Mae West: Devoting a Night to Sex

Pat Craig, theatre reviewer for Contra Costa Times, went up to the Aurora in Berkeley. Let's listen in and hear how it feels to devote one night to "Sex" — — and Mae West.

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • 'Sex' shows West at her wild, wild best
• • By Pat Craig, STAFF WRITER

• • Mae West's work as a dramatist will never be confused with that of, say, Thornton Wilder.
• • But Wilder couldn't shimmy nearly as well as West, which really is the point when you get down to cases in plays such as West's "Sex." This intentionally and unintentionally hilarious 1926 monument to the fine art of naughtiness that opened Thursday at Berkeley's Aurora Theatre proved West wasn't at all interested in selling literature, but was extremely eager to peddle the image of the wild, wild West.
• • In "Sex," West created the character of Margy LaMont (Delia MacDougall), who was very much the prototype of the blondly beloved character West wore like a skin-tight satin frock for most of her career.
• • Margy was a bit rougher around the edges, but then, she was a prostitute, not a movie star. Yet even in that seamy, steamy vocation, Margy's heart was in the right place — — and, beyond the delicious innuendo and double entendre, her heart beat with the solid values of a pragmatically melodramatic moralist.
• • "You could afford to give it away," Margy tells Clara (Maureen McVerry), the socialite caught trysting the night away in a Montreal bordello.
• • While "Sex" is not a particularly well-written play, it is wildly entertaining and well worth seeing as presented by Aurora in this stylish revival. In its first run [1926—1927], the show was closed by the New York vice squad, which had let it run for nearly a year before determining it was just too sinful for Broadway.
• • The play can't quite decide what it wants to be — — it begins as a grim, almost cautionary, melodrama in Montreal, where Margy decides to leave her fancy man, Rocky (Danny Wolohan), and follow the fleet, mostly in the guise of longtime boyfriend/ patron Lt. Gregg (Steve Irish).
• • At that point the scene shifts to a tropical paradise and the show becomes a musical. It moves back to melodrama when Margy splits from Gregg to marry the very wealthy Jimmy (Robert Brewer) and head back to America.
• • What makes the play soar is the work of the cast, the above-mentioned actors as well as Craig Jessup, whose half-dozen or so tiny jewel roles are scattered through "Sex"; Billy Philadelphia, who serves as music director and onstage piano player for the show; and Kristin Stokes, whose roles range from comic soiled doves to French maids.
• • Not only do you get a charmingly off-balance play, but a chance to see how Mae West invented herself, and a bit of an idea of what made the 1920s roar.

• • • • THEATER REVIEW • • • •
• • WHAT: "Sex," by Mae West
• • WHERE: Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison St., Berkeley, CA; T: 510-843-4822
• • WHEN: onstage until 9 December 2007
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • Source: Contra Costa Times — — http://www.contracostatimes.com/
• • Byline: Pat Craig, Staff Writer
• • Published on: 12 November 2007
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
________
Source:http://maewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml
Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • none • •
NYC
Mae West.