Page 181 - Weiss, Jernej, ur./ed. 2021. Opereta med obema svetovnima vojnama ▪︎ Operetta between the Two World Wars. Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. Studia musicologica Labacensia, 5
P. 181
oi: https://doi.org/10.26493/978-961-293-055-4.179-209
288 metres of velvet, 16 pairs of shoes,
12 yellow top hats, 5 bathtubs ...
– The Staging and Cultural Impact
of the 1925 Production of Halló, Amerika!
in the Budapest Operetta Theatre
Daniel Molnár
Samostojni raziskovalec
Independent researcher
Halló, Amerika! was the show of the 1924/25 season in Hungary – such a big
hit that even a very particularly targeted magazine, Autó [The Automobile]
wrote about it three times. It was not only a key performance in the finan-
cial and institutional history of the theatre, but a major Hungarian cultur-
al phenomenon, influencing language and society.
The first Fővárosi Operett Színház [Municipal Operetta Theatre] be-
tween 1922–1929 was researched by Gyöngyi Heltai.1 Her analysis shows
that the attempt to shift the repertoire towards revues started the decline of
the theatre. While she was focusing on intercultural trends and the institu-
tional management of the theatre, in this paper I attempt to examine one of
its key shows, the debates around it, and its short and long term influences
on Hungarian culture.2 The show – being a hit production – has a relative-
ly extensive range of source material: mostly press articles (with many pho-
tographs) and the management’s brief documentation kept in the National
Széchényi Library. However, we have to be aware that most of our sourc-
1 Her article will be published in Hungarian: Gyöngyi Heltai, “Transznacionális
hatások a Fővárosi Operettszínház korai korszakában (1922–1926)” [Transnation-
al influences in the early period of the Budapest Operetta Theatre (1922–1926)], in A
magyar populáris zene története(i). Források, módszerek, perspektívák, ed. Ádám Ig-
nácz (Budapest: ZTI, forthcoming); and also in English by the University of Leeds.
2 The show’s thematic scenographic analysis has already been published in Hungari-
an: Daniel Molnár, Vörös csillagok. A Rákosi-korszak szórakoztatóipara és a szocial
ista revűk [Red stars. Entertainment business in the Rákosi-era and the socialist re-
vues] (Budapest: Ráció, 2019), 332–9.
179
288 metres of velvet, 16 pairs of shoes,
12 yellow top hats, 5 bathtubs ...
– The Staging and Cultural Impact
of the 1925 Production of Halló, Amerika!
in the Budapest Operetta Theatre
Daniel Molnár
Samostojni raziskovalec
Independent researcher
Halló, Amerika! was the show of the 1924/25 season in Hungary – such a big
hit that even a very particularly targeted magazine, Autó [The Automobile]
wrote about it three times. It was not only a key performance in the finan-
cial and institutional history of the theatre, but a major Hungarian cultur-
al phenomenon, influencing language and society.
The first Fővárosi Operett Színház [Municipal Operetta Theatre] be-
tween 1922–1929 was researched by Gyöngyi Heltai.1 Her analysis shows
that the attempt to shift the repertoire towards revues started the decline of
the theatre. While she was focusing on intercultural trends and the institu-
tional management of the theatre, in this paper I attempt to examine one of
its key shows, the debates around it, and its short and long term influences
on Hungarian culture.2 The show – being a hit production – has a relative-
ly extensive range of source material: mostly press articles (with many pho-
tographs) and the management’s brief documentation kept in the National
Széchényi Library. However, we have to be aware that most of our sourc-
1 Her article will be published in Hungarian: Gyöngyi Heltai, “Transznacionális
hatások a Fővárosi Operettszínház korai korszakában (1922–1926)” [Transnation-
al influences in the early period of the Budapest Operetta Theatre (1922–1926)], in A
magyar populáris zene története(i). Források, módszerek, perspektívák, ed. Ádám Ig-
nácz (Budapest: ZTI, forthcoming); and also in English by the University of Leeds.
2 The show’s thematic scenographic analysis has already been published in Hungari-
an: Daniel Molnár, Vörös csillagok. A Rákosi-korszak szórakoztatóipara és a szocial
ista revűk [Red stars. Entertainment business in the Rákosi-era and the socialist re-
vues] (Budapest: Ráció, 2019), 332–9.
179
