Back in the days of vaudeville

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January 7, 2012

Local theaters embrace history as live shows return

By Shirley O'Shea Contributing Writer The Daily Star Sat Jan 07, 2012, 02:30 AM EST

I was following Jim Richardson into the dark recesses of the Walton Theatre, located at the village's Gardiner Place, on a recent gray December afternoon. Richardson, who serves on the Walton Theater Preservation Association, was giving me a tour of the grand old brick building, which was erected in 1914 and named to the National Register of Historic Places 70 years later.

"Now where is the light switch?" Richardson asked no one in particular as I waited on the stairs. He pulled out his iPhone, which, he told me, had a flashlight. No sooner had he switched it on than he saw a chain hanging from a naked bulb. Now we could begin to find our way around what had been the basement dressing rooms when the Walton Theatre featured performers on the vaudeville circuit.

About 50 years before the first "talkie" (motion picture with sound) and 100 years before the watershed blockbuster film "Star Wars" with its entrancing special effects, there was vaudeville, a form of live entertainment featured in modest-sized theaters and what were known at the time as opera houses. Vaudevillians included singers, instrumentalists, magicians, actors and actresses and comedians and included novelty performances such as animal acts. Many vaudevillians were itinerant, traveling circuits that crossed the United States, thanks to the extensive railroad system.

Vaudeville was "a fusion … of English Music Hall, musical shows of antebellum America, and Yiddish theater," according to PBS' website, which has a link to the network's series on great American creators behind the nation's culture, "American Masters."

This form of entertainment represented the multitude of cultural strands that made up the greater American society. English music hall entertainers performed popular music and comedy skits for the working and middle classes in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Antebellum, or pre-Civil War minstrel shows, consisted of white people performing music and comedy skits in blackface. Yiddish, or central European Jewish, theater included musical and theatrical performances.

The rivers of immigrants who came to the U.S. in the 19th and early 20th centuries swelled the nation's cities, and the people sought entertainment. Among the possible etymologies for the word "vaudeville" is the French phrase "voix de ville," or voice of the city, and according to Laurence Maslon and Michael Kantor, authors of "Make 'Em Laugh: The Funny Business of America," that seems a plausible explanation. And this urban mix of song, dance and comedy made its way to rural, wooded central New York.

"I'm proud that (the Walton Theatre) was a vaudeville place. I think it's marvelous," said Andrea Paternoster, chairwoman and treasurer of the Walton Theatre Restoration Committee. "I personally have never researched (the theater's vaudeville history). When I retire, I will probably wallow in research like that, because the theater is just a huge mine of history."

The predecessor to the Walton Theatre was a building, referred to as a hall, erected in 1883, according to a booklet by the Walton Restoration Committee. That building contained village offices, a firehouse and an opera hall.

This took place only two years after a New York City impresario named Tony Pastor "created a variety show for families," the "American Masters" website said. Pastor's shows forbade the consumption of alcohol by audience members and required that material used by performers by free of the obscenities that laced other performances. "Other managers recognized that a wider audience meant more money and followed his lead," noted "American Masters." No doubt shows with tee-totaling audiences and wholesome content appealed to the citizens of communities such as Walton and Oneonta, which had its own vaudeville venue.

The Walton hall burned almost a century ago, on Dec. 12, 1912. A new hall was erected, beginning in early 1913. It was home to the theater, the Walton fire department and the village clerk's office, according to the Walton Theatre history pamphlet. Jim Richardson believes that the speed with which the village raised the necessary funds and constructed the hall reflects the local demand for a venue for entertainers.

The Walton Theatre's opening night _ April 21, 1914 _ featured a play, a melodrama by Bayard Veiller titled "Within the Law," which, as a handbill from the time announces, was being produced "Just as played in New York for over 600 nights." The play had received a glowing review in the Sept. 12, 1912, New York Times (—¦ everybody in New York will go to see the play … It may be recommended to stir the most jaded nerves.") The Walton Theatre history pamphlet says that the April 1914 performance was "a professional/amateur production, (which) opened to a standing room crowd of approximately 1,500. The grand opening generated such interest in the area, that a special train from Delhi was added to the regular schedule to accommodate theater-goers."

Elite entertainment had found its way to Walton.

Many vaudeville acts performed at the Walton Theatre, but, as Richardson said, "We're having trouble finding the early stuff," that is, paraphernalia from vaudeville shows. According to Paternoster, when the theater restoration project commenced in 1986, there was still a handful of people living who recalled seeing vaudeville shows there, and they volunteered their reminiscences to those involved with the restoration. Many, if not most, of those individuals have since died.

Like Paternoster, Richardson intends to keep searching for information on acts that played the Walton Theatre. Among the items possesses is a handbill announcing a production, "Streets of Harlem," featuring "The Queen of Low Hot Blues, Ida Cox," who was performing with "the famous Victor Recording Cotton Pickers Orchestra!" Cox was a vaudevillian who had come up through the African-American minstrel show world. Cox went on to perform at Carnegie Hall.

Almost 15 years after the building of the first Walton Theatre, the Oneonta Theatre was constructed on Chestnut Street. According to city historian Mark Simonson, there was strong public support for the project. Willard Yager decided to build a theater across from the Windsor Hotel, site of the present day NBT Bank. He purchased the Chestnut Street lot from the Morris brothers, owners of a feed business. Simonson wrote, "The Morris Brothers liked Yager's plans so much, they turned out to be the largest investor in stock for the theater when Yager sold subscriptions to the public, at a hefty $8,000. The first subscription drive raised over $25,000."

The theater opened on Monday, Feb. 28, 1898, also with a play, "The Sporting Duchess," described by the New York Times in a review of a 1905 New York City performance as "an English melodrama."

"There will probably never be a time when melodrama of 'The Sporting Duchess' variety will not be popular with one or another class of audiences," the Times opined.

The Oneonta Theatre production was covered by the Star, and Simonson, in his discussion of the theater's history, quotes the Star as reporting, "The scene was so unlike any ever witnessed here before that one could hardly realize they were in Oneonta."

As was the case with the Walton Theater, vaudeville acts appeared in Oneonta, but there do not appear to be many artifacts of those performances readily available.

Richardson is gratified by the success of the Walton and Oneonta theaters in reviving the local tradition of bringing live entertainment to the region.

Although it is widely agreed that motion pictures signaled the demise of vaudeville, it seems as though a desire for artists performing in real time in close proximity to their audience is gaining momentum 100 years later, rather like the growing demand for locally raised food. Bodies and souls are seeking their nourishment close to home.