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{{Short description|Idiom}}
[[File:BroadwayMelodyy1929.jpg|thumb|Poster advertising the 1929 film ''[[The Broadway Melody]]'', from which the idiom is derived]]

'''All singing, all dancing''' is an [[idiom]] meaning "full of vitality", or, more recently, "full-featured".<ref name=Proverbs>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=i2wKEQAAQBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PA104|title=English Proverbs: A Journey Through Timeless Wisdom|first=David|last=Yao|year=2004|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> It originated with advertisements for the 1929 musical film ''[[The Broadway Melody]]'', which proclaimed the film to be "All talking all singing all dancing".<ref name=Proverbs /><ref name=martin/><ref>{{cite book |last1=MacDonald |first1=Laurence E. |title=The Invisible Art of Film Music: A Comprehensive History |date=1998 |publisher=Scarecrow Press |isbn=9781461673040 |pages=19–20 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=clPmzY4YNNYC&dq=%22all+singing+all+dancing%22+broadway+melody&pg=PT36 |accessdate=24 August 2020}}</ref>

The term actually predates talking films; it was used in 1895 to describe [[balladry]] as "primitive poetry."<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=d88_AQAAMAAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=RA1-PA49|page=49|title=Studies and Notes in Philology and Literature|volume=4-5|year=1895|publisher=Harvard University |access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

==20th century usage==
In the height of the 20th century, from 1930 to about 1990, the idiom referred principally to entertainment such as films, musical performances, musicals, early video games, mazes, fictional books, and the like.{{cn|date=October 2025}}

===Musical theatre and films as escapism===

So ubiquitous was the phrase used to describe the [[Broadway musical]] itself that it became the title of [[theatrical agent]] John Springer's 256-page, hardcover opus on the genre, ''All Talking All Singing All Dancing''.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1309809.All_Talking_All_Singing_All_Dancing|first=John |last=Springer|title=All Talking All Singing All Dancing|year=1966|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YQ0pAAAAIBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22&pg=PA50&article_id=7146,6792040|work=Deseret News| date=December 25, 1972|title=Kelly Back in Movies|first=Dan|last=Lewis|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> Film musicals are all about "All Singing! All Dancing! All Broadway!"<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theatermania.com/news/all-singing-all-dancing-all-broadway_2395/|work=Theatre Mania|title=Theater News All Singing! All Dancing! All Broadway!: An appreciation of the ten best Hollywood film versions of Broadway musicals.|date=August 7, 2002|access-date=November 30, 2024}}</ref>

Two retrospective films that covered the [[Classical Hollywood cinema]] of 1930s to the 1950s, ''[[That's Entertainment!]]'' and its sequel ''[[That's Entertainment, Part II]]'', were described in 1976 as "all singing, all dancing, all celebrating life," with the focus on "the very epitome of ‘escapist entertainment’ shunning real-life problems, social awareness, you name it."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=k5cuAAAAIBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22&pg=PA39&article_id=4274,1168211|title=That's Entertainment, that's Cannes|work=Montreal Gazette|page=39|date=June 5, 1976|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> Shown in theaters during the [[1973–1975 recession]], the first installment was marketed with the tag line, "Boy. Do we need it now," which emphasized the psychological need for [[escapism]] that watching nothing but singing and dancing affords, instead of worrying about [[stagflation]], the [[Vietnam War]], and other social problems. That was true from 1929, when the phrase came into popular consciousness: the front page of an article promising an early "all-talking, all-singing, all-dancing film" covered the horrific carnage of the [[Cleveland Clinic fire of 1929]].<ref>{{cite news|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VQo_AAAAIBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22&pg=PA22&article_id=4410,4062446|title=Fox Follies will be seen in Detroit|date=May 15, 1929|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

[[File:Unemployed men queued outside a depression soup kitchen opened in Chicago by Al Capone, 02-1931 - NARA - 541927.jpg|thumb|Unemployed men in 1931. The [[Great Depression]] profoundly influenced [[pre-Code Hollywood]] both financially and artistically.]]

By 1930, this genre of films and musicals was described as a bad [[fad]], derided as "meaningless melanges of technicolored chorus girls and mechanical oop-a-dooping with such appalling frequency since the 'Broadway Medody' … a protracted orgy of all-singing, all-dancing, all-colored monstrosities."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5OBbAAAAIBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22&pg=PA6&article_id=3056,25475|title=The Moving Picture Album: All Singing, All-Dancing|first=Robert E. |last=Shereood|work=St. Joseph Gazette|date=March 30, 1930|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> There was a "glutting [of] the market" by 1930, but by then, the phase was used to describe films that were ''not'' musicals.<ref name=First>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Rg-UBJaPD-sC&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PR9|page=xx|title=The First Hollywood Musicals: A Critical Filmography of 171 Features, 1927 through 1932|first=Edwin M.|last=Bradley|isbn=9780786420292|publisher=McFarland|year=2004|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> In fact, 1930 was the Dawn of the Decade of Escapism: [[Alan Brinkley]], author of ''Culture and Politics in the Great Depression'', presents how escapism became the new trend for dealing with the hardships created by [[Great Depression|the stock market crash in 1929]]: magazines, radio and movies, all were aimed to help people mentally escape from the mass poverty and economic downturn. This was a piece with [[escapist fiction]], which metaphorically is dancing and singing set to words; readers turned to escapist fiction as it provided them a mental escape from the bleakness of the economy during that period of time.<ref>{{cite web|last=Cappello|first=M.|year=2017|url=https://daily.jstor.org/how-we-escape-it-an-essay/|title= How We Escape It: An Essay, in JSTOR Daily.|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

