Ah, vaudeville, vaudeville ... How popular you were once and what undeserved oblivion and indifference you are now surrounded by! Today, many do not even know what this word means. It's time to talk about it. So...
What is vaudeville
This is a genre of comedy light play or musical theatrical performance with dances and couplets, the center of which is an anecdotal plot or an entertaining intrigue. The origin of the word vaudeville is interesting. It was born from the French "vau de vire" - "Vir valley". In the 15th century, comic jokes were common in this area. folk songs- vaudeviers.
In the 16th century in France, vaudeville was called urban comic songs that ridiculed ruling class. At the beginning of the 18th century, couplets were called that, which were an obligatory part of the performances that were held at fairs. These unpretentious performances were called so - performances with vaudeville. And only by the middle of the 18th century did vaudeville become an independent theatrical genre.
A bit of history
In early vaudeville, there is a close connection with the synthetic aesthetics of the fair: pantomime, buffoonery, characters of the French folk theater(Pierrot, Colombina, Harlequin, etc.). Distinctive features those performances were mobile and topical.
No special music was written for couplets, they were performed to popular melodies, which made it possible to prepare a performance for a very short term. Apparently, it is no coincidence that the first peak of the popularity of the genre fell on years French Revolution(1789-1794). In those days, vaudeville became the propaganda mouthpiece of the rebellious people.
After the noisy revolution, vaudeville loses its topical sharpness and pathos. Its main part is no longer satire, but witty joke, pun. The popularity of the genre in these years has increased many times over. In 1792, France formed new theater under the name "Vaudeville", and then "Theater Montansier" and "Theater of the Troubadours". For funny productions, special plays are written. One of the most famous authors vaudevilles were Eugene Scribe and Eugene Labiche. Their works were widely known, they were staged comedy performances on many world stages in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Dramatic features of the genre
To better understand what vaudeville is, you need to familiarize yourself with specific features genre. Here they are:
- The image in a comic form of a character's violation of any social norm (minor). For example, good neighborly relations, hospitality, etc.
- The presence of a dramatic line with an obligatory comedic touch.
- The rapid development of the action and the hyperbolic nature of the comic of everything that happens on the stage.
- Due to the insignificance of the norm violated in the play, the main denouement comes down to a short sharp clash of characters.
- The speed of vaudeville action requires specific thickening comic elements compared to comedy.
- predominance colloquial speech, and not singing, unlike the operetta.
Russian vaudeville
In Russia, vaudeville appeared as a genre based on comic opera. It happened at the beginning of the 19th century. Such writers and playwrights as V. Sollogub, A. Griboyedov, D. Lensky, P. Fedorov, F. Koni and others made a great contribution to the formation and development of the Russian drama school of the genre. great poet Nikolay Nekrasov wrote plays for small musical comedies under the pseudonym N. Perepelsky.
The stage history of Russian vaudeville is also rich famous names. During the dawn of the vaudeville genre, a whole galaxy of famous comedians shone on the stage of Russia, the basis of their work was exclusively vaudeville. These are N. Samoilov, A. Asenova, N. Dyur, V. Zhivokini and others. They played in vaudeville and famous actors realistic theater school, for example, M. Shchepkin.
In Russia, the genre we are considering was very popular. So, in October 1840 in Alexandrinsky theater 25 performances were played, 10 of which were vaudeville. In those days, there would hardly have been a person who did not know what vaudeville was.
In 1839, the premiere took place in Moscow musical comedy Lev Gurych Sinichkin. She became one of the most beloved and popular among representatives of various classes. The well-known French comedy "Father of the Debutante" was taken as the basis of this play.
The decline of the genre
At the end of the 1860s, operetta came to Russia from France, which led to the gradual decline of the genre. Nevertheless, vaudeville performances did not leave the stage for a long time. At the end of the 19th century, A.P. Chekhov wrote magnificent joke plays in the spirit of vaudeville: “The Bear”, “The Wedding”, “On the Harm of Tobacco”, “Jubilee”, which were then staged in many theaters.
