THEATRE: Finding News Articles

News outlets are reliable sources for reviews, criticism and biographical information on actors, designers and playwrights.

In the early days of the internet, many print news outlets also offered their articles online at no additional cost. However, today most high-quality journalism is paywalled, or funded in part by tracking readers' activities online.

Armacost Library maintains subscriptions to major national newspapers like the Los Angeles Times, New York Times and Wall Street Journal. Hundreds of national and regional news outlets are also included in the library's subscriptions to aggregator news databases.

When you come across a paywalled theater review online, be sure to search the library mentioning the reviewer's name, the play being reviewed, and the title of the news publication (the title given to the review itself is likely to fluctuate). Use the premiere date to help confirm you are looking at the right review.

This video shows how to use Advanced Search forms in Nexis Uni.

Skip to 2:28 to see the News advanced search in action!

Try some of these strategies to find information on playwrights, actors, directors and other people related to your research topic:

• Check for statements by your person on social media, on blogs or websites.
• Check for interviews published in magazines such as American Theatre or online as a blog post, podcast, etc.
• Check for articles about your person written by journalists or literary critics
  • Use library databases such as Nexis Uni and Literature Resource Center to get around online paywalls
• Search the library catalog for literary criticism published in scholarly articles and books.