Les Années Folles

The operetta of the Roaring Twenties was born at the end of 1918, buoyed by the euphoria of victory, with the first performance of ‘Phi-Phi’, based on a libretto by Albert Willemetz and music by Henri Christiné. This event marked the start of a movement that was in stark contrast to the pre-war productions, where bourgeois intrigues and sentimental romances predominated. The Viennese influence declined in favour of the new syncopated rhythms from England and America, such as the foxtrot, the one-step and the Charleston.

The grand operetta gave way almost entirely to a more modest form, the petite opérette, incorporating elements of the boulevard play and punctuated by songs. Music-hall and film stars (such as Chevalier, Arletty, Printemps, Dranem, Carton, etc.) took centre stage, relegating operatic voices to the background. Orchestras also became more modest, often reduced to a small group of around fifteen musicians.

The fiery passions of love and patriotism gave way to a modern comedy in which the characters thought only of enriching themselves by dubious means and playing each other off, thus exacerbating the features of society in the Roaring Twenties while at the same time mocking it. Increasingly, authors and composers adopted the subtitle ‘musical comedy’ rather than ‘operetta’ for these plays.