Vaudeville in cinema
Soviet cinema gave vaudeville a second life. In 1974, at the Mosfilm studio, director A. Belinsky shot a charming comedy with music, Lev Gurych Sinichkin, and the forgotten classic sparkled with new colors. Such celebrities as A. Mironov, N. Mordyukova, L. Kuravlev, O. Tabakov, M. Kazakov, N. Trofimov, R. Tkachuk took part in the filming. This good old vaudeville is still shown on television from time to time.
In the same year, the sparkling incomparable music of Isaac Schwartz was released TV movie"The Straw Hat" based on the play by Eugene Labiche. The director is L. Kvinikhidze, the main roles were brilliantly played by A. Mironov, Z. Gerdt, L. Gurchenko, E. Vasilyeva, M. Kozakov, V. Strzhelchik, E. Kopelyan, A. Freindlich.
In 1979, Svetlana Druzhinina's graceful vaudeville comedy The Courtship of a Hussar was released with music by Gennady Gladkov and a brilliant cast: M. Boyarsky, E. Koreneva, A. Popov, A. Barinov and others.
And finally, in 1980, the film "Ah, vaudeville, vaudeville ..." was released. Director - G. Yungvald-Khilkevich, composer - M. Dunaevsky, starring O. Tabakov, young G. Belyaeva, M. Pugovkin. After the premiere of the song from this picture, the whole country sang.
Conclusion
What is vaudeville today? One can probably say that this is an outdated genre of art, which no longer has a place in modern life. The hearts of today's viewers were conquered by musicals and grandiose shows. But there are wonderful films that capture the spirit of real vaudeville, and sometimes, depending on the mood, we can watch them and remember the past.
Vaudeville is the name goes back to the name of the valley of the river Vire, in Normandy (Val de Vire), where at the beginning of the 15th century the cloth maker Olivier de Baslin, a skilled composer of satirical songs, lived. Perhaps also the origin of the name of the city song- voix de ville ("city voices"). Vaudeville - easy comedy play with an anecdotal plot in which dialogue and dramatic action, built on an uncomplicated intrigue, are combined with couplet songs, music, and dances. Initially, vaudeville songs were not related to dramatic art. Only in the first half of the 18th century French writers began to insert popular songs of this kind into their one-act plays for fair theaters(L. Fuselier, A.R. Lesage, J.F. Regnard and others). By the middle of the 18th century, the poetic form of vaudeville had changed: the song turned into a couplet, and samples of comedy appeared in French dramaturgy with the completion of acts, especially the last one, with small couplet songs. The final songs of P.O. Beaumarchais's comedy The Marriage of Figaro (1784) were also called vaudeville. Thus arose "comedies of vaudeville" and "comedies embellished with vaudevilles". As an independent type of dramaturgy, vaudeville developed during the French Revolution. After the Legislative Assembly issued a decree of 1791 on the freedom of public spectacles in Paris, P.A.O. Pins and P.I. Bars opened a professional vaudeville theater in 1792 to stage plays exclusively of this genre, after which other vaudeville theaters appeared - the Troubadour Theater , Theater Montage. Over time, vaudeville, having lost its satirical pathos and turned into an entertainment genre, became a kind of European comedy. E. Scrib (1791-1861) canonized the genre in France and created about 150 such plays. Scribe's main themes were family virtues and enterprise.
