Behind the Burly Q

The documentary tells the history of burlesque. The account starts with variety shows that came out of vaudeville. It then follows the form’s decline and its reappearance years later. The film moves through old photographs, film clips and advertisements of the time. Interviews with people who worked on those stages make up the spine of the account. Arguments about morality and legal pressure are inside the story as well. Leslie Zemeckis treats the work as a profession rather than as something to gawp at. The ninety seven minutes are spread over more than a century. The account makes the women on those stages the ones who speak rather than the thing spoken about. Leslie Zemeckis’s American documentary was completed in 2010.