Mae West: Homestead, FL

A Mae-maven from Florida shared this personal memory of MAE WEST:
• • She said: "I wanted you to know that Mae was an avid bicyclist and rode almost every day. Mae attributed her maaaaarrvelous figure to this endeavor. What I just found out was that she actually vistited our small farming town of Homestead, Florida when it became the first town to have its own bicycle paths, thus being named Homestead, City of bicycles. She came here in the 1930s. ..."
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • none • •
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Mae West.

Mae West: New Book!

Mae West: The Statue of Libido is a new illustrated title that will be released in March 2008 by Taschen, a German publisher.
• • Book description: In terms of celebrity icons, few attained the highest levels of fame and controversy as rapidly as Mae West.
• • Labeled a "pornographer" by censorship boards, she was also one of 1930s Hollywood’s most lucrative box-office draws (causing Variety in 1933 to label the star "as hot an issue as Hitler"). Nicknamed by critic George Jean Nathan "the Statue of Libido" and paid homage to in the title song of Cole Porter's musical Anything Goes, her voluptuous image and signature platinum blond hair became recognizable worldwide and for decades beyond her prime years of fame in the 1930s. In fact, even by the 1960s when the Beatles wanted to use her image on the cover of their Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album, those long-haired icons of a new generation were required to deliver a handwritten plea to the icon (which they dutifully did), since Mae West herself always objected, as she said, to belonging to any "lonely hearts club."
• • Taschen's Movie Icon series: People talk about Hollywood glamour, about studios that had more stars than there are in heaven, about actors who weren't actors but were icons. Other people talk about these things, TASCHEN shows you. Movie Icons is a series of photo books that feature the most famous personalities in the history of cinema. These 192-page books are visual biographies of the stars. For each title, series editor Paul Duncan has selected approximately 150 high quality enigmatic and sumptuous portraits, colorful posters and lobby cards, rare film stills, and previously unpublished candid photos showing the stars as they really are. These images are accompanied by concise introductory essays by leading film writers; each book includes a chronology, a filmography, and a bibliography, and is peppered with quotes from the movies and from life.
• • More bang for your buck! "... a fast-food, high-energy fix on the topic at hand." — — The New York Times Book Review
• • Mae West: The Statue of Libido [192 pages — — ISBN 978-3-8228-2321-7]
• • Photos — — www.taschen.com/
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1932 • •
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Mae West.

Mae West: Albuquerque

Old-time newspaper men didn't live by the almighty press release when they wanted an interview with MAE WEST.
• • Ollie Reed, Jr. tells the story of veteran reporter George Baldwin, a Texas native, who started at The Albuquerque Tribune late in 1934 and worked at the paper — as reporter, city editor, managing editor, associate editor, and columnist — for more than 60 years. He died in 1997 at age 88.
• • In his first years at the paper, George Baldwin worked news beats all day, stopped at home for supper cooked by his wife, Ruth, and then covered University of New Mexico sports well into the evening. He didn't back off that work schedule until illness overtook him in his mid-1980s.
• • "He was at the paper at 6 in the morning and 6 in the evening," remembered Harry Moskos, who started at The Tribune in 1953. "I think that's where I got my work ethic."
• • George Baldwin began his days with breakfast at the Court Cafe, which was on Fourth Street, just north of Central Avenue. Then he walked to the old Alvarado Hotel near the Santa Fe Railway tracks to see if any movie stars or other notables were stopping in town on the trains that ran between Los Angeles and Chicago.
• • Once, in the late 1930s, he got a tip that movie star Mae West was on a train. Baldwin got on to look for her, and the train departed with him still aboard.
• • "Boy, that conductor was sore," Baldwin recalled in a 1996 interview. "You weren't supposed to stop a train in those days. They finally did stop it up by Menaul School and made me get off. I had to walk (about 2 1/2 miles) back to The Tribune offices." ...
— — excerpt — —
• • "The Times of The Tribune"
• • Byline: Ollie Reed Jr.
• • Published in: The Albuquerque Tribune
• • Published on: Thursday, 21 February 2008
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1932 • •
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Mae West: Lucky Ducky

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• • In this Max Fleischer Color Classic from the 1930s, the cartoonists created a sexpot DUCK — — modeled on the inimitable MAE WEST.
• • After you've had all that turkey, feast on these hens, roosters, and ducks.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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• • Photo: • • Mae West • • cartoon by Max Fleischer • •
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Mae West: Long Playing

MAE WEST did not do a lot of TV nor radio. However, a long-playing record — "Original Radio Broadcasts" [Mark 56 Records, 643] released in 1974 — contains an interesting sampling of Westian witchery.
• • Naturally, this compilation includes the infamous 1937 sketch entitled "Adam & Eve" performed by Mae West (as Eve) with Don Ameche (as Adam) on the Chase and Sanborn Hour hosted by ventriloquist Edgar Bergen and his wooden sidekick Charlie McCarthy. This was the skit that got Mae West banished from NBC's airwaves.
• • A "Frankie & Johnny" sequence was performed in the mid-1930s on the Rudy Vallee Show. And you'll hear two full length appearances by Mae on the American Forces Radio Service Christmas Shows of 1971 and 1972 during the Vietnam War.
• • Mae is at her best with the young men in uniform, teasing them with her special brand of innuendo. Classic Mae West lines are here, for example, "When I have to choose between two evils, I generally pick the one I never tried before!" and "In the New Year, I'm going to have Good Will towards Men .... and the More Men, the More I Will!"
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • none • •
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Mae West: Eggs-actly

