Mrs Henderson and original Windmill

[crabtree]

I've just been listening the cast recording of Mrs Henderson presents and so wish I had seen it, but this is more a question about the original Windmill. So the girls were presented in their tableaux vivant - does anyone know roughly how long the girls were expected to stand there in such a tableaux. Presumably there was music and an MC/narrator to keep the image going and give the stage some movement. Very intrigued how the lack of movement worked and for how long. Is Mrs h going out on tour or has she been released to the amateur circuit yet? Thanks.

[tonyloco]

In reply to crabtree's question, back in 1960 soon after I had arrived in London from Sydney I sampled a show at the Windmill while it was still functioning in its original form. I don't remember a lot about it, but a few things that I do recall are that the show, basically a variety bill of about an hour or so (I could be wrong about the length) just ran continuously all afternoon and evening. The men in their raincoats in the rows close to the front eventually got up and left and more men in raincoats from the rows further back then got up and moved forward. The tableaux vivants of naked girls standing still were all very artistic and I think lasted only for a minute or two. I suppose there was music but I don't remember much about that. The bulk of the bill was a mixed collection of a comic, a singer, a magician, etc, etc, the acts interspersed with the occasional tableau, but what really grabbed me was that as the shows repeated, each of the performers had a go at doing somebody else's act, so the magician sang a song, the singer did a stand-up routine and the comic did magic tricks. This was presumably to relieve the monotony of just repeating the same show over and over again but I found this totally engrossing and stayed on for several shows just to see who would do which act next. Needless to say, some of them were better at some things than others and I guess had I stayed longer I could have worked out when they were doing their own act and when they were just having a go at something else. I assume that the majority of the punters (essentially all men) were not too critical about the acts as they had all come to look at the naked girls in their classic poses. BTW, I found nothing erotic in the tableaux, which were all reproductions of famous paintings or mythological events so I don't know how those men in raincoats found them stimulating but they apparently did.

[crabtree]

thanks for that Tony. Sounds a unique experience, and the artistic (if it moves it's rude) tableaux still a bizarre notion. were scantily clad/naked men included in the tableaux as well?

[tonyloco]

Gosh, crabtree, I really don't remember whether there were any men in the tableaux. All I remember is that to me the whole idea was rather silly and I am sure the men sitting there in their raincoats could have had a lot more fun in most of the other attractions in Soho than the Windmill Theatre. It also occurs to me that the Lord Chamberlain would probably not have allowed men in the tableaux, even fully clothed, but again I might be wrong. And my memories of the actual tableaux is that the curtains opened only for a very short time, maybe no more than a few minutes at the most and the fact that the naked and semi-naked girls stood stock still to me seemed to remove any eroticism. But remember that the theatre was quite small and sitting anywhere in the auditorium felt being fairly close to the stage so I suppose that held a frisson of its own for the raincoat brigade.

[Mr Snow]

...I hope I remember this next time someone tries to convince me that everything was better when they were young.


Just how sheltered and repressed men must have been, that they considered this 'entertaining'?


Thanks for sharing.

[barrowside]

I often wonder as I pass by is there much of the fabric of the original theatre left? I know it was used for television and now for lap-dancing so it may have been gutted. I thought perhaps someday it could return to use as an intimate playhouse.

[tonyloco]

Wiki says the capacity of the Windmill Theatre was 320 when it closed as a theatre in 1964. I would say that by now it will have been gutted, especially when turned into the present strip club, but there's no reason why it could not be converted back to an intimate playhouse although I have no idea how successful it is these days as a lap dancing club.

[Jon]

Aug 29, 2017 15:24:10 GMT tonyloco said:

Wiki says the capacity of the Windmill Theatre was 320 when it closed as a theatre in 1964. I would say that by now it will have been gutted, especially when turned into the present strip club, but there's no reason why it could not be converted back to an intimate playhouse although I have no idea how successful it is these days as a lap dancing club.

I imagine it would be too expensive to turn it back into a theatre but I don't think it's impossible. 

[crabtree]

It really is one of those showbiz curiosities like ventriloquism on the radio. I just asked men in the tableaux whether they were soldier or attendant slaves in the various paintings/images, but probably the idea of the sexes mixing was too much. Iam an animator and am fascinated how I give human life to things, and there are various art forms where the illusion of life is taken away from humans, such as this, and those cursed living statues. I remember in the film, Will Young disrobed on stage, but I can't remember if that was to convince the Bob Hoskins character to disrobe as well.

[tonyloco]

Good point, but I can't remember the details and I don't think it was to justify men appearing nude on stage in the shows. Perhaps somebody else can remember better the plot of the film.

[mallardo]

In the musical the male nudity happens in a rehearsal scene where the girls say, if we have to do it the guys should have to do it too, fair is fair. Reluctantly, the guys do. The girls don't because the scene is interrupted. They save it for the first tableau scene which arrives next.

[barrowside]

There's a pic of the interior in the 1930's on Arthur Llloyd. www.arthurlloyd.co.uk/WindmillTheatre.htm

[steve10086]

Aug 30, 2017 18:09:58 GMT barrowside said:

There's a pic of the interior in the 1930's on Arthur Llloyd. www.arthurlloyd.co.uk/WindmillTheatre.htm

Please be careful when posting links to the Arthur Lloyd site. If I follow one link I end up on the site for hours!

[tonyloco]

Thanks barrowside for the link to the Arthur Lloyd website. Note the picture captioned: "The Windmill Theatre during its Revudeville period in 1957" showing men outside the theatre mostly all wearing raincoats. Note also that the pavement is dry and there is no chance of it raining inside the theatre but nobody ever took their coats off while sitting watching the show. Perhaps it was cold in there!

[Deleted]

Are you insinuating that they were giving a standing ovation?

[Mr Snow]

... or hearing the sound of one hand clapping.

[tonyloco]

Of course, the Tableaux vivants were greeted with total silence because the men were unable to applaud...!