Mae West: Shewabble

It was 4 October 1918 when MAE WEST hoped to stake her claim on Broadway, steeling her muscles under the spotlight at the Shubert Theatre.
• • It felt good to provoke all that joyful applause, Mae thought, by doing the shimmy. In the shimmy, there was hardly any movement of the feet, but continuous movement of the shoulders, torso, and pelvis.
• • Playing opposite Ed Wynn in Arthur Hammerstein's "Sometime," with music by Rudolf Friml, however, the 25-year-old comedienne realized she was throwing her witty lines away. She observed Ed Wynn closely, learning about timing from a clown prince.
• • This musical, which opened at the Shubert Theatre on 4 October 1918, closed in June 1919, after running for 283 performances.
• • Fast forward 30 years to 1949. Cub reporter William Safire goes up to see Mae, then starring on Broadway in a revival of "Diamond Lil.'' Her leading man in those post-war years was Richard Coogan — — better known as TV's "Captain Video" than the rialto's Captain Cummings.
• • According to Safire, Miss West, from her reclining position on a chaise longue, looked up at me with an expression of ''Have I sunk to this? They're sending the office boy?'' Worse, my first question was painfully puerile: what was it like to play opposite the hero of thousands of kids, Captain Video [New Jersey native Richard Coogan]?
• • Mae thought about that. Then, coming to a decision, she changed her expression. Batting those long false eyelashes, she looked at the ceiling and murmured, ''Mmmm . . . suppose you ask Captain Video . . . mmmm . . . how does it feel to play opposite . . . Mae West!''
• • She had caught the editor's angle, as I had not: send an innocent to the symbol of sin. She would play along for publicity's sake, presuming her persona would sell more tickets than her person.
• • As she rose to usher me out, I dared ask if she ever did the shimmy onstage. ''In an Ed Wynn show ['Sometime'], I did a shimmy. But never'' — — Miss West reached up to brush an imaginary blonde hair off my shoulder, a touch I can feel right now — — ''never did I do the shimmy shewabble!''
• • William Safire clarifies this for his New York Times readers in the year 2000: The shimmy sha-wobble is "a shimmy with bumps and grinds. Low class. Not our Mae."
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1918 • •
NYC
Mae West.