Editing Casey at the Bat (section)

==Live performances==
[[Image:Dewolfhopper1.jpg|left|thumb|upright=1.1|1909 theatrical poster with DeWolf Hopper in A Matinee Idol]]
[[DeWolf Hopper]] gave the poem's first stage [[recitation]] on August 14, 1888, at [[New York City|New York's]] [[Wallack Theatre]] as part of the [[comic opera]] ''[[Prinz Methusalem]]'' in the presence of the Chicago [[Chicago White Stockings (1870–1889)|White Stockings]] and New York [[New York Giants (baseball)|Giants]] baseball teams; August 14, 1888 was also Thayer's 25th birthday. Hopper became known as an orator of the poem, and recited it more than 10,000 times (by his count—some tabulations are as much as four times higher) before his death.<ref name=Gardner />
{{Quote_box
|width=20%
|align=right
|quote="It is as perfect an [[epitome]] of our national game today as it was when every player drank his coffee from a [[mustache cup]]. There are one or more Caseys in every [[Baseball league|league]], [[Bush league|bush]] or big, and there is no day in the playing season that this same supreme [[tragedy]], as stark as [[Aristophanes]] for the moment, does not befall on some field."<ref name=Gardner />}}
On stage in the early 1890s, baseball star Kelly recited the original "Casey" a few dozen times and not the parody. For example, in a review in 1893 of a variety show he was in, the ''Indianapolis News'' said, "Many who attended the performance had heard of Kelly's singing and his reciting, and many had heard De Wolf Hopper recite 'Casey at the Bat' in his inimitable way. Kelly recited this in a sing-song, school-boy fashion."  Upon Kelly's death, a writer would say he gained "considerable notoriety by his ludicrous rendition of 'Casey at the Bat,' with which he concluded his 'turn' [act] at each performance."{{r|rosenberg|page1=229}}

During the 1980s, the magic/comedy team [[Penn & Teller]] performed a version of "Casey at the Bat" with Teller (the "silent" partner) struggling to escape a [[straitjacket]] while suspended upside-down over a platform of sharp steel spikes. The set-up was that [[Penn Jillette]] would leap off his chair upon finishing the poem, releasing the rope which supported Teller, and send Teller to a gruesome death if Teller had failed to free himself by that time. Jillette enhanced the drama of the performance by drastically accelerating the pace of his recital after the first few stanzas, greatly reducing the time that Teller had left to work free from his bonds.