For information on current and upcoming exhibitions, programs and services at The New York Public Library, visit the Library's website.

The Best of Times: the Theatre of Charles Dickens was curated by Bob Taylor, Billy Rose Theatre Collection; Assistant to the Curator: Christopher Frith. The exhibit was developed, designed and installed by the Shelby Cullom Davis Museum of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts: Jacqueline Z. Davis, Executive Director; Barbara Stratyner, Curator of Exhibitions; Donald J. Vlack, Designer; Robert J. McGlynn, Graphics Designer; René Ronda, Herbert Ruiz and Anthony Walcott, Installers. This website was developed by the Research Libraries Web Development Team, Jonathan Blanc, Chris Mulholland, Michelle Misner and April Cech.

The majority of the artifacts are from the Billy Rose Theatre Collection of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. We are grateful to Isaac Gewirtz, Diana Burnham and Stephen Crook, of the Berg Collection, The New York Public Library, for the loan of Dickens’s public readings scripts. For the loan of the A Christmas Carol set model, thanks go to Tony Walton, Geoffrey Cohen, Dana Kenn and the Theater at Madison Square Garden.

The curator would like to acknowledge gratefully the assistance and support of the following: Richard Jordan, Philip A. Milito, Jerry Rothwell, Florian Schweizer and The Dickens House Museum, and Charlie Siedenberg. We gratefully acknowledge the help of the following members of the staff of The New York Public Library for their assistance: Maria Alos, Julius Crockwell, Patrick Hoffman, Karen Nickeson, Grace Owen, Alan Pally, Charles Squire, and the entire staff of the Billy Rose Theatre Collection.

We are grateful to the following for permissions to use material from the Theatre on Film and Tape Archives:
Mr. Kenneth Greenwood, Actors' Equity Association
Mr. William Moriarty, Local #802, American Federation of Musicians
Mr. Christopher Wilson, Dramatists Guild
Mr. Anthony De Paulo, Local #1, International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees
Ms. Barbara Hauptman, Society of Stage Directors & Choreographers, Inc.
Mr. Michael McBride, United Scenic Artists

Public Programs:

Public Programs take place in the Bruno Walter Auditorium, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center. Admission to all programs is free. Seating is limited. For information on programs, please call 212-642-0142.

Thursday, November 21, at 6:30 pm
Saturday, November 23, at 3 pm
Miriam Margolyes in Dickens' Women.
Devised by Miriam Margolyes and Sonia Fraser; directed by Sonia Fraser.
With Michael Lavine, pianist.
Presented in association with Richard Jordan Productions, Ltd. (UK)

Friday, November 22, at 3 pm
Creating a Book in Company: Charles Dickens as Actor-Manager,
A lecture by Prof. Michael Slater

Bibliography:
For further reading on the Theatre of Charles Dickens, the Curator recommends the following books:
Dickens and the Drama by S. J. Adair Fitz-Gerald. London: Chapman & Hall, Ltd., 1910
The Making of Charles Dickens by Christopher Hibbert. London: Longmans Green & Co., Ltd., 1967
The Dickens Theatrical Reader edited by Edgar and Eleanor Johnson. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1964
Dickens and The Stage by T. Edgar Pemberton. London: George Redway, 1888.
The Actor in Dickens by J. B. Van Amerongen. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1927.

Web links:
Charles Dickens
The Dickens Project of the University of California
Victorian Web Sites