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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 had her tete-a-tete with Mae in Hollywood — — not unlike the way she had hunkered 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, knowing that her mother's illness was worsening. After Matilda died, Mae felt, "There wasn't anyone to play to."
• • Happy Mother's Day!• • On 8 May 1961 • •
• • It was on 8 May 1961 that Mae signed a contract to perform the play "Sextette" at the Edgewater Beach Playhouse. Her salary was pegged at $5500 per week and she would also share in 33 1/3 (gross) of the box office.
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Describing The Hemingway in London, British journalist Richard Godwin writes: In the lavatories, gentlemen have the bewildering pleasure of urinating between a pair of plastic lips, their model uncertain (Mae West? Mick Jagger?). The soap is posh: Molton Brown. Rough paper does for hand towels. ...
• • Source: Article: "Meaty, companionable, a little frustrating —The Hemingway is equal to its muse" written by Richard Godwin, for the London Evening Standard [UK]; posted on 5 May 2011
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 1924th 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 • • 1927 • •
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Mae West.
MAE WEST was the inspiration for a sofa — — but, hey, move over, Dali.
• • In case you think, at a glance, that this is another view of Salvador Dali's Mae West Lips Sofa, look again. This is a colorized scanning electron microscope image of a diatom — — a tiny single-celled marine creature invisible to the naked eye. A type of algae, diatoms typically measure just 0.002 inches across. Scientists believe that diatoms pre-date the dinosaurs. Artist Faye Darling has used a digital paint program in order to colorize this image of a diatom.
• • Photo Credit: Dr. Paul Hargreaves and Faye Darling — — BNPS.co.uk
• • 27 April 1927 • •
• • On 20 April 1927 the headlines read: "Mae West Goes to Workhouse to Start Sentence" and the subhead explained further: Actress-Author of "Sex" Taken to Welfare Island With Two Negresses. The Women's Workhouse on Welfare Island was self-described as a "place of quiet reformatory meditation for the vicious." When Mae West was released on 27 April 1927, her beloved mother was there to escort her home along with Mae's younger siblings John and Beverly. 
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • 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
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Mae West was one of the first in Hollywood to defy gender roles. ...
• • Source: Photo Caption used to illustrate the article "BU Film Students Make Strides in Defying Hollywood Gender Roles" by Veronica Glab for BU Quad; posted on 24 April 2011
• • Quote, Unquote • •
• • Jonathan Berr starts his article with this sentence: State legislators are going to be tempted to follow the dictate of that fiscal expert Mae West who famously opined that “too much of a good thing is wonderful.” Of course, the film star wasn’t talking about state budgets, but many states may soon be tempted to follow her advice as the economy continues to rebound. ...
• • Source: Daily Austerity Watch: "The States’ Tax Dilemma" written by Jonathan Berr for 24/7 Wall St.; posted on 19 April 2011
• • By the Numbers • •
• • The Mae West Blog was started seven years ago in July 2004. You are reading the 1913th 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 • • 1927 • •
• • Feed — — http://feeds2.feedburner.com/MaeWest
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Mae West.
MAE WEST is now a permanent installation in Bavaria, her mother's homeland. 
• • Born in America in 1960, artist Rita McBride has been working in Germany for a number of years — — and struggling for the past eight years to get her controversial design of the screen queen installed. Finally, last month [on January 29th — 30th, 2011] a carbon version of Mae West was hoisted into place and will become a landmark. Mae's new home is the Effnerplatz in the east of Munich, a square which forms the center of a large traffic circle and is bisected by a tram line but does not seem to have much pedestrian traffic.
• • The artwork is 170.6 feet high and weighs 57 tons. In a press release, McBride (writing in German) described her piece as a monumental semi-transparent structure made of carbon fiber tubes, arranged in the form of a rotational hyperbolic paraboloid.
• • Rita McBride timed the installation to accompany a new book devoted to Mae called WESTways. More on that in an upcoming post.
