Tracy Lane, 2026.
Released into the public domain.

The Shadow Theatre

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August, 1967:

It was a night of shadows and flickering light, the television humming softly in the corner. Another listless evening in with my folks watching some ancient Hollywood musical, a tale of "The Olden Days," when trains ran on steam and streets bustled with carriages; no different from a dozen others I'd seen over the past year or two. Or so I thought, at least at the beginning.

I dozed through the first half hour, unable to follow the dialogue. It was half past bedtime and the Movie Of The Week didn't seem seem terribly exciting. My eyelids fluttered open in response to an errant snatch of dialogue, a burst of laughter, a clash of cymbals. What were they saying - something about... burlesque? That was a word I knew, one which always caught my attention. I shifted position on the sofa, gradually catching up with the story. The hayseed protagonist — an archetype country bumpkin lost in The Big City — had found himself in a Chicago hotspot surrounded by a troupe of beautiful chorus girls...

I sat up on the divan, fully awake for the first time that evening, attention fixed on the screen.

The dancers, the costumes, the sheer extravagance — it was a secret glimpse into a world of glamour and possibility. Something new was approaching, something bright and wonderful that was more than 'trivial' entertainment. I was six, maybe seven, little more than an infant by most standards, yet I felt a growing sense of premonition, an unexpected thrill of anticipation. I couldn't have put a name to such complex emotions, but perhaps that's the true enchantment of childhood.

The nightclub sequence began with a line of chorus girls stepping onto the stage, their ruffled skirts swaying in unison. Bonnets bobbed, skirts rustled like paper lanterns, filling the screen with glamour and rhythm and sweet, mischievous joy. Something in that moment imprinted itself on me — a secret recognition that this was a world beyond the boundaries of everyday life.

They started out with a game of jump-rope, nothing out of the ordinary, something I should have recognized from a hundred playground mornings. Only...this wasn't quite the same: these were grown women dressed as little girls, and that made all the difference. They skipped and sang under the glowing stage lamps, their voices rising like bubbles in a glass of soda, effervescent, impossible to catch. I recall leaning closer, heart quickening, as though a very great secret was about to be revealed.

And then it happened — the lead singer reached up and removed her bonnet. A common enough gesture, one might think, but a moment of utter scandal by the standards of the day. The other girls gasped, their eyes wide as beacons, ("Oh, no Janey - taking off your SUNBONNET in public!").

Next, she removed her sash, draping it neatly over the jump-rope "clothesline" with an air of casual seduction that must've driven the audience crazy. This was followed by an amazingly frilly pink apron ("No, no, Janey, that's SO naughty!") and when she began unfastening the back of her dress, I knew my premonition had been correct.

"Janey" wasn't just naughty. She was downright wicked!

The actress was probably wearing a standard cabaret outfit underneath her stage-smock, but I interpreted it as lacy white underwear. After all, that was what pretty young girls wore underneath as far as I knew at that time. I watched in muted fascination, trying to record each second of the performance, memorize the words they were singing...something like...come play with me?

Now almost completely disrobed, Janey continued the number accompanied by her ensemble, concluding the jump-rope game in her garters and stockings. I glanced quizzically at my parents, attempting to gauge their expressions. A vague smile curved Daddy's lips as if he'd seen it all before (and wouldn't mind seeing it all again), Mommy shook her head in mild disapproval — most probably for Daddy's benefit.

For the grown‑ups, it was just comedy, a wink at propriety, a striptease disguised as humor. To me, it was something else entirely. I thought of heavy cloth and summer heat, of how impossible it must be to skip rope in all those layers. Of course she had to undress — it was practical, logical, the only way to keep playing. I hadn't understood everything I'd seen, but my imagination filled in most of the details. It made sense that she'd strip down to her bare knickers...but there was also a touch of mischief hidden within the act, something sweet and lush and indescribably feminine. That much was obvious to me, even at the tender age of six.

The chorus girls had started spinning like tops, twirling so fast their skirts seemed ready to fly away. Petticoats, thighs and stocking-tops went on proud display, the audience cheered, and I leaned closer to the screen, knowing I was watching something forbidden and marvelous. At the same time, it looked fun and exciting, and I immediately imagined myself in the same position — singing and dancing in my underwear before a live audience in The Olden Days

Which was exactly what I planned to do.
Starting the very next morning.

October, 1967:

The house was still, the windows dark, the world outside hushed in its slumber. The weather was turning cool with the promise of an early winter. I rose every morning before the first light, padding softly across the floor, carrying with me the secret of the night. The Rumpus room in the basement had become my theatre, the silence my orchestra, the shadows my audience.

