Mae West: Echoed Queerly

Many great minds have contemplated MAE WEST — — but great minds don’t think alike. Academic and author Chase Dimock has written an interesting article on Mae as a playwright. This is Part 5.
• • Why Don’t You Come Up Sometime and Queer Me? • •
• • Reclaiming Mae West as Author and Sexual Philosopher • •
• • Homosexual, gay, invert, pansy • •
• • Chase Dimock wrote:  From her start on stage, Mae West cultivated a strong following amongst fairies and drag impersonators and became what I would call the first true gay icon. Before drag queens impersonated Cher, Diana Ross, and even Joan Crawford, they were impersonating Mae West in the 30s. Over the top, aggressively sexual, and trafficking in wise cracks and double entendres, Mae West was born for drag impersonation, and some scholars believe that she was actually made from drag.
• • Bert Savoy • •
• • Chase Dimock wrote:  Some believe that Mae West borrowed her “vamp” character and persona from the most famous female impersonator of the era, Bert Savoy. Savoy was the first female impersonator to achieve mainstream fame as a comedian with an act that played on the double entendre that every risqué joke he made as a female character echoed queerly as a man speaking the sexuality as a woman. For the masses, he was a man in a dress, but for the queer audience that read between the lines, he was the first gay comedian.
• • Mae’s vamp character • •    . . .
• • His article will be continued on the next post.
• • Source: As It Ought to Be
• • Chase Dimock, who teaches Literature and Composition at College of the Canyons, is Managing Editor of As It Ought to Be.
• • R.I.P. Actor Burt Reynolds [1936 — 2018] • •
• • In the last years of her life, when Mae West had an accident and was admitted to a hospital, her companion told the press that the actress had such an exciting dream about sexy Burt Reynolds that she had tumbled out of bed. In reality, the sad situation was that Mae had had a small stroke that caused her fall.
• • Born in February 1936, the one-time Cosmopolitan Magazine pin-up died on Thursday, 6 September 2018. He was 82.
• • Burt Reynolds mentioned Mae West in an interview just two years ago.
• • British Reporter: Who would be your dream dinner date?
• • Burt Reynolds:  I got to know Mae West in the late 1970s. I’d go to her art deco house in Los Angeles, sit on her bed and listen to her talk all day. She died in 1980 at the grand old age of 87. I’d love to have one more night with her, listening to her tales about Hollywood’s golden age.  ...
• • Source: Interview for The Daily Mail (U.K.); published on Friday, 29 January 2016.
• • On Saturday, 7 September 1912 • •
• • In New York City, the musical "A Winsome Widow" was staged on The Gay White Way from 11 April 1912 — 7 September 1912 at Moulin Rouge [1514 — 1516 Broadway at W. 44th St.]. Mae West, who was performing as Le Petite Daffy in that show, was taking her final bows, yes, a century ago on September 7th.
• • Overheard in Hollywood • •
• • "Mae West, author, loses her pianist," noted the trade paper Variety in their issue dated for Friday, 8 September 1922.
• • In Her Own Words • •

• • Mae West said: "Yes, I wrote the story myself. It's all about a girl who lost her reputation but never missed it. Come up and see it sometime."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • A Virginia daily mentioned Mae West.
• • “Mae West, the Brinkley Girl” • •
• • Mae West, the Brinkley Girl, popular because of her beauty as well as the modiste's creations she will display in association with a number of specially written and selected songs, will give a bright touch to the performance.
• • The Big City Four, a male quadrity known as the leading black-face singing four of the vaudeville world, will add harmony as their end of the entertainment.   . . .
• • Source: Article (page 8) in The Times-Dispatch (Virginia); published on Sunday, 7 September 1913
• • 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 14th anniversary • •  

• • Thank you for reading, sending questions, and posting comments during these past fourteen years. Not long ago, we entertained 3,497 visitors. And we reached a milestone recently when we completed 4,000 blog posts. Wow!  

• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started fourteen years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 4038th 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 England in 1947 • •
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