Shuffle Along was mainly to allow an excuse for the singing and dancing." Miller and Lyles also wore blackface in Shuffle Along. Miller and Lyles wrote thin, jokey dialogue scenes to connect the songs: "The plot of. Problems playing this file? See media help. Instrumental version of " I'm Just Wild About Harry" recorded on May 17, 1922. In the end, however, the show earned $9 million from its original Broadway production and three touring companies, an unusual sum in its time. It was able to book only a remote theater on West 63rd Street with no orchestra pit. When the show returned to New York about a year later, during the Depression of 1920–21, the production owed $18,000 and faced strong competition on Broadway in a season that included Florenz Ziegfeld's Sally and a new edition of George White's Scandals.
For some time, the entire set could fit in one taxicab, and was transported between theaters by that means (Krasner 244). The budget was so low that cast members had to wear damaged and worn leftover costumes from other shows. Cast members were rarely paid, and were "trapped out of town when the box-office receipts could not cover train fare". However, with its limited budget, it was difficult to meet travel and production expenses. After finding a small source of funding, Shuffle Along toured New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Promoters were skeptical that a black-written and produced show would appeal to Broadway audiences. None had ever written a musical, or even appeared on Broadway. The show's four writers were African-American Vaudeville veterans who first met in 1920 at a NAACP benefit held at the newly opened Dunbar Theatre in Philadelphia. Ī 2016 adaptation Shuffle Along, or, the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed focused on the challenges of mounting the original production, as well as its lasting effects on Broadway and race relations. It launched the careers of Josephine Baker, Adelaide Hall, Florence Mills, Fredi Washington and Paul Robeson, and was so popular it caused "curtain time traffic jams" on West 63rd Street. The show premiered at the 63rd Street Music Hall in 1921, running for 504 performances, a remarkably successful span for that decade. The first all-Black hit Broadway show, it was a landmark in African-American musical theater, credited with inspiring the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and '30s. Shuffle Along is a musical composed by Eubie Blake, with lyrics by Noble Sissle, and a revue-style plot written by the comedy duo Flournoy Miller and Aubrey Lyles. Sheet music for "Love Will Find a Way", a song from the show