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Legomania is a specialty
dance done as a limited eccentric
type of dancing. It is often times known as Rubberlegs
or Rubberlegging.
Legomania also became a trademark
of male and female impersonators who would perform a variety
of 'High Kicks'. Male impersonator such as Alberta Whitman
of the Whitman Sisters,
and female impersonators Julian Eltinge and Julian Costello.
Henry
"Rubberlegs" Williams used a variety in his
acts. He combined eccentric dancing
with high Kicks, wiggles and shimmies
along with the Camel Walk,
The Grind, the Boogie
Woogie, The Strut, Truckin'
etc. Many Chorus lines of the day would also used the style
of Williams. |
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Russian / Hungarian dancing was popular in the States especially
in American Vaudeville as early as 1900, but Ida
Forsyne brought it to the forefront up until Tap
dancers started to control the stages. Ida Forsyne, Greenlee
and Drayton, U.S.
Thompson, Willie
Covan, Dewey Weinglass and others would excell in these
qoute "Russian Dances," often times calling it Legomania
and sometimes a mixture these and other dances were called
Eccentric dancing
after WWI (see below).
In America, the Russian
dance was usually performed with what is called 'Kazotskys',
where the dancer squats down, crosses their arms across their
chest and kicks their legs out alternately while in this squatted
position. Altho this was an allready prior established Hungarian
dance called Czardas
and it was not and is not Russian, most Americans would not
know the difference and still today see it as Russian dancing.
Ida Forsyne was one of the first American woman to do
these 'Kazotsky's' at the end of her Vaudeville performance
in her Moscow program. These "Kazotsky's where done long
before her but after this one performance, and her improvisations
of it, she would be hailed (incorrectly) as the greatest
Russian dancer of all time. For about 15 years this style
Ida started would be done by many dancers on the American
Vaudeville and Broadway stages from 1911 to 1925. |
Ballrooms