Hello, my pretty flamingos. Welcome to another episode of my costume design/historical
analysis series. I haven't done one of these videos
in a while, which is pretty crazy, but this video and my next video
will be back on track before I inevitably branch out again. Today's topic is 'Chicago',
the 2002 movie musical. I don't think anyone has ever
requested for me to do this video, and if you have,
I guess I just didn't see it, because today's topic is really just going
to be a self-fulfilling video for me. 'Chicago' is one of my
favorite movies of all time. I love the soundtrack, I love the energy, I love Renée Zellweger and
Catherine Zeta-Jones... I've been obsessed with this honey
ragtime sequence since forever. And, in the last year or so, I've been really obsessed with
the jazz age fashion and makeup, so I feel like that kind of added to
a greater appreciation for this movie. This video is going to be kind of different
from the other costume design videos I've done. It's not like the other, girls. Because rather than breaking
down every single costume or different costumes in the movie, I'm actually just going to be talking
about 1920s show girl costumes and revolving my analysis
around that. Before I get started let's
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to anywhere in the US. Thank you, Native! For those of you who are
unfamiliar with 'Chicago', the movie 'Chicago' is based on the
1975 stage musical called 'Chicago', which is based on a 1926
play also called 'Chicago'. The play, written by
Maurine Dallas Watkins, is based on the real-life murder trials
of Beulah Annan and Belva Gaertner. The play is pretty different in that it's
not about show business or vaudeville at all, but the two main characters are still
called Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly, so, at least we have that. Now, the whole musical adaptation
situation is kind of sus. Bob Fosse, a theater director ,
nitially tried to buy the rights for 'Chicago' from Watkins herself,
but she refused adamantly and it was only when she died, did the Estate--
Did her estate sell the rights. John Kander and f Fred Ebb
wrote the music for 'Chicago', and they based their musical compositions
off of 1920s vaudeville numbers. The movie is actually really iconic in the
way that they adapted the stage to the film. I feel like, in a lot of movie musicals,
when the characters just kind of start singing, it's difficult for some people
to suspend their belief. In 'Chicago', each musical number is
shot in this fantasy-like setting, with the characters wearing different costumes
than what they're wearing in the "real world". It makes it feel more
realistic because it's like, "oh, the characters are not just actually
breaking out into song and dance". They're doing that
in these stage numbers, but they're acting the way that
normal people act, otherwise. Does that make sense? Let's quickly define "vaudeville", for those of you who are
unfamiliar with the term. "Vaudeville" is often used as
a synonym for the term "variety". Both describe a series
of unrelated stage acts, averaging about 10 per show. Some theater historian is going
to get on my case about this, but the most modern equivalent
I can think of to vaudeville is SNL. Like, if each skit
had different actors. These stage acts included: comedy skits, singing, dancing,
ventriloquy, magical illusions... You name it. Prior to the Civil War, variety was performed in
"less cultured" environments, like beer halls and variety saloons
that mostly cater to men, and these acts were often
pretty rugged and unrefined. After the Civil War, though,
theater owners such as Tony Pastor, saw the money-making
potential in variety and decided to spruce up their theaters
to host variety for the middle class. However, because the term "variety"
was popularly connotated with these disreputable working
class sorts of people, these theater owners opted to
call their new shows "vaudeville", because it sounded
French and classier, even though it was basicall
the same thing as variety. Benjamin Franklin Keith,
the father of big time entertainment, is one of the biggest players when
it comes to gentrifying vaudeville. He and his business
partner, Edward Franklin Albee, very popular name it seems, "Franklin", set all kinds of guidelines to ensure a squeaky
clean family-friendly form of entertainment. I do want to reiterate that
vaudeville is an American concept, and there were variety
shows in Europe as well, but they were not
called "vaudeville". The ones in Europe also had like
way less puritanical guidelines. Vaudeville was also not the highest
rung of show business during this time, many performers aimed to get into
the extravagant Broadway reviews, at some point in their career. Reviews combined elements
of vaudeville and burlesque. They were shows that still
featured a series of acts, but unlike vaudeville, a single cast would
perform the different acts. So, I guess SNL would actually
be more classified as a "review". So now that we covered that, the costumes in 'Chicago' were
designed by Colleen Atwood, who also did a number of other movies
including 'Little Women', the 1994 version, which I discussed in
my 'Little Women' video. In a press statement for
'Chicago' Atwood said: "After talking with Rob, "I understood that the main goal was to
