#apache dance

[chaplinfortheages]

"City Lights" 1931

Coming to the assistance of a apache* dancer fearing she is in peril.

Apache Dance or La Danse Apache originated in Paris in the early 20th century.

*Pronounced ah-PAHSH, not uh-PATCH-ee

[opiumflowers]

Here is the real, full-blooded apache girl, a dashing brunette with full red lips, and sinuous body which has never felt the restraint of a corset, dressed in a red jersey and short skirt, black silk stockings and shoes with outrageously high heels.

Netley Lucas, Criminal Paris, 1925, p 16

I found this quote in research for my dissertation and adore it. Too often writing this I see the big names of Mistinguett, Musidora and Clara Bow - this is what I want, the anonymous young women in cabarets who set the trends and made a difference even if their names aren’t remembered. (Plus, watching their dance moves makes them look like the first stuntwomen! Not to mention, they seem like they’d be the most fun to run around with in the city at night. OK, maybe I do enjoy Clara Bow's depiction…)

[mudwerks]

Mr. Magazine (1953)

[travsd]

A Morsel on Maurice

His full name was Maurice Oscar Louis Mouvet (1889-1927), though professionally he was usually known simply as “Maurice”. Though he was an international trendsetter for nearly two decades his name has been swallowed up as compared with some of his competitors, a factor perhaps of his relative lack of representation on film. He was born in New York to Belgian parents. By his own account, his…

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[travsd]

For International Choreographers Day: A Thing on The Apache Dance

We’ve had a gazillion occasions to mention the phenomenon known as the Apache Dance on this blog. For International Choreographer’s Day, we thought we’d do a little more comprehensive. If you watch old movies you have almost certain seen it depicted, and probably more than once. In the first half of the 20th century it required no explanation, so when it was shown it was never explained. But…

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[busterverse]

Really must watch this soon...

WHAAT dance Wednesday

[catskewl]

“The Face On The Ballroom Floor, or What’s Left of It After An Apache Dance Belongs to Lina Basquette,”

Miss Basquette formerly was premiere danseuse of the Ziegfeld “Follies”; and her performance of the dance of the Parisian underworld, wherein a girl must suffer if she syncopate, has all the lithe grace and savage intensity of the genuine, look-for-this-signature-on-the-label, article.

Motion Picture Magazine, 1929, photos by Lansing Brown

[catskewl]

Apache Dancers still from the 1916 film, “The Stranglers of Paris” in The Motion Picture News.