TY  - BOOK
AU  - Brisbane,Katharine
TI  - Entertaining Australia : : an illustrated history / 
SN  - 0868192864
U1  - 790.20994  20
PY  - 1991///
CY  - Sydney : 
PB  - Currency Press, 
KW  - Television
KW  - Australia
KW  - History
KW  - Radio
KW  - Motion pictures
KW  - Performing arts
N1  - Includes index; The hidden Australia --; Origins of a colonial culture --; Moving pictures in the theatre --; Moving pictures in the home --; 1990s: a cosmopolitan culture?
N2  - "Entertaining Australia is an exciting new examination of Australia's past revealing a Hidden Australia much richer and more cosmopolitan in taste and experience than the widely accepted legend of rural Australia has led us to believe. In the bustling 19th century performers of all kinds roamed the world, free from the restriction of trade and customs which prevail today. Ans Australia was part of that - a freewheeling country with money tp spend. When god fever was at its peak, Melbourne was reputed to be the richest city in the world. In the 1890s the extravagance of theatrical entertainment reached its height, excelling even The Phantom of the Opera in the 1990s.
The early 20th century saw film, the gramophone and radio enthusiastically embraced as the country experienced Federation, the Depression and two world wars, as well as the rise and later decline of a local film industry. A post-war tour by the Old Vic company with Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh led into the fifties and a new local drama with Summer of the Seventeenth Doll and the introduction of television. The decade ended with a tour of My Fair Lady in the theatres and Johnny O'Keefe on Bandstand, as the teenager was established as a dynamic social entity.
The Sixties saw the first Adelaide Festival of the Arts; Joan Sutherland toured Lucia di Lammermore; the country's students demonstrated against the Vietnam War, and the new wave of aggressive your playwright's tested the obscenity laws. And into the Seventies and Eighties: the opening of the Sydney Opera House and the sacking of a Government; black playwright Jack Davis depicted the pain of his people and the reviving film industry looked at white history. Graeme Murphy reflected the new national pride in a performance of his new choreography danced to music by Australian composer Carl Vine.
Now, in the 1990s the performing arts continue to reflect the cosset from which they spring, as social conditions and preoccupations change. All this social history is represented in this book, which demonstrates Australia's multicultural nature, so recently recognised and valued - a hidden resource reflecting a dynamic and spirited people." -- Book cover
ER  -