OVERVIEW
Although the American Burlesque Company only toured Australia for just over twelve months, beginning March 1913, it became a major influence on the development of both the Australian variety industry and locally written revusicals (or one-act musical comedies). Several leading troupe members remained in the country following the disbanding of the troupe and subsequently went on to provide invaluable experience to the local industry during the genre's initial creative development period (1914-1916). These artists were Bert Le Blanc, Paul Stanhope, and Harry Burgess. Two other performers also involved in revusical productions in later years were Carlton Chase (who toured for several years with Le Blanc's Travesty Stars) and Canadian-born variety entertainer Harry Ross, who initially established himself in the partnership Keating and Ross (with Clara Keating), before moving into revusicals in the mid-1920s.
BIOGRAPHY
NB: The following biography relates primarily to the American Burlesque Company's Australian tour.
Comprising some sixty performers, the American Burlesque Company left San Francisco in November 1912 under the auspices of the Oriental Amusement Company Ltd of the USA. Following a tour of the Far East (including seasons in Honolulu, Japan, and China), the company arrived in Australia, opening at the Bijou Theatre, Melbourne, on 15 March 1913. Although the company's repertoire comprised four burlesques (The Grafters, The Speculators, A Day at the Races, and Spielder Bounder's Dream), only the first three were staged during the Australian tour. The stories were largely built around the antics of the troupe's three lead comedians, Le Blanc, Frank Vack, and Dave Nowlin, with other principal cast members being Eugenie Le Blanc (no relation to Bert Le Blanc), Burgess, Stanhope, and Chase. The public accorded the Bijou season packed houses night after night, and even the normally reticent Melbourne theatre critics acknowledged that although the productions were essentially low-brow vaudeville-based entertainments (with some semblance of a story to tie the processions of songs, dances, and comedy together), they were spectacular entertainment. Also on hand to notice the public's excitement was Australian entrepreneur William Anderson, then producing a dramatic play at a nearby theatre. Anderson moved quickly to offer the company his services as producer for the remainder of its stay in the country, an offer that was taken up its management upon completion of the Melbourne season.
Over the course of its stay in Australia, the company played Melbourne and Sydney (twice each), Newcastle, and Brisbane, and possibly briefly toured New Zealand. The Brisbane Courier's review of the troupe's opening night performance at His Majesty's Theatre (in front of a 'splendid audience') provides an indication of how popular the company was with critics and audiences alike. 'If to provoke continuous and unrestrained laughter for three hours be the test of success of a combination of this description', writes the paper's theatre critic, 'then it can at once be said that the entertainers were eminently successful. Their humour was bright, pungent, and racy; there was a sufficiency of vocal music in solos and choruses, supported by a well-organised orchestra, to warrant the burlesque being termed musical, and a considerable amount of clever dancing added diversion and attractiveness to an entertainment that went with a swing from the start' (8 September 1913, p.10).
The routinely packed houses that greeted the American Burlesque Company tour suggest that the combination of variety elements (songs, farce, and comedy), large-scale extravaganza, and simple storyline were a potent mix that captured the popular culture market's attention in the same way that similar musical comedy offerings had begun finding widespread support in the US and UK almost a decade previous. The Age specifically identifies this attraction when it notes that 'For the most part, A Day at the Races is a variety entertainment (3 November 1913, p.11). The Sydney Morning Herald concurred: 'Of buffoonery there was an intimate quantity', wrote the paper's theatre critic, further noting that 'the feature of the burlesque is the rapid succession of songs, dances and choruses' (22 December 1913, p.3). Typical of popular culture productions, the burlesques also included 'up to the minute' novelties such as the Tango dance craze, ragtime music, and a score, or more, of 'brilliant musical hits' (Sydney Morning Herald 20 December 1913, p.2). Also typical of vaudeville shows was the practice of planting members of the troupe in the auditorium and having them extend the stage's fourth wall into the audience. 'The chorus [was] interrupted by the appearance of several young men amongst the audience', writes a Brisbane Courier critic. 'The 'friends' [grasped] their travelling bags and [rushed] to the stage where they [were] revealed as "The Grafters" male chorus' (19 September 1913, p.4). Charles Norman's recall of the American Burlesque Company, and Bert Le Blanc in particular, suggests that even were one to have a copy of the complete script, 'it would avail nothing. For how could it indicate the falls of Jake onto his blown up rubber stomach, which Bert, in his fury would kick right in the centre. Jake would then bounce all over the stage till he came to a stop. This would bring on the sniggering, coughs, squeaks and spontaneous business as he tried to get back onto his feet and the right side up... newspaper reviewers had a hard time finding new ways of saying "excruciatingly funny", and "winning the lion's share of laughter and applause"'.
Perhaps one further reason for the public taking to these productions was the popularity of Bert Le Blanc, and particularly the way he delivered his comic lines. Le Blanc's laid-back style was in stark contrast to the hammering effect American humour had on audiences. In this respect, Le Blanc either knowingly or unwittingly tapped into the Australian style of humour, a factor that was further enhanced by his equally unassuming larrikin streak. '[My] stage humour is of the dry kind', he told the Theatre in 1913. 'My idea is that a laugh got by something told in an easy, quiet, dry manner is worth three laughs secured by a performer as a result of his having to make a hard, strained, noisy appeal for them' (July 1913, p.20). Le Blanc's ability to negotiate a strong relationship with Australian audiences right from the start may well have been, in part, the result of his having spent some time in England during his early career.
The company's influence on the development of the local revusical can be seen by the way the industry initially reacted. Impressed by the public's response, a number of entrepreneurs and writers attempted to emulate the shows. Among the first to create a similar style of show were several variety managers and showmen based in Brisbane during the first half of 1914. These were Ted Holland and Percy St John at the Empire Theatre; Sydney Cook and Wynn Fowles at the Palace Theatre; and American-born/Australian-based singer Post Mason, then at the Crystal Gardens. Englishman Edward Branscombe, who by 1914 was also based in Australia (initially with his Smart Set company), also attempted to develop a similar style of show at the Athenaeum Theatre (Melbourne) around the same time. While there are a number of generic and structural similarities between the American Burlesque Company productions and the Australian revusical, the local product was forced to undertake some pruning in response to logistical and economic practicalities. As such, it developed itself around a small and more economically viable ensemble of eight to twelve actors and a chorus of six.