Vaudeville in Russia
In Russia, vaudeville appeared in the first decades of the 19th century. under the influence of French, divided into two types: the original Russian vaudeville, which invested in the national French form Russian content, and translated, fully preserving the traditions and main themes of the European genre. The first samples of the original Russian vaudeville, created in 1812-30, belong to A.A. Shakhovsky ("Cossack-poet", post. 1814, ed. 1815; "Lomonosov, or Recruit-poet", post. 1814, ed. 1816; "The Peasants, or the Meeting of the Uninvited", post. 1814, ed. 1815). V. was also written by N.I. Khmelnitsky (“Grandmother’s parrots”, 1819; “You can’t go around the betrothed by a horse, or there is no blessing without good” 1821), A.I. Pisarev (“Teacher and student, or Hangover in someone else’s feast”, 1824; "The Troublemaker, or the Work of the Master is Afraid", 1825). The development of Russian vaudeville from 1830 continued in two directions. On the one hand, a lot of purely entertaining vaudeville appeared with typical plot and mediocrity of images; on the other hand, there has been an appearance marked by democratic tendencies. Among the authors of this time there are many amateur actors and directors. Some vaudevilles, created by non-professional playwrights in 1830-40, have taken a firm place in comedy literature: "Lev Gurych Sinichkin" (posted in 1839, published in 1840), "The groom is in great demand" (1840) by D.T. Lensky; "Student, cornet, artist and swindler" (1840), "Petersburg apartments" (1840) F. A. Koni; “You can’t hide an awl in a bag, you can’t keep a girl under lock and key” (1841), “Actor” (1841) by N. A. Nekrasov; Bakery (1841), Eccentric dead man (1842) by P.A. Karatygin; "The Daughter of a Russian Actor" (1844), "Packing on a box in Italian opera» (1843) P.I. Grishrieva. Actors these vaudevilles were landowners, merchants, officials, patrons of the nobility, corrupt politicians. At the same time, late classical vaudeville moved closer to serious household comedy and comedy of characters, which led to the growth prose text at the expense of poetry and to the liberation of the couplet from dramatic functions. Vaudeville lost more and more genre features. In the second half of the 19th century, vaudeville almost completely disappeared from the repertoire of the Russian theater. One-act plays by A.P. Chekhov (On the Harm of Tobacco, 1886; The Bear, 1888; Proposal, 1888; Anniversary, 1892; Wedding, 1890, etc.) developed the traditions of Russian vaudeville . Elements of vaudeville plot construction (paradoxicality, swiftness of action, sudden denouement) were found in satirical miniatures by L. Andreev, V. Kataev and others.
The meaning of the word VAUDEVILLE in the Literary Encyclopedia
VAUDEVILLE
. - The word comes from the French "val de Vire" - the Vir valley. The Vire is a river in Normandy. In the 17th century, songs known as "Chanson de val de Vire" became widespread in France. They are attributed to the folk poets of the 15th century - Olivier Basselin and Le Goux. But most likely this is just a collective designation
271 special genre simple joking song folk character, light in melodic composition, mockingly satirical in content, and by its origin connected with the villages of the Vir Valley. This can also explain the further transformation of the name itself - from "val de Vire" to "voix de ville" ("village voice"). In the second half of the 17th century, small theatrical pieces appeared in France, introducing these songs in the course of the action and from them, which themselves received the name "vaudeville". And in 1792, even a special Th??tre de Vaudeville, the Theater of V., was founded in Paris. Of the French vaudeville artists, Scribe and Labiche are especially famous. Our prototype V. was a small comic opera late XVII century, which remained in the repertoire of the Russian theater and by the beginning of the 19th century. These include - "Sbitenshchik" Knyazhnin, Nikolaev - "Guardian-Professor" and "Misfortune from the Carriage", Levshin - "Imaginary Widowers", Matinsky - "St. Petersburg Gostiny Dvor”, Krylova -“ Coffee House ”, etc. Opera-V was a particular success. Ablesimov - "Melnik-sorcerer, deceiver and matchmaker" . “This play,” says the Dramatic Dictionary of 1787, “aroused so much attention from the public that it was played many times in a row ... Not only from national listeners, but also foreigners were quite curious.” In Pushkin's "Count Nulin" the definition of V. is still associated with the concept of an aria, an opera: "... Do you want to listen
Pretty vaudeville? and Count
Singing... Illustration: M. S. Shchepkin with his daughter in a dramatic vaudeville
