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Vaudeville Vs Burlesque Research Paper

1532 Words7 Pages

Kaitlyn Shively
Watson 4b
AP English 4
9 April, 2018
Vaudeville and Burlesque : Then & Now In order to compare the popularity and influence of vaudeville and burlesque we first have to understand what they actually are. The definition of Vaudeville according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary is, “a light often comic theatrical piece frequently combining pantomime, dialogue, dancing, and song”. On the other hand the definition of burlesque,according to the same dictionary, is “ theatrical entertainment of a broadly humorous often earthy character consisting of short turns, comic skits, and sometimes striptease acts”. While they sound similar they have some major differences. One of the biggest differences that can be spotted almost immediately is the “striptease” aspect of burlesque. One of the biggest questions I had when I started this paper was What’s the difference between Vaudeville and Burlesque?.The short answer is that Burlesque is Vaudeville’s “Evil Twin”(S.D.). The two came about around the same time,place and with the same crowd of people, but Vaudeville is seen as “clean” and family friendly and presents a wide variety of performances, whereas …show more content…

The performances were mostly done in urban areas and frontier settlements with males as the primary audience (“Vaudeville”,Britannica).Also stated by the source “Tony Pastor, a ballad and minstrel singer” is to thank because he was the person behind the first vaudeville show and made it “respectable”. He set the “family friendly” vibe of Vaudeville in the states and it became a popular as other people followed his tactics. Vaudeville went from something that people looked down on and thought should be hidden because it was inappropriate, to an art that everyone admired and wanted to watch. It became very popular throughout the 19th century and gave many people their fifteen minutes of

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