Mae West: Duke & Dutch at Do Drop

There was sufficient enthusiasm over a new musical featuring MAE WEST and Duke Ellington to lure trendy Harlemites haloed by extravagant hats down to Greenwich Village a few night ago, where they galivanted past the stage door entrance, gad-zooking red nails and filtered smokes aloft, austerity pinched away and outweighed by the demands of glamour. We approve of adults who not only attend the theatre but also take pains with their evening attire. A swelling crowd of supporters, impressive bling, bejeweled cigarette lighters — — along with eye-catching garments onstage and in the audience — — alas, do not a stage hit make.
• • Here's one assessment by Talking Broadway's drama critic Matthew Murray:
— — http://maewest.blogspot.com/2009/08/mae-west-dutch-ducked.html — —
• • Though Mae West has a pivotal role in "Scandalous People," which is part of the NY Fringe, the reviewer from Backstage left holding his nose.
• • Utter Ineptitude Quoth the Critic • •
• • Sparing no sparks when it comes to flaming outlandish folly, critic Erik Haagensen wrote this: The only thing scandalous about the musical "Scandalous People" is that the utter ineptitude of its writing didn't prevent someone from wildly overproducing it in the Fringe Festival.
• • Erik Haagensen elaborated: Myra Churchill's book attempts to tell the story of Dewey, proprietor, and star of Harlem's Do Drop Inn nightclub in the 1920s, who longs to present an interracial musical revue at a time when racial mixing on nightclub stages was forbidden by law. Mae West, Duke Ellington, and the gangster Dutch Schultz all figure into it, but the plotting is ludicrously obvious, the characterizations one-dimensional, the scene construction ragged, and the dialogue trite, particularly when lapsing into rhymed couplets for no discernible reason. Churchill's lyrics are even worse, so badly misaccented and rhymed that at times they sound like gibberish. Composer Benny Russell is clearly acquainted with the sounds of the period, but he has no sense of how to structure a song nor much of a gift for melody.
• • Erik Haagensen added: The talented cast includes Eugene Fleming as Dewey, but only Nicole Hill as his wife and star manages to rise above the authors' incompetence, which ultimately trivializes the important issues they raise.
• • Between August 19th — 29th, this musical will be offered by MyChurch Productions as part of the New York International Fringe Festival at the Minetta Lane Theatre, 18 Minetta Lane, NYC 10011. Dress to impress. You might, at least, meet an attractive ticket-holder posing by the bar.
— — Source: — —
• • Review: "Scandalous People"
• • BY: Erik Haagensen | Theatre Critic
• • Published in: Backstage — — www.backstage.com
• • Published on: Monday, 24 August 2009
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• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West: Lily the Milliner

Lily Birnbaum once made sensational hats for MAE WEST.
• • During the 1920s, this talented native New Yorker was head milliner for the Shubert Brothers, and kept busy designing show-stopping creations for their Broadway hits.
• • Born in 1895, Lily was raised amid hatboxes, hatpins, ostrich plumes, osprey feathers, glove boxes, and genteel feminine adornment. After she wed attorney Benjamin A. Javits, she focused on raising a family. Still tethered to the thrills of showbiz, she was one of the founders of the Palm Beach Film Festival. When she was in her sixties, she took up painting and had several exhibitions in Palm Beach and NYC galleries.
• • Following in her footsteps, one of her grandsons was so inspired by her colorful backstage stories that he became a milliner. Lily served for years as his consultant.
• • Lily Birnbaum Javits died at age 91 during the month of August — — on Thursday, 7 August 1986 — — after a series of strokes, at the Good Samaritan Hospital in Palm Beach, Florida.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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