Musicals of the Roaring Twenties and 1930s

This guide explores the popular musical genres favored by audiences during the 1920s and 1930s. It looks firstly at the continued popularity of the Broadway revue, including the Ziegfeld Follies and George White’s Scandals. It then moves on to examine the influence of jazz and some of the most successful collaborations of the era. Finally, the guide considers the impact of the Great Depression upon the Broadway musical.

Terminology

• Great Depression: the financial and industrial slump of 1929 and subsequent years.
• Jazz: a genre of music developed especially from ragtime and blues and characterized by syncopated rhythms, complex chords, elements of improvisation, and distortions of pitch and timbre.
• Revue: a light theatrical entertainment consisting of a series of short sketches, songs, and dances, typically dealing satirically with topical issues.
• Wall Street Crash: a major American stock market crash that occurred in the autumn of 1929.

Key Dates & Events

• 1919 - The first of George White’s Scandals was produced on Broadway. Modeled after the Ziegfeld Follies, the popular revue ran until 1939.
• 1921 - Irving Berlin begins his Music Box Revues.
• 1924 - Premiere of Lady, Be Good, the first full-length musical by George and Ira Gershwin. The show featured Fred and Adele Astaire in the lead roles.
• 1927 - Premiere of Show Boat at the Ziegfeld Theatre.
• 1929 - The Wall Street Crash.
• 1930 - Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, and George and Ira Gershwin all leave New York for Hollywood.
• 1930 - Ethel Merman made her Broadway debut in Girl Crazy, with rave reviews for her performance of “I Got Rhythm”.
• 1932 - Florenz Ziegfeld died in Hollywood, leaving several million dollars worth of debt.
• 1934 - Cole Porter has a smash hit with Anything Goes, starring Ethel Merman.
• 1937 - George Gershwin died of a brain tumor while in Hollywood.
• 1938 - Premiere of The Boys From Syracuse on Broadway. The show marked a departure from the standard Broadway musical at the time, by using Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors as its basic plot.
• 1940 - Gene Kelly starred in the lead role of Rodgers and Hart’s new show Pal Joey.