It was a minor plot point in Amadeus that the Art Police ordered Mozart to cut a dance scene from The Marriage of Figaro because dance-to-music-on-a-stage amounted to ballet, which was illegal in Austria. Was it illegal? Why?
My WAG: Teenagers liked it, parents were suspicious of it, and ballerinas were considered “hoochie.”
As I recall, ballet was fine, and opera was fine, but you weren’t supposed to mix the genres. Why not, I have no idea.
Just posting to note that as I was skimming Thread titles, my brain gathered just enough of “Was ballet Really illegal” that I thought I had read “Ballet Legal”, which brought to mind the possibility of a specialized porno mag focusing on 18yr old ballerinas.
There’s gotta be one. I mean, they’re so … flexible …
I’ll be in my bunk.
Joseph II’s edict against ballets within operas seems to have no more rationale than the emperor didn’t like ballet very much as an art form. Since he did like operas, he didn’t want them stunk up with a lot of dancing.
This vignette is related in the memoirs of Mozart’s librettist, Lorenzo Da Ponte (Cosi fan Tutte and Figaro, among others). According to the memoirs, Count Rosenberg (seen in Amadeus as the more hifalutin’ of the three musical advisors in Joseph II’s court) was told of the plans for a ballet in Da Ponte’s libretto, and – since Rosenberg didn’t want the opera to succeed – he confronted Da Ponte and informed him of Joseph’s edict against ballet in operas. Rosenberg ordered Da Ponte to strike the section from the work. Mozart was desperate when he found out, according to D.P.
Of course, since these were Da Ponte’s memoirs after all, the librettist made himself the hero of the episode. According to him, he assured Mozart things would work out fine once the Emperor saw the opera at rehearsal. And sure enough, they did; the situation went down roughly as shown in Amadeus: Joseph II viewed the Figaro scene with the lack of music (and also without dancers), and questioned what the heck was going on. Told by Count Rosenberg only that “there were no dancers available,” the emperor then ordered them to find available dancers.
One of the great scenes in the film. Embellished by the playwright of course, but charming and true, at least according to the dude who was, after all, there to see it.
Somewhat off-topic, but I’ve heard that there’s a similar issue in modern day France that by union rules, you can’t be both a dancer and a singer. So for any musical to play in France, they have to bring in foreigners since most musicals involve at least some minimum of dancing, including the main (singing) characters.
Note again that this is just something I’ve heard. Not sure as to the veracity.