Newsies: Carrying the Banner through Film, Live Theater, and Virtual Theater

Abstract

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes1 The Dead End Kids were a group of 14 adolescent boys from New York who appeared in Sidney Kingsley’s Broadway play Dead End in 1935. Two years later, film producer, Samuel Goldwyn, worked with the same cast to turn the play into a film. The Dead End Kids’ popularity resulted in more movies, including: The East Side Kids, The Little Tough Guys, and The Bowery Boys.2 For a more detailed account of how the production team brought Newsies from the film to the live theatre medium as well as from the live theatre medium to the virtual theatre medium, the author recommends 1) Ken Cerniglia’s (Citation2014) Newsies: Stories of the Unlikely Broadway Hit; 2) Chapter 6 of Amy Osatinski’s (Citation2019) Disney Theatrical Productions: Producing Broadway Musicals the Disney Way; 3) Amanda Marie Miller’s (2022) article, “Newsies—An Oral History: How It All Happened”; and 4) Courtney Potter’s (Citation2017) article, “Extra! Extra! Newsies Stars Talk About Bringing the Show from Stage to Screen!Additional informationNotes on contributorsAnn BrodaAnn Broda (MA Strategic Communication, Liberty University, 2017; MA Theater, Regent University, 2019) is an Instructional Designer at Spring Arbor University and an online Adjunct Instructor for Olivet Nazarene University. She is currently a doctoral candidate in her Doctor of Philosophy in Communication program through Regent University. Her research interests include exploring and analyzing the historical, cultural, and rhetorical impact of narratives on individuals’ lives and the discipline of communication.