Let Freedom Swing! Production Part of Stage Door Canteen Recreation

Let Freedom Swing!, a performance featuring songs and jokes from the 1940s, will be part of a recreation of the popular World War II nightclub, the Stage Door Canteen, at the National World War II Museum in New Orleans, LA. The attraction, part of the museum’s extensive expansion project, will open on November 6.

Swing! will rotate with jazz offerings, swing dancing, WWII trivia contests and more. The National World War II Museum’s new Stage Door Canteen will also offer museum-goers with a place to grab a meal, a soft drink or a cocktail while discovering the sights and sounds of the era.

Originally started in March 1942 in the basement of the 44th Street Theatre by the American Theatre Wing and staffed by Broadway performers, the Stage Door Canteen was a place where military personnel came to dance, eat, drink, and hobnob with the stars of Broadway and Hollywood. In the three and a half years it operated, the Stage Door Canteen had an enormous influence on popular culture. It inspired a weekly radio show on the Columbia Network and a 1943 motion picture, both called Stage Door Canteen, as well as Irvin Berlin’s popular war song “I Left My Heart at the Stage Door Canteen.”

For further information, visit www.nationalww2museum.org.