This year, instead of the Festival of The Arts, we have Passion Projects, although there is really not much of a difference to me, seeing as I've been doing the same type of project for the last two years as well, those plays being Annie and The Lion King. But, this year, we're doing the play production of the movie, Bugsy Malone, a play about two gangs going to war in the 1920's, the gang led by Sam 'Fat Sam' Stacetto and the other led by Dandy Dan, yes, that is his name, yes, it does sound really stupid when we rehearse the script, but we can't exactly change it. This year, I am playing a character nicknamed 'Knuckles', known to be named that because they crack their knuckles, this character is in Fat Sam's gang and the leader of this gang actually played Scar in The Lion King last year, so I'm their lackey once again, except we're kind of the good guys.
What were the buildings like?
The buildings, in the 1920's, were commonly skyscrapers and other forms of tall buildings, they were commonly duller and grey colours with straight and flat walls for architecture.
What was fashion like?
The fashion in 1920 was clean and outrageous, with shiny, and frilly skirts for the women, and tight, and bold suits for the men. The hairstyles were really short cut, ending as bobs for the women and cut even shorter for all of the men. Most people wore hats, headbands and all other forms of different head accessories. The shoes were often high heels/stilettos for all of the women and leather dress shoes, coming mostly in either black or brown.
The home life is a broad subject so I'll start off with gender roles. Even with women being viewed as more individualistic and rebellious in this age, many of them were still housewives, cleaning, cooking, and taking care of children. All of this while their husbands worked for long hours of the day. Moving on, The Roaring Twenties is often a nickname for this set of years, named so because in this time, in America, women earned the right to vote, great technological advancements were made, more children than ever started to get an education, more women than ever got a job outside of their household and attended school's and universities, and men and women began to marry for love.
What was entertainment like?
The entertainment of the 1920's included the first commercial radio stations, where they broadcasted across America. By 1929, ten million houses had radios, there were 800 different stations and sales of the radio's reached $426 million US dollars. Radios weren't the only form of entertainment though, as 'movie palaces' began to appear in all of America's major cities, costing a quarter (25 cents) for a double feature and a live show. Movie Palaces were able to seat thousands at a time and by the end of the decade, the weekly average of people became 90 million, some even going more than twice a week! Even so, the movies were just in development, and during this time, they were still colourless, and silent!
