In the early twentieth century, vaudeville was the most popular theatrical form in the United States. Operating before the rise of mechanically reproduced entertainment, its centralized booking offices moved tens of thousands of performers across hundreds of stages to an audience of millions. Designed to gather and analyze data about both audiences and performers, these offices created a complex informational economy that defined the genre—an internal market that sought to transform culture into a commodity. By reconstructing the concrete details of these business practices, it is possible to develop a new understanding of both the success of the vaudeville industry and its influence on the evolution of American mass culture.

在二十世纪初，杂耍是美国最流行的戏剧形式。在机械复制娱乐兴起之前运营，其中央售票处将数以万计的表演者跨越数百个舞台运送到数百万观众。这些办公室旨在收集和分析有关观众和表演者的数据，创造了一个复杂的信息经济，定义了流派——一个寻求将文化转化为商品的内部市场。通过重构这些商业行为的具体细节，可以对杂耍业的成功及其对美国大众文化演变的影响产生新的理解。