• • Perhaps because Rita McBride communicates in German, the American press has not covered this a-MAE-zing creation. Bravo, Rita!!
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • artwork by Rita McBride, 2011 • •
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Mae West.
Though we are not big fans of the 1982 TV bio-pic about MAE WEST, the actress who played Mae's beloved mother onscreen was born today.
• • Cast in this televised production as Matilda West, Piper Laurie's birthname was Rosetta Jacobs. The little redhead was born in Detroit, Michigan in the month of January — — on 22 January 1932 — — the daughter of a Polish immigrant and his Russian-American wife.
• • Mae West's Playboy Interview on iPad • • 
• • “Is that an iPad in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?” — — Mae West would most likely enjoy the opportunities that our media-driven world now offers for more people to be happy to see her. According to F.C. Etier: Whether you’re using the new Playboy Hard Drive or looking forward to the just announced Playboy feature (about to be available on iPad) to fill your eyes with beautiful models, opportunities abound. . . . On Thursday, 19 January 2011, Hugh Hefner announced (via his “official” Twitter account) that Playboy (archives and new issues) would be available “uncensored” on iPad. . . . [Source: Technorati.com, 21 January 2011]
• • On Mae West Street • •
• • According to John D'Anna, who reports for The Arizona Republic: Last year Bob Urdiales and his neighbors on Mae West Street at Superstition Sunrise RV Resort set the record for the world's longest salad bar. This year's party has a Love Boat shipwreck theme, playing off the idea that — — in addition to being a bawdy comedienne — — a Mae West is also a life preserver. ... [Source: AZCentral.com, 21 January 2011]
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1928 • •
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Mae West.
MAE WEST had a curious example of matrimony before her eyes — — the uneasy union of Champagne Till and Battling Jack — — and it perhaps led her to comment: "Marriage is a great institution, but I'm not ready for an institution."
• • Initially, the young lovers forged a passionate bond. Mae explained, "My father had swept her off her feet." But Tillie's youthful transgressions and singular ambitions met an end with Jack West.
• • 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 this date we remember the nuptials of Mr. and Mrs. John Patrick West, which blossomed and flowered in 1893 in the form of Baby Mae.• • 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 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, ambitious, financially successful, talented, 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!"
• • About his brother Guido and his sultry spouse, Pietro Deiro recalled: "We played together and we both shared great successes, Guido becoming rapidly very popular — — especially among restaurant waiters for his large and ostentatious tips. A few years later in New York, Mae West, Guido, and I went for supper to the old Gillette's restaurant. The meal finished, my brother left a two-dollar tip on the table. As he rose to leave, I picked up one of the dollars and later went fifty-fifty with Mae West. This got to be a habit with us. ... "
• • Pietro Deiro misremembered the name of the eatery, a special place Mae and Deiro returned to often when they were in New York City. It was located back then on West 49th Street. [This year's Mae West walking tour will swing by there and attendees will be shown vintage pictures of the building's exterior and the beautiful interior dining rooms where the lovebirds often enjoyed themselves.]• • When Mae and Guido went their separate ways in vaudeville, the Brooklyn bombshell wound up on a much lower tier of bookings.
• • July 14th • • • • On the 14th of 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."• • The 14th of July 1999 is a date Mae West [1893 — 1980] did not live to see. On that day, Mae's longtime lover Paul Novak passed away in California.• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1914 • •
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Mae West.
On 27 April 1927, shortly after daybreak, MAE WEST was released from her jail cell. 
• • The week before, one of her hometown papers ran with this headline: "Common Nuisance Mae West Goes to Jail."
• • On 20 April 1927 Mae West had been sentenced to ten days in the Women's Workhouse (then located on Welfare Island) in the middle of the East River.
• • During the trial in March and early April — — presided over by Judge George Donnellan — — Mae West had argued in a written statement that her plays were a work of art. Her lawyers made a case that "Sex" was a morally instructive drama. Mae did not take the stand. At Jefferson Market Court, Justice Donnellan had suggested a guilty verdict would be fitting, before the jurors went off to deliberate. Six hours later, the verdict came in. At her sentencing, Mae West was fined $500 and given 10 days to repent at an off-shore detention center.
