Queensland's institutional digital repository (The University of Queensland) · 2010 · 16 citations · 0 references
HumanitiesPerforming ArtsTheatre StudiesAncient DramaDramaTheatre HistoryCelebrity CultureCelebrity StudiesHistorical DramaHistorical DramaturgyStar StudiesTwentieth-century PerformanceActorsComparative CivilizationsGenre History Of DramaImperial Costume IconographyImperial IconsStar Studies HistoryTheatre Costume HistoryTheatrical Style
In the decades from Federation to the 1920s live entertainment was an integral part of the Imperial world, and performers the first generation of truly global marketeers. In epic tales of royal splendour and Napoleonic conquest, of heroic gladiators and Christian sacrifice, of musketeers and courtesans, hussars and doomed princesses, Arab houris and Oriental mandarins, international stage celebrities transported Australasian audiences into identification with the older, more powerful civilizations from which they had come. These stars travelled the world in style, carrying messages of trade, fashion, tourism, modernity and the privilege of being a member of the British Empire.