VAUDEVILLE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Vaudeville

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/vˈɑdvɪl/ Listen

noun

Vaudeville n. (Written also vaudevil)

A kind of song of a lively character, frequently embodying a satire on some person or event, sung to a familiar air in couplets with a refrain; a street song; a topical song.

A theatrical piece, usually a comedy, the dialogue of which is intermingled with light or satirical songs, set to familiar airs. "The early vaudeville, which is the forerunner of the opera bouffe, was light, graceful, and piquant."

A variety show when performed live in a theater (see above); as, to play in vaudeville; a vaudeville actor.

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Etymology of 'Vaudeville'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Vaudeville" Quotes from Famous Books

... renders it rather commonplace and meagre. Unfortunately, among many of our young people, the Bible seems to be a book to be avoided or to be treated in a rather "jocose" manner. To raise a laugh on the vaudeville stage, a Biblical quotation has only to be produced, and the weary comedian, when he is at a loss to get a witty speech across the footlights, is almost sure to speak of Jonah ...

— Confessions of a Book-Lover • Maurice Francis Egan

... Claribel went again to the wise chemist and signed a check for another box of magic bonbons; but she must have taken better care of these, for she is now a famous vaudeville actress. ...

— American Fairy Tales • L. Frank Baum

... thing is done less artistically every day upon the vaudeville stage. We love to recognize types; and what Browning ...

— Are You A Bromide? • Gelett Burgess

... Reveil, backed up by Martainville, the only one among his associates who stood by him without an afterthought. Martainville was not in the secret of certain understandings made and ratified amid after-dinner jokes, or at Dauriat's in the Wooden Galleries, or behind the scenes at the Vaudeville, when journalists of either side ...

— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac

... it is common honesty, mighty truth, a cardinal and beautiful teaching of Jesus Christ to deny one's self for the welfare of the weaker brother. Let one go to hear Mansfield in Shakespeare, and his neighbor boy will take his friend and go to the vaudeville, and his only excuse to his parents and to his half-taught mind and heart will be, "Well, Mr. So-and-So goes to the theater, he is a member of the Church and superintendent of the Sunday-school; surely there is no harm for me ...

— Questionable Amusements and Worthy Substitutes • J. M. Judy

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