On December 28, 1932, Radio City Musical Hall opened. The Rockettes were a part of that very first performance. Below are covers, and insides the programs from the 30s and 40s. About a year after opening, the Music Hall became a movie house in order to be financially viable. Every movie was accompanied by a stage show featuring the Rockettes. From that point on, the stage shows were 50 minutes long. From the 30s-70s the Music Hall was a first-run movie house and before and af

On December 28, 1932, Radio City Musical Hall opened. The Rockettes (Then called the Roxyettes) were a part of that very first performance. Opening Night, 1932. Photo from New York Times In the days leading up to the grand opening of the theater, an advertisement quoted Roxy Rothafel as saying: “We believe that nothing approaching the Radio City theaters has ever been given to the entertainment world…into this crowning work of my life I have poured the best that I have learn

In 1928, the Missouri Rockets traveled to New York City to perform in the Broadway show Rain or Shine where the caught the eye of showbiz impresario Roxy Rothafel. In 1930 they appeared in their first film, “ King of Jazz ”—a pre-Code musical revue starring Paul Whiteman ands orchestra. It contained only musical numbers and comedy sketches. King of Jazz  was the nineteenth all-talking motion picture filmed entirely in two-color  Technicolor  rather than simply including colo

Though it was Russell Markert who formed the original Rockettes (The Missouri Rockets) in 1925, the man who formed the first precision dance troupe was an English man named John Tiller. Tiller Girls 1891 In the 1880s, Tiller formed a dance school in Manchester, UK. In 1890 John was asked to present a quartet of children for the pantomime Robinson Crusoe at the Prince of Wales Theatre, Liverpool. He chose four of his best Manchester pupils, all aged about 10 years; Dolly Grey

Russell Markert founded the Missouri Rockets in 1925 and remained the chief choreographer. image-preserver and resident father-figure of the famous troupe until his retirement in 1971. In the era when the Music Hall played to full houses every day of the year, he trained and rehearsed 2,500 Rockettes, young women who had to be 5’5’’ to 5’8’’ tall. Markert began his professional career on Broadway, graduated from the chorus to dance director of the annual revue ‘Early Carroll’

The Missouri Rockets with Russell Markert Russell Market was a chorus dancer at the Missouri Theater. The owner of the theater asked him to come up with a specialty dance troupe so he began auditioning local girls. In 1925 he had formed a group of 16 women between between 5’2″and 5’6 ½”, and called them the “Missouri Rockets.” They made their debut that year in St. Louis performing before feature films at the Missouri Theater on Grand Avenue The Missouri Rockets In 1928, the

At the 1987 Tony Awards Bob Fosse and Gwen Verdon present the awards for Best Choreography and Best Director. Before announcing the winners, Bob took a moment to acknowledge that his success as a choreographer was due to the inspiration and partnership he found in Gwen Verdon. A beautiful acknowledgment of the vast body of work they created together including musicals, films, and their daughter Nicole. Despite separating in 1971, they remained close collaborators until Fosse'

Liza in "Nowadays" “When you love people, I think you help out, if you can.” — Liza on joining “Chicago” Just two months after Chicago opened in June of 1975, Gwen lost her voice. Marsha Bagwell relates the story that she took Gwen to her own renowned ENT where he recommended surgery to explore the issue. During surgery, the ENT found a single piece of confetti that had landed on her vocal chord and adhered to it, causing a blister. Marsha explained that during the finale whe

Hirschfeld made the drawing while Bob Fosse's show was still out of town in Philadelphia. It was published in the  Times  on June 8, 1975 after the Broadway opening. The Hirschfeld illustration has seven Ninas. Illustration of Gwen in her Roxie costume by Mark Cote. (left) Lenora Nemetz as Velma Kelly by Hirschfeld. (right) Illustration by Mark Cote of Fosse's shows. Top left illustration shows Gwen, Jerry and Chita.