MAE WEST was costumed colorfully for her film shoots. But since these 1930s movies were in black and white, only visitors to the set and Mae's co-stars and co-workers could appreciate the brilliant tones and hues.
• • The same is true for most of Mae's live stage work. Attractive candy-colored costumes by Dolly Tree and other designers were, too often, captured by photographers working with black and white film.
• • A visit to the Hollywood Museum, where many of Mae's gowns and possessions are on display, would reveal the peacock splendor of Travis Banton's costumes, Walter Plunkett's designs, and Edith Head's creations for Mae West.
• • To celebrate Easter Sunday, the Mae West blog presents Mae West in Technicolor.
• • Speaking about bunny day, Mae West had something to say about carrots: "I never worry about diets. The only carrots that interest me are the number you get in a diamond."
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1932 • •
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Mae West.

Mae West: Onstage Today

MAE WEST is part of the glitz and glamour of old Hollywood in the musical revue "Hollywood Revisited" - - playing today Sunday [beginning 2:30 pm] at Steadman Theatre, Mansfield University.
• • A stage show features vocalists from Hollywood and the Twin Tiers singing and dancing to movie-related music and wearing costumes from popular films of the 1930s - 1960s.
• • Audiences can see the actual costumes worn by legendary Tinseltown performers such as MAE WEST, Carole Lombard, Elizabeth Taylor, Marilyn Monrie, Gene Kelly, and Bob Hope while enjoying music from those actors' classic films such as "Belle of the Nineties," "The Three Musketeers," etc.
• • Pianist Greg Schreiner, a Los Angeles collector who owns over 300 movie costumes, created the revue and, in addition to providing musical accompaniment for the show, he will share anecdotes about the designers, movies, and scenes for each costume featured in the revue. Schreiner's fashion collection has been displayed at museums around the globe. Future performances of "Hollywood Revisited" that feature Mae West are announced here: www.hollywoodrevisited.com.
• • Today's staging of "Hollywood Revisited" is part of the Wellsboro Community Concert Association Series. Info and tickets: phone 570-724-5225 or 570-724-3481.
• • Though Community Concerts started in Wellsboro, Pennsylvania in 1947, its history as a national organization goes back to the early 1920s. Come up and see Mae - - today - - at Wellsboro!
• • This "Belle of the Nineties" animation was created by Mae West fan Martin [Mae West Color Site: www.maewest.nl/ - a colorful tribute to the Brooklyn bombshell in Holland].
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • "Belle of the 90s" • • 1934
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Mae West.

Mae West: Man Fook

MAE WEST knew men but she also had a special place in her heart for Man Fook Low. In Los Angeles, her favorite Oriental eatery was Man Fook Low in Market Chinatown, one of the first places to feature the dumplings now known as dim sum.
• • In the 1930s, Hollywood started patronizing the top Chinatown restaurants. Repeat attenders included chopstick-wielders such as Peter Lorre, Sidney Greenstreet, Walt Disney, and the Marx Brothers. During the Depression, when movie people could afford to eat well at a time when many Americans were jobless, the West Coast gossip columns and movie magazines would mention Tuey Far Low alongside showbiz hang-outs such as the Brown Derby, Sardi's, and the Coconut Grove. (Tuey Far Low courted customers by staying open until 5 A.M.)
• • Celebrities also flocked to Man Jen Low and the Dragon's Den.
• • In Mae's opinion, however, Man Fook Low was THE PLACE for "authentic" Chinese chow. In 1959 their shui mai dumplings were 35 cents each.
• • The Lunar Year 2007 begins the year of the pig.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1954 • •
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Mae West.

Mae West: Rhymes with Itch

Mae West's quotes have turned up in a new book published in the United Kingdom.
• • The northern quarter of London, England is home base for best-selling author Kate Figes, whose latest release is The Big Fat Bitch Book in which she heartily embraces the positive, hilarious side of bitchery. This tome is laced with humorous extracts from novels - - everything from Jane Austen to Mary McCarthy - - and pithy quotes delivered both on and off the silver screen.
• • Many witticisms date from the Golden Age of Hollywood divas, when strong, mouthy women such as MAE WEST, Bette Davis, and Katharine Hepburn ruled the box office. "If we had film stars like Mae West, who had those kinds of scripts and lines - - well, those 1930s actresses are the greats, for me.
• • "Clever bitching is an extreme female sport. It's thrilling and takes us to places we feel we shouldn't go," says Kate Figes.
• • The Big Fat Bitch Book is published by Virago.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West • • "blue" • • 1933 • •
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Mae West.