From New York to Middletown: Repeal and the Legitimization of Nightlife in the Great Depression

Abstract

IN THE MOVIE GIRL CRAZY (1943), A YOUNG PLAYBOY PORTRAYED BY MICKEY Rooney scandalizes his tycoon father with his incessant Broadway nightclubbing. After his latest escapade lands him in the tabloids, his father sends him to a ranch out west to learn discipline, willpower, and proper work habits. As the film suggests, many people perceived New York nightclubs during the Depression and early war years problematic vestiges of the nonsense 1920s. Yet, by movie's end, a transformation has taken place. In the process of learning his lesson, Rooney saves the bankrupt ranch with a spectacular New York nightclub show consisting of sophisticated swing bands, singers and chorus girls. New York nightclubs and American culture had been reconciled. This Hollywood musical is only one of many movies that expressed the widespread fascination with New York nightclubs during the Depression and World War II. Movies glorified an urban institution associated with risque entertainment, sexual experimentation and high consumption. More important, actual nightclubs continued to exist, and in some cases expanded during the Depression. Describing nightlife in 1937, for example, Bosley Crowther of The New York Times found business booming, as has not been enjoyed hereabouts since the whoopee wild days of the late Twenties. Several surveys found nightclubs penetrating even smaller cities where none before had existed. As Variety declared in December, 1933: HINTERLAND GOES HEY HEY.' As Crowther made clear, nightclubs continued to play an important role in the popular culture of the 1930s and 1940s. Despite the economic crisis, cabarets associated with New York continued in fact and in popular perception important urban entertainments. In fact, it was during the Depression and war years that the national fascination with New York City a city of play reached its zenith. Nightclubs formed part of the myth, standing emblems of 1920s values-consumption, sexual expression, youth culture and social informality-