Mae West: Tribute on Tap

MAE WEST has been having a wonderful year in her hometown. Commemorative events brought her novels and stage plays back to the spotlight, to be enjoyed by fans old and new.
• • These events began on Monday, 12 August 2013 and will conclude on Sunday, 24 November 2013.
• • Don't miss the triple-play of Westian wonders scheduled in Manhattan from Friday through Sunday, each one quite different.
• • We hope to see you because there's something for everyone — — paid events and free events, things to do in Greenwich Village and in midtown, and each gold-dusted by Westian history.  Come up and see Mae.
• • "Diamond Lil" video  — —   http://youtu.be/cKsHhSXfJ7U
• • On Sunday, 21 November 1948 • •
• • It was on 30 October 1948 that Mae West signed an Actor's Equity Association Stock Jobbing Contract on Equity's letterhead in New York. The Broadway star of "Diamond Lil" was agreeing to a weekly salary of $2,500, and the play would be opening in Montclair, New Jersey in the month of November — — on Sunday, 21 November 1948.
• • Until 21 November 2009 in Chicago • •
• • Mae West's play "Sex" was shown in Chicago until 21 November 2009.
• • Overheard in Hollywood • •
• • Warner Brothers even made a picture called "The Finger Man" which stars Jimmy Cagney as a former gangster who comes to Hollywood and becomes a big picture name. In case you don't savvy the term, the "finger man" of a mob is the fellow who points out the victim and the location to nab him. Mae West, Betty Compson, and one of the many Marxes are only a few of those who are reputed to have had the "finger" put on them at various times.

Sidney Myer plays the Boss of the Bowery in "Diamond Lil"

• • See "Diamond Lil" This Month! • • 

"Darlene Violette channels Mae West to perfection!" — Stu Hamstra

• • Actress Darlene Violette — — and the wonderful cast who have brought the Bowery denizens and Suicide Hall’s ne’er-do-wells to life since 17 August 2013 — — are concluding their triumphant run of “Diamond Lil” with two more evening performances at Don’t Tell Mama [343 W. 46th Street]:
• • 7:00pm on Sunday, November 24th — — the last show
• • Phone after 4pm to reserve a seat: 212-757-0788; RSVP online: www.donttellmamanyc.com
• • Closest MTA subway stations: 42nd St./ Times Sq. via A, C, E, 1, 2, 3 
• • The public is invited (suitable for age 18 and over). Join us as we turn the iconic NYC nightspot Don't Tell Mama into Gus Jordan's "Suicide Hall"! 
• • The Cast: Starring Darlene Violette as Diamond Lil, Queen of the Bowery and also featuring Sidney Myer, Anthony DiCarlo, Joanna Bonaro, Gary Napoli, Juan Sebastian Cortes, Kimmy Foskett, and Jim Gallagher
• • Director: Co-directed by Dena Tyler, The Actors Studio, and Darlene Violette.
• • Come up and see for yourself. You might even win a swell Raffle Prize.
• • Watch a short clip: Diamond Lil meets Pablo, a gigolo
• • Read a Review of "Diamond Lil" • •
• • L'Idea Magazine's editors attended four times and had a lot to say. Here's the link: http://www.lideamagazine.com/usa-still-entertaining-mae-wests-diamond-lil-makes-new-fans-in-new-york-city/
• • Staying faithful to the gritty themes in the novel, LindaAnn Loschiavo trimmed the work to 85 minutes for a cast of eight.
• • Audience Comments about "Diamond Lil" • •
• • Gigi Garcone said:  Just saw "Diamond Lil" — — a very entertaining production! This tribute to the sultry, irresistible diva Mae West is a must see! All the actors are very talented and you can see they put their hearts into their roles. I especially liked Darlene Violette as Mae West and Joanna Bonaro as Rita, a madam from Rio. Darlene encompassed the whole persona of Mae and Joanna was sublime as the madam — — she really has such a presence on stage. Very enjoyable performance and it's worth the trip!
• • Rick Baynes of Baltimore said: I second Gigi's comments. "Diamond Lil" brings the fabulous Mae West back to life. The wonderful Darlene Violette is spot-on in her portrayal of the lusty, bawdy Mae. Do yourself a favor and go see this lovely production.
