American musical theatre before the twentieth century / Katherine K. Preston -- Birth pangs, growing pains and sibling rivalry : musical theatre in New York, 1900-1920 / Orly Leah Krasner -- Romance, nostalgia and nevermore : American and British operetta i the 1920s / William A. Everett -- Images of African Americans : African-American musical theatre, Show Boat and Porgy and Bess / John Graziano -- The melody (and the words) linger on : American musical comedies of the 1920s and 1930s / Geoffrey Block. 'We said we wouldn't look back' : British musical theatre, 1935-1960 / John Snelson -- The coming of the musical play : Rodgers and Hammerstein / Ann Sears -- The successors of Rodgers and Hammerstein from the 1940s to the 1960s / Thomas L. Riis and Ann Sears with William A. Everett -- Musical sophistication on Broadway : Kurt Weill and Leonard Bernstein / bruce d. mcclung and Paul R. Laird -- Stephen Sondheim and the musical of the outsider / Jim Lovensheimer -- Choreographers, directors and the fully integrated musical / Paul R. Laird. Distant cousin or fraternal twin? Analytical approaches to the film musical / Graham Wood -- From Hair to Rent : is 'rock' a four-letter word on Broadway? / Scott Warfield -- The megamusical and beyond : the creation, internationalisation and impact of a genre / Paul Prece and William A. Everett.