The Performing Set

Andrew B. Harris is the author of the award-winning Broadway Theatre and a stage director, playwright, and producer. He has chaired theatre departments at Columbia University, Texas Christian University, and Southern Methodist University, USA where he met William and Jean Eckart. He lives in McKinney, Texas.

"The show that Jean and Bill offered me gave me my big break. And so they were not just brilliant designers and producers, but also really good friends."--Carol Burnett, actor and star of television and Once Upon a Mattress on Broadway "The sets for Mame were the first of the really magnificently choreographed sets. The furniture and the set pieces moved on and off without breaking the flow of the action. We never needed the curtain to come down for a change of scenery. It never stopped. Everything was just so fluid and marvelous."--Angela Lansbury, actor "Chock full of new and valuable information and which in my opinion will be an important book on the history of the American musical. I found it an excellent precis of the theatrical process and one which brilliantly shows the collaborative aspects of design."--Robert Taylor, curator of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts