Mae West: Zora Neale Hurston

Key elements of MAE WEST's persona were rooted in black traditions.
• • Mae West herself said that her earliest influence was the black entertainer Bert Williams. She popularized the sexually charged black dance the shimmy. Some believed she had invented it but she didn't; she learned it in a Chicago nightspot.
• • Mae West tinted photographs to make herself look like her black maid. And chronicler Zora Neale Hurston in a 1934 essay, ''Characteristics of Negro Expression,'' said that Mae West ''had much more flavor of the turpentine quarters than she did of the white bawd.''
• • Speaking of Zora Neale Hurston's 1934 essay "Characteristics of Negro Expression" — this was perhaps the first attempt to define the jook joint. Of course, Mae West set "Diamond Lil" in a Bowery saloon that was not too far distant from a jook — — i.e., the "turpentine quarters."
• • In January it's an ideal time to look back at the sharp-eyed writer Zora Neale Hurston.
• • Born in Alabama, Zora Neale Hurston [7 January 1891 — 28 January 1960] was a folklorist and an author during the time of the Harlem Renaissance; her best known work was the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God [1937]. In 2002, scholars listed Zora Neale Hurston among the 100 Greatest African-Americans.
• • Huston's essay appeared in a volume that was privately printed in Great Britain at the expense of Nancy Cunard, its editor. Negro: An Anthology was rejected by American publishers during the Prohibition Era. Wishart, a London imprint, released only 1,000 copies in 1934. This formidable door-stop of an anthology brought together 250 contributions by 150 black scribes and ran to 855 pages. Heiress Nancy Cunard [1896 — 1965] was a visionary and, fortunately, her small press run was eventually reprinted in the USA in wider release. If you have the book, read Zora Neale Huston's entries on behalf of her birthday: January 7th.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • none • •
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Mae West.

Mae West: Turpentine Quarters

The humor of Mae West was influenced by the farce and frisson of vaudeville, noted Edward Rothstein. Vaudevillians also based their humor on seemingly rigid categories, including race and gender; yet they play with boundaries, exhilaratingly breaking them down while exploring ambiguities.
• • Rothstein's article continued: Consider the revealing analysis offered by Ms. Jill Watts. She dismisses the longtime rumor that Mae West was a man in drag, but raises the unprovable hypothesis that she may have had black ancestry. It really doesn't matter though because, as Ms. Watts shows, key elements of West's persona were rooted in black traditions.
• • Mae West herself said that her earliest influence was the black entertainer Bert Williams. She popularized the sexually charged black dance the shimmy (it was sometimes believed she had invented it). She tinted photographs to make herself look like her black maid. And the black writer Zora Neale Hurston in a 1934 essay, ''Characteristics of Negro Expression,'' said that Mae West ''had much more flavor of the turpentine quarters than she did of the white bawd.''
• • [Ed: Speaking of Zora Neale Hurston's 1934 essay "Characteristics of Negro Expression" — this was perhaps the first attempt to define the jook joint. Of course, Mae West set "Diamond Lil" in a Bowery saloon that was not too far distant from a jook — — i.e., the "turpentine quarters."]
• • At the same time, Ms. Watts points out, racist caricature appeared in her acts along with attempts to emphasize her ''whiteness.'' Invoking Henry Louis Gates Jr., Ms. Watts argues that this double perspective stems from a particularly black style of humor and that it led to ''an indeterminacy that challenged the whole idea of racial fixity.''
• • The same indeterminacy characterized West's sexual persona, in which her saucy femininity was conjoined with a masculine assertion of power — — an opposition that led to the ''drag'' rumors. W. C. Fields called her ''a plumber's idea of Cleopatra.''
• • Mae West steered a course between respectability and vulgarity, racism and identification, femininity and masculinity. But of course, Mae West's interest in black culture did not determine such tensions. Rather, she and other 1930s motion picture actresses emerged out of the same popular tradition: vaudeville.
• • Vaudeville thrived on racial caricatures, satires of respectability and sexual inversions. Jews appeared as Irish; blacks appeared as Chinese; Eastern Europeans masqueraded as high society types; men appeared in drag. . . . This kind of humor, of course, is far from genteel; the jokes are tinged with discomfort and uncertainty. It's all very funny, but as Mae West might say, goodness has nothing to do with it.
— — Excerpt: — —
• • Article: "Connections — — Vaudeville Haunts Not So Strange Bedfellows."
• • Written by: Edward Rothstein
• • Published in: The New York Times — — nytimes.com
• • Published on: 11 August 2001
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• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
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Mae West.

