“One, two, three, KICK!” was their vocabulary—or is, for they are not all dead yet.
In England several managers at various times offered good productions, with casts of capable artists. Of such productions the most fortunate made small profits; the majority lost whatever money was put into them. Managers said the public did not want good work—a deduction apparently justifiable. They devised the elaborate scenic production—Aladdin’s-cave sort of thing, with millions of jewels the size of roc’s eggs, delirious with yards and furlongs of red, yellow and green foil-paper, acres of chrome-yellow, and “magic transformation scenes”; with one hundred people on the stage, one hundred, obviously making two hundred legs, every one of which was considered thrilling and dangerous in those days. Of all those legs displayed in all their amplitude, usually not one pair could dance a step; but they did not need to dance.
That was the form of art called the extravaganza. It was a naughty thing to patronise. Its inanities, without its “stupendous” cost of production, survive in the present-day burlesque.
In the morbid conditions of Montmartre there came into favour a species of acrobats whose aim was to produce the illusion that their legs and spines were out of joint, if not broken. Although of an ugliness demoniac, their work was called dancing. “Wiry Sal” in England and “Ruth the Twister” in America were the illuminating pseudonyms associated with the specialty. Perhaps a specimen of the kind might still be unearthed in a dime museum.
Enter Lottie Collins, she of “ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay.” To high kicking and contortion, and the Skirt Dance vogue of the moment, she added action so violent that it seemed a menace to life itself. The combination of attractions was irresistible; Europe and America made her rich. Her master-stroke was bending back until her body was horizontal, and violently straightening up to emphasise the “boom” of her song. For no less than a dancer she was a singer! The two talents were employed together. And hordes of little plagiarists of her act, as of every other “hit,” brought delight to the many and despair to the few.
Lottie Collinsism left no territory to be explored in its direction. So an eager world turned to the inanity of sweetness.
The dear little girl had been discovered. Evil among days! Preferably she was dimpled. She wore a blond wig with curls falling artlessly over her shoulders. Her eyebrows were painted in a smoothly curved arch extending around on to the sides of her face, and her eyes were shaded with the luxuriant lashes begot of heavy “beading”; they, too, were carried out an indefinite distance to the sides. She dressed as a child of twelve, with a sash that conveyed the idea of being dressed for Sunday-school; imagination always supplied a cent gripped in her fist. She wore “cunning” little low-heeled shoes, with straps. It was not amiss that she have some sort of sunbonnet, of lace, slipped carelessly off her flaxen head and hanging down her back. Rouge, with a bloom of rice powder, gave her a perfect peaches-and-cream complexion. Grease paint widened and shortened her lips, curved them into an infantile cupid’s bow. And from that cupid’s bow emerged, in piercing calliope tones, inflectionless recitals of her devotion to her dear old mother. At the end of each stanza she had a little dance—usually a slow polka-step, one, two, three and kick! (An irreproachably discreet little kick, to the side.) Repeat four times each side, and on to the next stanza—which instead of “mother” and “other,” will avail itself of the felicitous rhyme of “roam” and “home,” or “heart” and “part.”
Lest the enumeration of the foregoing horrors should be criticised as out of place in a discussion of dancing, be it recorded at this point that the said horrors went under the name of dancing within easy remembrance of people now living, that there are still people living who call them dancing, and—for artistic sins of the world as yet unexpiated—they still influence the dancing situation in these United States.
The Black Crook is a name that stands for superlatives. It was the most lavish spectacle America ever had seen. It made such a “hit” as rarely has been duplicated since. Its dancing features, which were of the first order, made more of an impression than had any dancing in this country since Ellsler’s tour, in 1840, ’41 and ’42. Its origin was in part due to the sometimes favourable factor of accident.
“In consequence of the destruction by fire of the Academy of Music, this city,” writes J. Allston Brown in his History of the New York Stage, “Jarrett and Palmer, who were to have produced La Biche au Bois there, had on their hands a number of artists brought from Europe. They made an arrangement with William Wheatley to utilise the ballet troupe, the chief scenic effects, of which they had models, and the transformation scene.” From those beginnings grew The Black Crook. With Marie Bonfanti, Rita Sangalli, Betty Rigl and Rose Delval as principal dancers, it opened at Niblo’s Garden in September, 1866. The run closed in January, 1868, after 475 performances. A return to Niblo’s in December, 1870, yielded 122 performances. December of the following year added 57 to the score. A revival in August, 1872, brought into the company the Kiralfy family, dancers, among whom were the brothers destined to fame as managers and producers. This 1872 revival ran twelve weeks. In 1874, Kiralfy Brothers appear as lessees of the Grand Opera House. They initiated their term with The Black Crook, with Bonfanti as première.