Thursday, March 17, 2022

Mae West: Red-Hot Mama

Depending on the person who wielded the pen, the fan magazine Picture Play could worship MAE WEST in fragrant ink or scold her. A year before publishing Dorothy Herzog’s skeptical sourness [May 1934], the zine printed a much more enthusiastic feature by Ben Maddox [April 1933] emphasizing Mae’s work ethic and down-to-earth side. This is Part 4 of 16 segments.
• • “Mae West: Don't Call Her Lady” • •  
• • Mae West: A brand-new kind of red-hot mama personality • •

• • Ben Maddox wrote: Miss West has a brand-new kind of red-hot mama personality which fairly glitters in "She Done Him Wrong." She's now making follow-up pictures of her famed "Diamond Lil" flavor.
• • Ben Maddox wrote: Now Broadway's bad girl has discovered a greater field for her million-voltage, red-hot mama personality.  
• • Mae is Hollywood's hottest houri • •
• • Ben Maddox wrote: The screen fans have been electrified, as she anticipated, and she's rearing to be branded as Hollywood's hottest houri.
• • Ben Maddox wrote: "She Done Him Wrong" initiated her career as a Paramount star and she's currently in the midst of torrid follow-up pictures.
• • Mae West: Torrid talking pictures • • …  
• • Note: Mae West and Jack LaRue in "Diamond Lil" (1928). As South American sex trafficker Juarez kisses her hand, Lil shouts to Gus Jordan, "Take a look at this, Gus, and learn something!" It's one of the few moments from her play that made the cut for the sanitized Paramount screen version, where the sex traffickers become Russian counterfeiters.
• • This will be continued on the next post.
• • Source: Picture Play; published in the issue dated for April 1933.
• • On Monday, 17 March 1930 • •
• • It was on Monday, 17 March 1930 when Mae West's "Pleasure Man" trial before Judge Amadeo Bertini began, and the New York District Attorney charged that Mae violated Section 1140-a by writing another gay play and he also charged her with the crime of maintaining a public nuisance — — an insulting charge typically levied at speakeasies and skidrow saloons, not playwrights.
• • Note: Learn more about Mae's trial by reading the stage play "Courting Mae West."
• • Overheard in Hollywood • •
• • Hollywood reporter Aileen St. John Brenon wrote: Mae West never forgets a friend nor a kindness, and seems to have an inexhaustible memory for the faces of those who have crossed her pathway in her long journey from Brooklyn to Broadway.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "I write my plays in rehearsal."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • A Connecticut newspaper mentioned Mae West.
• • Sex” by Mae West • •
• • Certain producers and theater-owners had openly announced that Miss West’s next opus "The Drag,” would never be able to get a New York theater.
• • It is an exposition of psychopathic conduct which they feared would bring down government censors upon the entire New York theater. …
• • Manchester Evening News (Manchester, Conn.); published on Tuesday, 1 March 1927

• • 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 4,900 blog posts. Wow! 
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seventeen years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 4,952nd 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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• • Be sure to bookmark or follow The Mae West Blog
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • "Diamond Lil" in 1928
• •
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