• • Mrs. Jean McLoughlin of NYC said:   I recently saw "Diamond Lil" and loved every minute. The entire cast was top-notch, and I was impressed with their creative use of the entire space. The characters really came to life and I was transported back to the raunchy days of Mae West. Darlene Violette gave a great performance as Diamond Lil  — — but Joanna Bonaro really shone as the sultry, venomous Rita. Joanna commands attention and I was more than willing to give it. Fantastic show, I highly recommend that everyone see it! Even my husband, who does not like theater, really enjoyed it.
• • At Jefferson Market Library in NYC this week • •
• • Mae West's most successful play "Diamond Lil" will be performed here on Friday, 22 November 2013 in the evening.
• • And Mae West's legal woes inspired the stage play "Courting Mae West." See it on Saturday, 23 November 2013 in the very same room where Mae faced off with Judge George Donnellan and 12 jurors. 
• • Darlene Violette stars as Mae West and the rest of the cast will soon be announced. 
• • The play, based on true events, is set during the Prohibition Era when Mae's plays were padlocked and she was sent to jail. Talk about a woman who climbed the ladder of success wrong by wrong.. 
• • This free event is open to the public and there is ample seating. [Note: The humor and adult themes are not suitable for children under 13.]
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "Me? Suntanned! Say, honey, woman's greatest weapon is her snow-white skin. The sun's swell for invalids, but I'm no invalid!"
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • An article in Australia discussed Mae West.
• • "Mae West May Visit Australia" • •
• • Sydney, Tuesday — Negotiations to bring Mae West to Australia for the production of "Catherine Was Great" and "Diamond Lil" may fail because she demands £3,000 a week.
• • Other obstacles include transport.
• • The Director of the Tivoli Circuit (Mr. David Martin) who visited Hollywood recently said Mae West was a lovely person who neither smoked nor drank. If negotiations were satisfactorily completed, she would arrive in Australia about this time next year.
• • Source: Article: "Mae West May Visit Australia" in The Canberra Times (page 2); published on Wednesday, 21 November 1945
• • By the Numbers • • 
• • The Mae West Blog was started nine years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2793rd 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 • • Diamond Lil returned for Mae's birthday • •
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Mae West: Don't Miss It on August 14

Spend the afternoon today with MAE WEST. N.Y. Press highlighted "Five Events You Can't Afford to Miss" this week — — and the annual Mae West walking tour was a top selection. Thank you N.Y. Press. We love you.
• • For an a-MAE-zing walking tour, come up and see Mae and celebrate with a nice group of people.
• • Mae West & Eugene O'Neill: Off-beat Links • •
• • At a time when City Hall was monitoring "dirt plays" and policing the ever present threat of theatrical innovations, both Eugene O'Neill and Mae West aroused the finger shakers in the mayor's office. Joab Banton, N.Y.'s District Attorney, was especially severe on both playwrights. "Desire under the Elms" really got Banton's knickers in a knot. This drama was "too thoroughly bad to be purified by blue pen," said Banton.
• • Oh, those purity police! Ever on the patrol for playwrights — — and meanwhile NYC bootleggers buzzed up the booze profits.
• • On Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011 • •
• • "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill"
• • Mae West's birthday is August 17th. Join us at 3:00 pm on Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011. The title of this illustrated historical theme walk is "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill." Rare vintage illustrations will show you how the buildings and blocks looked as these two theatre people saw them.
• • Where: This illustrated walking tour begins at 62 West Ninth Street, NYC (near Sixth Avenue). Join us and take a walk on the wild side next weekend.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "Good sex is like good Bridge. If you don't have a good partner, you'd better have a good hand.”
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • San Francisco costume designer Eleanor Knowles Dugan, always keeping abreast of fashion and design trends, was watching "Project Runway" when she heard a familiar style icon mentioned: Mae West.
• • Eleanor Knowles Dugan writes: This week's episode of Project Runway (11 August 2011) teamed the designers to make fashions for stiltwalkers, necessitating pants. In one pairing, the 22-year-old designer Viktor suggested they do something "glamorous 1930s Hollywood, like Mae West." Bert, the 57-year-old designer, said snootily, "Mae West never wore pants!" But of course Mae DID — — as the lion tamer in "I'm No Angel!" Hmmm. So much for the superior knowledge of age. ...
• • Source: Eleanor Knowles Dugan
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2022nd 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 • • invitation • •
• • Feed — — http://feeds2.feedburner.com/MaeWest
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Mae West: Nice to Have a Man

MAE WEST sang a very memorable song on TV (no, not the duet with Rock Hudson) — — and it was written by a native New Yorker and praised the idea of a live-in fellow.