"Sailor". Rice. Dannenberg The next stage in V.'s development is "a little comedy with music," as Bulgarin defines it. This V. has received special distribution since about the 20s of the last century. Typical examples of such
272 V. Bulgarin considers "The Cossack Poet" and "Lomonosov" by Shakhovsky. “The Cossack poet,” writes F. Vigel in his “Notes”, “is especially remarkable in that he was the first to appear on the stage under the real name of V. This endless chain of these light works stretched from him.” Among the noble-guards youth of the early XIX century. was considered a sign good manners» compose V. for the benefit performance of this or that actor or actress. And for the beneficiary it was beneficial, because it also meant some "propaganda" on the part of the author for the upcoming benefit collection. Later, even Nekrasov “sinned” with several vaudevilles under the pseudonym N. Perepelsky (“You can’t hide an awl in a bag, you can’t keep a girl in a bag”, “Feoklist Onufrievich Bob, or a husband is not at ease”, “This is what it means to fall in love with an actress”, "Actor" and "Grandma's Parrots"). Usually V. were translated from French. "Reworking into Russian manners" of French vaudeville was limited for the most part replacing French names with Russian ones. Gogol in 1835 puts it in his notebook: “But what happened now, when a real Russian, and even a somewhat stern and distinguished by a peculiar national character, with his heavy figure, began to imitate the shuffling of a petimeter, and our obese, but quick-witted and intelligent a merchant with a broad beard, who knows nothing on his foot but a heavy boot, would put on a narrow slipper and stockings instead? jour, and the other, even better, he would leave in his boot and become the first couple in a French quadrille. But almost the same is our national vaudeville. Belinsky’s verdict on Russian vaudeville is just as harsh: “Firstly, they are for the most part a reworking of French vaudeville, therefore, couplets, witticisms, ridiculous situations, a plot and a denouement - everything is ready, just know how to use it. And what comes out? This lightness, naturalness, liveliness, which involuntarily captivated and entertained our imagination in French vaudeville, this witticism, these cute nonsense, this coquetry of talent, this play of the mind, these grimaces of fantasy, in a word, all this disappears in the Russian copy, and only heaviness remains. , awkwardness, unnaturalness, stiffness, two or three puns, two or three equivocations, and nothing more. The secular theater-goers of V. usually cooked for a very simple recipe. Griboedovsky Repetilov also told about him (“Woe from Wit”): “... six of us, looking - vaudeville
The other six set to music,
Others clap when they give it ... "There are indications that Pushkin, meeting the requests of some friends, paid tribute to the custom of the then high-society dandies, although with certainty
273 the texts of Pushkin's vaudeville couplets have not been established. Usually vaudeville verses are such that, with all the leniency, they can only be called rhyming. The passion for vaudeville was truly enormous. In October 1840, only 25 performances were staged at the Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, of which almost every one, in addition to the main play, had one or two V., but ten performances were, moreover, composed exclusively of vaudeville. Herzen, looking forward to the arrival of M. S. Shchepkin in London, recalls (in a letter to M. K. Reichel) not his big roles, and the vaudeville chorus: “Chuk-chuk, Tetyana,
Chernobrov Kokhan. Shchepkin himself played V. very willingly. They occupied a very prominent place in his repertoire. Going on tour in St. Petersburg in 1834, he sent Sosnitsky his repertoire, where, along with Woe from Wit, there is a lot of V. From about the 40s. in V. begins to noticeably layer, now in the text, now in the form of acting gag and verses, an element of topicality and polemic, and this has the public big success. Of course, topicality in Nikolaev times could not go beyond purely literary or theatrical malice (and then carefully), everything else was "strictly forbidden." In Lensky’s vaudeville, for example, “In people an angel is not a wife, at home with a husband it’s Satan” Smudge sings: “Here, for example, is an analysis
