Page 56 - Weiss, Jernej, ur./ed. 2021. Opereta med obema svetovnima vojnama ▪︎ Operetta between the Two World Wars. Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. Studia musicologica Labacensia, 5
P. 56
opereta med obema svetovnima vojnama
with a wild desire to understudy those two […] imprudent charac
ters. He certainly looked awfully nice, his figure being perfection.23
It’s a dimension to operetta performances – and their success back in
the 1860s and 70s – that has not been examined by historians either. In the
context of today’s casting politics, let’s say by Netflix, to attract female teen-
age viewers, a discussion of male stars in operetta and the effect they had on
the reception of the shows seems overdue. Because isn’t Mr. Marius a clear
forerunner of heart throbs such as Jacob Elordi and Noah Centineo?
First and foremost, though, it was the leading ladies who sold the
shows and made operetta a phenomenon, also in the United States. New
York discovered the joys of opéra bouffe in 1867 when Hezekiah Linthicum
Bateman imported a French company, with Lucille Tostée from the Paris
Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens as its prima donna, playing La Grande-Duch
esse. This was followed in 1868 by a production of Genevieve de Brabant. The
Tribune reported on 22 October 1868:
Mr. Grau has distinguished himself by producing at the French
Theatre the most revolting mass of filth that has ever been shown
on the boards of a respectable place of amusement in this city. […]
Geneviève is not merely indecent, but it grovels in a low depth, even
below decency.24
Operetta as Family Entertainment
With such moral outrage gaining momentum, not just in New York, it was
only a matter of time till the pendulum swung back. This happened after
the French-Prussian war was lost by the French in 1870/71. Suddenly, all
things associated with the Second Empire were spurned. (This is the situa-
tion in which Zola writes Nana.) At the same time, interest in the genre op-
eretta spread and reached the middle classes who wanted their share of the
fun. Laurence Senelick writes: “Bourgeois society, more venturesome in its
money-making and more secure in its income, aspires to imitate the court.”25
What happens when the spurred-and-ridiculed-for-their-morals sud-
denly enter the safe space of aristocratic operetta and fill the stalls that had
been left empty when La Snédèr performed in Gerolstein? A counter move-
ment can be discerned in Austria in the 1880s with a new wave of shows
23 Emily Soldene quoted in Gänzl, Emily Soldene, 320.
24 Quoted in Gänzl, Emily Soldene, 416.
25 Senelick, “Sexuality and Gender,” 82.
54
with a wild desire to understudy those two […] imprudent charac
ters. He certainly looked awfully nice, his figure being perfection.23
It’s a dimension to operetta performances – and their success back in
the 1860s and 70s – that has not been examined by historians either. In the
context of today’s casting politics, let’s say by Netflix, to attract female teen-
age viewers, a discussion of male stars in operetta and the effect they had on
the reception of the shows seems overdue. Because isn’t Mr. Marius a clear
forerunner of heart throbs such as Jacob Elordi and Noah Centineo?
First and foremost, though, it was the leading ladies who sold the
shows and made operetta a phenomenon, also in the United States. New
York discovered the joys of opéra bouffe in 1867 when Hezekiah Linthicum
Bateman imported a French company, with Lucille Tostée from the Paris
Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens as its prima donna, playing La Grande-Duch
esse. This was followed in 1868 by a production of Genevieve de Brabant. The
Tribune reported on 22 October 1868:
Mr. Grau has distinguished himself by producing at the French
Theatre the most revolting mass of filth that has ever been shown
on the boards of a respectable place of amusement in this city. […]
Geneviève is not merely indecent, but it grovels in a low depth, even
below decency.24
Operetta as Family Entertainment
With such moral outrage gaining momentum, not just in New York, it was
only a matter of time till the pendulum swung back. This happened after
the French-Prussian war was lost by the French in 1870/71. Suddenly, all
things associated with the Second Empire were spurned. (This is the situa-
tion in which Zola writes Nana.) At the same time, interest in the genre op-
eretta spread and reached the middle classes who wanted their share of the
fun. Laurence Senelick writes: “Bourgeois society, more venturesome in its
money-making and more secure in its income, aspires to imitate the court.”25
What happens when the spurred-and-ridiculed-for-their-morals sud-
denly enter the safe space of aristocratic operetta and fill the stalls that had
been left empty when La Snédèr performed in Gerolstein? A counter move-
ment can be discerned in Austria in the 1880s with a new wave of shows
23 Emily Soldene quoted in Gänzl, Emily Soldene, 320.
24 Quoted in Gänzl, Emily Soldene, 416.
25 Senelick, “Sexuality and Gender,” 82.
54
