Playbill: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

An issue of Playbill magazine for the 1970 Broadway Theatre production of Purlie, starring Cleavon Little, Melba Moore, and John Heffernan. The magazine has an off-white cover with the signature yellow title block of black text “PLAYBILL / the national magazine for theatregoers” across the top. In the first quarter corner at the top beside the name block is “The / Broadway / Theatre”. The cover design includes “Purlie” in large, stylized font above an illustration of the character Purlie leaping into the air on the right and the character Lutiebelle looking up at him from the lower left corner. The magazine has 48 pages. The feature pages for Purlie cover from pages 13 through 22 and list the cast, Acts 1 and 2, Scenes, and musical numbers. There are black and white advertisements throughout each page and on the back cover, which has no markings.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: 1970
• Published by: Playbill, American, founded 1884
• Subject of: Melba Moore, American, born 1945
• Subject of: Cleavon Little, American, 1939 - 1992
• Subject of: Broadway Theatre, American, founded 1924
• Type: playbills
• Medium: ink on paper
• Dimensions: H x W (closed): 9 1/16 × 6 1/8 in. (23 × 15.5 cm)
• Dimensions: H x W (open): 9 1/16 × 12 3/16 in. (23 × 30.9 cm)
• Place printed: New York City, New York, United States, North and Central America
• Topic: African American
• Topic: Actors
• Topic: Associations and institutions
• Topic: Broadway Theatre
• Topic: Musicians
• Topic: Singers (Musicians)
• Topic: Theatre
• Object number: 2024.13.3
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Melba Moore and Charli Huggins
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The underlying object's rights statement is: Unknown – Restrictions Possible Rights assessment and proper usage is the responsibility of the user.