Silent films owe a great deal to the music-hall tradition.
The vaudeville show, with its combination of unrelated acts ranging from singers to acrobats to clowns, was a natural and inexhaustible subject for early cinema. Little is known about this dancing pig, filmed by several different companies, but we can still share the uncontrolled laughter of the audience, lapping up this popular act.
The brief length of each music-hall act corresponded perfectly with the restraints of early cinema technology, where each shot was limited by the amount of film the camera could hold.
With editing and shooting from various angles still to be invented, most of the earliest films were simply taken head-on with a stationary camera.
Before cinema usurped music hall’s throne, it captured a few short sketches for posterity.
But music hall performing was also where a good number of future comic film stars learned their trade.
Charlie Chaplin, Stan Laurel and Buster Keaton all began their careers by treading the boards, and would each, in his own way, pay homage to this wonderful school for performers, which cinema would eventually replace in the public’s heart.
The vaudeville show, with its combination of unrelated acts ranging from singers to acrobats to clowns, was a natural and inexhaustible subject for early cinema. Little is known about this dancing pig, filmed by several different companies, but we can still share the uncontrolled laughter of the audience, lapping up this popular act.
The brief length of each music-hall act corresponded perfectly with the restraints of early cinema technology, where each shot was limited by the amount of film the camera could hold.
With editing and shooting from various angles still to be invented, most of the earliest films were simply taken head-on with a stationary camera.
Before cinema usurped music hall’s throne, it captured a few short sketches for posterity.
But music hall performing was also where a good number of future comic film stars learned their trade.
Charlie Chaplin, Stan Laurel and Buster Keaton all began their careers by treading the boards, and would each, in his own way, pay homage to this wonderful school for performers, which cinema would eventually replace in the public’s heart.
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