Ziegfeld

When Florenz Ziegfeld started in theatre, it was flea circus and sideshow rolled into one. When he left, the glamorous world of 'show-biz' had been created. From the muscle man "Sandow", to the songbird "Anna Held", Ziegfeld learned that a big star filled seats and he hired them all for his "Follies" - Marilyn Miller, Will Rogers, Bert Williams, Eddie Cantor and Fanny Brice among them. A man of voracious sexual appetites, Ziegfeld's ardour created the Ziegfeld Girl. Head-dressed and bejewelled, they wore little more than a smile when gliding down the steps of the most eye-popping evenings theatregoers had ever seen. His power, though, went beyond the Follies as he produced a number of landmark shows, including Kern and Hammerstein's seminal "Showboat." In "Ziegfeld", Mordden recreates the lost world of the "Follies", a place filled with a glamour that no longer exists, masterminded by one of the most inventive and exacting men ever to fill a Broadway stage: Florenz Ziegfeld.