A movie prologue or prolog was a short live vaudeville show, performed at the start of film showings in movie theaters in the United States, especially at the end of the silent film era in the 1920s and early 1930s.
They were "an extremely popular, hybrid form of performance originally devised as a way to offset the public's boredom with silent films".
[2] The leading movie theaters had elaborate sets, generally in an Art Deco style or incorporating exotic motifs, which acted as a backdrop for music and dance shows often featuring many chorus girls.
Leading producers and choreographers included Fanchon and Marco, Leon Leonidoff, Chester Hale, J.
Their development and production was the fictionalised subject of the 1933 movie Footlight Parade, starring James Cagney and choreographed by Busby Berkeley.