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In response to educators' growing need for Broadway show study guides that met National Curriculum Standards and were usable in the classroom, Camp Broadway created StageNOTES®: A Field Guide for Teachers. This series of study guides provides relevant, useful background information, with a uniformity of style and lesson plans. The content of our study guides is specifically written to be useful as a teaching tool whether or not the class sees the show. For example, The Color Purple study guide is extremely effective for students studying the novel, and Aida study guide is an excellent educational complement to any study of Egyptian culture.
StageNotes® is our creative response to the need for standards-compliant curriculum. We hope you, your students, and your family enjoy using our guides as much as we enjoy creating them for you!
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42nd Street
42nd Street features the career of up-and-coming chorus girl Peggy Sawyer, seeking a Broadway career. After gathering her courage for hours, she enters to audition for Julian Marsh's new musical, Pretty Lady. Marsh is a director trying to get on top after the Great Depression with one last musical. Unfortunately, the audition is over when Peggy arrives. Luckily for her, the suave tenor lead of Pretty Lady, Billy Lawlor, is attracted to Peggy and gets her to sing with him and get noticed by Julian, who puts her in the show as a chorus girl. The lead of the musical is Dorothy Brock, who was cast for the sole reason that her boyfriend is the show's angel. During the show’s opening night, Peggy accidentally trips and pushes Dorothy Brock, causing her to fall and break her ankle. Billy and the cast convince Julian to replace Dorothy with Peggy in order to continue the show. At the train station, Julian tries to convince Peggy to stay, singing to her: "Come on along and listen to the lullaby of Broadway...." and she decides to stay and do the musical. The show is a huge success and pushes Peggy into stardom. The lyrics sung by Marsh to Sawyer, from the song "The Lullaby of Broadway," have become among the best recognized musical lyrics in Broadway history.
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Aida
Winner of four 2000 Tony® Awards, Elton John and Tim Rice's AIDA is a musical bursting with contemporary energy chronicling the love triangle between Aida, a Nubian princess stolen from her country, Amneris, an Egyptian princess, and Radames, the soldier they both love. AIDA is an epic tale of love, loyalty and betrayal, with an exhilarating Tony® and Grammy® Award-winning score by Elton John and Tim Rice, their first collaboration since writing the music for the worldwide phenomenon The Lion King.
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A Year With Frog and Toad
Arnold Lobel's well-loved characters hop from the page to the stage in Robert and Willie Reale's musical A Year With Frog And Toad. Conceived by Mr. Lobel's daughter, Adrianne Lobel, A Year With Frog And Toad remains true to the spirit of the original stories as it follows two great friends, the cheerful and popular Frog and the rather grumpy Toad through four fun-filled seasons. Waking from hibernation in the spring, they proceed to plant gardens, swim, rake leaves and go sledding, learning life lessons along the way, including a most important one about friendship and rejoicing in the attributes that make each of us different and special.
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Cats
Winner of 7 Tony Awards (including Best Musical), CATS has become an international sensation. Boasting Andrew Lloyd Webber’s award winning score, this magical production has given millions of people an inside look at the Jellicle tribe of cats and their dreams of making it to the Heavyside Layer. Find out more about life as a cat in one of the most famous and loved musicals in Broadway history!
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Grease
Grease, by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey, is the all-American musical, based on the sub-cultures of high school life in the 1950’s. The show takes place at Rydell High School, where Danny Zuko fronts his gang – the T-Birds – who romance their female equivalents – the Pink Ladies. When good-girl Sandy Dumbrowski arrives in town, the Pink Ladies take her under their collective wing. The Grease StageNotes takes a curriculum compliant look at the themes of this classic musical.
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Hairspray
In Hairspray it's 1962 - the '50s are out and change is in the air. Baltimore's Tracy Turnblad, a big girl with big hair and an even bigger heart, has only one passion--to dance. She wins a spot on the local TV dance program, "The Corny Collins Show" and, overnight, is transformed from outsider to irrepressible teen celebrity. But can a trendsetter in dance and fashion vanquish the program's reigning princess, win the heart of heartthrob Link Larkin, and integrate a television show without denting her 'do? Only in Hairspray! Welcome to the '60s! The musical features an original score by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman. Their songs take Tracy from the soundstage of a 60's-style dance show to the streets of Baltimore to a downtown rhythm and blues record shop.
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In The Heights
IN THE HEIGHTS is a new musical about three days in the life of Washington Heights, a vibrant and tight knit community at the top of the island of Manhattan. It's a place where the coffee from the corner bodega is light and sweet, the windows are always open, and the breeze carries the rhythm of three generations of music.
Find out what it takes to make a living, what it costs to have a dream, and what it means to be home. Previews begin on Broadway February 14, 2008 at the Richard Rodgers Theatre.
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Jane Eyre
Jane Eyre is the story of an orphan girl who overcomes an abusive childhood and the death of her best friend to become the governess of Thornfield Hall. At Thornfield Hall, she falls in love with Edward Rochester, an Earl with a dark secret. On their wedding day she discovers his secret: he already has a wife, an insane lunatic hidden in the attic. Shocked, Jane flees to her childhood home, to find that her aunt is dying. Even though her Aunt had treated her cruelly as a child, Jane forgives her. In her absolution of her aunt, and the realization that she is someone who can love and be loved in exchange, she returns to Thornfield Hill, only to discover it has burned to the ground and Rochester has been blinded. Jane and Rochester are married and soon Rochester's sight partially returns so that he is able to see his new-born son.
