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An annual erotic poetry event in sunny California was inspired by MAE WEST. Who knew? 
• • Taking place on December 29th this month at Priya Indian Cuisine [see below for the complete address in Berkeley], Poetry Express extends an invitation to its sixth annual "Between the Holidays Erotic Poetry Night."
• • The name of the event is a syntactic nod to Mae West, says Poetry Express host Mark States, who explains that the bawdy thespian "named her legs Christmas and New Year's and asked if you would 'come visit her between the holidays.'" [Perhaps we should state the obvious — — that this was well-known quip was not a line from one of the actress's movies for Paramount Pictures — — because a comment like this in a screenplay surely would have been red-lined by the film board's purity police.]• • Throughout the evening, attendees' readings at the open mic will be interspersed with Mae West witticisms, quips, and quotes.
• • Although Poetry Express happens almost every Monday evening throughout the year . . . PE's erotica theme nights are a popular tradition in the local open-mic scene. One year, States remembers, "a triad — — one wife, two husbands — — came and read their group-sex poems to each other. Somehow," he laughs, "the rest of us felt left out." Another year, "the sensuous lesbian love stories were the most popular and sweat-inducing. ... Good erotic poetry does not have to be obscene, nor technical like the Kama Sutra," advises States, a noted performance poet whose books include Reinvention from Mother's Hen, Grip of the Past, and Tongue Control. "It should engage the audience, make them see and smell and taste the experience as though they were there. . . . If you can make me blush and sweat, you've written a great erotic poem." . . .
— — Excerpt: — —
• • Article: Do Tell: Warm up a winter night with erotic poetry, performed live.
• • Byline: Anneli Rufus
• • Published by: East Bay Express — — www.eastbayexpress.com/
• • Published on: 24 December 2008
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • Priya Indian Cuisine is located here: 2072 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley, California 94702; 510-644-3977• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Source:http://maewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml
Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • Xmas greetings • •
NYC
Mae West.
MAE WEST, always the mistress of the silver tongue, says of the occasion Marlene Dietrich offered to wash her hair for her: “I had to turn her down. I was afraid she didn’t mean the hair on my head.”
— — Source: — —
• • The Girls: Sappho Goes to Hollywood by Diana McLellan
• • Published by: Robson, 2008• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Source:http://maewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml
Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • none • •
NYC
Mae West.
MAE WEST, best known for her friendships with homosexuals and drag queens, also had gay women in her circle. 
• • New Jersey native Marion Morgan [born on 4 January 1881] — — in the spotlight as a young dancer and then as a 34-year-old choreographer — — relocated to the West Coast. In 1930, she moved into the Hollywood Hills house owned by her lover, film director Dorothy Arzner. They lived openly together for over 40 years until Marion's death in 1971.
• • Morphing into a screenwriter, the very versatile and attractive Marion Morgan worked on the script for "Goin' to Town" [1935] and "Klondike Annie" [1936].
• • This career move was quite a change. Audiences and critics had known her because of the Marion Morgan Dancers, formed in 1915, which was originally comprised of six young women who had studied with Marion Morgan in California. The troupe specialized in ballets adapted from classical legends, such as 'Helen of Troy,' and usually danced in togas and bare feet.
• • In this photo, Arnold Genthe captures Marion Morgan as she glides across the stage, wearing a flowing costume and carrying a drum head.
• • Marion Morgan lived to be 90 years old. She died in the month of November — — on 10 November 1971 — — in Los Angeles, California.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West's collaborator • • Marion Morgan • •
NYC
Mae West.
MAE WEST defined camp as "the kinda comedy where they imitate me." In "Guilty Pleasures: Feminist Camp from Mae West to Madonna" [Duke University Press, 1996] Pamela Robertson saw things differently.
