Sadly, my reason is quite shallow. The clothes! Come on, I had a body built for the 50's, and I loved the style back then. I still long for a pair of saddle shoes, and that prom dress Sandy wore in Grease. I guess the dancing would be a good reason too--I'm not much of a bump and grind kind of girl. It makes me feel awkward, even with my boyfriend. I much prefer steps with footwork and I used to love, love, love swing. Now I'm more into ballroom, but I still think that fits the 50's better than it fits now. And have you seen the competition dresses for ballroom dance in the 50's? Holy fluffy dresses! I found some youtube videos of old school ballroom competitions, and I'd have to say they are probably some of the coolest things I've seen in awhile and must share:
Edit: Somehow I knew I should have saved those links...ugh. I'll fix it later. Technical difficulties, folks!
This is a 1959 video of the paso doble. Look at the dresses! They are fabulous and I wish they were still in style for ballroom. Here's a video from 2008 for comparison:
And just to have fun, here's some standard, too:
So now that you've seen the Viennese Waltz in 1939 (with commentary in German :P), here it is in 2008!
Looks...pretty similar. Then again, I think standard is mostly people living out their fantasy of being Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire (which there is nothing wrong with, by the way) so I wouldn't really expect much else :)
Costumes now = more scandalous. And more fringeful, which I don't really get, but oh well. And for the record, I have a very hard time taking paso seriously when it's danced by someone in a pink fringed dress. It just doesn't work for me at all.
Well, I totally went on a tangent from why I would want to live in 1955, but oh well. I think spiffy past and present ballroom videos is much more interesting than my other reason (I'd want to actually take part in the feminist movement). It may be shallow, but really--who can resist those fluffy dresses?
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