They won’t understand a word here ... ”V. Lensky’s five-act “Lev Gurych Sinichkin or a Provincial Debutante”, remade from the French play “Debutante's Father”, was a particular success. It has been preserved in the repertoire of theaters to this day, now, of course, it is already devoid of any topicality (of which there was a lot in it), but it has not yet lost its significance as a picture of theatrical customs of that time. In the 1940's, another special genre of V. "with dressing up" appeared. In them, the young actress Asenkova, glorified by Nekrasov, had a resounding success. The most popular authors of V. were: Shakhovskoy, Khmelnitsky (his V. " Castles in the air» held up to late XIX c.), Pisarev, Koni, Fedorov, Grigoriev, Solovyov, Karatygin (the author of "Vitsmundir"), Lensky and others. The penetration of operetta from France at the end of the 60s (see) weakened V.'s passion, that all sorts of political impromptu (of course, within the limits of very vigilant censorship), gag and especially topical (in the same vaudeville type) couplets were widely practiced in the operetta. Without such verses, the operetta then
274 was not conceived. Nevertheless, V. has remained in the repertoire of the Russian theater for quite a long time. Its noticeable decline begins only in the eighties of the last century. Illustration: Illustration for "La Calomnie" by E. Scribe, ed. 1861 Bibliography: Gorbunov I. F., L. T. Lensky, "Russian Antiquity", No. 10, 1880; Tikhonravov N. S., prof., M. S. Shchepkin and N. V. Gogol, zhurn. "Artist", book. V, 1890; Izmailov A., Fedor Koni and the old vaudeville., “Yearbook of the Emperor. theatres, No. 3, 1909; Varneke B. V., History of the Russian theater, part II, Kazan, 1910; Notes, letters and stories of M. S. Shchepkin, St. Petersburg., 1914; Ignatov I. N., Theater and spectators, part I, M., 1916; Beskin E., Nekrasov-playwright, journalist. "Worker of Education", No. 12, 1921; Grossman L., Pushkin in theater chairs, L., 1926; Vigel F. F., Notes, vol. I, M., 1928, Beskin E. M., History of the Russian theater, M., 1928; Vsevolodsky-Gerngross, History of the Russian Theatre, M., 1929 (2 vols.). Em. Beskin
Literary encyclopedia. 2012
See also interpretations, synonyms, meanings of the word and what VAUDEVILLE is in Russian in dictionaries, encyclopedias and reference books:
- VAUDEVILLE in the Dictionary of Literary Terms:
- (from the French vaudeville) - a type of comedy: an entertaining play with an entertaining intrigue and unpretentious everyday plot in which the dramatic ... - VAUDEVILLE in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(French vaudeville from vau de Vire - the valley of the river Vir in Normandy, where in the 15th century folk songs-vodevirs were widespread), ... - VAUDEVILLE in big Soviet encyclopedia, TSB:
(French vaudeville), a light comedy play with couplet songs and dances. Homeland V. - France. The name comes from the river valley. Veer (Vau… - VAUDEVILLE in encyclopedic dictionary Brockhaus and Euphron:
Franz. the word Vaudeville comes from the word Vaux-de-Vire, that is, the valley of the city of Vire in Normandy, the birthplace of the national poet Olivier Basselin, ... - VAUDEVILLE in the Modern Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(French vaudeville, from vau de vire, literally - the valley of the river Vir in Normandy, where in the 15th century folk ... - VAUDEVILLE
[French vaudeville] 1) urban street song 1 6 c. in France; 2) small theatrical play light, comedic character with verses ... - VAUDEVILLE in the Encyclopedic Dictionary:
, i, m. A short comic play, usually with singing. Vaudeville - pertaining to vaudeville, vaudeville; like vaudeville. ||Wed. MUSICAL … - VAUDEVILLE in the Encyclopedic Dictionary:
[de], -ya, m. A short comic play, usually with singing. II adj. vaudeville… - VAUDEVILLE in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
VAUDEVILLE (French vaudeville, from vau de Vire - the valley of the river Vir in Normandy, where in the 15th century people were common ... - VAUDEVILLE in the Encyclopedia of Brockhaus and Efron:
Franz. the word Vaudeville comes from the word vaux-de-Vire, that is, the valley of the city of Vire in Normandy, the birthplace of the national poet Olivier Basselin, ... - VAUDEVILLE in the Full accentuated paradigm according to Zaliznyak:
vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, vaudeville, ... - VAUDEVILLE in the Popular Explanatory-Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Russian Language:
[de], -i, m. A play of a light comedic nature with an entertaining intrigue, in which dialogues alternate with singing couplets and dancing. Plot … - VAUDEVILLE in the Dictionary for solving and compiling scanwords:
Musical… - VAUDEVILLE in the New Dictionary of Foreign Words:
(French vaudeville) 1) street urban song in France of the 16th century; 2) a play of a light, comedic nature with couplets and dances; …
Vaudeville (fr. vaudeville) - a comedy play with couplet songs and dances.
