ethan mordden, who has written -- ethan, i'm in the middle of writing one book, and i think by the timefinish my one book, you'll probably have cranked out another three or four. >> haskins: is this your 900th? >> how many? >> i lost count. >> and the book is called "anything goes: a history of the american musical theatre." ethan is one of the foremost experts on the topic. and we're delighted that he's with us today on "theater talk." >> thank you. >> you have written several books about the musical theater built up decade by decade. what is the purpose of this book, just to give us an overview or are you crystallizing your thinking? >> no. i decided to give it a completely fresh look, push everything i've already written aside, start from the beginning, which is "the beggar's opera," 1728, and go up to last thursday, more or less -- actually it's "wicked." [laughter] but "bonnie & clyde" gets in there, too, so it goes up to 2011. the idea was to take a fresh look and try to understand what is so basic and wonderful and marvelous about this, everyone says, basic american art form. and