Research Guides: Theatre Studies: Home

Welcome!

This guide gives an overview of the theatre materials and resources available at NYU Libraries. Use the tabs on the left hand side of the page to find information about watching streaming productions, finding plays and articles, and more.

Selection of Theatre-related Databases

Drama Online This link opens in a new window
Drama Online contains full texts and full-length filmed performances of plays ranging from Aeschylus to the present day, with supplementary material including first night program texts, critical analyses, and images from the Victoria and Albert Museum's archive of production photos. Includes the Core Collection, Critical Studies and Performance Practice, Nick Hern Books Modern Plays, National Theatre Collection, RSC Live Collection, and Aurora Metro Books, among others.
Performing Arts Periodicals Database This link opens in a new window
Performing Arts Periodicals Database provides indexing and abstracts for more than 210 international journals in the performing arts dating from 1864 to the near present.
Contemporary World Drama This link opens in a new window
Contemporary World Drama examines contemporary theatre and drama from a global context. The collection brings together new work from our existing playwright partners alongside work from up-and-coming playwrights from around the world, including recently produced world premieres, previously unpublished works, etc. from every continent.
Black Drama, 3rd Edition This link opens in a new window
Black Drama, now in its expanded third edition, contains the full text of more than 1,700 plays written from the mid-1800s to the present by more than 200 playwrights from North America, English-speaking Africa, the Caribbean, and other African diaspora countries. More than 40 percent of the collection consists of previously unpublished plays.
Asian American Drama This link opens in a new window
Asian American Drama contains 252 plays by 42 playwrights, together with detailed information on productions, theaters, production companies. The database also includes selected playbills, production photographs and other ephemera. Some 50% of these plays have never been published before.
North American Indian Drama This link opens in a new window
This edition of North American Indian Drama contains 256 plays by 49 playwrights. More than half of the works are previously unpublished, and hard to find, representing groups such as Cherokee, Métis, Creek, Choctaw, Pembina Chippewa, Ojibway, Lenape, Comanche, Cree, Navajo, Rappahannock, Hawaiian/Samoan, and others
New Play Exchange This link opens in a new window
The New Play Exchange is a digital library of scripts by living writers which can be filtered by title, length, age level, genre, subject matter, production history, script availability, cast size and characteristics, playwright, and playwright demographics. The database includes a directory of organizations and one of people, which are faceted by role (dramaturgs and types of writers), gender identity, race/ethnic identity, sexual identity, and location. While the focus is currently North American, the intended scope is international.

Selection of Theatre Journals

TDR: The Drama Review
TDR is scholarly, accessible, and dynamic with a global appeal. TDR supports progressive political and social movements and ideas. TDR is inclusive and interdisciplinary. Written by and for scholars and artists—and their students—TDR is where leaders and future leaders of performance studies go for performance texts, performative writing, editorials, reviews, and articles about the performing arts, performance in everyday life, politics, popular entertainment, business, and sports.
PAJ : a journal of performance and art
Covers the directions of new work in performance, video, installations, dance, photography, media, film, and music.
Theatre Journal
Drawing contributions from noted practitioners and scholars, Theatre Journal features social and historical studies, production reviews, and theoretical inquiries that analyze dramatic texts and production.
Theatre Topics
The first theatre publication devoted to issues of concern to practitioners, Theatre Topics focuses on performance studies, dramaturgy, and theatre pedagogy. Concise and timely articles on a broad array of practical, performance-oriented subjects (with special attention to topics of current interest to the profession) keep readers informed of the latest developments on the stage and in the classroom. The journal's audience includes scholars and students of theatre, educators, members of theatre associations, actors, directors, playwrights, designers, and theatre enthusiasts. Theatre Topics is an official publication of the Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE).
Theatre Survey
Theatre Survey is chartered by the American Society for Theatre Research as a theatre history journal. Its theatrical and historical orientations are broadly conceived. Performance-centered and historiographic studies from all points across the historical, cultural, and methodological spectra are welcome.
Performance Research
Emphasis is on research in contemporary performance arts within changing cultures.
Modern Drama
The journal features refereed articles that enhance our understanding of plays in both formal and historical terms, largely treating literature of the past two centuries from diverse geo-political contexts, as well as an extensive book review section.
Applied Theatre Research
Focuses on drama, theatre and performance with specific audiences or participants in a range of social contexts and locations.
Contemporary Theatre Review
Contemporary Theatre Review is a peer-reviewed journal of theatre and performance studies. The journal is home to the most rigorous, experimental, and influential scholarly interventions into the study of international theatre and related practices. Publishing the best research on a broad spectrum of performance practices – including mainstream theatre, drama, performance histories; live art and performance art; dance theatre; digital performance; sound; and performative social and applied practices – Contemporary Theatre Review supports and encourages a wide range of methodologies and approaches, especially interdisciplinary inflections.
Journal of American Drama and Theatre
JADT publishes thoughtful and innovative work by leading scholars on theatre, drama, and performance in the Americas – past and present. Provocative articles provide valuable insight and information on the heritage of American theatre, as well as its continuing contribution to world literature and the performing arts.

Theatre Studies

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Selection of Theatre-related Databases

Selection of Theatre Journals

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