Mae West: Merman at the Ravenswood

MAE WEST has generated her fair share of ink. It was in early July — — on 1 July 2003 — — that Camille Paglia's fascinating article was published in Interview Magazine. Her title was "Where's Mae West When We Need Her?" Indeed.
• • Merman's Jealousy of Mae West • •
• • Native New Yorker Ethel Merman took her first stab at Tinseltown in the fall of 1933. The singing actress and her mother moved into a Hancock Park apartment building called the Ravenswood, where Mae West was already nicely settled in.
• • Brian Kellow writes: Tired of having her achievements overlooked, Ethel got a little testy with the Hollywood press when it was suggested that her performing style owed something to Mae West's. Although they occupied different floors of the Ravenswood, West had not been particularly friendly, and Ethel got even by telling reporters that it was she who had started the Mae West vogue, not the other way around. "I was singing 'Eadie Was a Lady' all dressed up with the wiggly hips an' everything before Mae West's first picture, Night After Night, came out," Ethel said, ". . . so I shall always claim Mae sailed to glory on my vogue." In fact, West's style was fully evolved by the time of her big stage successes of the 1920s, long before she hit Hollywood. But Ethel's rewriting of history was a good indication of her defensiveness over her treatment in Hollywood. ...
• • Source: Ethel Merman: A Life by Brian Kellow (from Chapter 5)
• • Mae West Magazine Cover July 1980 • •
• • Mae West was on the cover of Memory Lane Magazine [Vol. 1, No. 9] July 1980.
• • Mae West Club • •
• • At North Georgia College a Mae West Club had been organized in 1934. The founder and president was C. L. Ellis. Unfortunately, it quickly disbanded — — perhaps due to pressure from the dean.
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • A New Jersey staffwriter reported: Friday, 22 July 2011, at 10:30 a.m. the Warrenbrook Senior Center will be Remembering the Year We Were Born. Do you know that in 1935, the largest salary earned during the year was that of William Randolph Hearst; the 2nd largest was Mae West’s. ...
• • Source: Article: "Warrenbrook Senior Center plans special July events" written by staff for the Independent Press; published on 30 June 2011
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 1978th blog post. Unlike many blogs, which draw upon reprinted content from a newspaper or a magazine and/ or summaries, links, or photos, the mainstay of this blog is its fresh material focused on the life and career of Mae West, herself an American original.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • with Ethel Merman and Judy Garland • •
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