Mae West: Robert Benchley

MAE WEST got her share of negative reviews from critic Robert Benchley. However, he and Zora Neale Hurston were two of a very small group of writers who had favorable things to say about "Sex."
• • Benchley's comments about Mae's show at Daly's 63rd Street Theatre appeared in Life Magazine on 20 May I926 (the month after the premiere) — — though his byline during the 1920s is more commonly associated with The New Yorker.
• • Born in New England on 15 September 1889, Robert Charles Benchley was a humorist, journalist, and (briefly) a screen actor cast in minor roles in Hollywood. He attended Harvard and became part of the "vicious circle" presided over by Dorothy Parker at the Algonquin Hotel. Like Mrs. Parker, he was an alcoholic.
• • Cirrhosis of the liver — — aggravated by his drinking — — contributed to Robert Benchley's death at age 56 on 21 November 1945.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
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Mae West.

Mae West: Sex in August

Hot: August in New York City — — especially over on the westside when MAE WEST was starring in "Sex" as the unapologetic prostitute Margy LaMont. By the summer of 1926, the show had been booked in Daly's West 63rd Street Theatre for a couple of months but the boxoffice was still sizzling. Onstage Mae was shimmying. All this in the days before air-conditioning, too.
• • As with most writers or actors, Mae West did not want to be ignored.
• • Even before "Sex" officially opened in Manhattan during April 1926, it attracted strong reactions. Mostly, it received a black eye in print.
• • It was "feeble and disjointed," The New York Times critic said.
• • It was a "disgrace," The New Yorker announced.
• • Walter Winchell called it "a vulgar affair ... amateurish in script and cast."
• • The Daily Mirror, a William Randolph Hearst paper, was less mellow. This was, it said, "a monstrosity plucked from the garbage can, destined for the sewer."
• • Theatre critics had a different perspective on scarlet women back in '26.
• • Mae West's play looked at the social mores of the time, she claimed, but John Q. Public was not so sure. The first attempt to close "Sex" failed; the police department convened a play jury but the officials barely missed getting the required three-fourths vote of a citizens' panel.
• • Moreover, celebrities and certain authors [for example, Robert Benchley and Zora Neale Hurston] had favorable things to say about "Sex." Some newspapers carried second reviews, reversing their first opinion.
• • After making a profit on the show, West was fined $500 and sentenced to 10 days in jail. "This will be the making of me," she predicted.
• • That prediction, however, would take a while. Five years later, and nearing her 40th birthday, Mae West finally made her presence felt in the motion picture world. She often wrote her own lines, oozing sexual references. She died in 1980 at 87, having outlived the era she mocked.
• • David Thompson wrote of Mae West: "The real conclusion of her work is that sex is an idea, an obsession for the human being, and one of the most reliable distractions from the equally potent idea that life is tragic."
• • Stage-manage your weekend and make some time for Mae West on Friday evening 17 August 2007, when a guided tour will explore Manhattan's WEST-side during the "Mae West Side Story" walking tour. The event — — open to the public — — is timed to salute Brooklyn's own sexpot on her birthdate. [See the Annual Mae West Gala posting below.]
• • Only 4 more days until Mae's birthday!
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • Daly's Theatre (briefly renamed Coburn) in 1928 • •
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Mae West.