• • Born in Mae's hometown, New York City, Harold Spina [21 June 1906 — 11 August 1997] earned a reputation as a skillful arranger as well as a composer of popular songs. He always claimed that as a 14-year-old, he was conducting his own orchestra. By the time he finished high school, he was writing vocal arrangements and working as a staff pianist for music publishing companies on Tin Pan Alley. During the early 1930s, when he was still in his twenties, he was turning out his best-loved numbers in collaboration with the lyricists Joe Young and Johnny Burke. In 1937 he took the opportunity to head to Hollywood to create film scores. Still tuned into pop music, he co-created several chart-toppers with the lyricist John Elliot — — including "It's So Nice To Have a Man Around the House," made famous by Dinah Shore, and most memorably performed by Mae West when she guest-starred in March 1960 on CBS-TV's "The Red Skelton Show" wearing a gorgeous red gown. At 91 years old, Harold Spina died in the month of August — — on 11 August 1997.
• • Mae West & Eugene O'Neill: Off-beat Links • •
• • Eugene O'Neill's name was regularly mentioned in connection with judicial proceedings regarding censorship at Jefferson Market Court on Sixth Avenue. For instance, City Hall gave him a few headaches by trying to stop his plays from being performed in NYC on Sundays. Unlike Mae West, Gene was not arrested nor hauled in to Jefferson Market Police Court in a paddy wagon. Nor did he spend time in their jail as Mae did on two occasions. On Sunday August 14th, those who take the tour will see rare photos of the prison that held Mae in 1927. In those days, when there was no such thing as prisoners rights, cold dirt floors and broken windows awaited the inmates.
• • On Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011 • •
• • "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill"
• • Mae West's birthday is August 17th. Join us at 3:00 pm on Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011. The title of this illustrated historical theme walk is "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill." Rare vintage illustrations will show you how the buildings and blocks looked as these two theatre people saw them.
• • Where: This illustrated walking tour begins at 62 West Ninth Street, NYC (near Sixth Avenue). Join us and take a walk on the wild side this weekend.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: No gold-digging for me. I'll I take diamonds! We may be off the gold standard someday.
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Mae West is mentioned in an interview with Craig Russell, an impersonator who was then performing in Melbourne, Australia.
• • The Australian Women's Weekly writes: MOST PEOPLE know Mae West only as a famous American sex queen. But behind that face lurk two more faces — — the philanthropist and the hard-headed businesswoman. So says 28-year-old comedian-impressionist Craig Russell, who is at present performing in Melbourne.
• • And Craig should know. For almost a year, he worked as her secretary and helped with her autobiography, Goodness Had Nothing To Do With lt. "Actually, goodness had a lot to do with it." Craig says. "Mae's sexy burlesque queen image is so strong that people fail to realize at the back of it lurks an angel who has had her hand in her pocket for years supporting people, worthy causes and putting wings on hospitals."
• • And she is also a "cute businesswoman." says Craig. "She bought real estate hand over fist in the '30s." He said it was sad most people only saw Mae as a sexy, salty platinum bombshell. "She's a Leo. Like Jackie Onassis and Lucille Ball. Mae is a real power lady!" It was Mae who gave Craig his start in show business. ...
• • Source: Article: "THE TWO HIDDEN FACES OF MAE WEST" from The Australian Women's Weekly (1932 — 1982); published on Wednesday, 24 November 1976
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2019th 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 trouble in 1927 • •
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Mae West: Queen of the Third Sex

Many people think of MAE WEST as a movie queen. But she was also a writer who worked hard honing her witticisms and comic comebacks. The Brooklyn bombshell discussed her habits with Dick Cavett on "Backlot USA" [1976], revealing that she did not know how to type and she always wrote longhand in bed. Mae also confessed that, since she knew the censors would want to red pencil her manuscripts, she would deliberately put extra material in.
• • In preparation for the walking tour at 3:00 pm on Sunday, 14 August 2011, here's some background on Mae's battles with the purity police during her Broadway career in the 1920s. Instead of pursuing gun-toting bootleggers, City Hall kept the city safe and sanitized by jailing individuals like Mae and some lesbian novelists (like Eve Addams), and also giving O'Neill legal grief over minutiae such as Sunday performances of his plays. Dramatist and resident of "Bohemia" LindaAnn Loschiavo has prepared this look back in time.
• • The artwork, drawn by Michael Di Motta, is taken from his preliminary sketches for The Courting Mae West Comic Book.
