‘Shuffle Along’ Changed Musical Theater 100 Years Ago

No Comments
I Can't

American composers and musicians Noble Sissle, center left, and Eubie Blake, on piano, perform with a group of women on stage in the early 20th century. Sissle and Blake wrote the score for Shuffle Along.

Though much of it is unwatchable today — it contains blackface and other minstrelsy — Shuffle Along brought jazz to Broadway and was the first African American show to be a smash hit.

(Image credit: Anthony Barboza/Getty Images)

Though much of it is unwatchable today — it contains blackface and other minstrelsy — Shuffle Along brought jazz to Broadway and was the first African American show to be a smash hit.