Mae West: Story of O

Only one of MAE WEST's motion pictures received an Academy Award nod. Alas, a wink is not a win. The Brooklyn bombshell's big box-office for "She Done Him Wrong" left no impression on the gold-plated statuette's baby-sitters. And so, anticipating the season of Oscar, New York Times writer Dave Kehr offers his analysis about the tug-of-war between wowing the audience versus winning the laurels.
• • According to Dave Kehr: One of the enduring traditions of the Academy Awards is that the Oscar for best picture almost invariably goes to a film that isn’t. This will not be news to anyone who has sat through some genuine groaners from Oscars past: pictures like Frank Lloyd’s 1933 “Cavalcade,” Robert Z. Leonard’s 1936 “Great Ziegfeld” and Cecil B. DeMille’s 1952 “Greatest Show on Earth.”
• • But even when good movies win, the other nominees are usually of equal or even greater interest. Most famously there was the banner year of 1941, for which John Ford’s magnificent “How Green Was My Valley” was named what the academy then termed “outstanding motion picture” (a more modest, defensible claim and perhaps one the academy should revive) while Orson Welles’s game-changing “Citizen Kane” went home with only the original screenplay award.
• • If the Oscars aren’t a reliable guide to artistic accomplishment, they provide an infallible index to how the leaders of the motion picture industry want their business to be seen in any given year. In 1933, for example, pressure was mounting from civic and religious groups for Hollywood to clean up its act — — pressure that would result in the renewed enforcement of the Production Code in 1934.
• • By selecting “Cavalcade” — — a numbing historical pageant, derived from a Noël Coward play, about a wealthy couple (Diana Wynyard and Clive Brook) stiff-upper-lipping their way through 40 years of English history — — the members of the academy distanced themselves from the racy entertainments that then dominated the box office.
• • Hollywood's 1932 — 1933 Season of O
• • Among the other nominees of the 1932 — 1933 season: the flesh-baring, garter-snapping backstage musical “42nd Street”; Mae West’s “She Done Him Wrong” — — the film in which she sings the innuendo-laden ballad “Where Has My Easy Rider Gone?” [sic]; and Frank Borzage’s adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s “Farewell to Arms,” a film so forthright in its depiction of premarital sex that 12 minutes had to be cut when it was reissued into the more prudish, post-Code world of 1938. . . .
• • For most of the ’30s the academy whipsawed between popular entertainments (“It Happened One Night,” 1934) and prestigious literary adaptations (“Mutiny on the Bounty,” 1935) meant to assure would-be censors that Hollywood was a dignified, pipe-smoking kind of place, tirelessly working for the moral improvement of American audiences. . . .
— — Excerpt: — —
• • Article: "Big, Important Picture? Sure. But Is It Best?"
• • Byline: DAVE KEHR
• • Published in: The New York Times
• • Published on: 31 December 2008
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • none • •
NYC
Mae West.

Mae West: Head for Fashion

MAE WEST influenced Hollywood's wardrobe wiz Edith Head [born 28 October 1897 – – died 24 October 1981], whose impressive screen career earned her 34 Academy Awards nominations. "Mae taught me all I know about sex," quipped the gown guru, "clothes-wise." Head won an Oscar eight times – – all for helping MAE WEST and others don their gay apparel for memorable scenes in big-budget movies.
• • How many fans knew what Mae's costumes looked like in COLOR?
• • As costume designer at Paramount Pictures, Edith Head took on a side chore: the custodian of a score of costumes that had been sentimentally preserved because they contributed to movie history.
• • In November 1960, an article in The New York Times discussed the final appearance of these glamourous gowns. "I'm only managing to hold them together with emergency sewing now. This will be about their last time out," said Edith Head. The collection, referred to as a "million dollar" affair, included Mae West's emerald green, jewel-encrusted come-up-and-see-me-sometime gown from "She Done Him Wrong," Texas Guinan and Clara Bow outfits, and Ginger Rogers's mink dress from "Lady in the Dark." . . . [excerpt, N.Y. Times 29 November 1960]
• • Co-starring Cary Grant as a Salvation Army Officer, "She Done Him Wrong" was the only Mae West film that was considered for an Academy Award. Nominated for "Best Picture" in 1933, it lost out to the winner: "Cavalcade." [The trophy-winning motion picture dramatized a cavalcade of English life from New Year's Eve 1899 until 1933 seen through the eyes of well-to-do Londoners Jane and Robert Marryot.] For her portrayal of the wealthy Mrs. Marryot, actress Diana Wynyard received a "Best Actress" nomination but did not go home with the statuette.
• • The Oscar – – that should have gone to Mae West – – was awarded that year to Claudette Colbert, another headliner dressed from time to time by Edith Head. Colbert may have won over the Academy but she never captured the admiration of Ms. Head, who barely concealed her dislike.
• • In contrast, this designing woman had enormous affection for Mae West and other glamour girls such as Barbara Stanwyck and Grace Kelly.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West's friend • • designing woman Edith Head • •
NYC
Mae West.