There, in the half‑light, I replayed the number I had seen on the screen. But I did not stop at imitation — I embroidered it, stitched new wonders into its seams. A cancan before the jump‑rope, because it was right for the era (and anyway, why not?), a burst of wild legs and laughter to set the stage. And when the rope had spun and the song was sung, I would bow in my underwear before an audience only I could see. They rose to their feet, clapping, cheering, a standing ovation that echoed in the chambers of my imagination.

It was scandalous, yes — my cheeks burned even in solitude, knowing how mortified I would be if anyone walked in. Yet it was thrilling too, filling my veins with a sweet, liquid fire, warming me in the dawn.

But sometimes, the theatre was too heavy with its own silence, too bright with its own secrets. To ease the weight, I invented stories — little plays within the play — that explained why I had to perform...

In one, the school had chosen me for the lead role, and there was no escape. The curtain would rise, the rope would turn, and I would have to sing and dance and flash my knickers, because duty demanded it. In another, my family was drowning in debt, and the only way to save them was to join a nightclub chorus, my stockings and garters transformed into sacrifice. Or else I was lost in The Big City, pockets empty, and the only job offered was as a chorus girl, reluctant but resigned.

These stories were elaborate, embroidered with necessity. They made sense to me. They turned scandal into obligation, embarrassment into duty. And in that strange alchemy, I found relief.

In one of my 'darker' fantasies, I wasn't embarrassed to be caught — I was paradoxically delighted. I frequently imagined an unnamed adult - rich, charming and charismatic - walking in on my rehearsal, asking me to show him the whole routine. I started again from the beginning, changing back into my girlie-girl smock and performing each section. When I finished, he told me I was good enough to dance professionally and arranged for me to appear on a real stage downtown. In this particular scenario, I wasn't hiding — I was radiant, revealing my undies to all and sundry, convinced that this was what it meant to be beautiful and "sexy."

February, 1974.

As the years passed, the Shadow Theatre didn't fade — it grew. What had once been furtive whispers in the dawn became sketches on paper, lines of dialogue scrawled in notebooks, whole worlds spun from pencil and ink. I drew the chorus girls, the jump‑rope, the chandeliers, the imagined burlesque houses that never existed in our quiet suburb. Each drawing was a doorway back into that childhood magic, each story a way of keeping the flame alive.

I practiced. I studied. I learned. My first crude fumblings improved. I poured through magazines looking for reference materials; photos, illustrations, cartoons, anything that reminded me of that long-ago Movie Of The Week. There was precious little to be found anywhere, it was as though the film had been erased from the back pages of history. I sometimes doubted my own recollections. Perhaps it had never existed beyond the daydreams of a six year-old.

Well, no matter. I still had my artwork, my stories, my vibrant, technicolor imagination. My progress was slow, very slow in at times, but it was progress all the same. I was already graduating from pencil to ink, from from ballpoint to keyboard. My time would come soon enough. The lobby cards, the posters, the musicals I had only envisioned would be conjured into being. I would step into them, live inside the fantasy I had carried for so long. The Shadow Theatre would became a gallery, a stage, a world entire unto itself.

When that time finally came, it would no longer a guilty pleasure hidden in the half‑light. It would be creation, celebration, vindication. A reclaiming of visions that I'd concealed so long in the deep silence. And most importantly, above any other possible consideration...

Janey would live again.

May, 2026.

Looking back, I see a tapestry woven from light and shadow. A child before a flickering screen, entranced by a troupe of chorus girls with a jump‑rope. A secret performer rising before dawn, inventing routines in the dawntide. A dreamer who built elaborate stories of obligation, who longed for applause, who sketched and wrote and, later, conjured alternate realities with machines that could dream alongside her.

What began as scandal in the half‑light became art in the daylight. The shame that once burned its mark into my soul has softened into the warm glow of acceptance. Those fantasies — whether of duty, of validation, or of radiant exposure — were rehearsals for identity, small plays in which I tried on selves I could not yet name.

Now, with images and words, I can honor them. I can place the chorus girls on the page, hang the lobby cards in my gallery, and let the Shadow Theatre breathe again. It is no longer hidden, no longer taboo. It is part of me, part of the strange and beautiful mystique of childhood, when ordinary things — jump‑ropes, bonnets, stockings — could open doors to extraordinary worlds.

And with these parting words, I leave the stage to more capable hands. She'll be here soon, striding confidently beneath the floodlamps as befits a star of her mythic stature. Perhaps she'll enter from the wings, as bright and beautiful as the first time I saw her almost sixty years ago. Perhaps she'll arrive at center stage, filling the limelight with her irresistible presence. However she returns, it will not be in secrecy, but in celebration — applauded by an audience of memory, standing ovation guaranteed.

Postcript: I'd like to write a series of vignettes describing "Janey's" various performances in the Shadow Theatre. Leave a message if you find any of the scenarios described above particularly appealing.

Tracy, author.