Mae West: Vanished Art Form

MAE WEST inspired and influenced numerous people. Listen to Tangarra. This is Part 2 of two parts.
• • “Tangarra, Recognized as Buffalo’s First Female Impersonator, Looks Back at a Past That No Longer Exists” • •
• • Written by Mary Kunz Goldman, Elizabeth Barr, and News Staff Reporters
• • John E. Minzer [22 October 1912 – 17 April 2004] — a.k.a. “Tangarra” • •
• • Tangarra met Mae West in 1939 • •

• • Buffalo News wrote: Eighty-eight years old (in 2001), Tangarra can claim to be Buffalo's first female impersonator, with a strange and glittering career that took him across the country. He can recall not only Mae West but also other stars like Tallulah Bankhead ("She put my hair up and I looked ridiculous," he jeers) and Ann Miller. ("She looks like a Japanese sunset!" he laughs, pointing at an old snapshot.)
• • Buffalo News wrote: When he looks back, he sees a world that doesn't exist anymore.
• • Buffalo News wrote: Tangarra feels sad that the mix of burlesque and vaudeville that had been his specialty is a vanished art. …
• • Note: John E. Minzer, AKA Tangara, Buffalo's legendary female impersonator, age 95, who was known to generations of Western New York audiences as Tangarra, died on Tuesday, 17 April 2007.
• • Buffalo News wrote: Tangarra was the last and possibly one of the best vestiges of the time when drag performers were a beloved part of any vaudeville or night club experience.
• • Buffalo News wrote: In a 1998 Outcome interview, Tangarra described a very first public performance in 1928 at the Erie County Fair as "Little Egypt."
• • Buffalo News wrote: A booking agent arranged for a (then) sixteen-year-old John Minzer to perform on the Ismailia Shrine Temple stage as "Little Egypt."
• • Buffalo News wrote: "They made me up and then they put me in a black wig! I've never had black hair in my life! They gave me a veil that went from here to here. (Tangarra indicated that it covered the face from just below the eyes to below the chin line.) I wore a heavy gold belt around my waist with long flowing fabric hanging off of the belt."
• • Buffalo News wrote: "I was pretty popular," Tangarra told Outcome Magazine, adding that she was driven around the fairgrounds while in costume, greeting and meeting fairgoers and received many presents and applause.
• • Buffalo News wrote: Tangarra retired from performing in 1974 but did perform at the 1998 grand opening of what was then known as Secrets on Allen Street.
• • Note: John a.k.a. Tangarra had lived in Buffalo, New York 14221.
• • Source: The Buffalo News; published on Sunday, 11 March 2001.
• • John Patrick West [March 1866 —  5 January 1935] • •