===Plot, characters, and themes===
While serious drama, or even comedy, should have plot and [[characterization]], the whole point to an "all dancing, all singing [[extravaganza]]" was that such a "revue leaves little room for plot."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AgwqAAAAIBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22&pg=PA25&article_id=3078,1039980|title=Super revue leaves little room for plot: It's full of feathers, sequins, music, dancing|work=The News-Ledger|first=John|last=Wirt|date=April 3, 1992|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> Even without plot or development, "singing, dancing extravaganza" can still make room for a wholesome [[Theme (narrative)|theme]], such as "doing things for other is what [[Christmas]] is all about."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZLA_AAAAIBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22&pg=PA22&article_id=4213,2435047|title=Every parent knows that children's fascination for dinosaurs seems almost inexhaustible (advertisement for Barney)|work=The Robesonian |date=December 6, 1996|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> In fact, when it first appeared, ''[[Godspell (film)|Godspell]]'' was described as an "all-singing, all-dancing retelling of the Gospel according to St. Matthew."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_hMyAAAAIBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22&pg=PA21&article_id=2836,715985|title=Godspell: Musical Gospel|first=Dane|last=Langken|work=Montreal Gazette|date=May 18, 1973|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

==Late 20th and early 21st century uses==

Starting in the mid-1990s, and continuing for the next three decades, the idiom also has come to be used to describe [[high tech]] gadgetry such as [[smartphone]]s, indicating that the product is very advanced, ambitious, or has an abundance of features.<ref name=Proverbs /><ref name=Oxford>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1n__mWpluMsC&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PA106|page=106|title=English Idioms in Use: Advanced with Answers|first1=Felicity |last1=O'Dell|first2= Michael|last2=McCarthy |year= 2010|publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-74429-4 |access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LyvsDwAAQBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PT146|title=Oxford Dictionary of Idioms|first=John |last=Ayto|year=2020|isbn=9780192584380|publisher=OUP Oxford |access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

===Extension of meanings===

While originally from [[show business]], such as theatre, stage shows, and movies, by extension to technology,<ref name=Oxford/> the phrase has been recently "most often applied to some computer wizardry that seems to do everything."<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BfY47TgrbiMC&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PT10|title=Why is Q Always Followed by U?: Word-Perfect Answers to the Most-Asked Questions About Language|first=Michael |last=Quinion |year=2009|publisher=Penguin Books|isbn=9780141959696|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

For example, from a 1995 article in ''[[The Daily Telegraph]]'':<ref name=martin>{{cite web
| last = Martin
| first = Gary
| title = All singing, all dancing
| work = The Phrase Finder
| url = http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/28200.html
| accessdate = 2009-09-12}}</ref>

{{quote|"Satellites as small as a box of cornflakes can be launched at little cost by riding [[Piggyback (transportation)|piggyback]] with larger satellites. A handful of these '[[miniaturized satellites|microsatellite]]s' would be used instead of a single all-singing all-dancing 'platform' bristling with instruments."}}

The phrase also appears in the 1996 novel [[Fight Club (novel)|''Fight Club'']], and the 1999 [[Fight Club|film]] based on it, in which the character [[Fight Club (novel)#Tyler Durden|Tyler Durden]] excoriates his disciples: "You're the all singing, all dancing crap of the world."<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jqapAgAAQBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PA147|title=Fight Club|editor=Thomas E. Wartenberg|page =147|publisher=Routledge|year=2013|isbn=9781136665639|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YbTeDwAAQBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PA32|title=Film Directors and Emotion: An Affective Turn in Contemporary American Cinema|first1=Darragh |last1=Greene|first2=Graham |last2=Price|publisher=McFarlabd, Inc.|year=2020|isbn=9781476640082|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

A 1998 episode of ''[[The Simpsons]]'' was titled "[[All Singing, All Dancing]]".<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-S4rDwAAQBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PA241|page=240|title=Music, Sound, and Silence in Buffy the Vampire Slayer|first=Janet K.|last=Halfyard |year=2017|isbn=9781351557023|access-date=November 29, 2024}} The author called this episode "flaunted fakery".</ref>