• • In her book review, Harmony H. Wu writes: Pamela Robertson has set out a difficult task for herself in GUILTY PLEASURES: FEMINIST CAMP FROM MAE WEST TO MADONNA. Never mind that “traditional” notions of camp are contentious and hard to pin down, Robertson wants to define a “feminist camp” sensibility, one that has relationships to but is distinct from more familiar conceptions of gay camp. She argues that while women have historically been active participants in camp, discourse AROUND camp has increasingly posited an exclusively gay male agent of camp, distancing women from the site of camp production. Robertson seeks to re-center women in camp, drawing on popular culture texts and gay constructions of camp to argue for a specifically feminist camp sensibility and practice.
• • Harmony H. Wu explains: In a brief genealogy of the term, Robertson finds that “camp” can be located as far back as 1909. By 1945, the term was understood to connote gay or lesbian . . .
• • Harmony H. Wu focuses on the MAE WEST section: The chapter on Mae West most successfully illustrates that feminist camp both resides within and extends beyond the sphere of gay males. Noting that Mae West was/is frequently referred to as doing “female drag,” Robertson notes that West actually modeled her performance on contemporary female impersonators, which would have been recognized by her audience. Furthermore, the gay male played a significant role in West's act and functioned as a crucial element of her proto-feminist camp sensibility. From stage plays to Hollywood movies, “West did not simply copy gay style but linked certain aspects of gay culture to aspects of a female sensibility” (33). While, as Robertson points out, West's acts were in collusion with the inversion theory of gay men, on the other hand, West clearly believed that women and gay men were aligned because of their shared oppression by straight men. In her hyperbolic performances of femininity, Robertson suggests that West rewrites the gay male drag performance, extracting the masculine characteristics and “articulate[s] a specifically feminine form of aggressivity… She paradoxically reappropriates — and hyperbolizes — the image of the woman from male female impersonators so that the object of her joke is not the woman but the idea that an essential feminine identity exists prior to the image” (34). It is within this reinscription of a gay male camp activity (female drag) that Robertson locates West's feminist camp. Furthermore, she suggests that female VIEWERS have access to the critical stance of West's feminist camp — not only through watching the narratives but also in the female spectators' practice of West imitation, a practice alluded to by contemporary fan magazines and reviews, giving women “imaginary access to [West's] autonomy, transgression, and humor” (51). . . .
— — Excerpt: — —
• • Article: Book Review of "Guilty Pleasure: Feminist Camp from Mae West to Madonna"
• • Written by: Ms. Harmony H. Wu
• • Publication: International Gay & Lesbian Review, Los Angeles, CA — — www.gaybookreviews.info
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1935 • •
NYC
Mae West.
MAE WEST was arrested on 9 February 1927 along with the cast of "Sex" and the cast of "The Captive." Snooty Basil Rathbone, who died in July [on 21 July 1967 in New York, NY], was cuffed and brought downtown to Jefferson Market Police Court along with Helen Menken and their co-stars. 
• • Born in South Africa on 13 June 1892, Basil Rathbone was one year older than Mae West — — but in his mind, he was worlds apart even though they were both starring on Broadway in 1927.
• • During the 1920s, most of Basil Rathbone's work was in the legitimate theater. For many of his Broadway roles he portrayed a suave, sophisticated seducer of women — — quite a change from the legendary ascetic Baker Street detective he would play later in his career.
• • Making a sensation at the Empire Theatre [on Broadway and West 40th Street] was a drama that had been highly regarded in Paris: "The Captive." Basil Rathbone was cast in the role of Jacques Virieu, a young man engaged to be married, only to discover that his fiancée [played by Helen Menken] is in love with someone else — — a woman. Since homosexuality was such a controversial topic during the Roaring Twenties, the entire cast was charged with offending public morals, and the play was closed.
• • Rathbone was very angry about the censorship of his work, but even more aggrieved that show people would start whispering that he was arrested and booked — — with Mae West.
• • For years, Basil Rathbone and his wife made their home at 135 Central Park West. Mae lived in several westside locations, occasionally not far from Rathbone. But there is no record of their taking tea together to reminisce over their arrest on indecency charges in 1927.• • Brush up on your Mae West lines right on Broadway 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 18 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's partners in crime, Rathbone and Menken • • 1926 • •
NYC
Mae West.
