Mae West: August 1921

It was 15 August 1921 and MAE WEST was enjoying her debut in "The Mimic World."
• • With "The Mimic World of 1921," the Shuberts had hoped for a big hit. Additionally, this revue was inaugurating their new roof theatre that featured a restaurant and a promenade overlooking Central Park. However, the show opened to mixed reviews from a number of top critics. Mae West wore a daring black velvet dress onstage, "cut at either side to display her bare hips," wrote Women's Wear [24 August 1921], quaking under such a sartorial shock. Jack Dempsey must have liked what he saw because he went to Mae's dressing room on opening night — — and the two hit it off big-time.
• • Theatre Magazine offered a single page spotlight and described the singing comedienne with the right amount of promotional piffle. The staffwriter announced that "those who do not know African tribal customs credit Mae West with the invention of the shimmy."
• • And don't you adore this picture they ran? The actress had just toasted her 28th birthday.
• • 14 August 2011 A-MAE-Zing Mae West Walking Tour • •
• • "Mae West in Bohemia — — Gin, Sin, Censorship, and Eugene O'Neill"
• • Mae West's birthday is August 17th, and it's time to celebrate the New York City life of the Brooklyn Bombshell.
• • Record rainfall in The Big Apple? No matter. "Mae West in Bohemia," a two hour walking tour that examined where Mae drank her gin, sinned, battled censorship, and kept tabs on Eugene O'Neill and his gang, went forth. Five lucky individuals won amazing raffle prizes at the finale.
• • Esther Tolkoff said: ‎"Mae" you were awesome — — all that info about the Village, Eugene O'Neill, the speakeasies, Texas Guinan, and (of course) your namesake, all new to me, the lifelong "new-yawka." And you delivered it all like a pro, very entertaining, Bravissima!!!
• • Francis Zuccarello said: I enjoyed the awesome and scholarly Mae West/ Eugene O‘Neill/ Greenwich Village tour. And I won such a valuable door prize!
• • PHOTO: Conrad Bradford
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "I'd rather be looked over than overlooked.”
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Would Mae West have been enchanted by the romantic menace from Venice, Giacomo Casanova [2 April 1725 — 4 June 1798]?
• • Book reviewer Elizabeth Benedict wrote: Had the great matchmaker in the sky arranged for Giacomo Casanova and Mae West to meet, they surely would have been notches on each other's holsters, reveling in West's motto: "Too much of a good thing is wonderful.'' In this fecund season of Casanova — — a dazzling new biography, "Casanova: The Man Who Really Loved Women,'' and the paperback of his 12-volume autobiography have just appeared — — we learn that it was not only seduction and dalliance that filled his calendar. By the time this Venetian-born Proteus died, in a castle in Bohemia in 1798, he had had a dozen careers . . .
• • Source: Book Review: "A REAL CASANOVA: THE MAN WHO GAVE HIS NAME TO LOVE WAS FAR, FAR MORE THAN A DASHING ROUE" written by Elizabeth Benedict for The Boston Globe; published on SUNDAY, 30 November 1997
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2023rd 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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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1921 • •
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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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Mae West
• • 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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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • on trial, 3 March 1927 • •
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Mae West: Off-beat

One of Scotland's newspapers The East Lothian Courier interviewed the Fringe folks and found that "The Life and Times of MAE WEST" was a top pick. Pene Herman Smith recreates the role of this complex American actress and writer, portraying Mae in her later years after the death of Jim Timony, on Tuesday 9 August 2011.
• • The Scottish journalist Kirsty Gibbins writes: Fringe by the Sea 2011 kicks off on Monday [8 August 2011] and organisers have vowed that this year's festival will be the best ... Other highlights of the seven-day programme . . . 'The Life and Times of Mae West', a one-woman show delivering two performances in the Masonic Hall on Tuesday .... [Source: Article: "A Fringe full of benefits" written by Kirsty Gibbins for The East Lothian Courier; posted on 4 Aug 2011]
• • Mae West & Eugene O'Neill: Off-beat Links • •
• • Cole Porter [1891 — 1964] wrote the novelty "You're the Top" for the musical "Anything Goes." The song mentions numerous bold-faced names such as Mae West, Eugene O'Neill, Strauss, Vincent Youmans, Mahatma Gandhi, Greta Garbo, Calvin Coolidge, Fred Astaire, Dante, Jimmy Durante, Botticelli, Keats, Shelley, Irving Berlin, and others. Out-of-town try-outs began on 5 November 1934 at the Colonial Theatre, Boston. The Broadway hit premiered at the Alvin Theatre on 21 November 1934. Here's an excerpt:
• • • ... You're the top!
• • • You're an arrow collar
• • • You're the top!
• • • You're a Coolidge dollar,
• • • You're the nimble tread
• • • Of the feet of Fred Astaire,
• • • You're an O'Neill drama, ...
• • • ... You're Ovaltine!
• • • You're a boom,
• • • You're the dam at Boulder,
• • • You're the moon,
• • • Over Mae West's shoulder, ...
• • 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).
• • Mae West on the Newsstand • •
• • "The Successful Career of Mae West on the American Stage" written by Yvonne Shafer was published in The Journal of American Drama and Theatre [JADT, Volume 12, Number 3, Fall 2000]. To order a copy of this back issue, contact the editors: JADT c/o Martin E. Segal Theatre Center, CUNY Graduate Center, 365 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10016-4309.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West wrote this movie dialogue for her character Mavis Arden ["Go West Young Man"]:
• • Morgan: You mean I'm practically your slave.
• • Mavis Arden: You're not. Slaves are generally useful.
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • It was the legitimate theatre season of 1926 — 1927. When the short-eyed critics assembled a list of the ten dirtiest shows, "Sex" by Mae West was in this number. Well, heck, no wonder ticket-buyers saw the show numerous times.
• • Robert Rusie writes: In April of 1926, Mae West opened in Sex, which Variety defined as a "nasty red-light district show." Miss West would be arrested and serve ten days [sic] in the Women's Workhouse on Welfare Island — — but not until after the show ran for 375 performances. Miss West's comment on the ordeal? The uniforms were uncomfortable. In Sex, Miss West played a Montreal Madame. This wasn't the only show on Broadway at the time with a prostitutes as a main character. The Shanghai Gesture, starring Florence Reed (331 performances), and Lulu Belle (461 performances) were also playing. The difference is that in the later two shows old Victorian "righteousness" won out. Even The Easiest Way, from the preceding decade, had a moral overtone. The (anti)heroine couldn't help but be morally disposed to "the easiest way." In fairness, though, it must be told that Lulu Belle was listed with Sex as one of the ten (yes, ten) dirtiest shows on Broadway. ...
• • Source: Broadway 101: The History of the Great White Way written by Robert Rusie; this excerpt comes from his section 1920 — 1930, The American Theater, Part 3
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2013th 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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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • with Lyons Wickland in "Sex" 1926 • •
• • Feed — — http://feeds2.feedburner.com/MaeWest
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Mae West.