By 1999, the phrase was called "hackneyed" and "clichéd", and even extended by meaning to many machines, such as cars,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vp7voujROB4C&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PA5|title=Cliches: Over 1500 Phrases Explored and Explained|page=5|first1=Betty |last1=Kirkpatrick|first2=Elizabeth |last2=McLaren Kirkpatrick |year=1999|isbn=9780312198442 |publisher=St Martin |access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> in 2007, "Used jokingly to describe any piece of equipment or technology that is the latest model," but for [[autistic]] readers, not to be taken literally,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7PsPBQAAQBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PA16|title=An Asperger Dictionary of Everyday Expressions|page=16|first=Ian |last=Stuart-Hamilton|year=2007|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> and by 2010 to "an advanced computer or other gadget."<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=J4i3zV4vnBAC&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22+-wikipedia&pg=PA12|page=12|title=Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=9780199547937|year=2010|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

===Continued musical use===

Meanwhile, the idiom has continued to mean mindless musical merriment on [[Broadway theatre|Broadway]], such as [[Tommy Tune|Tommy Tune's]] [[White tie]] and tales show, "All singing, all dancing [[Big Band]] show” of 2002, which was consciously produced with temporarily erasing the [[9/11 terrorist attacks]] from the minds of the audience.<ref>{{cite news|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=jL9eAAAAIBAJ&dq=%22All+singing%2C+all+dancing%22&pg=PA27&article_id=4083,3471408 |title=Tune thinks it's ''S'wonderful'' to be back in New York|agency=[[Associated Press]]|first=Mark|last=Kennedy|date=December 27, 2002|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> This was extended to [[Off-off-Broadway]] and [[marijuana legalization]], when [[La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club|La MaMa]] produced a musical described as "All Singing! All Dancing! All Legal! Cannabis!"<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Sunday-Morning-Michael-Dale-All-Singing-All-Dancing-All-Legal-Cannabis-A-Viper-Vaudeville-Opens-at-La-MaMa-20220724|title=Sunday Morning Michael Dale: All Singing! All Dancing! All Legal! Cannabis! A Viper Vaudeville Opens at La MaMa|work=Broadway World| first=Michael |last=Dale|date=July 24, 2022|access-date=November 30, 2024}} ''[[Cannabis sativa]]'' is the scientific name.</ref> The connections between "all-singing, all-dancing" and gay relationships is now explicit on ''[[Glee (TV series)|Glee]]''.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.the-independent.com/hei-fi/entertainment/get-ready-to-singalonga-teenage-sex-education-6259761.html|title=Get ready to singalong-a teenage sex education|first=Adam |last=Sherwin|date=November 10, 2011|quote=Things are getting serious for the all-singing, all-dancing school kids in Glee. A controversial episode featuring a straight and a gay couple each losing their virginity has been praised for its mature attitude towards adolescent sexuality.|access-date=November 30, 2024}}</ref>

[[Bollywood]] has become the 21st century headquarters of all-singing, all dancing, which ''[[The Guardian]]'', in reviewing a typical "turkey", wrote that they are:
{{quote|fantastically awful. It's a product of a Bollywood machine that assumes that Indians have a subnormal intelligence and will watch anything. About 80% of all films made here are complete flops. The industry churns out a dizzying number of films, hoping that one will become the blockbuster that makes up for the rest.|Bollywood nights: An all-singing, all-dancing, counter terrorism turkey<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/film/2008/aug/05/bollywood|title=Bollywood nights: An all-singing, all-dancing, counter terrorism turkey: This week our man in Mumbai watches a movie that mixes love, dance, fabulous hair and issues of homeland security|first=Nirpal |last=Dhaliwal|work=The Guardian|date=August 6, 2008|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>}}

[[File:Alam Ara poster, 1931.jpg|thumb|right|Theatrical release poster for [[Alam Ara]]]]

This really carries on an almost century of tradition, since Mumbai-based cinema industry has been from the very beginning in 1931 a center of musical dance number movies: the [[lost film]], ''[[Alam Ara]]'', directed by [[Ardeshir Irani]], "was advertised as ‘All talking, all singing, all dancing’."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bfi.org.uk/lists/10-great-bollywood-musicals|work=British Film Institute |title=10 great Bollywood musicals: Our 10-film tasting menu of some of the most spectacular musicals to come out of India.|date=November 7, 2019|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref> A documentary has explored extensively this history of Indian all-dancing and all-singing film-making.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.kingstonlibrary.org/event/bollywood-documentary/|title=Shalom Bollywood (Documentary Screening)|website=The Kingston Library|quote=A celebration of the all-singing, all-dancing history of Indian cinema, SHALOM BOLLYWOOD reveals the unlikely story of the 2000 year old Indian Jewish community and its formative place in shaping the world’s largest film industry.|access-date=November 29, 2024}}</ref>

==See also==
*{{wiktionary-inline}}
* [[Bread and circuses]]
* [[Language change]]
* [[Metalepsis]]
* [[Metaphor]]
* [[Simile]]

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:English-language idioms]]

All singing, all dancing - Revision history

TrinaAshby9096: Stub