Argues for the centrality of theater and performance in the American national imaginary.

List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xv
Introduction: Here and Now 1
1. Not About AIDS 49
2. Visa Denied: Chay Yew's Theatre of Immigration and the Performance of Asian American History 78
3. Latino Genealogies: Broadway and Beyond — the Case of John Leguizamo 109
4. Archival Drags; or, the Afterlife of Performance 137
5. Cabaret as Cultural History: Popular Song and Public Performance in America 179
6. Tragedy and the Performing Arts in the Wake of September 11, 2001 226
Afterword: The Time of Your Life 281
Notes 311
Bibliography 333
Index 345

David Román is Professor of English and American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California. He is the author of Acts of Intervention: Performance, Gay Culture, and AIDS and a coeditor of O Solo Homo: The New Queer Performance.