Intro to Burlesque

[Burlesquebroads]

A History of The Musical
Burlesque: A Misunderstood Genre
by John Kenrick
(Copyright 1996-2003)

(The images below are thumbnails – click on them to see larger versions.)

Lydia Thompson, the audacious British showgirl who's troupe of blonde beauties made burlesque a sensation in America.

Most people think that "burlesque" means female strippers walking a runway to a bump and grind beat. But that only fits the form in its declining years. At its best, burlesque was a rich source of music and comedy that kept America, audiences laughing from 1840 through the 1960's. However, I have no intention of wrapping burlesque in a mantle of pseudo-intellectual respectability. The "transgressive" comedy and borrowed songs were not what people came to see. The primary attraction of burlesque was sex – in the form of immodestly dressed women and/or ribald humor. Although many dismissed burlesque as the tail-end of show business, its influence reaches through the development of popular entertainment into the present.

In the 19th Century, the term "burlesque" was applied to a wide range of comic plays, including non-musicals. Beginning in the 1840's, these works entertained the lower and middle classes in Great Britain and the United States by making fun of (or "burlesquing") the operas, plays and social habits of the upper classes. These shows used comedy and music to challenge the established way of looking at things. Everything from Shakespearean drama to the craze for Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind could inspire a full-length burlesque spoof. On Broadway, the burlesque productions of actor managers William Mitchell, John Brougham and Laura Keene were among Broadway's most popular hits of the mid-19th Century.

By the 1860's, British burlesque became increasingly reliant on the display of shapely, underdressed women to keep audiences interested. Suggestive rather than bawdy, these shows relied less on strong scripts or songs than on sheer star power. When Broadway's so-called first musical, The Black Crook became a massive hit in 1866, its troop of ballerinas in flesh-colored tights served notice that respectable American audiences were ready to fork over big bucks for sexually stimulating entertainment. All it took was a daring producer to take things to the next level.

The original program to Ixion, Broadway's first burlesque hit.

Legendary showman P.T. Barnum took advantage of this new trend by importing Lydia Thompson's British burlesque troupe to New York. Their first hit was Ixion (1868), a mythological spoof that had women in revealing tights playing men's roles. In the Victorian age, when proper women went to great lengths to hide their physical form beneath bustles, hoops and frills, the idea of young ladies appearing onstage in tights was a powerful challenge. Underdressed women playing sexual aggressors, combining good looks with impertinent comedy – in a production written and managed by a woman? Unthinkable! No wonder men and adventurous wives turned out in droves, making Thompson and her "British blondes" the hottest thing in American show business. Demand for tickets was such that Ixion soon moved to Broadway's most prestigious musical house, Niblo's Garden – the same theatre where The Black Crook had triumphed two years earlier. All told, Thompson's first New York season grossed over $370,000.

Thompson and her imitators did not bother with such mundane matters as hiring composers. Instead, they openly borrowed popular songs of the day, incorporating them into the action for comic or sentimental effect. Since none of the scripts for these early burlesques have survived, we can only guess at their exact content and staging, but audiences of that time were delighted. The press initially praised these burlesques, but turned vicious under pressure from do-gooders. When editorials and sermons condemned burlesque as "indecent," they only made the form more popular. Demand was such that copycat burlesque companies soon appeared, many with female managers.

Mabel Saintley became America's first native-born burlesque star, leading "Mme. Rintz's Female Minstrels" from the 1880's onwards in a stylish burlesque of all-male troupes.

Burlesque left little to the imagination. The popular stage spectacle Ben Hur inspired "The High Rollers" troupe to produce Bend Her, with scantily clad chorines as Roman charioteers.

Any stage hit could become a target for humor. The popular melodrama Trilby was spoofed in 'Twill Be, and The Mikado was parodied in The Mick Hair-Do.

Composer Edward E.Rice teamed with actor Henry Dixey to create Adonis (1874), the story of a statue that comes to life and is so disgusted by human folly that he happily turns back into stone. The show ran over 500 performances in New York and toured for years.



Burlesque Format
As male managers took over the form in the 1880's, feminine wit was replaced by a determination to reveal as much of the feminine form as local laws allowed. But nothing obscene or vulgar was allowed – the point was to spoof and (to a limited extent) titillate, not to offend. Burlesque underwent a crucial change when Michael Leavitt produced burlesque variety shows using something similar to the three act minstrel show format –

ACT ONE: The ensemble entertains with songs and gags, dressed in formal evening clothes.

ACT TWO: An "olio" of variety acts (singers, comics, skits, etc.).

ACT THREE: A complete one-act musical burlesque. These ranged from Shakespearean take offs like Much Ado About a Merchant of Venice to a Gilbert and Sullivan spoof called The Mick Hair-Do.

By the early 1900's, burlesque had vaudeville-style circuits of small, medium and big time theatres. Because big time burlesque companies played the Columbia and Mutual theatres in regular rotations, these circuits came to be known as "wheels." These wheels evolved over the years, but for three decades they made burlesque a great source of steady work. Where vaudeville performers were independent agents who sought bookings from week to week, burlesque performers spent an entire forty week season touring as part of one complete troupe.

The biggest burlesque star of the early 20th Century was dancer Millie DeLeon, an attractive brunette who tossed her garters into the audience and occasionally neglected to wear tights. Such shenanigans got her arrested on occasion, and helped to give burlesque a raunchy reputation. Although vaudevillians looked down on burlesque performers, many a vaude trouper secretly avoided bankruptcy by appearing in burlesque – usually under an assumed name, to avoid embarrassment.



Training Ground for Talent
Long before his "Cowardly Lion" days, Bert Lahr polished his comic skills in burlesque. Note the outlandish costume and exaggerated make-up, required attire for burlesque comics.

In time, burlesque bills began and ended with "burlettas," extended skits that made fun of hit shows and popular topics. In between came a variety olio where singers, comics, jugglers, magicians and specialty acts were all part of the mix. Herb Goldman points out in Fanny Brice: The Original Funny Girl (Oxford: NYC, 1992, p. 28-29) that burlesque – not vaudeville – was the real "break-in ground" where amateurs could prove if they had the talent and determination to survive in show business. By the time most performers reached vaudeville, they were already experienced pros.

While it was common for burlesque stars to graduate into vaudeville, vaudevillians considered it a fatal disgrace to appear in burlesque, insisting that only those who were "washed up" would stoop so low. However, many a vaudeville veteran hit the burlesque wheels during dry spells, appearing under an assumed name.

Burlesque's richest legacy was its comedy. Some wondrous comics learned their craft working the burlesque wheels, including future musical comedy stars Jackie Gleason, Fanny Brice, Leon Errol, Bert Lahr, W.C. Fields, Bobby Clark, Red Skelton, Phil Silvers, Joey Faye and Bob Hope. All used the same basic routines, but no two played them the same way. The top comic in a burlesque show was referred to as the "top banana," and his sidekicks were known as the second, third, etc. – because these rough and tumble clowns would resort to slipping on banana peels in order to get a laugh. The lower you were in the "bunch," the more likely you were to suffer the worst of the physical humor (pies in the face, seltzer in the pants, etc.).

And what was burlesque comedy like?

Next: Burlesque II

[JaNell]

Alrighty then!

Love old time burlesque - I have quite a few books on the subject - even a copy of The G-String Murders by Gypsy Rose Lee, which was possibly ghost-written by gossip columnist Walter Winchell - although Ms. Lee was reputedly quite intellectual and capable of authoring a decent book all by herself.

[littlepockit]

i loved the "baby burlesque" that was done in the late 20's. it has a 3 year old shirley temple. it is soo funny.