UCF Research Guides: Theatre Databases: Theatre

Theatre Databases

Play Collections

American Drama 1714–1915 (Proquest)
"Containing more than 1,500 dramatic works from the early eighteenth century up to the beginning of the twentieth, American Drama 1714–1915 reflects American dramatic writing in all its richness and diversity: plays in verse, farces, melodramas, minstrel shows, realist plays, frontier plays, temperance dialogues and a range of other genres are represented. Major dramatists include David Belasco, Rachel Crothers, Augustin Daly, Clyde Fitch, Edward Harrigan, James Herne, William Dean Howells and Joaquin Miller."

Now on the ProQuest platform. The Chadwyck Healey platform is no longer available.
Asian American Drama (Alexander Street)
Contains 252 plays by 42 playwrights, together with detailed, fielded information on related productions, theaters, production companies, and more. Some 50% of these plays have never been published before. The database also includes selected playbills, production photographs and other ephemera related to the plays.
Black Drama (Alexander Street)
Contains approximately 1200 plays by 200 playwrights, together with detailed, fielded information on related productions, theaters, production companies, and more. The database also includes selected playbills, production photographs and other ephemera related to the plays. Some 440 of the plays are published here for the first time, including a number by major authors.
Eighteenth Century Drama (Adam Matthew) (1660-1824)
"A unique archive of almost every play submitted for licence between 1737 and 1824, and hundreds of documents that provide social context for the plays"
Features include:
-Primary source documents; the focus of which is the Larpent collection of plays from the Huntington Library and Anna Larpent's Diaries
-The London Stage Database (1660-1800)
-The Biographical Dictionary Database of Actors, Actresses, Musicians, Dancers, Managers, and Other Stage Personnel in London, 16620-1800
English Drama (Proquest)
Now available on the Proquest platform.

"A unique collection of more than 3,900 plays in verse and prose tracing the development of drama in English from the medieval mystery cycles to the comedies of Oscar Wilde."
Latino Literature : Poetry, Drama, and Fiction (Proquest) (1850+)
Now available on the Proquest platform.

Full text of hundreds of novels, short stories, poetry, and plays by Chicano, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Dominican and other Latin writers working in the United States.
National New Play Network
"The New Play Exchange ® (NPX) is the world's largest digital library of scripts by living writers. The NPX, a National New Play Network program, is flipping the script on the ways in which new work is shared and discovered. National New Play Network (NNPN) is an alliance of professional theaters that collaborate in innovative ways to develop, produce, and extend the life of new plays."
North American Indian Drama (Alexander Street)
" North American Indian Drama contains 256 plays by 49 playwrights representing the stories and creative energies of American Indian and First Nation playwrights of the twentieth century. More than half of the works are previously unpublished, and hard to find, representing groups such as Cherokee, Métis, Creek, Choctaw, Pembina Chippewa, Ojibway, Lenape, Comanche, Cree, Navajo, Rappahannock, Hawaiian/Samoan, and others. Together, the plays demonstrate Native theater’s diversity of tribal traditions and approaches to drama—melding conventional dramatic form with ancient storytelling and ritual performance elements, experimenting with traditional ideas of time and narrative, or challenging Western dramatic structure."
North American Women's Drama (Alexander Street)
"contains 1,517 plays by 330 playwrights, together with detailed, fielded information on related productions, theaters, production companies, and more."
Twentieth Century North American Drama (Alexander Street)
"contains 2,059 plays by 434 playwrights, together with detailed, fielded information on related productions, theaters, production companies, and more. The database also includes selected playbills, production photographs and other ephemera related to the plays."
Twentieth Century Drama (Proquest)
"Bringing together an unparalleled collection of the most important works from the last century from the English-speaking world, Twentieth Century Drama is the essential resource for the study and research of the drama of this influential period.

Featuring plays from noted playwrights as well as lesser known dramatists, the collection includes works by over 300 writers including Amiri Baraka, Noël Coward, Susan Glaspell, Langston Hughes, Brian Friel, David Mamet, Eugene O’Neill, John Osborne, Sean O’Casey, Harold Pinter, Bernard Shaw, Gertrude Stein, Tom Stoppard, Derek Walcott, August Wilson and Elizabeth Wong."

Available on the ProQuest platform. The Chadwyck Healey platform is no longer available.