The name comes from the French "val de Vire" - the Vir valley. The Vire is a river in Normandy. AT XVII century in France, songs known as "Chanson de val de Vire" became widespread. They are attributed to the folk poets of the 15th century - Olivier Basselin and Le Goux.
But most likely this is just a collective designation of a special genre of a simple, unpretentious, humorous song of a folk character, light in melodic composition, mockingly satirical in content, and by its origin connected with the villages of the Vir Valley. This can explain the further transformation of the name itself - from "val de Vire" to "voix de ville" ("voice of the city").
In the second half of the 17th century, small theatrical pieces also appeared in France, introducing these songs in the course of the action and from them themselves received the name "vaudeville". And in 1792, even a special "Thtre de Vaudeville" - "Vaudeville Theater" was founded in Paris. Of the French vaudeville artists, Scribe and Labiche are especially famous.
In Russia, the prototype of vaudeville was a small comic opera of the late 17th century, which remained in the repertoire of the Russian theater even by the beginning of the 19th century. These include - Knyazhnin's "Sbitenshchik", Nikolaev - "Guardian-Professor" and "Misfortune from the carriage", Levshin - "Imaginary widowers", Matinsky - "St. Petersburg Gostiny Dvor", Krylov - "Coffee House" and others.
The opera by V. Ablesimov - "Miller-sorcerer, deceiver and matchmaker" (1779) had a particular success. “This play,” says the “Dramatic Dictionary” of 1787, “aroused so much attention from the public that it was played many times in a row ... Not only from national listeners, but also foreigners were quite curious.”
In Pushkin's "Count Nulin" the definition of vaudeville is also associated with the concept of an aria, an opera:
The next stage in the development of vaudeville is "a little comedy with music", as Bulgarin defines it. This vovedil has become especially widespread since about the 20s of the last century. Bulgarin considers Shakhovsky's Cossack the Poet and Lomonosov as typical examples of such vaudeville.
“The Cossack poet,” writes F. Vigel in his “Notes”, “is especially notable for the fact that he was the first to appear on the stage under the real name of vaudeville. This endless chain of these light works stretched from him.
Among the youth of the nobility and guards at the beginning of the 19th century, it was considered a sign of "good form" to compose a vaudeville for a benefit performance of one or another actor or actress. And for the beneficiary it was beneficial, because it also meant some "propaganda" on the part of the author for the upcoming benefit collection. Later, even Nekrasov “sinned” with several vaudevilles under the pseudonym N. Perepelsky (“You can’t hide an awl in a bag, you can’t keep a girl in a bag”, “Feoklist Onufrievich Bob, or a husband is not at ease”, “This is what it means to fall in love with an actress”, "Actor" and "Grandma's Parrots").
Vaudeville usually translated from French. The “reworking into Russian manners” of French vaudeville was limited mainly to the replacement of French names with Russian ones. N.V. Gogol in 1835 puts it in his notebook: “But what happened now, when a real Russian, and even a somewhat stern and distinguished by a peculiar national character, with his heavy figure, began to imitate the shuffling of a petimeter, and our obese, but a quick-witted and intelligent merchant with a broad beard, who knows nothing on his foot but a heavy boot, would instead put on a narrow slipper and jour stockings, and leave the other, even better, in his boot and become the first pair in a French quadrille. But almost the same is our national vaudeville.
Belinsky’s verdict on Russian vaudeville is just as harsh: “Firstly, they are basically a reworking of French vaudeville, therefore, couplets, witticisms, funny situations, a plot and a denouement - everything is ready, just know how to use it. And what comes out? This lightness, naturalness, liveliness, which involuntarily captivated and entertained our imagination in French vaudeville, this witticism, these sweet nonsense, this coquetry of talent, this play of the mind, these grimaces of fantasy, in a word, all this disappears in the Russian copy, and what remains is one heaviness, awkwardness, unnaturalness, stiffness, two or three puns, two or three equivocations, and nothing more.