• • • • "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill" • • • •
• • The Jazz Age in Greenwich Village might seem like one big party. In spite of the weighty Eighteenth Amendment, which enacted the Prohibition Era in the USA on 16 January 1919, speakeasies were all the rage. The “pansy craze” made drag balls a hot ticket not only for gays but also heterosexuals. And more publishers were renting storefronts in Washington Square and printing left-wing journals, radical essays, little magazines, and controversial plays.
• • Despite the appearance of a free-wheeling society, censorship was ever present. The Catholic Church found a champion in New York’s Gov. Alfred E. Smith [elected governor in 1922, 1924, and 1926]. And The New York Society for the Suppression of Vice (NYSSV or SSV), founded in 1873 by Anthony Comstock, was a leading force in banning books by James Joyce and D.H. Lawrence, and lodging complaints about “dirt” plays on Broadway. [After his death in 1915, Comstock was succeeded by John S. Sumner, who headed the NYSSV until 1950.]
• • • • MAE WEST & CENSORSHIP • • • •
• • In February 1927 Mae was arrested and jailed shortly after her gay play The Drag had a midnight performance on 31 January 1927. Her play Sex (which had been doing good box office at Daly's 63rd Street Theatre for 10 months) was raided and padlocked. After a jury found her guilty, she served a short sentence in the Women’s Workhouse in April 1927.
• • In October 1928, Mae was arrested again when her gay play Pleasure Man opened at the Biltmore Theatre on Broadway. Though her well-connected lawyer Nathan Burkan kept her out of jail, the trial in 1930 bankrupted her.
• • • • EUGENE O’NEILL & CENSORSHIP • • • •
• • Throughout his career, Eugene G. O'Neill faced protests and efforts at censorship over material that some found objectionable and scandalous — — or immoral such as The Hairy Ape in 1922.
• • May 15, 1924 After a newspaper noted a "white Actress to kiss Negro's hand" in O'Neill's play All God's Chillun Got Wings [starring Paul Robeson], a member of the Salvation Army and the Society for the Suppression of Vice called for the production to cease. During rehearsal, the Provincetown Players got threatening letters from the Ku Klux Klan. Under a bomb threat, the play opened with a large police presence at the Provincetown Playhouse [15 May 1924]. The Mayor’s office showed their disapproval, too. The directors of the theater had applied for a permit to use a group of children in the first scene and the permit had been refused, no explanation being offered.
• • With its depiction of a passionate relationship between a young man and his stepmother, O'Neill's Desire Under the Elms outraged New York District Attorney Joab Banton after it opened on Broadway in 1924. Banton had also targeted other productions at the time. . . . But Desire, he said, was "too thoroughly bad to be purified by blue pen," and he threatened to convene a grand jury if the play was not shut down. After the producer refused, Banton created a citizen jury to evaluate the morality of Broadway productions. Upon seeing Desire, the play jury reached a verdict that it was not obscene, and the show went on. O'Neill bemoaned the final result. "We got a large audience, but of the wrong kind of people," O’Neill said. "They came for dirt and found it in everything.”
• • • • Greenwich Village's "queen of the third sex" • • • •
• • Eva Kotchever, a Jewish Polish emigre, took the name Eve Addams and proclaimed herself to be "queen of the third sex." At Eve's Hang-out on MacDougal St., social activities included poetry readings, salons, and discussions focused on sexual topics. A few newspapers raised an alarm about this cafe "where ladies prefer each other" and a sign on her door that announced MEN ARE ADMITTED BUT NOT WELCOME. Tipped off, an under-cover policewoman stopped by, and began to drop in and flirt with Eve, who shared some of her writing with the newcomer, a book titled Lesbian Love. The police raided the premises in June 1926. Charged with obscenity, Eve was sent to the Women’s Workhouse, then deported at the end of the year.
• • Mae West & Eugene O'Neill: Off-beat Links • •
• • Eugene O'Neill loved to watch boxing as much as Mae West did. Anyone who went to take in the fights at Madison Square Garden during the 1920s or early 1930s might have spotted Gene or Mae in a good seat. Of course the Brooklynite had an advantage here in that she could also date the prizefighters after the bout.
• • On Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011 • •
• • "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill"
• • Mae West's birthday is August 17th. Join us at 3:00 pm on Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011. The title of this illustrated historical theme walk is "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill." Rare vintage illustrations will show you how the buildings and blocks looked as these two theatre people saw them.
