Musicals have been adapted from stage plays, novels, and movies. With The Lion King, Disney transforms its animated film into show-stopping, live-action musical theatre. The guide Disney provides to accompany a study...

Aladdin, Disney's Broadway musical comedy, is a magic carpet ride. Prepare your class for a field trip to the show with a study guide that is a treasure trove of activities, cultural connections, and background information.

Students, utilizing video clips and Web sites, compare specific passages from original texts to moments in Broadway musicals on which they were based, analyzing similarities and differences between them. They adapt literature into a...

Introduce young thespians to all aspects of the theater. A syllabus for a one-semester drama course provides lessons that take learners from the history of drama to the many facets of play production.

Read biographical information on Arthur Miller, author and notable playwright. Show your class this presentation as you begin reading Death of a Salesman and look into the man who created the work.

Learners of any age can learn to communicate using gestures and their bodies. They create a pantomime of a specific activity without using any words. This resource includes a link to an Off-Broadway Workshop for kids.

Learners encounter and study "Mambo" from "West Side Story," by Leonard Bernstein. They practice utilizing musical elements (instrumentation, tempo, and dynamics) to create a certain mood for a scene with music. Each student interprets...

Music has often been called the international language that transcends cultures and regions. Scholars analyze the impact of Latin American music on New York City culture in the years following World War II. They research music, video,...

Get to know the meaning behind the song "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" from the legendary 1939 film The Wizard of Oz. Groups of two take the roles of performer and questioner. Performers sing lines of the song while questioners...

Middle schoolers research and examine the various roles needed to put on a major drama production. Using this information, they role play one of these different responsibilities. As a class, they perform a play of their choosing and...

Anita's iconic rooftop ode to American life in West Side Story is the focus of a lesson on immigration. As class members listen to "America," they follow along with printed lyrics, and discuss whether they agree with Anita's...

Students, in groups, study a Tony Award winner from the past through researching its history, watching the production, and reading the written origin of the production. They create programs for these productions and assess

Students discover the group dynamics necessary to produce an American musical in this six day instructional activity. Themes and characterization techniques are explored during collaborative small group research projects.

For this history of opera worksheet, students explore and research what an opera is and then answer four questions regarding the history of opera in complete sentences.

In this opera worksheet, 8th graders read about the history and evolution of opera as a type of theatre. They answer 4 questions based on the reading using complete sentences.

Students listen to a piece of music called "March of the Siamese Students." They discuss the country and people of Thailand. Next, they sing the song, Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush, and talk about things they do each day.

Students see how music and theatre deals with contemporary problems and issues. The sight-read new music and examine the musical, 'RENT.'

This is a great article on the fall of the traditional revue, the Zeigfeld Follies, and the rise of musical plays. Click on the arrow on the bottom to continue the article.

Features comprehensive biographical details on "the most successful composer of our time", Andrew Lloyd Weber. His play, "The Phantom of the Opera", is the longest running musical in Broadway history and he has won an Oscar, a Golden...

The world of modern theater owes its roots to the tragedians of Ancient Greece. As far back as the 5th Century BCE, actors and playwrights were entertaining the masses with intriguing stories. Melanie Sirof unveils the ancient theatrical...

Interested in popular and serious music, Gershwin (1898-1937) played a big part in bringing jazz to a more important place in American music. He helped mix it with classical music in his compositions. Read more about his work, including...

A commercial website that provides a solid history of American musical theatre. Includes summaries of many musicals through history. Focus is on shows before 1960.