Broadway Dancing

Broadway dancing is known as a style of jazz dance which has become popularised by both Broadway musicals and musical theatre across the world. The method is differentiated from other freer forms of jazz dancing, as Broadway jazz dancing is almost always heavily choreographed and requires a great deal of practice to be proficient at it.

Some of the earliest choreographers who made the style famous were Bob Fosse, Jack Cole, Gus Giordano, and Eugene Louis Faccuito. Their techniques all revolved around creating dances which would entrance an audience, focusing on moves that would be difficult or impossible for the average audience member to perform themselves. It was also due to this need for highly trained professionals that being a dancer as a career started to become viable, although it would often be a short-lived career due to the high physical demand of the job.

The style of choreographed dance eventually found its way into movies, with several films helping to popularise the fashion in American culture, such as Kismet, released in 1944, and Gilda, released in 1946. These films helped introduce several places in the United States to dancing when these places might otherwise not have been exposed to it at all, particularly more rural areas that did not have musical theatres but did have cinemas. Although political statements were often made through films, one thing that musical films very often shared, was that they were apolitical, not attempting to convey a particular message regarding politics. However, this has changed somewhat over the years, as many more modern films have decided to include political messages, particularly relating to the empowerment of women.