Mae West: Readying "Whirl"

The sweet romance MAE WEST had with Jimmy Hussey seems to have escaped the fixative of the biographical accounts of her life. But the Mae West Blog knows better.
• • These hard-working, ambitious vaudevillians met when Mae was booked at the Central Theatre [Broadway and West 47th Street] on Saturday, 25 December 1920. The fortuitous meeting was even better than a visit from Santa Claus.
• • In 1920, Irish-American comedian Jimmy Hussey [1891 — 1930] was the star attraction that Christmas Day. Also performing were Phil Baker and Aileen Stanley — — but Mae West must have pulled focus and attracted Hussey's attention. Hussey started producing material especially suited to the Brooklyn bombshell's talents such as "The Trial of Shimmy Mae."
• • In October of 1920, "The Jimmy Hussey Show" was also known as "Tattle Tales."  Though he was under the Shubert umbrella, the weather was growing stormy.  Johnny Dundee, an actor-investor, had just dropped out and Hussey was having difficulties with those powerful show business brothers as well.
• • The first act of "Tattle Tales" closed with an ensemble piece and a shimmy by Rae Samuels. "Miss Samuels won plenty of laughter in several songs and 'shaking the shimmy,' wrote The New York Clipper [13 October 1920] — — however, that number was revised and the heat was recalibrated for Mae West. Hussey was smitten all right. Let's see what Variety wrote on Wednesday, 18 May 1921.
• • Readying "Whirl" — Shuberts Arrange to Put Hussey Show Atop Century • •
• • "The Whirl of the Town," which was closed after the Philadelphia run, will be the attraction for the Century Roof and the first for that house since its conversion into a theatre. The presentation of "The Whirl" atop the Century was in doubt until this week when arrangements between the Shuberts and Jimmy Hussey had been straightened out.
• • Hussey will appear in the show, as will Mae West, Moran and Weiser, and most of the original cast. Ann Cody, who at first was billed as Mlle. Codee, with Frank Orth, will withdraw. With the Orth and Cody act out of the show, the combination turn framed last season with Moran and Weiser is off.
• • The "Whirl" show went to the road as a combination of Hussey's "Tattle Tales" and the second edition the "Midnight Rounders," which was the Century Roof attraction. New numbers are to be put on, the idea being to evolve a show entirely new for New York. The "Whirl" was presented in Philadelphia at $1.50 top. It is expected to be ready for the Roof by the end of the month or early in June.
• • Source: Article in Variety;  published on Wednesday, 18 May 1921.
• • On Saturday, 18 May 1912 in Variety • •
• • Frank Bohm bought a generous ad in Variety (issue dated for 18 May 1912) to help publicize his client Mae West as "The Scintillating Singing Comedienne, Late of Ziegfeld's Moulin Rouge." Billboard gave the vaudevillian's act a favorable review the following month.
• • On Thursday, 18 May 1933 in Camperdown Chronicle • •
• • Costume designer Travis Banton spoke about beauty standards in motion pictures and the measurements of Mae West, Claudette Colbert, and other top actresses. The Australian newspaper Camperdown Chronicle printed the article in a Thursday issue on 18 May 1933.
• • Overheard in Hollywood • •
• • Mae West is believed to have some interest in occult matters, and is convinced that she brings luck to people associated with her.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said:  "I never think anything but success, success, success. Other people catch the spirit of it from me."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • The Urbana Daily Courier mentioned Miss Mae West.

• • Christopher Billopp, in The Baltimore Evening Sun wrote:  We can't say that we altogether approve of the almost universal custom among headline writers today of referring to young women prominent in the news by their first names, such as Barbara or Anne. We were brought up in the old Southern school which regarded that as undue familiarity. 
• • Of course, we cannot prevent the practise but, on the other hand, the headline writers cannot prevent us from mentally prefixing a Miss to such names whenever we run across them. Somehow when we say to ourselves "Miss Mae West" we feel ever so much better about it.  . . .
• • Source: Item quoted in The Urbana Daily Courier; published on Saturday, 18 May 1935 
• • The Mae West Blog celebrates its 10th anniversary • •    
• • Thank you for reading, sending questions, and posting comments during this past decade. The other day we entertained 3,497 visitors. And we reached a milestone recently when we completed 3,100 blog posts. Wow! 
• • By the Numbers • • 
• • The Mae West Blog was started ten years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 3180th 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 • • in 1935 • •
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Mae West: Twitting O'Neill

