Showboat in 1927 marked a change in musicals; from play to musical play – integrating not only music into the acts, but also racial significance. This was one of the first plays where two races would perform on stage and interact together. One key figure during showboat was Paul Robeson, who was initially an all-American foot ball player, and joined a revival of ShowBoat. His character acted as an outspoken critic on the lack of civil right, portrayed in the song, “Old Man River“.
There’s a large difference in musicals after Showboat, which classified numerous musicals as “Before Showboat, or After Showboat”.
After the depression era, there was desperation that occurred – people who starving and unemployed, because they were in so much debt. Musicals started to take two different stances from this point onwards. Especially because of the rising popularity of the Radio, Musicals were getting less attention. Stars like Al Jolson and Bing Crosby became popular because of this. However, musicals took on two different approaches:
- Forget your troubles outside of the theater and be entertained by us. A truly mindless play where anything is possible, and reminisce about the good days.
- You think you have it bad? Depressing but with resolution; basically, don’t feel so bad about yourself, because it could be worse.
FDR takes presidency after the Depression and creates the New Deal. The New Deal had many components to it, including creating social security, giving unemployed tax assurance, creating job programs, the CCC or Civilian Conservation Core, which planted trees in numerous cities, and amongst that, creating the WPA, or Works Progress Administration. The WPA was for fixing public roads and buildings, but also had a sect called the FTP or Federal Theater Project.
One major director of this time was Orson Welles, who was taking classics and making them controversial, politically and socially; Like Macbeth and Julius Ceasar. He was also the writer of the Cradle Will Rock – which talks about the WPA Federal Theater Project. There was also the Will Rogers Follies, which portrayed contemporary, recent news as drama. It was considered like a living newspaper.
We then jumped to Gunshow musicals, and Gunboat musicals. These musicals were on boats, which traveled and went to real places, performing ideas on wishful thinking. One example in class was Korea, bringing good ol’ american democracy to them.
We also talked about the fueling attitudes for cultures during this time. There were many different ones, however, we sometimes get mixed up between the definition of different political beliefs and movements. The one’s we talked about were:
- Imperialism: extending the power of a country through force (either diplomatically or militarily)
- Isolationism: A country which closes itself off to other countries, thus to block out influences
- Xenophobia: The fear or distrust of foreigners… This in effect fuels imperialism, in the idea that “they’re not quite on our level”.
- Chauvinism: Exaggerated, or aggressive patriotism towards ones own country
- Nationalism: That the countries primary importance is itself.
An important performer of this time was Black Patti, but her real name was Sissieretti Jones. Her voice was so great, it was equal to that of the Patti.
Immigration was a large component to the US, the term coined around the time of the constitution in 1787 as to define and identify people not from America. It was said that there were three levels of people when we first began developing:
- Colonists – who were residences for more than 100 years.
- Settlers – who had 30-40 year roots, both active in the america revolution, thus making them “Americans”
- Immigrants – who reaped the benefits of the fight.
By 1820-1920, over 35 million people had immigrated to America, because other countries were sending their problems over to the US. The individual immigrating snowballed. It was usually the youthful that immigrated, because the elders already had their roots tied to their own country. 95% of immigrants were between the age of 15-30. New immigrants were known as Green-Horns. They were met by the same nationality in America, which caused settlers to form groups. Often these green horns would get taken advantage of by the people who “already knew the bends” and could “help them out a little”.
But immigrants did not always have a good standing in society. There was much hostility to these immigrants. One example is against the Irish. Numerous employment areas would have signs that said NINA, which stood for “No Irish Need Apply”. Thus, don’t apply.
But immigration also brought a great influx of cultural influences on theater. America at this point became a true melting pot and thus a “United” States. Some examples was irish jig and tap dance, african music and culture, german clog dancing. They all became an integral part of musical theater.
Look at the similarities between these dances and how it influenced the this 2011 performance of Anything Goes.
Irish Dance Group – Riverdancing (2009) vs. African Jazz Dance by OFFJAZZ.
There was also a Backlash to the 1920’s – The Scopes Monkey Trial tries two different opinions in america; do we embrace new ideas or reject and live in the past? This was backed with numerous other incidents, such as the resurgence of the KKK, and the conservative and fundamentalists starting to speak out. Theater was starting to question whether american culture was american culture – and where it was drawing its influences on being bad or good. This goes back to xenophobia and nationalism, in which we don’t know whether we’re scared of foreigners which might have made American culture bad, or if they added to it.
Musical Theater As Social Commentary: Chicago 