The Gold Diggers (1919 play)

The Gold Diggers is a play written by Avery Hopwood. It popularized the use of the term "gold digger" to refer to hypergamistic women who seek wealthy partners, as opposed to the earlier usage referring to gold miners. Producer David Belasco staged it on Broadway in 1919, with Ina Claire in the lead role. It was a hit, running for two consecutive seasons before going on tour.

The Gold Diggers
Broadway program
Written byAvery Hopwood
Date premieredSeptember 30, 1919 (1919-09-30)
Place premieredLyceum Theatre
Original languageEnglish
GenreFarce

Plot

Stephen Lee is a wealthy man who is convinced that the chorus girl engaged to his nephew is a "gold digger", who only wants his nephew's money. Lee asks Jerry Lamar, another chorus girl he knows, to convince his nephew to break off the engagement. Instead she tries to convince Lee that not all chorus girls are out for money. Unfortunately for her effort, several of her friends demonstrate that they are as money-hungry as Lee fears.

Annoyed by Lee's comments, Lamar decides to show him up by getting him drunk and tricking him into proposing to her. Her scheme proves harmless when it turns out that she and Lee really are in love.

Productions

The play's Broadway opening was at the Lyceum Theatre on September 30, 1919. It ran on Broadway until June 1921, with 720 performances. It then went on tour across the United States until 1923. In this time the play earned over $1.9 million.[1][2]

The characters and cast from the Broadway production are given below:

Black and white portrait photo of Ina Claire.
Ina Claire starred as Jerry Lamar in the Broadway production.
Black and white portrait photo of Bruce McRae.
Bruce McRae played Stephen Lee in the Broadway production.
Character Broadway cast[3]
Jerry LamarIna Claire
Wally SaundersHorace Braham
SadieLouise Burton
Gypsy MontroseGladys Feldman
Mrs. LamarLouise Galloway
Eleanor MontgomeryLuella Gear
Tom NewtonWilliam Goodridge
Mabel MunroeJobyna Howland
Cissie GrayLoraine Lally
Freddie TurnerDay Manson
Stephen LeeBruce McRae
Marty WoodsArthur Miles
James BlakeH. Reeves-Smith
Fenton JessupA.E. Scott
Trixie AndrewsLilyan Tashman
Topsy St. JohnRuth Terry
Barney BarnettFrederick Truesdell
Dolly BaxterKatharine Walsh
Violet DayneBeverly West

Reception and legacy

Reviews for the play were mixed.[4] In The New York Times, Alexander Woollcott said it was "screamingly funny at times and rather dull at others".[5] A critic for The Drama called it "vulgar and immoral" and said it gave the wrong impression of chorus girls.[6]

The opinions of reviewers did not stop the play from being a hit. One result of its long run was that after other plays he had written opened in 1920, Hopwood eventually had four shows running on Broadway simultaneously.[4] The play and the string of movies it inspired also helped to popularize the use of the term "gold digger" to refer to acquisitive women, a usage that Hopwood did not invent but which was relatively new at the time.[7][8] Hopwood's usage of the term was rare enough in 1919 that Belasco's production assistants worried that the play would be mistaken for a story about mining, but within a few years the new usage was widespread.[9]

Adaptations

The play was adapted as a film four times:

Gold Diggers of 1933 spawned multiple sequels that were not directly based on Hopwood's play: Gold Diggers of 1935, Gold Diggers of 1937, and Gold Diggers in Paris.

References
  1. Gelsey, Erwin; Seymour, James (1980). Hove, Arthur (ed.). Gold Diggers of 1933. Madison, Wisconsin: Univ of Wisconsin Press. p. 23. ISBN 0-299-08084-6.
  2. Timberlake, Craig (1954). The Bishop of Broadway: The Life & Work of David Belasco. New York: Library Publishers. p. 456.
  3. Unless otherwise cited, all cast info is from "The Gold Diggers". Internet Broadway Database. Retrieved May 1, 2014.
  4. Bader, Arno L. (Autumn 1959). "Avery Hopwood, Dramatist". Michigan Alumnus Quarterly Review: A Journal of University Perspectives. 66 (10): 65–66.
  5. Woollcott, Alexander (October 1, 1919). "Mr. Belasco's Season Begins" (PDF). The New York Times. Retrieved May 1, 2014.
  6. Sloan, J. Vandervoort (October–November 1921). "The Loop Has a Thousand Eyes". The Drama. 12 (1): 24.
  7. Sharrar, Jack F. (1998) [1989]. Avery Hopwood: His Life and Plays. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press. p. 218. ISBN 0-472-10963-4.
  8. Slavens, Clarence R. (2006). "Gold-diggers". In Ditmore, Melissa Hope (ed.). Encyclopedia of Prostitution and Sex Work. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. pp. 187–188. ISBN 978-0-313-32968-5.
  9. Donovan, Brian L. (April 2017). "Alimony Panic, Gold Diggers, and the Cultural Foundations of Early Twentieth-century Marriage Reform in the United States". Journal of Family History. 42 (2): 111–127. doi:10.1177/0363199017694602. S2CID 151625383.
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