Mae West: ”All about Us”

MAE WEST’s plump, curvaceous body was a vital element in her comedy. Academics have emphasized that “excessive body is one of the qualities of female unruliness, suggesting that she is unwilling or unable to control her physical appetites.” Japanese film historian Mio Hatokai discusses how Hollywood publicists and fan zines responded to this “fatness” in 1933. This is Part 24 of a lengthy piece.
• • Laughing off the “Fatness” ― Mae West’s Body Image and Female Spectators in the Early 1930s • •
• • Mae West: Garbo’s a goddess but Mae is “all about us” • •
• • Mio Hatokai wrote: Garbo is wanted on the screen; Mae West is, conversely, “all about us.”

• • Mio Hatokai wrote: To put it more precisely, there can never be a million little Garbos, as Garbo, “a   glamorous, glittering, slender and appealing lady,” is the sole presence on silver screen, while West, “an ‘inviting,’ sexy, curvy lady,” is more attainable, or much closer to the average film spectators in terms of shape, and thus can be “all about us.”
• • Weight-obsessive Discourses Created by Fan Magazines • •
• • Mio Hatokai wrote: Along with these letters, let us take a look at an article appeared in July 1933 issue of Motion Picture Magazine.  
• • Mae West: “Curves! Hollywood Wants ‘em!” • •  ...
• • Mio Hatokai’s lengthy article will continue on the next post.
• • Source: Academic anthology on film stars released by Waseda University, 2015.
• • On Saturday, 19 November 1927 • •
• • When Mae's play "The Wicked Age" opened, The New York Times reacted with alarm: "The whole was in the best Mae West school of playwriting . . . ." Yes, you're right; this was never meant to be a compliment.
• • The curtain clanged down on "The Wicked Age" on Saturday, 19 November 1927.
• • Overheard in Hollywood • •
• • Hollywood in the 1930s was not an easy place for a British actor to get work, unless he happened to meet Mae West.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • About Frank Wallace suing her for $1,000 per month alimony, Mae West said: "The nerve of a brass monkey!”
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • An article in The N.Y. Observer discussed Mae West.
• • "Come Up and Signify Me: Mae West Meets Academia" • •
• • Robert Gottlieb explained: Mae West may have been a laughingstock to some, but to others she was a brilliant original — a woman of large talents, if not education, who triumphantly asserted the right to her rampant sexuality and created a type as unique as Chaplin, Garbo or the Marx Brothers. ...
• • Source: The New York Observer; posted on Sunday, 4 November 2001
• • 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 17th anniversary • • 
• • Thank you for reading, sending questions, and posting comments during these past seventeen years. Not long ago, we entertained 3,497 visitors. And we reached a milestone recently when we completed 4,800 blog posts. Wow! 
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seventeen years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 4,869th 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 a magazine, in 1933 • •
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