Touring Variety in the Asia Pacific Region, 1946–1975

Jonathan Bollen is Senior Lecturer in Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. His research interests include performance and desire, popular entertainment, regional touring, productions of Australian plays, and digital methods for research.

• 1. Chapter 1: Introduction.- 2. Chapter 2: Transporting Variety through the Nightclubs of Hong Kong.- 3. Chapter 3: Translating Repertoire between Melbourne and Manila.- 4. Chapter 4: The Tourist Trade: Flying in to Singapore, 1946–1975.- 5. Chapter 5: Entrepreneurial Diplomacy: The Cherry Blossom Show on tour from Tokyo.- 6. Chapter 6: Encountering Internationalism on the Circuit around Sydney.- 7. Chapter 7: Containing Diversity: National Distinction and International Style.- 8. Chapter 8: Conclusion.

“Bollen’s appreciation of the virtues of variety performance and its constituents infuse the book with both rigour and colour, and his demonstration of the breadth and implications of mobility in terms of actual travel but also through the mobility of repertoire physically and through recording, is a particular strength … . This book makes a major contribution to the study of entertainment in the Asia Pacific, the history of Australian internationalism in entertainment, to modernism and migration, global cultural studies, and to the profound relationship between cosmopolitan entertainment and economic development.” (Anne Pender, Australasian Drama Studies, Vol. 78, 2021)