In the American

vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment which began in France in the middle of the 19th century. A ''vaudeville'' was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a drama ...

and British

music hall Music hall is a type of British theatrical entertainment that was most popular from the early Victorian era, beginning around 1850, through the World War I, Great War. It faded away after 1918 as the halls rebranded their entertainment as Varie ...

traditions, the bill matter was the identifying phrase used in advertising material to describe and summarize the appeal and attributes of each performer or group of performers. Each was considered as a

trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a form of intellectual property that consists of a word, phrase, symbol, design, or a combination that identifies a Good (economics and accounting), product or Service (economics), service f ...

, not to be used by other performers.Roy Hudd, ''Roy Hudd's Book of Music Hall, Variety and Showbiz Anecdotes'', Robson Books, 1993, , p.195 Examples in Britain included

George Robey Sir George Edward Wade, Commander of the Order of the British Empire, CBE (20 September 1869 – 29 November 1954),James Harding (music writer), Harding, James"Robey, George" ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University P ...

, "The Prime Minister of Mirth";

G. H. Elliott George Henry Elliott (3 November 1882 – 19 November 1962) was a British music hall singer and dancer. Known as "The Chocolate Coloured Coon", he performed with a Blackface, painted brown face and dressed entirely in white: white top hat, white t ...

, "The Chocolate Coloured Coon"; Max Miller, "The Cheeky Chappie"; and Billy Bennett, "Almost a Gentleman". According to writer

Michael Kilgarriff Michael Kilgarriff (born 16 June 1937) is a British actor, author and pianist from Brighton. As an actor, he is well known for his rich voice and height. His film and television roles include ''The Dark Crystal'' (1982) as the General, and th ...

: "The heydays for these showbiz strap-lines were the inter-war years, for prior to 1914 performers saw little need for a personalised slogan, contenting themselves with such bald descriptions as 'Singer', 'Comedian', or 'Dancer'". By the 1950s, the use of bill matter was seen as old-fashioned.Michael Kilgarriff, ''Grace, Beauty and Banjos: Peculiar Lives and Strange Times of Music Hall and Variety Artistes'', Oberon Books, 1998, , pp.13-15

References

Advertising English-language idioms Vaudeville tropes {{Entertainment-stub