Vladimir Dukelsky’s London Productions of the Second Half of the 1920s: From the Ballet a la Russe – To the English Thriller
Abstract
Participation of the Russian émigré composers of the “first wave” in the activities of the
London music hall was a rare occurrence. The article examines one of such exclusive cases of
the cooperation of Vladimir Dukelsky (Vernon Duke) with the musical entertainment industry in
London in the 1920s. Dukelsky made his debut at the Coliseum Theater as an academic composer,
the creator of the ballet music “Zephyr and Flora” (1925) and after a successful premiere signed
several contracts for writing numbers to musical comedies. The greatest success was enjoyed
by the musical thriller “The Yellow Mask” based on Edgar Wallace’s play “The Traitor’s Gate.”
Thereby, the tightly plotted performance was from the very beginning “doomed for success”
during the period of “the golden age of the detective genre.” Along with this, separate aspects of
the plot of “The Yellow Mask” presented a curious commentary to the social-political situation
of the 1920s.
Keywords: music hall, the musical life of London in the 1920s, Dukelsky, Vernon Duke, “Yellow
Mask,” Sergei Diaghilev’s “Ballets Russes.”
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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.33779/2587-6341.2020.3.086-095
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