separate the world of the imagination "from the world in which the characters lived. "My initial direction and inspiration came from
watching each dance number play out in rehearsal, "so that I could see what kind
of movement went with each song". The reason being, obviously, is that, when you're designing
costumes for dance sequences, the costumes have to
hold up for a number of takes. They have to be practical, so that the actors can perform all kinds of
acrobatics that the choreography requires. As for individualizing the characters,
Atwood said that, for Roxie, most of Roxie's real world outfits
were of a skin toned color palette, while her outfits and her fantasies
were stronger and more vibrant. Which makes sense,
because when we watch the movie, Roxie is just fully in her head
delusional and fame hungry. That's kind of why she
kills Fred Casely to begin with. - So you never told anyone about me? - Sugar... You wear hot stuff, I would have
said anything to get a piece of that! Roxie's costume,
for the musical number "Roxie", was inspired by an originally a totally trashed 1930s beaded dress that
Atwood found in a film studio. Atwood wanted to recreate it and,
even found vintage beads, to give the new costume a similar look. Velma Kelly, on the other hand ,
s a strong confident character. So she wears black and bold reds
to convey her fearlessness, In Atwood's words, "Velma Kelly was the kind of girl that
would wear a cocktail dress to lunch". So now I want to break down the elements
of Roxie and Velma's showgirl costumes. If you notice, Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly actually wear fringed leotards,
not dresses, which makes more sense anyway because leotards
allow a wider range of movement for dancers, and Roxie and Velma are dancers. Their look is heavily inspired
by the 1920s flapper girl. The reason I wanted to talk
about 1920s showgirl fashion versus like, 1920s flapper fashion, is because they were different. If I dissected Roxie and Velma's
costumes through the everyday 1920s lens, then I would have to say things like: "Oh, their hemlines are too high",
or something like that. But it wouldn't really make much sense because
Roxie and Velma are vaudeville performers, and show business had a completely
different set of guidelines, when it came to what was appropriate dress. And, for centuries prior,
stage performers got away with wearing way more revealing clothing
than what was appropriate in regular society. According to Jane Merrill
in her book "The Showgirl Costume", which honestly like,
I highly recommend purchasing if you're into this area of interest, because I heavily relied
on this book for this video. But according to Merrill, ballet dancers at the Paris opera in the
1700s started to wear more revealing clothing because it was easier for movement... As well as providing kind of shock value
to the audience to hold their attention. Which meant, you know,
more of this... Now, compared to France, American attitudes towards sexual
expression was more uptight, even before the whole
Keith-Albee vaudeville circuit. In a journal entry
dated April 23, 1795, Thomas Perkins wrote about the
actresses in the show 'Telemachus', which was playing at the Paris opera. "The nymphs,
upwards of 40 in number, "were dressed with all the
wantonness imaginable: "Their dancing, too,
is to us Americans, "indecent in the extreme". And in the 20th Century, it was actually illegal for performers
to move while being naked. So they were allowed to be nude on stage,
if they were just standing still, but if they were moving... Illegal. But even so, there was still a lot more
freedom when it came to costumes on stage, compared to in regular society. A lot of that had to do with,
once again, dancers needing to move easily. And also the fact that Europe was more
relaxed when it came to risque costuming, so theater directors tried to
emulate what they saw in Paris. Plus, by the jazz age, the public was in general growing more tolerant
of changing ideals on woman's sexual behavior. But, of course, there were limits! For example, Mae West. You may know her for her
acting career in Hollywood films, started off in vaudeville and had a
pretty controversial stage presence. She sang songs with highly suggestive lyrics, and even had the audacity to address
the audience during her performance, which was a practice
not allowed in Keith's theaters. Her vaudeville career was
limited to small time vaudeville, which was less prestigious, but also more tolerant of suggestive material
than Keith's Big Time Vaudeville Circuit. She did try to get into Big Time
Vaudeville multiple times at the 1910s, but in 1916, Variety wrote: "Unless Miss West can tone down
her stage presence in every way, "she just as well might hop right
out of vaudeville into burlesque". Robert Allen, in his book
'Horrible Prettiness', described Eva Tanguay as "the only performer to achieve
stardom in Big Time Vaudeville, "with an act structured
around sexual transgression". In 1908, Tanguay's performance of
"Salome and the Dance of the Seven Veils", led the New York Times
to report that: "she wore a costume made
of nothing but two pearls". This is what she actually wore,
so definitely more than two pearls! But it was pretty scandalous for the time. However, Allen also said that Tanguay's
performances were very grotesque, and comedic and ungraceful... So her onstage sexual expression was,
