minstrel show (redirected from Minstrel shows)

minstrel show, stage entertainment by white performers made up as blacks. Thomas Dartmouth Rice, who gave (c.1828) the first solo performance in blackface and introduced the song-and-dance act Jim Crow, is called the "father of American minstrelsy." The first public performance of a minstrel show was given in 1843 by the Virginia Minstrels, headed by Daniel Decatur Emmett. Christy's Minstrels (for whom Stephen Foster wrote some of his most popular songs) appeared in 1846, headed by Edwin P. Christy. In the first part of the minstrel show the company, in blackface and gaudy costumes, paraded to chairs placed in a semicircle on the stage. The interlocutor then cracked jokes with the end men, and, for a finale, the company passed in review in the "walk around." This part of the minstrel show caricatured the black man, representing him by grotesque stereotypes that were retained in the minds of white American audiences for many decades. In the second part of the show vaudeville or olio (medley) acts were presented. The third or afterpart was a burlesque on a play or an opera. The minstrel show was at its peak from 1850 to 1870 but passed with the coming of vaudeville, motion pictures, and radio.

Bibliography

See C. Wittke, Tambo and Bones: A History of the American Minstrel Stage (1930, repr. 1968).

---

minstrel show

Form of entertainment popular in the U.S. in the 19th and early 20th centuries. It originated in the 1830s with the popular white performer Thomas D. Rice, known as “Jim Crow,” who wore the stylized makeup called blackface and performed songs and dances in a stereotyped imitation of African Americans. Blackfaced white minstrel troupes were particularly popular in the U.S. and England in 1840–80 and included groups such as the Christy Minstrels, who played on Broadway for 10 years and had songs composed for them by Stephen Foster. The minstrel show included an opening chorus and frequent exchanges of jokes between the emcee, Mr. Interlocutor, and the end men, Mr. Tambo (who played the tambourine) and Mr. Bones (who rattled the bones), interspersed with ballads, comic songs, and instrumental numbers (usually on the banjo and violin), as well as individual acts, soft-shoe dances, and specialty numbers. Minstrel troupes composed of African Americans were formed after the Civil War; in general, minstrel shows were the only theatrical medium in which black performers of the period could support themselves. Minstrel shows had effectively disappeared by the early 20th century, but the effects of their racial stereotyping persisted in performance mediums well into mid century.

---

minstrel show

a theatrical entertainment consisting of songs, dances, comic turns, etc., performed by a troupe of actors wearing black face make-up