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Legally Blonde
Sorority star Elle Woods doesn't take "no" for an answer. So when her boyfriend dumps her for someone “serious,” Elle puts down the credit card, hits the books, and sets out to go where no Delta Nu has gone before: Harvard Law. Along the way, Elle proves that being true to yourself never goes out of style. LEGALLY BLONDE The Musical has been created by a dean's list of top-of-their-class Broadway talent, including Tony Award-winning director/choreographer Jerry (Hairspray) Mitchell; composer and lyricist Laurence (Batboy) O'Keefe and Nell (Sarah, Plain and Tall) Benjamin; book writer Heather (Freaky Friday) Hach; and scenic designer David (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels) Rockwell. LEGALLY BLONDE The Musical will take you from the sorority house to the halls of justice with Broadway's brightest new heroine (and of course, her chihuahua, Bruiser).
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Movin' Out
Movin' Out is a jukebox musical featuring the songs of Billy Joel. Conceived by Twyla Tharp, the musical tells the story of a generation of American youth growing up on Long Island during the 1960s and their experiences with the Vietnam War. The principal characters are drawn from those who appeared in various Joel tunes: high school sweethearts Brenda and Eddie ("Scenes from an Italian Restaurant"), James ("James"), Judy ("Why Judy Why"), and Tony (Anthony in "Movin' Out"). The show is unusual in that, unlike the traditional musical, it essentially is a series of dances linked by a thin plot, and none of the dancers sing. All the vocals are performed by a pianist and band suspended on a platform above the stage while the dancers act out the narrative sans dialogue.
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Stomp
One of the most unique theatre experiences in the world of performance, STOMP has played to thousands of sold-out audiences around the globe. Company members use everything from dustpans to garbage can lids to create a pulsating and thrilling show. Audiences everywhere have been awakened and inspired by this physical tour de force, helping individuals all over the world to find the rhythm in their own lives.
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The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee
The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee is a one act musical comedy with music and lyrics by William Finn and a book by Rachel Sheinkin. The show centers around a fictional spelling bee set in a geographically ambiguous Putnam County. Six quirky adolescents compete in the Bee, run by three equally-quirky grown-ups. The spellers learn that winning isn't everything. The 2005 Broadway production, directed by James Lapine was nominated for six Tony Awards, winning two, including Best Book. The show has spawned various other productions in the U.S., a national tour and Australian productions. An unusual aspect of the show is that three or four real audience members are invited on stage to compete in the spelling bee alongside the six young characters.
This StageNOTES® was produced with Bridge Multimedia and Universal Design on Stage providing rich support for experiencing theatre including:
- A large print version of the program, a foreign language version of the program, a spoken word version of the program and a Braille version.
- Synopses are provided in advance in foreign languages and in simplified English; pre-show introductions are provided to patrons who are visually impaired or blind; hard of hearing or deaf, or have limited English proficiency.
- An accompanying study guide, aligned to what students are learning, gives school groups a reason to attend the theatre.
- Performances with a sign language interpreter, or with an educational associate further extend the theatre experience.
Click here to download the study guide PDF
Click here to listen to the Visual Description for this show
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The Color Purple
The Color Purple is a joyous musical adaptation of Alice Walker’s award-winning novel. This guide has been developed as a teaching tool to assist educators in the classroom who are introducing their students to the story.
By using StageNOTES®, you will understand how The Color Purple exposes the past (History), expands our visual and verbal vocabulary (Language Arts), encourages creative thinking and expression (The Performing Arts), illuminates the human condition (Behavioral Studies), and aids in our own self-exploration (Life Skills).
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Urinetown
Urinetown: The Musical begins its satirical tale of industrial corruption in a Gotham-like city, where a 20-year drought has brought on a crippling water shortage. In a mad attempt to regulate water consumption, the government has outlawed the use of private toilets. The citizenry must use public, pay-per-use amenities owned and operated by Urine Good Company (or "UGC"), a private corporation run by the corrupt and iron-fisted Caldwell B. Cladwell. Anyone who refuses to pay is immediately and without question hauled off to Urinetown. Nobody knows exactly what happens in Urinetown, but the population is going mad, desperate for relief.
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Wicked
Long before Dorothy dropped in, two other girls meet in the Land of Oz. One - born with emerald green skin - is smart, fiery and misunderstood. The other is beautiful, ambitious and very popular. How these two unlikely friends end up as the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda the Good Witch makes for the most spellbinding new musical in years. WICKED, the untold story of the witches of Oz, features music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz (Godspell, Pippin, Academy Award winner for Pocahontas and The Prince of Egypt) and book by Winnie Holzman ("My So Called Life," "Once And Again" and "thirtysomething"), and is based on the best-selling novel by Gregory Maguire. With musical staging by Tony Award winner Wayne Cilento (Aida, The Who's Tommy, How To Succeed...), WICKED is directed by 2003 and 2004 Tony Award winner Joe Mantello (Take Me Out, Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, A Man of No Importance).
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