The Black and White Minstrel Show

The Black and White Minstrel Show

"The Black and White Minstrel Show" was a British television series that ran from 1958 until 1978 and was a popular stage show. It was a weekly light entertainment and variety show presenting traditional American minstrel and Country songs, as well as show and music hall numbers, usually performed in blackface, and with lavish costumes.

History

The show was first broadcast on the BBC on June 14 1958. It began as a one-off special featuring the male Mitchell Minstrels (after George Mitchell, the Musical Director) and the female Television Toppers dancers in 1957. It was popular and soon developed into a regular 45 minute show on Saturday evenings, featuring both solo and minstrel pieces (often with extended segueing) as well as "comedy interludes". It was produced by George Inns with George Mitchell.

Popularity

Audiences regularly exceeded 18 million. The Minstrels also had a theatrical show which ran for 6,477 performances from 1960–1972 and established itself in "The Guinness Book of Records" as the stage show seen by the largest number of people. At this time, the creation had gained considerable international respect and kudos. The show won a Golden Rose at Montreux in 1961 for best light entertainment programme and the first three albums of songs (1960–1962) all did extremely well, the first two being long-running number ones in the British album chart.

While the show started off being broadcast in (genuine) black-and-white, the show was one of the very first to be moved to colour by the BBC in 1967.

Several famous personalities guested on the show, while others started their careers there. Comedian Lenny Henry was one such star, being the first black comedian to appear, in 1975. [ [http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/profiles/lenny_henry.shtml Lenny Henry profile] BBC Comedy pages]

Controversy

The show's premise began to be seen as offensive on account of its portrayal of blacked-up characters behaving in a stereotypical manner. A petition against it was received by the BBC in 1967, [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/2223239.stm Minstrels founder Mitchell dies] BBC, 29 August 2002. Accessed 2 February 2008.] and since cancellation it has come to be seen more widely as an embarrassment, despite its popularity at the time. [ [http://www.thecustard.tv/linksandlists/100momentsfromhell.html thecustard.tv links and lists • The 100 Greatest TV Moments From Hell ] ] [ [http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/timeshift/minstrels.shtml BBC - BBC Four Time Shift - Black and White Minstrel Show Revisited ] ]

Post-TV

The BBC1 TV show was cancelled in 1978 as part of a reduction in variety programming (although by this point the blackface element had been reduced), [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/2223239.stm BBC NEWS | Entertainment | TV and Radio | Minstrels founder Mitchell dies ] ] but the stage show continued. Having left the Victoria Palace Theatre, where the stage show played from 1962 to 1972, the show toured almost every year to various big city and seaside resort theatres around the UK, including The Futurist in Scarborough, The Festival Hall in Paignton and The Pavilion Theatre in Bournemouth. This continued each summer until 1987, when a final tour of three Butlins resorts (Minehead, Bognor Regis and Barry Island) saw the last official Black and White Minstrel Show on stage.

Cultural impact

"Alternative Roots", an episode of the BBC comedy series "The Goodies", spoofed the popularity of "The Black and White Minstrel Show", suggesting that any programme could double its viewing figures by being performed in blackface, and mentioning that a series of "The Black and White Minstrel Show" had been tried without make up. [cite episode| title = Alternative Roots| episodelink = Alternative Roots| series = The Goodies| serieslink = The Goodies| airdate = 2008-11-01| seriesno = 7| number = 1] In the late 1960s, "Masquerade", a "whiteface" version of the show, had been tried, only to lose viewers.cite web|url=http://www.theofficialcharts.com/album_chart_history_1961.php|title=1961|last=Mawer|first=Sharon|date=2007|work=Album Chart History|publisher=The Official UK Charts Company|accessdate=2008-10-05]

When a revival of the "Black And White Minstrel Show" was proposed by fictional television presenter Roger Mellie, Tom states "Television bade good riddance to that racist rubbish decades ago".Fact|date=April 2007

References

External links

* [http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/B/htmlB/blackandwhim/blackandwhim.htm "The Black and White Minstrel Show"] at museum.tv


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем решить контрольную работу

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Minstrel show — For the album by Little Brother, see The Minstrel Show. Detail from cover of The Celebrated Negro Melodies, as Sung by the Virginia Minstrels, 1843 The minstrel show, or minstrelsy, was an American entertainment consisting of comic skits, variety …   Wikipedia

  • black television —    The converging histories of Afro Caribbean immigration and the mass expansion of television in 1950s Britain have belied their continuing divergence on a predominantly white broadcasting medium. Programmes targeted at Afro Caribbean… …   Encyclopedia of contemporary British culture

  • minstrel show — a popular stage entertainment featuring comic dialogue, song, and dance in highly conventionalized patterns, performed by a troupe of actors, traditionally comprising two end men and a chorus in blackface and an interlocutor: developed in the U.S …   Universalium

  • The Summer Show — A British comedy sketch show from 1975 featuring winners of the ATV talent show New Faces.Designed to emulate the fast moving style of Rowan and Martin s Laugh In, it featured Marti Caine, Lenny Henry, Victoria Wood, impressionist Aiden J Harvey… …   Wikipedia

  • Minstrel show — Veranstaltungsplakat für Dandy Jim from Caroline, ca. 1844 Minstrel show, oder auch blackface minstrelsy, ist ein Unterhaltungsspiel, bei dem Weiße in Form von Stereotypen Schwarze darstellen. Die zentrale Figur war in der Regel ein Clown mit… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Minstrel Show — Veranstaltungsplakat für Dandy Jim from Caroline, ca. 1844 Minstrel show, oder auch blackface minstrelsy (benannt nach dem als blackface bezeichneten, schwarz geschminkten Gesicht des Clowns), ist ein Unterhaltungsspiel bei dem Weiße in Form von… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show — Boris Natasha redirects here. For the movie by that name, see Boris and Natasha: The Movie. This article is about the television series. For the video game, see The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends (video game). For the 2000 movie,… …   Wikipedia

  • List of number-one albums from the 1960s (UK) — This is a list of the number one hits in the UK Albums Chart in the 1960s. The sources are the Melody Maker chart until March 1960, and the Record Retailer chart from March 1960 onwards.1960# Freddy Cannon The Explosive Freddy Cannon #:March 12th …   Wikipedia

  • List of television programmes broadcast by the BBC — This is a list of television programmes that are either currently being broadcast or have previously been broadcast on the BBC in the United Kingdom. Normal Programming compactTOC NOTOC Please note that this is not a complete list. Children s… …   Wikipedia

  • Out of the Shadows — For the Hawkwind song, see Space Bandits. For the video game, see Out of the Shadows (video game). Out of The Shadows Studio album by The Sh …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”