The Immigrant Scene: Ethnic Amusements in New York, 1880-1920

336 Pages·2008·3.33 MB·English

by  Sabine Haenni

The Immigrant Scene
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The Immigrant Scene
Ethnic Amusements
in New York, 1880–1920
Sabine Haenni
University of Minnesota Press
Minneapolis
London
The University of Minnesota Press gratefully acknowledges the generous assistance
provided for the publication of this book from the Hull Memorial Publication Fund
of Cornell University.
Passages in the Introduction draw on “Visual and Theatrical Culture, Tenement Fiction,
and the Immigrant Subject in Abraham Cahan’s Yekl,”American Literature 71, no. 3
(September 1999): 493–527. Portions of chapter 2 appeared in German? American?
Literature? New Directions in German-A merican Studies, edited by Winfried Fluck and
Werner Sollors (New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 2002), 217–48, and Theatre Research
International 28, no. 3 (October 2003): 268–88. A portion of chapter 4 appeared in
Screening Asian Americans, edited by Peter X. Feng (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers
University Press, 2002), 21–52.
Copyright 2008 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photo-
copying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Published by the University of Minnesota Press
111 Third Avenue South, Suite 290
Minneapolis, MN 55401- 2520
http://www.upress.umn.edu
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Haenni, Sabine.
The immigrant scene : ethnic amusements in New York, 1880–1920 / Sabine Haenni.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8166-4981-5 (hc : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-8166-4982-2 (pb : alk.
paper)
1. Ethnic theater—New York (State)—New York—History—19th century. 2. Ethnic
theater—New York (State)—New York—History—20th century. 3. Immigrants in
motion pictures. 4. Motion pictures—United States. I. Title.
PN2277.N5H26 2008
791.430973—dc22
2008027793
Printed in the United States of America on acid- free paper
The University of Minnesota is an equal- opportunity educator and employer.
15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction: Urban Space and Ethnic Entertainment 1
1. Mobile Metropolis
Urban Circulation, Modern Media, Moving Publics 27
2. A Community of Consumers
Legitimate Hybridity, German American Theater,
and the American Public 57
3. The Drama of Performance
Early Italian and Yiddish Theatrical Cultures 95
4. Filming Chinatown
Fake Visions, Bodily Transformations, Narrative Crises 143
5. Alien Intimacies, Urban Crowds
Screening Immigrants on Broadway 189
Coda: From New York to California 229
Notes 253
Index 309
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Acknowledgments
In the process of being researched and written, this book has traveled
through various places and undergone many transformations. I was
fortunate to be able to develop its fi rst iterations at the University of
Chicago, where cinema, theory, and cultural history came together in
an exciting and inspiring environment. Bill Brown inextricably linked
history and theory while encouraging the kind of interdisciplinary re-
search that continues to shape my scholarship. Loren Kruger shared
her expertise in the history of theater and an ethics of research that I can
only hope to replicate. I will be forever grateful for Miriam Hansen’s
ability to foster what she sometimes likes to call “promiscuous” types
of inquiry; her intellect, integrity, commitment, and humor have al-
ways been and will continue to be inspiring, modeling the kind of aca-
demic one might want to be. Members of the Mass Culture Works hop
and the American Cultures Workshop provided lively and inspiring
environments for intellectual exchange.
In the journey from Chicago to upstate New York, the research for
this project has been generously supported by the Mellon Foundation, a
Tillotson Travel Award, the Humanities Visiting Committee at the Uni-
versity of Chicago, Cornell University’s Humanities Council, and an
Affi nito- Stewart Grant from the President’s Council of Cornell Women.
I am grateful to the staffs of the Motion Picture and Tele vision Read-
ing Room at the Library of Congress (especially Rosemarie Hanes); the
Margaret Herrick Library of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Sciences (especially Barbara Hall and Faye Thompson); the Immigra-
tion History Research Center at the University of Minnesota; the Center
for Migration Studies of New York, Staten Island; the Harvard Theatre
Collection; the Theater Collection at the Museum of the City of New
York (especially Marty Jacobs); the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research;
the New York Public Library; and the Billy Rose Theatre Collection of
the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Lincoln Center.
Donald Weber and Tom Ferraro fi rst got me interested in immi-
grant cultures, and I continue to be indebted to their example as re-
searchers and teachers. Tom Gunning provided support and inspira-
tion in crucial moments. For the past ten years, Leigh Anne Duck and
Brad Evans have been my best readers, both in person and in virtual
space. A host of friends and colleagues answered questions, posed im-
portant new ones, and provided support, insight, and companionship:
Paula Amad, Giorgio Bertellini, Vincent Bertolini, Floyd Cheung, Peter
Feng, Anne- Lise François, Oliver Gaycken, Ivan Kreilkamp, Jim Lastra,
Peter Marx, Mary Helen McMurran, Jennifer Peterson, Lauren Rabino-
vitz, Michelle Raheja, Laura Reed-M orrison, Sara Shreve, Jacqueline
Stewart, Nina Warnke, Nick Yablon, and Paul Young. Peter Rachleff
generously read the entire manuscript, and Robert Snyder did so twice;
without his suggestions, it would not have its present shape.
At Cornell, the academic savvy, intellectual brilliance, and inspir-
ing example of David Bathrick and Amy Villarejo have shown and
continue to show me how things work and how one might get things
to work. Anindita Banerjee, María Fernández, Sherry Martin, Rachel
Prentice, and Sara Warner shared their work and helped navigate a new
environment. Rayna Kalas and Jeremy Braddock answered questions
and supplied some of the most stimulating conversation in Ithaca’s
backyards and bars. A particular pleasure of Cornell’s interd isciplinary
cross-f ertilization has been the host of colleagues who have provided guid-
ance and intellectual companionship: Glenn Altschuler, Mary Pat Brady,
Susan Buck- Morss, Eric Cheyfi tz, Don Fredericksen, Ellen Gainor, Kent
Goetz, Michael Jones- Correa, Barry Maxwell, Kate McCullough, Larry
Moore, Tim Murray, Steve Pond, Masha Raskolnikov, Diane Ruben stein,
Nick Salvatore, Shirley Samuels, Deborah Starr, Thuy Tu, Shelley Wong,
and Mary Woods. In the fi nal stages of preparing the manuscript, Nicole
Casi, Ryan Platt, and Jennifer Williams provided crucial help.
In the end, I owe my biggest thanks to where it all started. Therese
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix
and Rudolf Hänni fi rst put me on the road and encouraged me to keep
going, even when they realized how much travel (and how much else)
it would require on their part. I am grateful to Brigitte Hänni and
Eddie Bollier for being such good tourists, for their comments on the
U.S. landscape, and for offering to go into the publishing business on
my behalf.