General Databases

BBC Shakespeare Plays (Ambrose Video)
"Featuring some of Britain's most distinguished theatrical talent Ambrose Video is proud to be the exclusive distributor of Shakespeare's plays which are so richly rewarding to our viewers."
British Theatre, Music, & Literature: High & Popular Culture (Nineteenth Century Collections Online)
"British Theatre, Music, and Literature: High and Popular Culture features a wide range of primary sources related to the arts in the Victorian era, from playbills and scripts to operas and complete scores."
"British Theatre, Music, and Literature: High and Popular Culture features a wide range of primary sources related to the arts in the long nineteenth century, from playbills and scripts to operas and complete scores. These rare documents, many of them never before available, are sourced from the British Library and other institutions. Curation is by experts in British arts history. Covering more than a century, and encompassing both the Georgian and Victorian theatre, British Theatre, Music, and Literature is without equal as a resource.
Collections include:
- Archives of the Royal Literary Fund
- Archives of the Royal Philharmonic Society
- Crystal Palace Saturday Concerts
- Crystal Palace Triennial Handel Festival
- Drury Lane Theatre Archive
- J.W. Davison Papers
- King's Theatre, Haymarket Archive
- Konzert-Programm-Austausch
- London Theatre Archives: Programmes, Receipts
- Lord Chamberlain's Plays
- Manuscript Music from the Library of the Royal Philharmonic Society
- Royal Albert Hall Archives
- Sir George Smart Papers
- St. James Hall Monday/Saturday Popular Concerts
- Wandering Minstrels"
C19 : the nineteenth century index (ProQuest)
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"C19: The Nineteenth Century Index – the most comprehensive and dynamic source for discovering nineteenth-century books, periodicals, official documents, newspapers and archives."

C19 has moved to the ProQuest platform. The Chadwyck Healey platform is no longer available.
"C19 Index is the bibliographic spine of 19th century research, providing integrated access to the most important finding aids for books, periodicals, official publications, newspapers and archives. Users of C19 Index can query its 14 collections simultaneously, or can conduct more detailed research using collection-specific search screens. C19 Index is a dynamic and growing resource, currently containing over 24 million bibliographic records for a full range of 19th century source material. The links below provide more detail on the 14 collections available in C19 Index."
- American Periodicals from the Center for Research Libraries (APCRL)
- American Periodicals Series (full text)
- Archive Finder
- Bookman Directory of Booksellers, Publishers & Authors
- British Periodicals
- Cotgreave's Index
- Dictionary of Nineteenth-Century Journalism
- House of Commons Parliamentary Papers
- Niles' Register Cumulative Index, 1811-1849
- Nineteenth Century
- Nineteenth-Century Short Title Catalogue (NSTC)
- Palmer's Index to The [London] Times
- Periodicals Index Online / Periodicals Archive Online
- Poole's Index to Periodical Literature
- Proceedings of the Old Bailey
- Stead's Index to Periodicals
- Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals, 1824-1900
- U.S. Serial Set (1789-1901)
Early English Books Online (EEBO) (ProQuest)
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Contains digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473-1700.