• • Despite having an ambivalent relationship with her father, Mae West took after him and also worked for him when he peddled fruit in Brooklyn and when he helmed a "detective agency" in New Jersey and New York City. Before opening his own operation, John West had walked the beat in Coney Island and elsewhere in Brooklyn.
• • Born on Manhattan's Lower East Side in March 1866, John Patrick West [called "Jack"] grew up feisty, impatient, and strong. As a child he boasted that he'd rather fight than eat. He got his Irish up rather quickly, remembered Mae. He was easily angered and "always ready to do physical violence when the urge was on him." In 1969, Mae revealed in an interview that she thought her father was cruel — — but realized "all his fighting was done doing other people's fighting for them."
• • Jack West was 7 years old in 1873 when his family moved from Avenue C (near the docks) in Manhattan to the borough of Brooklyn, settling first in Red Hook, and then in Greenpoint.
• • On 19 January 1889, in Greenpoint, Battling Jack West and Tillie Delker took their wedding vows before a local minister with Jack's sister Julia West acting as maid of honor.
• • On Saturday, 5 January 1935, "Battling Jack" heard the final countdown; he passed away in Oakland, California of a stroke.
• • On this date we remember John Patrick West with love and respect.
• • On Wednesday, 5 January 1938 • •
• • "Paramount: Mae West Most Likely All Washed Up" was the downbeat headline in Variety Magazine on Wednesday, 5 January 1938. After the NBC broadcast brouhaha, Paramount began monitoring audience feedback to the coming attractions that were onscreen at the New York City Paramount Theatre.
• • Overheard in Hollywood • •
• • The recent dispute between Mae West, Raoul Walsh (director), and Paramount executives over the quality of the photography of her new picture, "Klondike Annie," which caused a four-day production halt while a new cameraman was found has been given much prominence in America and inspired 'Variety'' to a consideration of stars and their favorite cameraman.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "Call me anything, but call me often."
• • Mae West said: "I'm going to change my tempo and work very, very fast. This picture needs a big lift to pick up the speed to wake an audience up."
• • Mae West said: "Half the people in the world impersonate me. Men, women, and even children. They put their hands on their hips or something."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • An article on women in the theatre mentioned Mae West.
• • "Mae West: An Uncommon Woman" • •
• • Anthony Chase wrote: Another American woman playwright who enjoyed the distinction of racking up the highest advance box office sales in the history of Broadway, Mae West, scored a huge hit with her 1926 play, Sex, but saw her 1928 play, Pleasure Man, closed down by the police after its second performance.
• • Anthony Chase wrote: Despite the fact that she duplicated this success in Hollywood, West’s work is not included in anthologies, she is never mentioned in theater textbooks, and her work is out of print.
• • Anthony Chase wrote: In fact, the only American woman whose plays are consistently included in the American repertoire is Lillian Hellman, and even she had to go on a deliberate publicity campaign in the 1970s when she saw a list of the nation’s 10 greatest living playwrights and found that her name was missing. ...
• • Source: Art Voice (Buffalo, NY); posted on Wednesday, 5 January 2011
• • 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 18th anniversary • • 
• • Thank you for reading, sending questions, and posting comments during these past eighteen years. Not long ago, we entertained 3,497 visitors. And we reached a milestone recently when we completed 5,150 blog posts. Wow! 
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started eighteen years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 5,150th 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 • • with her loved ones in 1934 • •
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Mae West: Along Avenue C

MAE WEST's Irish paternal grandfather worked on ships in Canada and the USA. Before the West family moved to an area on the Brooklyn waterfront, her father John ["Battling Jack"] West spent his teenage years with his parents and siblings on Avenue C.
• • A bunch of young New Yorkers (who probably never heard of John West) were singing about his daughter Mae West in mid-December — — on 15 December 1938 — — right along Avenue C, a stretch facing the East River once quite familiar to the amateur young boxer.
• • During the Great Depression, case worker Fred Romanofsky conducted interviews among impoverished shoeshine boys. He spoke to the children between the hours of 5 — 7 PM, at the street corners of East Ninth and Avenue C, and East Eleventh and Avenue C, New York City.
• • Here is a song improvised by the locals to amuse themselves, while they cleaned the footwear of businessmen, salesmen, porters, and dockworkers, lyrics popular in 1938:
• • • Song of the NYC Shoeshine Boys • • •
• • • Hei ho! Hei ho!
• • • To Hollywood we go,
• • • To see Mae West and all the rest.
• • • Hei ho! Hei ho!
• • • Me and my friend Toni
• • • We come from Italy.
• • • We drink the booze
• • • And shine the shoes
• • • Me and my friend Toni. ...
• • Source: "Text from Dead End Kids (Life on the East Side): interviews by case worker Fred Romanofsky" — — from WPA Life Stories (Library of Congress); on 15 December 1938.
• • In December, Let's Remember Edward Earle [1882 — 1972] • •
• • Born on 16 July 1882 in Toronto, Canada, Edward Earle was active in vaudeville and on the stage where he was cast in musical comedies. His theatrical work paved the road to Hollywood and the slim six-footer was seen in close to 400 motion pictures from 1914 — 1956.
• • "The Heat's On" [released in the USA on 2 December 1943] was a 79-minute musical comedy starring Mae West as Fay Lawrence. Edward Earle was cast as one of Fay Lawrence's writers.
• • Edward Earle died in Woodland Hills, California during the month of December — — on 15 December 1972. He was 90 years old.
• • On 15 December 1933 • •
• • The release date for "She Done Him Wrong" in France was on 15 December 1933. In that country, the film's title was "Lady Lou."
• • Gift Giving in December 2011 • •
• • The company Face á Face created eyeglasses based on Mae West's lips. Inspired by Salvador Dali's Mae West lips sofa, these Senso sunglasses come in red or black.
• • These spectacles are a-MAE-zing.
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said, in response to Frank Wallace's statement that they were wed in 1911: "They'll have me married to triplets next! ... Since there were no signatures on that mysterious marriage certificate, Frank Wallace better dig up his divorce and find a signature on that."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • An article printed in People Magazine on December 15th mentioned Mae West.
• • Brad Darrach writes: By 1930 he was playing leads on Broadway, and in 1932 Paramount signed him to a five-year contract at $450 a week and changed his name to Cary Grant. In a year Cary Grant did bit parts in seven movies. Then one day Mae West got an eyeful of his sultry good looks. "If he can talk," she's supposed to have said, "I'll take him." Cary Grant disliked the woman, but "She Done Him Wrong" made him faintly famous as the hunk she hooked with a notorious (and frequently misquoted) line: "Why dontcha come up sometime and see me?" Topper [1937] made him a star. ...
• • Source: Flashback Column: "Cary Grant Remembered" by Brad Darrach for People Magazine; written 15 December 1986; reposted on 27 April 2011
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2146th 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: Delker Not Doelger