MAE WEST sang "I'm in the Mood for Love" — — and it was featured on the LP Fabulous Mae West [released in September 1955]. The song had been published twenty years earlier in 1935.
• • Born in Boston in the month of July — — on 10 July 1894 — — James Francis McHugh was a prolific songwriter who was doing his best work from the 1920s through the 1950s. McHugh composed over 270 songs and his hits were recorded by Mae West as well as Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Judy Garland, Billie Holiday, Chet Baker, Dinah Washington, June Christy, Peggy Lee, Deanna Durbin, and Ella Fitzgerald.
• • Composer Jimmy McHugh collaborated with lyricist Dorothy Fields on "I'm in the Mood for Love," which enjoyed great popularity and is still being sung today.
• • Jimmy McHugh died on 23 May 1969 in Beverly Hills, California at age 74.
• • In July 1922 • •
• • During July 1922, Mae was preparing for her spotlight as she rehearsed the "Ginger Box Review" with a wonderful cast that included Jimmy Hussey and Harry Richman. After a two performance try-out in Hartford, Connecticut, this musical was supposed to be opening at the Greenwich Village Theatre in Sheridan Square. If only . . . .
• • "Ginger Revue Now a Pepless Stew as Promoter Disappears" announced the New York Daily News [13 August 1922]. Thirteen Equity actors sued Perkins to recover their salaries — — but not Mae, who was to have received a percentage of the box office.
• • Well, this situation was forcing the ambitious Brooklynite into the one role she feared the most: unemployed actress. On 23 August 1922, however, the New York Clipper noted: Mae West, who was with 'The Ginger Box,' which opened and closed rather suddenly, has returned to vaudeville, and opened at Proctor's Fifth Avenue on Monday. . . .
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West: During her number "Eugene O'Neill, You've Put a Curse on Broadway," Mae's character was bellowing, Yank-style, "She don me doit! Lemme up! I'll show her who's an ape!"
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • "Mae West was better suited to writing gritty realism than Eugene O'Neill," explains Frank Cullen in the book "Vaudeville, Old and New" [2007].
• • Mae West spoofed Eugene O'Neill in 1922 and others followed with a parody.
• • Felicia Hardison Londré writes: During the 1920s Eugene O’Neill’s plays elicited an exceptionally large number of playful rewrites. . . . Why did Eugene O’Neill’s plays of the 1920s become such a magnet for la critique créatrice as well as source material for burlesque? First, he met the basic criterion of a subject for parody: universal recognition by the target audience. . . . The Hairy Ape opened on 9 March 1922 and moved uptown in April for a 127-performance run. It quickly spawned travesties, beginning in June with a three-scene burlesque titled “The Shaving of the Hairy Ape” in Raymond Hitchcock’s Pinwheel Revel. Although Frank Fay played “Bull Burke, the Ape Man,” the piece attracted little critical attention apart from a general call for scissors to be taken to the whole show (NYT 16 June 1922). O’Neill’s strong language was targeted in the next two stage lampoons of The Hairy Ape. First came The Ginger Box on July 28-29 in Stamford, Connecticut. The program in the Billy Rose Theatre Collection proclaims “prior to opening at the Greenwich Village Theatre, New York,” but an unscrupulous producer left the show in the lurch and it never got to New York (Watts 61). In the second slot of Act 2, Mae West impersonated Yank Smith and, backed up by the twelve Stoker Girls, sang “Eugene O’Neill, You’ve Put a Curse on Broadway.”
• • Two months later, The Passing Show of 1922 at the Winter Garden featured a similar number performed by the popular blonde singing comedienne Ethel Shutta. According to an undated clipping in the file on that show in the Billy Rose Theatre Collection, the song “condemned O’Neill for teaching Broadway to curse,” while “a supporting chorus yelled ‘Go to hell!’ with an aptitude which might have shamed the ‘Hairy Ape’.” ...
• • Source: Article: "Twitting O’Neill: His Plays of the 1920s Subjected to La Critique Créatrice" written by Felicia Hardison Londré for The Eugene O'Neill Review; posted in Volume 26 — — 2004
• • 17 July 2004 — 17 July 2011 • •
• • In mid-July the Mae West Blog will celebrate its seventh anniversary. Thank you to all those Mae-mavens who come up and see Mae every day.
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 1987th 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 • • Greenwich Village Theatre, 1922 • •
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Mae West: January Gents

When MAE WEST pulled Cary Grant into her motion picture comedy "She Done Him Wrong" [1932], she put wings on his feet. And Happy Birthday to one of Hollywood's hottest leading men, born eleven years after Mae — — on 18 January 1904.
• • But years before Paramount would offer her a contract, the struggling comedienne was featured at the Central Theatre [Broadway & West 47th Street] on 25 December 1920. The pretty brunette had no idea that the goddess of career networking found a sweet gentleman Jim willing to help her ascend the vaudeville ladder.
• • Irish-American comedian Jimmy Hussey [1891 — 1930] was the star attraction that Christmas Day. Also performing were Phil Baker and Aileen Stanley — — but Mae West must have pulled focus and attracted Hussey's attention.
• • Born in Chicago on 18 January 1891, James J. Hussey made his stage debut (accidentally) when he attended a performance in The Windy City and started singing choruses from the balcony. Instead of getting thrown out, he won a contract and started appearing on the Shubert vaudeville circuit.
• • Clearly, Mae left the right impression on Christmas Day 1920. Several months later, Hussey finished writing the book and the lyrics for the revue that would be renamed "The Mimic World 1921." He made sure his new material was custom-tailored to Mae's unique talents. She was cast in many prominent skits in this production — — including the con artist "Shifty Liz."
• • Clearly with Mae's approval and cooperation, Hussey penned the skit "The Trial of Shimmy Mae." Hussey himself played the judge as Mae demonstrated the shimmy in his topsy-turvy courtroom.
• • For the skit "The Bridal Suite," Jimmy Hussey took the role of a busy newly-wed who has to leave his honeymoon for a business meeting. In his absence, the pretty bride entertains her lovers, making her own appointments. "The Bridal Suite" was scrapped from the revue when it had a Boston try-out. The censors also cut the lights when Shimmy Mae started to dance.
• • "The Mimic World 1921" opened on 17 August 1921 and Hussey's close friend, Jack Dempsey (another Irish-American) attended the premiere, and visited Mae backstage after the show.
• • Jimmy Hussey, who was a brilliant success onstage (oddly enough) as a Jewish dialect comedian, died at age 39 of pneumonia on 20 November 1930. Mae West attended his memorial service, which was held at St. Malachy's on West 49th Street, a ceremony that also commemorated the recent deaths of two other Roman Catholic colleagues of hers, Tommy Gray and Tony Pastor.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West: Jimmy & Shimmy Mae

