Mae West: Gender Is an Act

While you’re sleeping, college professors in Hungary are thinking about MAE WEST. Here’s a long, striking research paper you might have missed. This is Part 49.
• • "Mae West. The Dirty Snow White" • •
• • Written by:  Zsófia Anna Tóth
• • The Double Meaning • •
• • Zsófia Anna Tóth wrote:  The prescribed gender roles are all to be enacted since “[g]ender is an ‘act’ which is both intentional and performative, where ‘performative’ itself carries the double-meaning of ‘dramatic’ and ‘non-referential’” (Butler 1997, 404). Joan Riviere also declares that womanliness is itself both masquerade and role-playing (38-39). And what is even more significant in relation to West is that “homosexual men exaggerate their heterosexuality as a ‘defence’” while “women who wish for masculinity may put on a mask of womanliness to avert anxiety and the retribution feared from men” (Riviere 35). These women who dare to intellectually challenge the men (such as the femme fatale or the female comedian) directly or indirectly seeks the sexual attentions of those men in a more or less veiled manner (Riviere 36) in order to cover her intellect and ambition with her sexuality.
• • Public display of womanhood • •  . . .
• • This was Part 49 of a lengthy article. Part 50 will follow tomorrow.  
• • Source: Americana — — E-Journal of American Studies in Hungary; Vol. XI, No. 1, Spring 2015.
• • On Friday, 12 April 1929 • •

• • In her popular column "Texas Guinan Says" for The New York Daily News, Texas had playfully mentioned her friend: "Mae's a good girl at heart — — but she's got a bad heart." During the "Pleasure Man" trial readers heard about the Brooklyn bombshell on Friday, 12 April 1929 and other times.
• • Overheard in Hollywood • •
• • In her autobiography, Mae West tells how she came to conceive of the character Diamond Lil.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said:  "I'm here to make talkies. I hope the film can take the temperature."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • The N.Y. Daily News mentioned Mae West.
• • Kate Feldman wrote: Chuck McCann, the comedian and WPIX children’s show host, died Sunday in Los Angeles. He was 83.
• • Kate Feldman wrote: Chuck “His connections to stars and showbiz range from working with his heroes Oliver & Hardy, Mae West and Cary Grant, to contemporary icons like Hugh Hefner, Howard Stern, George Schlatter, Tim Conway, Carol Burnett, Harvey Korman, Stan Lee, and Jerry Lewis...he knew everyone.”  . . .
• • Source: Obit in The N.Y. Daily News; published on Sunday, 8 April 2018
• • The evolution of 2 Mae West plays that keep her memory alive • • 
• • A discussion with Mae West playwright LindaAnn LoSchiavo — — 
• • http://lideamagazine.com/renaissance-woman-new-york-city-interview-lindaann-loschiavo/

• • The Mae West Blog celebrates its 13th anniversary • •  

• • Thank you for reading, sending questions, and posting comments during these past thirteen years. Not long ago, we entertained 3,497 visitors. And we reached a milestone recently when we completed 3,800 blog posts. Wow!  

• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started thirteen years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 3938th 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 April 1930 • •
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