Others whose visits to Sydney were few and far between probably relate more to Sorlies.

I have some distant recollections of a Tivoli show, but the Sorlies tent shows in country towns come vividly to mind, with the star of the show, Bobby le Brun, always assisted by one or two attractive dancers.

Bambi is the only name I can recall. Bambi would qualify to be a great grandmother these days. Bobby le Brun, sadly, has passed on to that great vaudeville show in the sky.

I had a late night phone call a few weeks ago from one of those Tivoli-era entertainers, now living on the sixth floor of a Gold Coast apartment block. He is writing his life story, with which is closely entwined the story of 20th century Australian entertainment.

He wanted to know how to spell a word that sounded like “shany”.

“It describes the start of a vaudeville show where the dancers come out in a line and really put everybody in the mood to have a good time,” he said.

I had never heard of “shany”, but after a few hours of searching we finally agreed around 11pm that the word he sought was chaine. A call to a local dance school the next day confirmed our find.

In the meantime, however, we shared a few thoughts about some of the great vaudeville shows that kept Australians entertained before the television era. The key word was variety. “Who can forget Buster Noble?” my friend said. “I remember Patsy Ann Noble better,” was the response.

Then the names came thick and fast, but not having seen behind the scenes at such vaudeville shows I was soon left behind in the reminiscing stakes.

Eventually, however, we had to touch on the meaning of the word vaudeville. After all, you can’t write a book about vaudeville without saying what it means.

In Normandy, France, is a river called the Vire. That area was the home ground of a 15th century poet and songwriter called Olivier Basselin, who became famous for his topical and satirical works. His home was known as Vau de Vire, literally Valley of the Vire. His songs and those of his friends became known as chansons or songs from the Vau de Vire.

The Merriam-Webster people say the English term vaudeville made its first appearance in Cotgrave’s Dictionarie of the French and English Tongues (1611). The British, however, resisted using the term for some time, favouring the word variety.

Samuel Johnson in his 1755 dictionary described “vaudevil” as “a song common among the vulgar and sung about the streets”.

By the 19th century, those songs represented by vaudeville had given way to any form of light entertainment.

The Americans had little trouble taking to the word vaudeville to describe their light entertainment shows.

By the time of the second world war, however, vaudeville shows were on their last legs, giving way to more modern forms of American-inspired entertainment. The Americans liberated the town of Vire in July, 1944, probably not realising this was the place where vaudeville began.

Vaudeville variety shows were strong on humorous counterpoints and double entendres. That was a hallmark of Bobby le Brun’s style of entertainment, along with many others of his ilk perhaps more famous in the annals of Australian entertainment.

lauriebarber.com;lbword@midcoast.com.au

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