Between 1852 and 1930 there were many different versions of Uncle Tom's
Cabin produced theatrically. Most of the serious versions derived in some way from the Aiken script
listed first below, but not all (Conway's version, for example, played against Aiken's
in New York in 1853). And over the decades the hundreds of "Tom
Show" companies introduced many changes and additions into the basic script, as
you can see from the other scripts and the "Synopses" accessible below. In addition, the popularity of the play, as well as the
strong regional and racial anxieties aroused by the story, led to numerous
burlesque, minstrel or satirical re-enactments. The four such versions included below are
representative of these "anti-tom" performances.
In the mid-1850s Stowe herself wrote a dramatic version of the
novel; the text of THE CHRISTIAN
SLAVE is in the UTC section of the archive. |
The John Hay Library
Brown University
|
Melodramas
Uncle Tom's Cabin: A Domestic Drama in Six
Acts
By George L. Aiken [1852; New York: Samuel French, 1858]
Uncle Tom's Cabin: A Drama in Five Parts
By Henry J. Conway [1852; from the manuscript]
Uncle Tom's Cabin [One Act Verse
Version]
By Walter Burnot [c.1850s; from the manuscript]
1869 Howard Family Promptbook [Excerpts]
Adapted from Aiken by George Howard(?)
c1876 Howard Family Promptbook
"Uncle Tom's Cabin As Perfected by G. C. Howard"
Uncle Tom's Cabin Dramatized by George F.
Rowe
Expressly for Messrs. Jarrett & Palmer [1878]
Uncle Tom's Cabin (New Version)
Arranged by Charles Townsend [New York: Harold Roorbach, 1889]
c1900 7-Act Version of Aiken
New York Library for the Performing Arts Promptbook
Uncle Tom's Cabin
The Wm. A. Brady Revival Text [1901]
The Harmount Company Scripts
[Two Four-Act "Tom Shows," c. 1910]
A New Dramatization in Five Acts
By Chas. Morton, 1912 [TWO VERSIONS]
Anonymous Script
[A 3-Act Dramatization, c. 1920]
Synopses from Various
Playbills
|
Atkinson Collection
University of Chicago Library |
Happy Uncle Tom: A Celebrated Plantation Scene
[New York: Dick & Fitzgerald, 1868]
Uncle Tom: An Ethiopian Interlude
[New York: Happy Hours Company, 1874]
The Landlord's Revenge; or Uncle Tom
Up To Date:
A Farce in Two Scenes
By M. C. Browne [Clyde, Ohio: Ames Publishing Co., 1894]
A Burlesque on Uncle Tom's Cabin
By Harry L. Newton [Chicago: Will Rossiter, 1903]
The Filming of "Uncle Tom's Cabin":
A
Classical Comicality in One Act
By Arthur Leroy Kaser [Chicago: T. S. Denison & Company, 1922]
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