• • Where: This illustrated walking tour begins at 62 West Ninth Street, NYC (near Sixth Avenue). Join us and take a walk on the wild side this weekend on August 14th.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West told this to a reporter (but maybe it was said tongue-in-cheek): "Right now I think censorship is necessary. The things they're doing and saying in films right now just shouldn't be allowed. There's no dignity anymore and I think that's very important."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Celia Walden writes: Mr. Chow had pulled off every restaurateur’s dream: transposing a restaurant and its atmosphere from one city to another. Not that the idiosyncrasies of the Sixties Brit Pack could rival this lot. Chow can still remember Mae West being given a standing ovation for finishing her meal and scrawling “for food that’s best, ask Mae West” in the visitor’s book. ...
• • Source: Interview: "Mr. Chow — — How the world's starriest restaurateur turned feeding the famous into an art" written by Celia Walden for The Telegraph (UK); posted on Monday, 08 August 2011
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2017th 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 • • 1927 • •
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Mae West: Frank Buchman

It was August 1939 when MAE WEST agreed to meet with Frank Buchman for a half an hour.
• • Born in in Pennsburg, Pennsylvania on 4 June 1878, Franklin Nathaniel Daniel Buchman was a Protestant Christian evangelist who founded the Oxford Group (known as Moral Re-Armament from 1938 until 2001, and as Initiatives of Change since then). Buchman was a controversial figure throughout much of his adult life, and critics dubbed his movement as "Buchmanism" from the 1920s.
• • Buchman, who never married, went out to Hollywood in 1939 to have himself photographed with movie stars as a way to use these pictures for his own publicity.
• • In August 1939, Mae West suggested that Buchman also make a call on film comedian W.C. Fields.
• • Despite a stroke in 1942, and failing health that eventually led to blindness and immobility, he remained fairly active for the next nineteen years. Buchman died in Freudenstadt, Germany in the month of August — — on 7 August 1961.
• • Mae West & Eugene O'Neill: Off-beat Links • •
• • Historical Events for 9th April 1928:
• • Eugene O'Neill's "Lazarus Laughed" premieres in Pasadena, California.
• • Mae West's Broadway debut in her daring new play "Diamond Lil" at the Royale Theatre.
• • On Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011 • •
• • "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill"
• • Mae West's birthday is August 17th. Join us at 3:00 pm on Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011. The title of this illustrated historical theme walk is "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill." Rare vintage illustrations will show you how the buildings and blocks looked as these two theatre people saw them.
• • Where: This illustrated walking tour begins at 62 West Ninth Street, NYC (near Sixth Avenue). Join us and take a walk on the wild side next weekend.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "I feel like a million tonight — — but one at a time."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Mae West is mentioned in a new book by David Wallace — — Capital of the World: A Portrait of New York City in the Roaring Twenties.
• • Slate reporter Libby Copeland writes: Capital of the World, which just came out, is a rollicking look at the outsize personalities who defined the city in the ‘20s. Tellingly, given the freedoms and irreverence of the era, there are a lot of women in the book. Some of their names are familiar (Dorothy Parker, Fanny Brice, Martha Graham) and some are less so. Wallace introduces us to Texas Guinan, a housewife [sic] turned celluloid cowgirl who parlayed her Hollywood fame into a job as a New York City speakeasy hostess. Texas Guinan’s job was to get people drunk and entertain them, and she was spectacularly good at it, making oodles of money (though a lot of it had to go to bribes). Guinan turned insult into an art form — — she liked to greet customers with the phrase “Hello, suckers!”— — and she later became the inspiration for Mae West’s brand of sass. ...
• • Source: Article: "Limited Engagement! One Night Only! A Panel Tonight on New York During the '20s and '40s!" written by Libby Copeland for Slate; posted Wednesday, 3 August 2011
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2015th 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 • • August 1939 • •
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Mae West: The Purity Police

It was 1912 when MAE WEST got her first major vaudeville break: a spot on the bill at Hammerstein's Victoria in mid-May. At last the scintillating singing comedienne could demonstrate that she was in a league with the top-tiered headliners often billed at "The Corner" such as Eva Tanguay, Sophie Tucker, Fanny Brice, Nora Bayes, and other notables.
• • Mae was close to her 19th birthday when she was invited back by Oscar Hammerstein for a weeklong booking that began in the month of August — — on 6 August 1912. She shared the stagebill with several acts — — including Fields and Carroll.