thus viewed as being comedic, and not as a serious offense. Gertrude Hoffman also
played Salome the same year, complete with a suggestive dance
style and a revealing costume, but she was arrested by local police for it. So, in the end, I guess,
whether or not you were cancelled, depended on where you were
performing and also who you were. But I'm getting off track. I just wanted to say that there is a fine
line that directors and performers had to walk when it came to dressing
risque #ForTheArt and... Not getting arrested. Let's take a closer look at
Roxie and Velma's costumes: They wear fishnets,
which is totally fine. Fishnets became a trend in
the 1920s among showgirls. They were popular because,
from a distance, if you're wearing fishnets, it looked like you were
just wearing black tights. But, on stage, with all like,
the lights shining and everything, you could see like the little dots
of flesh through the tights, which was, you know,
pretty scandalous! They were also popular for dancing, because in the 1920s,
stockings were made of silk and rayon, and were physically restrictive
and got sweaty pretty quickly. The pattern holes in fishnet
stockings made them more breathable. The leotard was actually invented
for the trapeze artist Jules Leotard, in the 1850s, though,
he himself called the garment a "maillot". It was created to show off
his guns and performance. Roxie and Velma's leotards are adorned
with fringe, sequins and beading, which were all popular embellishments for
stage costumes in the early 20th Century. Of course, the movie costumes
are more modernized. Like Velma's costume for the song
"I can't do it alone", looks particularly early 2000s,
especially the bustier part. But I do think that, overall, the costumes capture the essence
of early showgirl costumes. The reason stage costumes were
so incredibly decorated was... You guessed it,
to captivate audiences! Before 1900 performers
would popularly dress in body stockings covered
with the rhinestones, so that they would literally
look like human chandeliers. And it got to a point where the
public expected a level of opulence when it came to big productions. One of the biggest musical reviews
of the time period, the Ziegfeld Follies, had a public relations office that
would regularly announce the high cost and authenticity of the jewels
fabrics and furs worn on stage. They would even mention how expensive
the items not seen by the public were, like, you know, the Irish linen
putty coats and the silk bloomers. A 1919 publicity piece proclaims that: "Only in shoddy chorus girl shows "would girls be forced to wear
cotton tights and two dollar shoes". So, obviously, to make these costumes look
as decorative and expensive as possible, it took highly skilled people
to design and sew them. Major couturiers for the 1920s musical reviews, included Paul Poiret, Madame Rasimi and Max Weldy. They were highly skilled couturiers,
but they also needed teams, because a lot of these reviews hired
like up to hundreds of chorus girls that needed to be dressed. According to sabine piola, an expert on French theater and music
hall costumes from 1920 to 1940, no fewer than 300 dressmakers
worked in the atelier of Max Weldy. I also want to point out again that Roxie and
Velma's costumes resemble flapper dresses, but, in general,
showgirl costumes of the time ranged in silhouette and
design depending on the act. For instance, if the
act was about springtime, then the showgirls would wear costumes
adorned with fruits and flowers. I think that the reason why production opted
to put Velma and Roxie in flapper costumes is to make it clear that this
was all happening in the 1920s. The flapper look is probably
what most people think of when they think of 1920s fashion; and because this movie is
anachronistic in a lot of ways, choosing to incorporate finger
waves, bobbed hair and fringe dresses and the styling helps set the scene. Now, before anyone gets in my case, I know that fringe was not the most
common embellishment of the 1920s. I'm just saying that,
in the popular consciousness, we associate fringe with
the 1920s or vice versa. But the reason why flappers didn't
wear a lot of fringe details, was because fringe actually
weighed down their dresses. Modern fringe is made of
lightweight synthetic material. Fringe in the 1920s, on the
other hand was super dense, could weigh up to 25 pounds. And got tangled really easily! So just not optimal for dancing. The full fringe dresses we do see from
the 1920s were not dancing dresses, they were incredibly expensive
and intensive to make. I could also argue that the flapper look
was Roxie and Velma's purposeful costuming. The point of their act at the end of the movie
is that they're young glamorous free woman. The song "Nowadays",
has the lyrics: "You can like the life you're living. "You can live the life you like. "You can even marry Harry
or mess around with Ike". The pair is celebrating
modern womanhood, and freedom in both the
personal and systemic sense. And what better way to represent that
than bodying the look of the flapper, the 1920s caricature for the modern independent,
rebellious woman. So, there you go! Let me know in the comments
what you think of 'Chicago', or what you think about
theater costumes in general. And I'll see y'all next time! Bye!
