How did Planche feel about the dominant sorts of burlesque written in his time?
At the time Planche first began to write, burlesques in England usually emphasized broad comedy, elements of farce, spectacle (especially processions), and elaborate costumes (which often did not reflect the same esthetics as one another). At their best, they could be wildly funny, but at their worst, they interpolated all manner of variety entertainments which were not really part of the plot, and came to be almost incoherent as plays. They were “shows,” in the widest sense, but sometimes had little to commend them as comic theater, such as Planche wanted to create. Later in his career, burlesques usually embodied more continuity of story, but they also took a new turn Planche disliked. Increasingly, puns and word play were in vogue, and dialog came to be an excercise in ingenious (and sometimes tortuous) verbal shenanigans. Verisimilitude of dialog was often sacrificed for a barrage of one-liners. Costume, generally, was esthetically consistent, but came to be very revealing, especia