Jersey Journal Here you can read several reviews of the opening night of Chicago. Although reviews were mixed, the show ran for 936 performances

Bob and Gwen on opening night. Photos by Martha Swope. Of opening night: “The audience adored it—they even applauded when the lights first went down—and there are things, very very positive things, for everyone to adore, not least the performers. Both the girls dance their hearts out, together, singly, or leading the splendid band of gypsies who make up most of the rest of the cast. Miss Verdon’s voice, all candy innocence and yet somehow naughtily suggestive of untold viciou

"Bobby had the audacity to present us as 'poetry in motion, two moving as one.' Each of our movements was perfectly matched to the microsecond. We went all-out on 'Hot Honey Rag,' as the emcee announced: 'Okay, let's pick up the pace, let's shake the blues away, let's make the party longer, the skirts shorter and shorter, let's make the music hotter. Let's all go to town in a fast car and keep it hot!' "And we did, changing into fringed skirts that whipped around in time to t

Chita and Gwen perform the new finale: Nowadays Chita: "Bobby and Freddy had always struggled with how to end Chicago. After Roxie is acquitted in her trial and Velma in hers (offstage), they put together a vaudeville act to take advantage of their notoriety. When Velma suggests the merger, Roxie has a ready answer: 'You're forgetting one thing. We hate each other.' Velma replies, 'Yeah, but there's only one business where that doesn't matter.' True. Like I said, Bobby was so

Original finale of Chicago Chita: "Bobby [Fosse] and Freddy [Ebb] had always struggled with how to end Chicago. After Roxie is acquitted in her trial and Velma in hers (offstage), they put together a vaudeville act to take advantage of their notoriety. When Velma suggests the merger, Roxie has a ready answer: 'You're forgetting one thing. We hate each other.' Velma replies, 'Yeah, but there's only one business where that doesn't matter.' True. Like I said, Bobby was so good a

Mary McCarty and Chita Rivera. Kander: Writing “Class” was fun in that way where we were able to just let go. Ebb: That was a duet for Velma and the prison matron. After we had written it, I remember having serious second thoughts about the number. Ebb: I almost talked myself out of that one. Funny songs actually terrify me. I'm at a loss there because very seldom do I think what I've written is funny. I would have cut "Class" in two minutes from my own fear of it before I

KANDER: I remember when we wrote "Razzle Dazzle," before we took it in and played it for Bob, you said with absolute confidence, "Try adding a couple of finger snaps to it. Bobby will love that." We added them, and then we took it in and played it for Bob, and as soon as he heard the finger snaps, he loved the song. -- Colored Lights: Forty Years of Words and Music, Show Biz, Collaboration, and All That Jazz by John Kander Fred Ebb, Greg Lawrence Jerry Orbach: "In Razzle Da

“‘When Velma Takes the Stand’ and the entire courtroom scene is an imitation of the many courtroom comedy sketches, a staple of vaudeville and burlesque. ‘When Velma Takes the Stand’ is also modeled on the many vaudeville acts that showcased the latest dance crazes, in this case, the Charleston. Denounced by moralists as the devil’s dance, the dance from hell, and other similar names, the Charleston found its roots in African dance and became popular in the American South aro

"I liked Velma because she was a straight shooter, so to speak, blunt and practical. To give you a flavor, one of my favorite scenes in the musical is when the female inmates are playing a game of cards. One by one, they cheat. June sneaks a card from under her chair. Liz pulls one out from her wig. Annie has one hidden in her cleavage. All this time, Velma is smoking a cigarette. Finally she exhales a puff and deftly extracts the card that's been in her mouth all along. -- C

Barney Martin as Amos Hart on Broadway. Photo by Martha Swope, 1975. Did you know, “Mr. Cellophane” in Bob Fosse’s Chicago  was based performances by Bert Williams?  Williams was the first modern Black entertainment star: the first Black recording artist, one of the earliest Black leading men on film, and the first Black performer to star in a major Broadway production (Ziegfeld Follies) with white actors. His signature song, “Nobody,”  a hauntingly comic lament about being u

The first version of this number featured Gwen doing an Eddie Cantor--style number with the ensemble of men dressed as giant babies dancing behind her. In a conversation I had with Candy Brown, Michon Peacock, Lenora Nemetz, and Pamela Sousa, they said that Gwen hated that number (and they even felt they could see her discomfort in these pictures). What replaced it was "The Strut" which cut the ensemble down to two men dressed in suits and bowler hats dancing behind her. This