The musical that David Bowie pilfered from “throughout the ’70s”
“I suppose for me as an artist, it wasn’t always just about expressing my work. I really wanted, more than anything else, to contribute in some way to the culture I was living in,” David Bowie once said.
Echoing another sentiment once uttered by a certain Nina Simone about how an artist must reflect the times, Bowie’s words didn’t just show how much he wanted to be a part of the world he found himself in. However much he wished to connect audiences to the holistic nature of art, never stopping for too long in one place before moving on to the next.
As such, this is probably why it’s so easy to look at someone like Bowie and say he’s the ultimate connoisseur of the theatrical, a hero who truly knew how to tie everything together in a way that made his influences feel like everything and nothing all at once. The 1970s and 1980s saw a bit of a return to tradition in many arenas, but Bowie stood as a beacon for all that occurred around him, not just embracing all of culture as a means of greater artistic expression, but to establish where he stood in history.
This is also why, for many, figuring out the singer’s influences feels nearly impossible. Of course, having spoken about many of the names most cite as seminal influences reveals certain facets of his artistry, like how deeply he loved The Beatles, or the quintessential elements of glam rock he borrowed from people like Marc Bolan. But the theatrics we often refer to go back to the basics of the form itself, and how musicals formed the backbone of music of his persona, right down to how he learned to tell a good story.
One of the biggest game-changers for Bowie was Anthony Newley, the cabaret star and Al Jolson-adjacent individualist who arrived in a pure form, free from the pressure of perfect onlookers, adorning a Cockney accent like he didn’t much care for the polished criteria of the industry’s biggest critics. Looking up to these kinds of musical figures, Bowie found a guiding light, feeling inspired to one day write his own rock-based Broadway number but settling for letting it infiltrate his music in the meantime.
Suppose this is also why, if anyone were to try to guess the one musical Bowie grew particularly fond of and used as a touchpoint for his artistry throughout much of the ’70s, the answer would come almost immediately. As someone who also had an interest in the place from a historical and cultural perspective, Weimar culture in Berlin was foundational to much of his work during the decade beyond even the Berlin Trilogy, with Cabaret representing something more layered alongside his own surface-level abstraction.
Bowie once told Paul Du Noyer that the original version was one of the things that “impressed” him the most, enough for him to take its “massively innovative” appeal and “nick bits of it throughout the ’70s.” However, this actually presents a massive statement about his artistry, as someone who didn’t just take different influences and channel them in a more flippant manner, but who actually understood the importance of layering. Especially when it came to representing things that appeared one way initially while harbouring deeper and sometimes much darker truths beneath the surface.
A significant part of this can be condensed into the character of the Emcee, who appears quirky and somewhat harmless at a glance but actually anchors a major part of the story’s moral compass. Like Bowie’s characters, the Emcee is incredibly complicated and has been the subject of ongoing debate since Cabaret first emerged. Most of this centres around the importance of his inclusion in the story and how he’s supposed to be perceived: Is he actually integral to the story and the development of the other characters? Or just a device to enhance the surrealist atmosphere and the absurdity of the times?
Culturally, Bowie’s significance serves as a significant parallel. While there will always be critics who view many facets of his characters as nothing more than colourful gimmicks, there’s an undeniable undertone there, the kind that points to a deeper truth about how Bowie masterfully embedded himself into culture, using innovative storytelling and complex characters as tools for extensive exploration.
