Production News

The world of CHICAGO and The Roaring Twenties – Flapper Counterculture

As we move toward the holidays, this Is the first in a series of articles about the world of CHICAGO.  As America emerged from the First World War, it entered an interesting and dissonant period of its history.  Women who had been engaged in full time work to support the war effort were incensed that upon, the return of young men from war, they were expected to give up their full-time jobs and return to their suburban lives as homemakers. Younger women in particular rebelled against this idea, creating a new subgroup in US society called ‘flapper culture’.  As their working freedoms were stripped from them, they began to explore their freedoms in other ways.  Empowered by their time in full-time work, they started to cut their hair in short styles against the expectation, showed their ankles in public, wore stylish clothes, and stayed out late drinking, partying and smoking.

‘The Great Gatsby’, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s seminal novel about the Roaring Twenties was based in this time period. The end of the Great War spoke of endless possibility for the USA Public sentiment, an increase in living standards and in personal and disposable income meant that nightclub entertainment and performance were on everyone’s to do list.  That people flocked to this type of entertainment is all the more remarkable as the US was in the Prohibition era, one that specified the banning of alcohol across the country. This had the effect of driving entertainment and popular culture underground, including vaudeville and dancing shows.  During this time, speakeasies (small illegal bars selling bootleg liquor) cropped up all over the country.  Organised crime began its insidious rise across the nation and the backlash from the established patriarchal government was inevitable. Young women were driven away from ideas of equality and forced to pursue their dreams ‘underground’.

It is in this climate that the show CHICAGO is set.  In a city with over 30,000 illegal bars and speakeasies, our anti-heroine Roxy Hart attempts to make her way in a cut throat entertainment industry to follow her dream of leaving behind her life as the faceless wife of a mechanic and becoming a famous entertainer! Be sure to check the newsletter regularly for more information on the Production!

Ross Pearson

Co-Producer