The Federal Theatre Project stands alone as the only national theatre in the history of the United States. This study re-imagines this vital moment in American history, considering the Federal Theatre Project on its own terms - as a "federation of theatres" designed to stimulate new audiences and create locally-relevant theatre during the turbulent 1930s. It integrates a wealth of previously undiscovered archival materials with cultural history, delving into regional activities in Chicago, Boston, Portland, Atlanta, and Birmingham, as well as tours of refugee camps and Civilian Conservation Corps Divisions. For a brief, exhilarating moment, the Federal Theatre Project created a democratic theatre that staged the American people.

The Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal plan to fund theatre and other live artistic performances during the Great Depression, had the primary goal of employing out-of-work artists, writers, and directors, with the secondary aim of entertaining poor families and creating relevant art. These case studies explore the ties between the Federal Theatre Project and regional communities throughout the United States.

Theatre has long been an art form of subterfuge and concealment. Working in the Wings: New Perspectives on Theatre History and Labor, edited by Elizabeth A. Osborne and Christine Woodworth, brings attention to what goes on behind-the-scenes in this essay collection that considers, challenges, and revises our understanding of work, theatre, and history. Essays consider a range of historic moments and geographic locations-from African Americans' performance of the cakewalk in Florida's resort hotels during the Gilded Age to the UAW Union Theatre and striking automobile workers in post-World War II Detroit to the creative struggle in the latter part of the twentieth century to finish an adaptation of Moby Dick for the stage before the memory of creator, Rinde Eckert, fails. Contributors incorporate methodologies and theories from fields as diverse as theatre history, historiography, work studies, legal studies, economics, and literary analysis and draw on traditional archival materials, including performance texts and architectural structures, as well as less tangible material traces of stagecraft. Working in the Wings looks at the ways in which workers' identities are shaped, influenced, and dictated by what they do; the traces left behind by workers whose contributions have been overwritten; the intersections between the sometimes repetitive and sometimes destructive process of creation and the end result-the play or performance; and the ways in which theatre affects the popular imagination. This collected volume draws attention to the significance of work in the theatre, encouraging a fresh examination of this important subject in the history of the theatre and beyond.