Operetta beyond borders: The different versions of Die Csárdásfürstin in Europe and the United States (1915–1921)

Imre Kálmán’s operetta Die Csárdásfürstin premiered in Vienna in 1915 and was soon an international success. It appeared in Budapest as Csárdáskirályné (1916), in Moscow as u (1917), in New York as The Riviera Girl (1917) and in London as The Gipsy Princess (1921). By considering its different stagings, this article focuses on the reciprocal ways whereby Western and Eastern Europeans interact, influence, react and respond to each other. Thus the aim of the article is to bring together the different formulations of European and international theatre to show the various networks, connections and relations among the different theatre traditions both within and outside Europe; and to set up a methodology of theatre historiography which goes beyond European orientation, the East/West divide and the image of the ‘West’ as a single and unified entity.