Staged News

​‘At a point when the development of new media in photojournalism and radio broadcasting caused journalists and their readers to rearticulate what the news was and how it was consumed, Cox convincingly argues that theatre offered a 'glimmer of possibility' about how theater and the newspaper might 'supplement and transform each other.' The relevance of that work from the 1930s is even greater today, Cox argues, and her book provides a significant resource in understanding how embodying the news, particularly in nonliteral ways, may again redefine what is ultimately newsworthy.’—Michael DeWhatley, Journal of American Drama Theatre

​‘Staged News deftly captures the way that the New Deal afforded New York-based workers in theater and journalism, as it did for arts workers in other locations and cultural fields, an opportunity to reframe the possibilities of their craft in ways that intersected with the changing dynamics of the nation.’—J.J. Butts, Gotham Center for New York History

‘Staged News is engaging and incisive throughout. Cox acknowledges and builds on the work of other scholars, while developing a distinctive take of her own. This book is strongly recommended to anyone with an interest in 1930s American drama, or in documentary theatre forms more generally.’—Stephen Scott-Bottoms, New Theatre Quarterly

‘Staged News makes important strides toward connecting the history of American journalism to the history of ideas and culture more broadly. . . . Given the historical dominance of social science in scholarly approaches to journalism, such a broadening into the humanities [is] welcome.’—Kevin M. Lerner, American Journalism

‘Cox brilliantly chronicles the embrace of imagination by newspaper reporters and theatre makers. This engaging, beautifully written book reveals how their staging of the news inspired democratic participation while questioning the idea of journalistic objectivity.’—Harvey Young, author of Theatre and Race

‘Jordana Cox deftly traces the twinned histories of US theater and journalism in the 1930s, drawing on extensive archival material to detail how innovations in journalistic practice and imagination shaped many of the Federal Theatre Project’s most significant Living Newspaper productions. This is a timely and insightful book.’—Marlis Schweitzer, author of Bloody Tyrants and Little Pickles: Stage Roles of Anglo-American Girls in the Nineteenth Century

‘Journalism historians have paid little attention to the subject of Living Newspapers. In this carefully researched history, Cox uncovers how this New Deal program illuminated the limitations of journalism while offering an alternative and collaborative model for truth-telling—a model with lasting value.’—Carolyn Kitch, author of Pages from the Past: History and Memory in American Magazines

‘Cox’s writing style is smooth and fluid, and she has mined archives that others have missed. A book on Living Newspapers that focuses on their journalistic status is way overdue.’—Laura Browder, author of Rousing the Nation: Radical Culture in Depression America