'Vaudeville Wars offers the only thorough account of the vaudeville business from the ground up, centering on the roistering entrepreneurs who, within a generation, lifted their enterprise into America's leading diversion. Wertheim shows both the human side and the voraciousness of the moguls. Unravelling the business-end of show business from the motley fabric that was vaudeville, he demonstrates that when the enterprise faded, only a few of the founders were left to witness their lofty estimate of vaudeville's manic display ensconce itself in the national lore.' - Leigh Woods, author Transatlantic Stage Stars in Vaudeville and Variety (forthcoming, Palgrave
Macmillan)
'Until Wertheim's Vaudeville Wars, the men who created the institution of vaudeville had remained as inscrutable as official portraits. Wertheim drags away from their ledgers, telephones and mahogany desks the derby-hatted, cigar-smoking barons of vaudeville and places them downstage centre under the spotlight. They emerge as human beings - some venomous, all ambitious and a few nearly decent. Wertheim has provided the most clear, entertaining and reliable history of the business end of vaudeville. Besides being an engrossing read, Vaudeville Wars makes a fine case study fit for any MBA programme.' - Frank Cullen, founder, American Vaudeville Museum, Vaudeville Times Quarterly
'Wertheim gives us what is likely to be the definitive work on the business side of vaudeville for a long time to come, offering countless details available nowhere else, well organized and completely comprehensive... A valuable resource, one long needed.' - American Theatre