-Laura Keene

Theater manager Laura Keene redefined Broadway in the mid-nineteenth century. Prior to Keene’s innovations, theaters would put together low-budget productions designed to last only a few days or weeks at most. Keene increased both the budget and the number of performances for plays such as “Our American Cousin,” leading to the model that theater producers use to this day. Keene’s touring production of “Our American Cousin” at Ford’s Theater in Washington, D.C. has become infamous as the site of the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.