Secular theater-goers cooked vaudeville usually according to a very simple recipe. Griboedov’s Repetilov also spoke about him (“Woe from Wit”):
There are indications that Pushkin, meeting the requests of some friends, paid tribute to the custom of the then high society dandies, although the texts of Pushkin's vaudeville couplets have not been established with certainty.
Usually vaudeville verses were such that, with all the leniency, they can only be called rhyming.
The passion for vaudeville was truly enormous. In October 1840, only 25 performances were staged at the Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, of which almost every one, in addition to the main play, had one or two vaudevilles, but ten performances were, moreover, composed exclusively of vaudevilles. Herzen, looking forward to the arrival of M. S. Shchepkin in London, recalls (in a letter to M. K. Reichel) not his big roles, but the vaudeville chorus:
Shchepkin himself played vaudeville very willingly. They occupied a very prominent place in his repertoire. Going on tour in St. Petersburg in 1834, he sent Sosnitsky his repertoire, where, along with Woe from Wit, there are a lot of vaudeville.
Approximately from the 1840s. vaudeville begins to noticeably layer, now in the text, now in the form of acting gag and verses, an element of topicality and polemic, and this is a great success with the public. Of course, topicality in Nikolaev times could not go beyond purely literary or theatrical malice (and then carefully), everything else was "strictly prohibited." In Lensky's vaudeville, for example, "In people, an angel is not a wife, at home with her husband - Satan" Smudge sings:
For example, here is the parsing
Pieces of the Field -
Both author and actor
They won't understand a word...
Lensky's five-act vaudeville "Lev Gurych Sinichkin or a Provincial Debutante", remade from the French play "The Debutante's Father", was especially successful. It remained in the repertoire of theaters until the beginning of the 20th century, although, of course, it was already devoid of any topicality (of which there was a lot in it), but it still did not lose its significance as a picture of theatrical customs of that time. In the 1840s, another special genre of vaudeville "with disguises" appeared. In them, the young actress Asenkova, glorified by Nekrasov, had a resounding success. The most popular authors of vaudeville were: Shakhovskoy, Khmelnitsky (his vaudeville "Castles in the Air" survived until the end of the 19th century), Pisarev, Koni, Fedorov, Grigoriev, Solovyov, Karatygin (the author of "Vitsmundir"), Lensky and others.
The penetration of operetta from France into Russia at the end of the 1860s weakened the enthusiasm for vaudeville, especially since all kinds of political impromptu (of course, within the limits of very vigilant censorship), gag and especially topical (in the same vaudeville type) couplets were widely practiced in the operetta. Without such verses, the operetta was not conceived at that time. Nevertheless, vaudeville has been preserved in the repertoire of the Russian theater for quite a long time. Its noticeable decline begins only in the eighties of the XIX century.
Bibliography
Gorbunov I. F., L. T. Lensky. "Russian antiquity", Ї 10, 1880.
Tikhonravov N. S., prof., M. S. Shchepkin and N. V. Gogol, magazine "Artist", book. V, 1890.
Izmailov A. Fedor Koni and old vaudeville. "Yearbook of the Imperial Theaters". 3. 1909.
Varneke B. V. History of the Russian theater. part II. - Kazan. 1910.
Notes, letters and stories of MS Shchepkin. SPb. 1914.
Ignatov I. N. Theater and audience. part I. - M. 1916
Beskin E. Nekrasov-playwright, "Worker of Education" magazine. Ї 12. 1921.
Grossman L. Pushkin in theater chairs. - L. 1926.
Vigel F. F. Notes. vol. I. - M. 1928.
Beskin E. M. History of the Russian theater. - M. 1928.
Vsevolodsky-Gerngross. History of the Russian theater. - M. 1929 (2 vols.).
The article is based on the materials of the Literary Encyclopedia 1929-1939. Wikipedia
The word vaudeville (Vaudeville) comes from the French "val de Vire" - the Vir valley. The Vire is a river in Normandy.