MAE WEST used to say, "To err is human but it feels divine."
• • Robert Simonson, a journalist and blogger of the drinking life, and the originator of the "A Beer At..." column, wrote a recent column for NY.Eater.com, and it was dotted with shaky misstatements about Mae West and her family that need to be righted.
• • Why don't columnists fact check anymore? Could it be that some readers don't notice?
• • Robert Simonson writes: "Teddy's is the oldest bar in Williamsburg [96 Berry St., Brooklyn, NY]. It's been around since 1889. ... Peter Doelger was a millionaire beer baron, and probably a bit of a capitalist bastard; an anarchist once left a bomb on his doorstep. He also disapproved of his daughter Mathilda marrying a boxer named John West, even though that union gave the world Mae West. ..."
• • • • FACT: Yes, wealthy brewer Peter Doelger did have a daughter named Mathilde [American born in 1875], whose lavish nuptials were covered in the society section in The N.Y. Times. However, Peter Doelger [1832 — 1912] was neither the maternal grandfather of Mae nor the father of Bavarian born Matilda Dilker/ Delker [1870 — 1930], who wed John West, an amateur boxer and fulltime saddle and bridle maker at Brooklyn's City Hall in January 1889 when the bride was 18 years old.
• • Robert Simonson continues: One would love to picture Mae lifting one or two here at some point. But Mathilda remarried in the 1890s — — wedding the son of another local brewer (sounds like daddy's doing) — — so it's hard to say. ...
• • • • FACT: Mae's parents remained married to each other from January 1889 until Matilda's death in January 1930.
• • Source: Article: "Finding the 'Other' Williamsburg at 122 Year-Old Teddy's" written by Robert Simonson for NY.Eater.com; posted on Friday, 19 August 2011
• • In Her Own Words • •
• • Mae West said: "One and one is two, and two and two is four, and five will get you ten if you know how to work it.”
• • Mae West said: "Virtue has its own reward — — but has no sale at the box office."
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Mae West and W.C. Fields traveled the variety artist circuit, though not together.
• • Mark Hopkins writes: Oddly enough, my mind is on W.C. Fields, one of the great comedians of the first half of the 20th century. Fields was a contemporary of Mae West, Al Jolson, George M. Cohen and others who traveled the live performance circuit called vaudeville. Most of those theaters were in the northeast part of the country and Philadelphia was a usual stop on the circuit.
• • Mark Hopkins continues: No performer relished facing the raucous crowds of the theaters of Philadelphia. It was not unusual for people to be pelted with tomatoes, booed off the stage and otherwise mistreated. ...
• • Source: Article: "My Southern perspective: All things considered, Philadelphia’s not so bad" written by Mark Hopkins for Independent Mail/ Scripps News; posted on 14 August 2011
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 2028th 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: Brooklyn Daily Errors