Available on the ProQuest platform. The Chadwyck Healey platform is no longer available.
LinkedIn Learning
LinkedIn Learning offers online interactive video-based training on a wide range of topics, including software, design, and business skills. Applications include Adobe, MS Office, open-source applications, multimedia, web development, programming and more!
The UCF subscription to Lynda.com migrated to a new name "LinkedIn Learning" on August 19, 2019. See Migrating to LinkedIn Learning for more information.
* Thanks for extending UCF's Lynda subscription to: Academic Affairs, College Of Arts And Humanities, College Of Business, College Of Engineering, College Of Grad Studies, College Of Medicine, College Of Sciences, Digital Learning, Information Technologies & Resources, Student Development And Enrollment Services
"Provides access to over 3000+ instructional videos and exercise files to active students and faculty at UCF. Videos covering the latest software, creative, and business skills. Taught by accomplished teachers and recognized industry experts, lynda.com is a high-quality resource for students, faculty, and staff looking to develop skills in Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Suite, project management, social media, and a wide range of other topics."
Literature Criticism Online (Gale)
Excerpts and full text of articles and essays providing critical discussion of authors and their works.
- Children’s Literature Review
- Classical and Medieval Literature Criticism
- Contemporary Literary Criticism
- Dictionary of Literary Biography
- Drama Criticism
- Literature Criticism 1400-1800
- Nineteenth Century Literary Criticism
- Poetry Criticism
- Shakespearean Criticism (see index information)
- Short Story Criticism
- Something About the Authors
- Twentieth Century Literary Criticism
Literature Resource Center (Gale)
Information on literary figures from all time periods of writing in such genres as fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, history, journalism, and more. Includes the Dictionary Of Literary Biography.
MagillOnLiterature Plus (EBSCOhost)
Critical analyses and brief plot summaries of the most studied works in the history of literature: long fiction, short fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama.
- Censorship
- Critical Survey of Drama
- Critical Survey of Long Fiction
- Critical Survey of Mystery & Detective Fiction
- Critical Survey of Poetry
- Critical Survey of Short Fiction
- Cyclopedia of Literary Characters
- Cyclopedia of Literary Places
- Cyclopedia of World Authors
- Dictionary of World Biography (The Ancient World, The Middle Ages, The Renaissance, The 17th & 18th Centuries, The 19th Century, The 20th Century)
- Encyclopedia of the Ancient World
- Ethics
- Guide to Literary Masters & Their Works
- Identities & Issues in Literature
- Magill's Book Reviews
- Magill's Choice: Holocaust Literature
- Magill's Guide to Science Fiction & Fantasy Literature
- Magill's History Annual, 1983-1985
- Magill's Literary Annuals, 1977+
- Magill's Survey of American Literature
- Magill's Survey of World Literature
- Masterplots
- Masterplots II: African American Literature
- Masterplots II: American Fiction
- Masterplots II: British & Commonwealth Fiction
- Masterplots II: Christian Literature
- Masterplots II: Drama
- Masterplots II: European Fiction
- Masterplots II: Juvenile & Young Adult Biography
- Masterplots II: Juvenile & Young Adult Fiction
- Masterplots II: Juvenile & Young Adult Literature
- Masterplots II: Nonfiction
- Masterplots II: Poetry
- Masterplots II: Short Story
- Masterplots II: Women's Literature
- Masterplots II: World Fiction
- Sixties in America
Mango Languages
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Learn a new language from Mango Languages. Choose from more than 70 languages, including Latin American Spanish and English for speakers of other languages. Access Mango via your computer or download an app to your mobile device.
MLA International Bibliography (EBSCOhost) (1926+)
Indexes critical literary and language scholarship in journals and serials published worldwide.
New York Times, Historical (ProQuest) (1851-2017)
Complete text and images of the New York Times.
See also:
- New York Times (ProQuest) (1980+)
Play Finder in Lit Finder (Gale)
Database of play citations as well as literature and poems. To search Play Finder, Search in LitFinder and set the Type of Work to Play.
"Over 1,000 complete plays covering the range of dramatic expression: including one-act plays, puppet plays, Harlinquinades, tragedies, gothic, children's, religious, romantic, historical, children's and comedic plays. The collection includes many nationalities, all in English or English translations. Plays are analyzed for subjects, and also list all characters."
Readers' Guide Retrospective (H.W. Wilson - EBSCOhost) (1890-1982)
"provides indexing of over three million articles from more than 550 leading magazines, including full coverage of the original print volumes of Readers’ Guide to Periodical Literature™. This important resource offers a wide range of researchers access to information about history, culture and seminal developments across nearly a century."
"Subject coverage includes, arts, business, computers, crafts, dance, drama, education, entertainment, fashion, film & television, food, gardening, health and medicine, home improvement, literature, news and current events, photography, popular and classical music, politics, popular culture, religion, sports and fitness, technology, transportation, travel and more."
See more recent coverage for 1983+ in Readers' Guide
Shakespeare in Performance (Adam Matthew)
"goes behind the scenes to shine a light on how Shakespeare’s plays have been interpreted by theatre companies, actors and directors across the centuries. The resource features prompt books from the world-famous collection at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington DC. These prompt books tell the story of Shakespeare’s plays as they were performed in theatres throughout Great Britain, the United States and internationally, between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries."
Show Music on Record (Library of Congress)
"provides a reference list for commercially-released show music recordings, starting with those captured on early cylinders in the late 19th century and continuing through compact disc productions of the early 21st century."
"Which Shows Are Included?
Stage Shows
- Any American stage show with songs, whether operetta, book musical, or revue.
- Foreign musical shows that played in the U.S. or were written by American composers.
Motion Pictures and Television Programs
- Any American motion picture or television show with musical numbers.
- Film musicals from England, France, and Germany that saw limited release in the U.S.
Additional Types of Shows
- College shows, amateur shows, and industrial shows if they are of special interest, such as having well‑known composers or performers.
- "Concept musicals" or productions originally conceived as sound recordings.
- Puppet shows with songs, popular oratorios, pageants, and cantatas, if they are in the tradition of the American musical theater."
Trade Catalogues and the American Home (Adam Matthew) (1850-1950)
"Explore domestic consumerism, life and leisure in America between 1850-1950 with Trade Catalogues and the American Home. This resource presents a wealth of highly illustrated primary source documents that highlight commercial tastes and consumer trends, and provide a valuable visual record for a breadth of interdisciplinary study."