their competitors, their stars, their writers, their directors, their associates, their employees, their partners, their government; singly, and in combination, they took on the press, the tax department, Equity, ASCAF, the Dramatists Guild, local politicians, censors, each other." They fought their way to the top and then raised the top. Everyone in show business in the United States during the first half of this century had to cope, sooner or later, with one or more Shuberts; for this reason the index of this book is like a Who's Who in the American Theater, 1900-1950. The Brothers Shubert is an important and entertaining chapter in the history of the theater in our time. All orders shipped protected in a box.…