• • It was then that Mae West heard Fields and Carroll perform their jaunty rag "On the Mississippi" — — about 99 years ago on the corner of Seventh Avenue and 42nd Street. Then "Mae West and Her Boys" sang a few rags and played the bones, minstrel style. Variety slammed their routine, suggesting she return to burlesque since she lacked the refinement necessary for top-drawer vaudeville. Instead Mae once again became a solo act, purchased new material, and kept on trouping.
• • Half of the team was a man five years older than Mae. Arthur Fields was also born in the month August — — on 6 August 1888 — — and he hailed from Philadelphia, where he started out in life as Abe Finkelstein. For years he toured with Harry Carroll. Scrappy little Arthur Fields was merely 11 years old when he turned pro, booking singing engagements in Utica, New York and then branching out to Coney Island. Around 1908 the ambitious baritone toured with Guy Brother's Minstrel Show, and helped assemble a vaudeville novelty "Weston, Fields, and Carroll." Four years later, the partnership had been paired down to Fields and Carroll. Arthur Fields had his first hit as a songwriter with "On the Mississippi" (1912); he had composed this ragtime music with Harry Carroll, but Ballard MacDonald supplied the lyrics.
• • When his wife's health necessitated a move from New York to Florida, the couple relocated to the sunbelt and settled in Hollywood in 1946. The tireless entertainer snagged his own radio gig over WKAT, Miami: "The Arthur Fields Program."
• • Sadly, in March 1953, he had a stroke and went under the care of the Littlefield Convalescent Home in Largo, Florida. Most unfortunately, the institution had a fire, which ended his life on 29 March 1953. He was 64 years old.
• • Mae West & Eugene O'Neill: Off-beat Links • •
• • The Edwin Forrest Theatre was renamed the Coronet when it was refurbished and reopened in December 1945. A few years later, this playhouse hosted the revival of Mae West's enormously successful Bowery classic. "Diamond Lil" met her public at the Coronet beginning on 5 February 1949.
• • Eventually, the Coronet became the Eugene O'Neill Theatre on 19 November 1959.
• • Eugene O'Neill was born in New York, NY on 16 October 1888 and introduced to the theatre world via the Provincetown Playhouse during the 1920s. The Pulitzer-winning "Beyond the Horizon" [published in 1920] was O'Neill's first important play.
• • Though Mae found O'Neill's outlook depressing, she was well aware of his enormous popularity and made sure to go and see his plays.
• • "Mae West was better suited to writing gritty realism than Eugene O'Neill," explains Frank Cullen in the book "Vaudeville, Old and New" [2007].
• • On Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011 • •
• • "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill"
• • Mae West's birthday is August 17th. Join us at 3:00 pm on Sunday afternoon, 14 August 2011. The title of this illustrated historical theme walk is "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill." Rare vintage illustrations will show you how the buildings and blocks looked as these two theatre people saw them.
• • Where: This illustrated walking tour begins at 62 West Ninth Street, NYC (near Sixth Avenue). Come along and take a walk on the wild side next weekend.
• • Censorship and the Wales Padlock Law • •
• • During the 1920s in the Empire State, because law enforcement had the support of Governor Al Smith, a Roman Catholic, New York City's district attorney and the police department of New York City undertook a crackdown on "salacious plays." But, in reality, City Hall was after one individual: Mae West. Not only was she an actress, she also was daring enough to write plays like "The Drag" about homosexuals and drag queens.
• • Signed into law by the governor, in time for Mae's trial at Jefferson Market Court in early 1927, the Wales Padlock Law held writers and producers, but not actors, responsible for obscenity.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "Keep a diary and one day it'll keep you."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Mae West was pursued by the censors both in her hometown of New York City and also out West in Hollywood.
• • Robert Rusie writes: The morality police, the arbiters of public taste, received a blow in March of 1930. A hung jury caused the judge to dismiss obscenity charges against Mae West's Pleasure Man. This is the same judge who broke a gavel, pounding to keep order and erase from the record a question by Miss West about how a police officer could tell if he were addressing a young lady or a man in drag. When the show was raided, police arrested 52 members of the cast, several of whom were men in drag. This resulted in an amendment to the "Wales Padlock Law" in New York. In the future, only the writers and producers — — and not the cast or crew of a show — — would be held responsible for material deemed obscene or immoral. ...
• • Source: Broadway 101: The History of the Great White Way written by Robert Rusie; this excerpt comes from his section 1930 — 1940, The Great Depression
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2014th 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 • • on trial, 3 March 1927 • •
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