When MAE WEST was featured at the Central Theatre [Broadway & West 47th Street] on 25 December 1920, she had no idea that Santa Nick had a sweet little career surprise waiting.
• • Irish-American comedian Jimmy Hussey [1891 — 1930] was the star attraction that Christmas Day. Also performing were Phil Baker and Aileen Stanley — — but Mae West must have pulled focus and attracted Hussey's attention.
• • Born in Chicago in 1891, James J. Hussey made his stage debut (accidentally) when he attended a performance in The Windy City and started singing choruses from the balcony. Instead of getting thrown out, he won a contract and started appearing on the Shubert vaudeville circuit.
• • Clearly, Mae left the right impression on Christmas Day 1920. Several months later, Hussey wrote the book and the lyrics for the revue that would be renamed "The Mimic World 1921." He made sure his new material was custom-tailored to Mae's unique talents. She was cast in many prominent skits in this production — — including the con artist "Shifty Liz."
• • Clearly with Mae's approval and cooperation, Hussey penned the skit "The Trial of Shimmy Mae." Hussey himself played the judge as Mae demonstrated the shimmy in his topsy-turvy courtroom.
• • For the skit "The Bridal Suite," Jimmy Hussey took the role of a busy newly-wed who has to leave his honeymoon for a business meeting. In his absence, the pretty bride entertains her lovers, making her own appointments. "The Bridal Suite" was scrapped from the revue when it had a Boston try-out. The censors also cut the lights when Shimmy Mae started to dance.
• • "The Mimic World 1921" opened on 17 August 1921 and Hussey's close friend, Jack Dempsey (another Irish-American) attended the premiere, and visited Mae backstage after the show.
• • Death at age 39 on 20 November 1930 • •
• • Jimmy Hussey, who was a brilliant success onstage as a Jewish comedian, died at age 39 of pneumonia on 20 November 1930. Mae West attended his memorial service, which was held at St. Malachy's on West 49th Street, a ceremony that also commemorated the recent deaths of two other Roman Catholic colleagues of hers, Tommy Gray and Tony Pastor.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1921 • •
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Mae West: Jimmy Hussey

When MAE WEST was featured at the Central Theatre [Broadway & West 47th Street] on 25 December 1920, she had no idea Santa Claus had a career surprise waiting.
• • Irish-American comedian Jimmy Hussey [1891-1930] was the star attraction that Christmas Day. Also performing were Phil Baker and Aileen Stanley - - but Mae West must have pulled focus and attracted Hussey's attention.
• • Born in Chicago in 1891, James J. Hussey made his stage debut (accidentally) when he attended a performance in The Windy City and started singing choruses from the balcony. Instead of getting thrown out, he won a contract and started appearing on the Shubert vaudeville circuit.
• • Clearly, Mae left the right impression on Christmas Day 1920. Several months later, Hussey wrote the book and the lyrics for the revue that would be renamed "The Mimic World 1921." He made sure his new material was custom-tailored to Mae's unique talents. She was cast in many prominent skits in this production - - including the con artist "Shifty Liz."
• • Clearly with Mae's approval and cooperation, Hussey penned the skit "The Trial of Shimmy Mae." Hussey himself played the judge as Mae demonstrated the shimmy in his topsy-turvy courtroom.
• • For the skit "The Bridal Suite," Jimmy Hussey took the role of a busy newly-wed who has to leave his honeymoon for a business meeting. In his absence, the pretty bride entertains her lovers, making her own appointments. "The Bridal Suite" was scrapped from the revue when it had a Boston try-out. The censors also cut the lights when Shimmy Mae started to dance.
• • "The Mimic World 1921" opened on 17 August 1921 and Hussey's close friend, Jack Dempsey (another Irish-American) attended the premiere, and visited Mae backstage after the show.
• • Hussey, who was a brilliant success onstage as a Jewish comedian, died at age 39 of pneumonia on 20 November 1930. Mae West attended his memorial service, which was held at St. Malachy's on West 49th Street, a ceremony that also commemorated the recent deaths of two other Roman Catholic colleagues of hers, Tommy Gray and Tony Pastor.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
________
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Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West • • "The Mimic World" • • 1921 • •
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