Friday, May 04, 2012

Mae West: Flower Belle Lee

MAE WEST will be featured at a Tuesday matinee this month on Long Island. 
• • "My Little Chickadee" [1940] will be screened at the Farmingdale Public Library and the admission is free. Join the fearless Flower Belle Lee and traveling con man Cuthbert J. Twillie on Tuesday, 15 May 2012, starting at 2:00 o'clock in the afternoon.
• • WHERE:  Farmingdale Public Library, 116 Merritts Road, Farmingdale, NY 11735.
• • Eddie Borden [1 May 1888 — 1 July 1955] • •
• • Mae West worked twice with Eddie Borden, who was seen in "I'm No Angel" [1933] as an amusing carnival sideshow spectator who ogles "Tira the Incomparable" in her provocative costume — — and he was cast the following year as a comedian in "Belle of the Nineties" [1934].
• • Born in Deer Lodge, Tennessee on the first day in May — — on 1 May 1888 — — the funnyman launched his career as a variety artist, then gave up vaudeville for the screen trade. After his start in Hollywood in 1922, Eddie Borden appeared in 142 motion pictures during the next 30 years.
• • Eddie Borden worked with director Leo McCarey in "Bad Boy" [1925], who would also direct "Belle of the Nineties" nine years later.  The five-foot-nine actor had a number of feature roles when he first landed in Tinseltown in the 1920s, but gradually he became just another bit parts player.
• • Casting agents tended to use him as an extra in a brief scene. Typically, he was seen as a stagehand, one of the revenuers, a waiter, barfly, reveller, spectator, man in the crowd, taxi driver, etc.  Borden bid his farewell to the silver screen in "Holiday for Sinners" [1952], a title that sounds tailor-made for Mae West.
• • Eddie Borden died in Hollywood, California on the first day of July (on 1 July 1955) in Hollywood, California. He was 67.
• • On Tuesday, 4 May 1886 • •
• • On Tuesday, 4 May 1886 the black composer Shelton Brooks was born. Mae and Beverly performed his dance novelty "Walking the Dog" when they toured with their act "Mae West and Sister." In her 1928 Bowery melodrama "Diamond Lil," Mae performed his jaunty song "Where Has My Easy Rider Gone?" and the number would be reprised in "She Done Him Wrong" [filmed in 1932].
• • On Saturday, 4 May 1935 • •
• • A Los Angeles Times columnist noted on Saturday, 4 May 1935, that the news about Mae West's secret marriage to Frank Wallace had "chased Hitler, the NRA, and the quintuplets off the front page of every newspaper in America for two weeks."
• • On Sunday, 4 May 1969 • •
• • Reporter Whitney Bolton wrote an article, a first person remembrance: "Critic Impressed by Mae West Role of Siren at Seance." Bolton had attended one of Mae's backstage seances and his piece was published in the Philadelphia Inquirer in its weekend edition on Sunday, 4 May 1969.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "If we can send a man to the moon, why don’t we send all of 'em?"
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • An article on the weather in May mentioned Mae West.
• • Humorist Glenn Cochrane wrote:  After a typical Toronto winter, which always seems so long and so dour, we are finally heading happily into the Merry Month of May and not a moment too soon, if you ask me. According to my notes the month is named after Mae West, a popular stage and movie performer back in the 1930s and '40s. Little is known about her today which I believe is the result of a cover up on the part of her bosses, which is what they were always urging her to do. Cover up, that is, which I am adding for purposes of clarification. Mae West is long back in the days of her buxom prime.   . . .
• • Source: Article: "Mae West can’t beat May in the Beach" written by Glenn Cochrane for Beach Metro Community News; published on 4 May 2011
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2290th 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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• • Photo:
• • Mae West •  1940 • •
• •
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Mae West.

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