Children Childhood and Musical Theater

<p>Bringing together scholars from musicology, literature, childhood studies, and theater, this volume examines the ways in which children's musicals tap into adult nostalgia for childhood while appealing to the needs and consumer potential of the child. The contributors take up a wide range of musicals, including works inspired by the books of children's authors such as Roald Dahl, P.L. Travers, and Francis Hodgson Burnett; created by Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lionel Bart, and other leading lights of musical theater; or conceived for a cast made up entirely of children. The collection examines musicals that propagate or complicate normative attitudes regarding what childhood is or should be. It also considers the child performer in movie musicals as well as in professional and amateur stage musicals. This far-ranging collection highlights the special place that musical theater occupies in the imaginations and lives of children as well as adults. The collection comes at a time of increased importance of musical theater in the lives of children and young adults. </p> <p>1. Children, Childhood, and Musical Theater: an Introduction</p><p>James Leve and Donelle Ruwe </p><p>2. Beginning with Do Re Mi: Childhood and <i>The Sound of Music </i></p><p>Ryan Bunch </p><p>3. Walt Disney, Dr. Benjamin Spock, and the Gospel of Ideal Childrearing: Creating Superlative Nuclear Families in <i>Mary Poppins</i>, <i>Chitty Chitty Bang Bang</i>, and <i>Bedknobs and Broomsticks </i></p><p>William A. Everett </p><p>4. Saving Mr<i>. [Blank]</i>: Rescuing the Father through Song in Children’s and Family Musicals </p><p>Raymond Knapp </p><p>5. Dickensian Discourses: Giving a (Singing) Voice to the Child-Hero in <i>Oliver! </i>and C<i>opperfield</i> </p><p>Marc Napolitano </p><p>6. Ghetto Chic: Utopianism and the Authentic Child in <i>The Me Nobody Knows </i>(1970) </p><p>Donelle Ruwe </p><p>7. Little Girls, Big Voices: <i>Annie</i> </p><p>James Leve</p><p>8. Urchins, Unite: <i>Newsies</i> as an Antidote to <i>Annie </i></p><p>Marah Gubar </p><p>9. Agency, Power, and the Inner Child: The "Revolting Children" of <i>Matilda the Musical </i></p><p>Helen Freshwater </p><p>10. Children’s Musicals for Educational and Community Settings </p><p>Lauren Acton </p><p>11. Broadway Junior </p><p>Stacy Wolf </p><p>Bibliography of Scholarly Sources </p>