• • The warden shortened her sentence by two days for good behavior.
• • The play "Courting Mae West" dramatizes the trial and the melee in court when the verdict comes in.
• • Mae was paid $1,000 to write about her experiences for a women's magazine. Some of her essay appears elsewhere on this blog. [Mae donated the $1,000 to the workhouse to establish a library for female inmates.]
• • Released from the lock-up on April 27th, Mae told the reporters — — who were waiting for her like Stage Door Johnnies — — that she had enough material for several plays now. Criminal street cred served the playwright well when she sat down to write "Diamond Lil" about a woman with a thing for bling, whose motto is, "My career is diamonds."• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 27 April 1927 • •
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Mae West.
Rona Barrett called her friend MAE WEST "the star that will not dim." But in January 1930 the inner illumination that guided the actress failed.
• • As the Los Angeles engagement of "Diamond Lil" was winding down, a telegram arrived. The condition of Matilda West was worsening; the cancer had spread to her liver. Mae West hired a private train. On 14 January 1930 — — after their last performance in California — — Mae and the cast left for Brooklyn, New York.
• • The death of 59-year-old Matilda West in January 1930 "was a staggering blow," admitted Mae, who was inconsolable.
• • Born in December 1870 in Bavaria, Matilda died in an apartment on Euclid Avenue in Brooklyn, perhaps being nursed there by relatives. [Matilda and Jack had also owned a house on 88th Street in Woodhaven, Queens according to the 1920 Census. By 1927 the West family was residing on Jericho Turnpike in Floral Park, Queens, New York.]
• • On 27 January 1930 Mae West attended the funeral.
• • In this photo, crime boss Owney Madden waits for her by the door of the sedan, wearing a dark topcoat with a Persian lamb collar.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • Owney Madden • • 1930 • •
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Mae West.
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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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • 1914 • •
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Mae West.
Since it's Mother's Day, it's apt to mention that Mae West really adored her German-born mother Matilda [Dilker] West, whom Mae's father had nicknamed "Champagne Til."
• • Here they are in April 1927, as Mae leaves the women's workhouse, the female prison on Welfare Island.• • Dedicating her autobiography, "Goodness Had Nothing to Do With It," Mae West wrote: "In loving memory of my mother, without whom I might have been somebody else."
• • In January 1930, Mae purchased a marble mausoleum for her beloved late mother in Cypress Hills Cemetery in Brooklyn, NY. In 1980, Mae was interred there with the West family.• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Source:http://maewest.blogspot.com/atom.xmlMae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • Tillie West • • 1927 • •NYC
Mae West.
MAE WEST was born in August but she associated herself with April's birthstone: the diamond. Her mother seems to have been fascinated by the same stone; Matilda West bought her daughter her first diamond. Of course, in her most successful stage play "Diamond Lil," the actress sparkled plenty.
• • Diamonds, a wonder of nature, have a sparkling fire that has held humans spell-bound for centuries, inspiring myths of romance, intrigue, power, greed, and magic.
• • Ancient Hindus, finding diamonds washed out of the ground after thunderstorms, believed the gems were created by bolts of lightning.
• • In America, the diamond is marketed as a symbol of enduring love. Typically, they appear on engagement rings.
• • There are many kinds of diamonds: transparent, translucent or opaque; ranging from colorless to sooty black, with many colors in between. For the most part transparent, diamonds [colorless or tinted] are used as jewelry. They are also used for industrial purposes.
• • The color of a diamond depends on the kind of impurities embedded inside it. Yellow diamonds, for example, betray minute quantities of nitrogen, while boron imparts a bluish hue.
• • Diamonds are the rich cousins of graphite; both are crystalline forms of pure carbon.• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Source:http://maewest.blogspot.com/atom.xmlMae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • "Diamond Lil" • • 1928NYC
Mae West.
