Bradford Ropes (January 1, 1905 – November 21, 1966) was a novelist and screenwriter whose work includes the novel 42nd Street that was adapted into the 1933 film of the same name, which then became a Tony Award-winning stage musical.^[1] His next novel, Stage Mother in 1933 was also adapted to film,^[2] He also wrote many Western stories, screenplays for Roy Rogers and Rex Allen, and contributed to films starring Abbott & Costello and Laurel & Hardy.

Ropes was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He died in the Wollaston section of Quincy, Massachusetts.

Ropes wrote in 1932 that America was still waiting for the "Uncle Tom's Cabin of the chorus girl."^[3]

Novels

• 42nd Street (1932)
• Stage Mother (1933)
• Go Into Your Dance (1934)

Films (screenplays unless noted)

• Source:^[4]

• Maya Cantu: Greasepaint Puritan : Boston to 42nd street in the queer backstage novels of Bradford Ropes, Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press, 2024, ISBN 978-0-472-07657-4