Only a groomed woman deserves her name: Fashion, emancipation, and stardom in the Czechoslovak film musical THE LADY OF THE LINES

Socialist Czechoslovakia in the 1960s witnessed substantial changes in terms of lifestyle. The film musical DÁMA NA KOLEJÍCH (THE LADY OF THE LINES, 1966) addresses these shifts through female emancipation and fashion. Therefore the film articulates a utopian space of couture fashion as a vehicle for equality of the sexes. The seductive vision of a stylish, empowered lady was presented as accessible to any working class woman. Also, the pages of period lifestyle magazines, the musical form, and the bitter finale tell a different story of a very limited transferability to everyday reality.