New York City Burlesque dancers being let out on bail after being arrested during Fiorello LaGuardia's ban on burlesque clubs and everything related thought to be obscene. ( 1932)

 

The 1860’s started the expansion of burlesque from the good natured, bawdy comical relief into those same elements while adding scantily clad women, depending upon which time period it is. Once it changed and more legs were shown, and there was public outcry. The dissenters of this new form of burlesque had much more of an opinion at the start of the 1920’s.

One example of attempted reform was between 1925 and 1934 when the Women’s Cooperative Alliance objected to the content at the Gayety Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The strategy of burlesque houses used to get customers was to sometimes use sex as a tool, because men were more likely to spend money on a burlesque dancer than a movie or vaudeville show. The greatest concern was that there were reports of children viewing the shows. Soon enough other women’s groups joined in the fight against the act that they believed was so obscene. Men objected to the overprotective nature of these women’s groups and the licensed of the Gayety being revoked. The argument was constantly made that the Gayety had it on their agenda to have children in the audience by stating on their programs “Children under 10 free” (Against Obscenity, 104). The Women’s Cooperative Alliance with support still lost to the Gayety, but there were other ways that they could combat the problem. Anti- obscenity legislation attempts continued in all venues of entertainment, extending mainly to the ever popular film, which can be traced back to the negative portrayal of burlesque dancers in films of the time period.

The major turning point for burlesque in the eyes of specifically New York City law was when Fiorello LaGuardia was elected as mayor in 1934. He fought alongside Paul Moss to clean up burlesque in New York City. Women were forbidden to go into the audience, and they must seem covered at all times. Luckily, despite the laws and judicial rulings instituted by LaGuardia per his and Moss’s initiative and anti-obscenity activists, burlesque prospered in New York.  In the mid 1930’s it was announced that burlesque led to sex crimes, this led to license renewal hearings of theaters, raids, and the constant mention of children being affected by these environments.

Eventually burlesque was banned all over the city and the Variety Revue Theatre Association was formed by LaGuardia, which forced a board to choose respectable, family friendly acts for theaters. The plan was soon a success as of the late 1930’s. Theaters closed, because of licensing issues, fines to the government, and for breaking the new laws that forbid humor, undressing and sexual expression in burlesque. There was protest against burlesque theaters and the types of entertainment that were influenced by it until 1969, the year when the last old fashioned houses closed down.
During the war the danger in burlesque was no longer concern for the children, but more so for the soldiers and men. Burlesque might drain male energies, which the women and children had a dependence on. As of 1942 theaters closed under a Supreme Court ruling by Justice Levy. The Eltinge, Republic, Gaiety in Manhattan and the Star in Brooklyn closed, ending a part of theatrical history, but burlesque lived on in the movies, and burlesque houses sprang up again.
(Prurient Interests, 62-94)