Musical Hairspray Analysis

Historical and Cultural context of the Musical Hairspray

The Buddy Dean Show which was a teen dance show in Baltimore is memorialized in the musical and film by John Waters, Hairspray. The plot of this story revolves around an attempt in which teens from both backgrounds in Baltimore integrate successfully in a teen dance show called The Corny Collins show. There was a massive cultural revolution in musical taste in the ‘50s and ‘60s that was signalled by teens from the big band sound of rock and roll in the ‘40s this was because of the uplifting popularity of teen dance shows which signalled this shift in teens. This is important because teen dance shows introduced black music, singers and even musicians; it became popular within an increasingly
However, not all African Americans were able to vote due to them being required to take a literacy tests, pass poll taxes and residency requirements before they could vote. This is still not a total submission of free to vote in terms of democracy between white and black people. Having diminishing rights than the usual normal person which also made them less fortunate and a harder task to accomplish, many African Americans were unable to achieve these tasks as anticipated. The white population controlled how the social institutions and politics system lead the society; this ultimately made the African Americans lives pretty much impossible in terms of living to their full potential. This is evident in Hairspray because it clearly is influenced in the musical as a similar role played out in the Corny Collins Show. The whites in the show only accepted African Americans to dance once a month, all whilst acting as if they were pleased and happy for their appearance on the show.
The Musical Hairspray is also influenced by events from both the ‘80s and ‘90s along with the first few years of the 21st century. In addition, the focus in Hairspray is not only the mistreatment and lack of equality for
1997 - Tiger woods, an important player that influenced hairspray by winning the Masters title as an African American human being recognised on television. The characters in Hairspray are thriving for this same independence for their family and friends.
1998 - Hairspray was originally adapted from a 1988 John Waters musical, following the trend of some other Broadway musicals for example Footloose, The Producers and Saturday Night Fever that were also adapted from movies. During the development of creating the musical, many occurrences reflecting racist remarks were happening in this time. One of the most headlined incidents in 1998 would be James Byrd Jr. an African American whom was dragged behind a pickup truck leaving him dead.
2001 - During this year the Cincinnati Riot arose due to the shooting of Timothy Thomas whom was an African American man, followed by many more major events happening because of the hate crime against race, destroying thousands of people’s lives. This links in with Hairspray because the characters want to stop hate crime incidence occurring because of the colour of their