In the 17th century, songs known as "Chanson de val de Vire" became widespread in France. Their authors are considered to be the folk poets of the 15th century - Olivier Basselin and Le Goux. Perhaps this is just a collective designation of a special genre of a simple, unpretentious, playful song of a folk character, light in melodic composition, mockingly satirical in content, and by its origin connected with the villages of the Vir Valley. This can also explain the further transformation of the name itself - from "val de Vire" to "voix de ville" ("village voice").
In the second half of the 17th century, small theatrical pieces appeared in France, introducing these songs in the course of action and from them, which themselves received the name "vaudeville". And in 1792, even a special "Theatre de Vaudeville" - "Vaudeville Theater" was founded in Paris. Of the French vaudeville artists, E. Scribe and E. Labiche are especially famous.
In Russia, the prototype of vaudeville was a small comic opera of the late 17th century, which remained in the repertoire of the Russian theater by the beginning of the 19th century. These are Knyazhnin's "Sbitenshchik", Nikolaev - "Guardian-Professor" and "Misfortune from the Carriage", Levshin - "Imaginary Widowers", Matinsky - "St. Petersburg Gostiny Dvor", Krylov - "Coffee House" and others. Ablesimov's vaudeville "Melnik-sorcerer, deceiver and matchmaker" 1779.
The next stage in the development of vaudeville is the "little comedy with music." This vaudeville has been especially popular since about the 20s of the 19th century. Typical examples of such vaudeville are "The Cossack Poet" and "Lomonosov" by Shakhovsky.
AT early XIX century it was considered a sign of "good form" to compose a vaudeville for the benefit of an actor or actress. For example, the vaudeville "My Family, or the Married Bride" in 1817 was created by A.S. Griboyedov in collaboration with A.A. Shakhovsky and N.I. Khmelnitsky for M.I. Valberkhova. D.T.'s five-act vaudeville was particularly successful. Lensky's "Lev Gurych Sinichkin or a Provincial Debutante", remade from the French play "The Father of the Debutante" (staged in 1839), it has been preserved in the repertoire of theaters to this day and is a reliable picture of the theatrical mores of that time.
Later, N.A. Nekrasov created several vaudevilles under the pseudonym N. Perepelsky (“You can’t hide an awl in a bag, you can’t keep a girl in a bag”, “Feoklist Onufrievich Bob, or a husband out of his element”, “This is what it means to fall in love with an actress” , "Actor" and "Grandma's parrots").
Usually vaudeville was translated from French. "The alteration to Russian manners" of French vaudeville was usually limited to the replacement of French names by Russians. Vaudevilles were created according to a very simple recipe. Repetilov also spoke about him in A.S. Griboedov's comedy "Woe from Wit":
"... six of us, look - vaudeville
blind,
The other six set to music,
Others clap when they give it..."
The passion for vaudeville was truly enormous. In October 1840, only 25 performances were staged at the Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, of which almost each, in addition to the main play, had one or two more vaudevilles, but ten performances were, moreover, composed exclusively of vaudevilles.
From about the 40s, elements of topicality and polemic appear in vaudeville, and this is a great success with the public. It should be noted that topicality in Nikolaev times could not go beyond purely literary or theatrical topics (and then carefully), everything else was "strictly prohibited." In the vaudeville of D.T. Lensky, for example, "In people, an angel is not a wife, at home with her husband - Satan" Smudge sings:
"Here, for example, analysis
Polevoy's Pieces -
Both author and actor
They don't understand a word...
The most popular vaudeville authors were A.A. Shakhovskoy, N.I. Khmelnitsky (his vaudeville "Castles in the Air" survived until the end of the 19th century), A.I. Pisarev, F.A. Koni, P.S. Fedorov, P. I.Grigoriev, P.A.Karatygin (author of "Vitsmundir"), D.T.Lensky and others.
On February 23, 1888, A.P. Chekhov admits in one of his letters: “When I write my name, I will write vaudeville and live by it. It seems to me that I could write hundreds of them a year. Vaudeville plots come out of me like oil from Baku bowels". By that time, he had written "On the dangers of tobacco", "Bear", "Proposal".