Though MAE WEST spent years in Brooklyn, there is no proof she ever lived on Franklin Avenue, a thoroughfare situated in the Greenpoint section of Kings County. And though primary sources have shown where John and Matilda West were living when their feisty little daughter was born at home — — the delivery assisted by a mid-wife "on a cool night in a hot month" — — reporters keep getting it wrong and spreading misinformation that bobbleheads will copy and paste.
• • Let's do the math. Since Mae West started life in August 1893, publications and writers have had over 115 years to nail down her birthplace, eh?
• • Vernon Parker reminds us that Greenpoint was designated as an historic district in 1982, the area where Charles Pratt’s Astral Oil Works refined kerosene. "One point of interest in Greenpoint today is the Astral Apartments at 184 Franklin Avenue, originally built to house workers from Pratt’s Astral Oil (and where it is believed that screen star Mae West was born in 1893)," writes columnist Vernon Parker in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle [located at 30 Henry Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201 — www.brooklyneagle.com —] on 14 September 2009.
• • Wrong, false, and incorrect. Moreover, Mae West was not born anywhere in Greenpoint.
• • Sheesh, fellas! Don't make us come down there.
• • The Brooklyn Daily Eagle can be reached at 718-422-7400.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West: Ruth's Truths

This is the real MAE WEST — — a woman of passion, highly geared emotions, tense feelings, who has been forced over a period of years to feed those emotions to a box-office, wrote Ruth Biery in 1934. A greedy, wanting-to-be-shocked box-office. Urged gently at first, tempted cleverly, promoted subtly, Mae West has put all the force of her cyclonic nature into bringing the thrills of love and life to others.
• • Journalist Ruth Biery sat down with Mae in Hollywood — — not unlike the way she had sat down with Greta Garbo in the 1920s — — as a sympathetic listener who wrote mainly for movie magazines. "I have really loved only once," Mae has told me, as she has told others. But never before have I heard her say, "They always found a way to break me up with a man before it became too serious. I was not allowed to love, really love. My mother and then Timony — — "
• • Journalist Ruth Biery either was mild enough or persuasive enough to extract Mae's confidences. Or perhaps Mae was ready to confess: "You see, first it was my mother. If she thought I was falling in love, she'd stop it right like that. If I was liking a man too much or she thought a 'crush' was getting serious, she'd find a way. She knew me so well, she could always find a way. She wouldn't let me learn to love really. She wouldn't let me — — and now Timony protects me."
• • When little Mae was growing up, neighbors referred to her as "the German girl."
• • The daughter of Christiana and Jacob Delker, Matilda was born in December 1870 — — perhaps in Wurttemberg, Germany, speculates biographer Jill Watts, noting that Jacob Delker had been working there in a sugar refinery. In January 1889, 18-year-old Matilda Delker wed John West. However, she and her daughter Mae were really the love of each other's lives until Matilda died on 26 January 1930 at age 59. How terrifying it was for Mae during the winter of 1929, watching her mother's illness worsen. After Matilda died, Mae felt, "There wasn't anyone to play to."
• • "Courting Mae West" features interesting scenes dramatizing their relationship.
• • 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: July 1920

MAE WEST and the Italian accordionist Guido Deiro made beautiful music together for several years in variety. Her marriage to the Mediterranean keyboard king was one of the few secrets Mae kept from her mother Matilda.
• • Vibrant, jealous, well-built, and sexy, Deiro even threatened to kill the next man who tried to take Mae away from him. John "Battling Jack" West, alarmed for his daughter's safety, cautioned Guido: "None of those Italian knife tricks now, please!"
• • When Mae and Guido went their separate ways in vaudeville, the Brooklyn bombshell wound up on a much lower tier of bookings.
• • On 14 July 1920, Mae West filed for a divorce from Guido Deiro, charging him with abandonment. Having moved back to her parents' house in Queens County, Mae filed her petition at the courthouse in Jamaica, Queens.
• • When their divorce became final in November 1920, Guido quickly wed his third wife.
• • Mae West was so daunted by this marriage (and the way Guido affected her equilibrium), that she does not even mention his name in her autobiography, coyly referring to him only as "Mr. D."
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1914 • •
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