Mae's man: Mario "Shortie" De Angelis

MAE WEST used to say: "It's not the men in my life. It's the life in my men."
• • In the play "Courting Mae West," the role of the leading man is a fictional reporter MARIO "Shortie" De ANGELIS.
• • In his early 20s, cub reporter MARIO "Shortie" lives in a boarding house owned by Irish Catholic news seller DECLAN ROURKE, run by PEG ROURKE on West 9th Street in Greenwich Village.
• • A dreamer, a schemer, hard-working, well-read, college educated, very poor, and very ambitious, MARIO "Shortie" De ANGELIS has a drive to succeed as a writer and a reporter along with an insecurity that makes his personality prickly, sarcastic, class conscious, chauvinistic, and prone to arguments — — especially when his sense of self (his self worth) is being challenged.
• • Shortie and his news man's fedora — — the badge of the serious, on-the-move reporter — — are inseparable along with the big chip on his shoulder.
• • His signature gesture with MAE WEST: removing her glove and ravishing her hand
• • MARIO's core: manipulation by determination (or charm)
• • Come up and see Mae onstage July 19st — 22nd in New York City when MAE WEST will be portrayed by Yvonne Sayers and MARIO "Shortie" De ANGELIS will be portrayed by Jason Emanuel. Source: CourtingMaeWest.blogspot.com
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" opens at 6 o'clock on Saturday night July 19, 2008 at the Algonquin Theatre [East 24th Street and Park Avenue South].
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" — — showtimes
• • July 19th, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 20th, 2008 — — 2:00 PM matinee
• • July 21st, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 22nd, 2008 — — 9:00 PM
• • Tickets to "COURTING MAE WEST" are $18 per adult.
• • Theatermania.com sells the tickets — — http://www.theatermania.com/content/show.cfm/show/144297
• • Questions? Phone 212-779-3051.
• • The play is 95 minutes.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae West, Texas Guinan, and the gang onstage in mid-July 2008.
_____________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West • • Maebill • •
NYC
Mae West.

A powerful Peg Rourke

In the first scene of "Courting Mae West" — — set in the speakeasy where MAE WEST became acquainted with drag queens that inspired "The Drag" — — MAE WEST rails against hypocrisy.
• • Hypocrites in City Hall and the "purity police" were, Mae felt, double dealers who overlooked their own sins even as they tried to chase "dirt plays" off the boards.
• • Landlady Peg Rourke (one of the play's fictional characters) runs a boarding house on West Ninth Street where her daughter is an unpaid maid, and where one lodger is the journalist who is "courting" Mae West. Peg has discounted the reporter's rent, which arouses Mae's suspicions. "Discounts start with reasons," says Mae. "Is she taking it out in trade?"
• • News man Mario "Shortie" De Angelis insists Peg Rourke is "a pious prude."
• • Portraying the complex landlady with a dark past is Gloria M. Buccino.
• • Gloria Buccino is a retired police sergeant. Having retired from law enforcement, Gloria decided to pursue her passion — — acting. "I always knew I wanted to act," she said. "It just took me a while to focus on it." Over the years, while "on the job," she studied at Susan Grace Cohen Studio, West Baron Studio, Acting Management. In 2006, now retired, she began studying with Howard Meyer at HM Acting Studio, a division of Axial Theatre [in Westchester, New York]. In 2007 Miss Buccino was seen in these HM Acting Workshop Productions: Girl Talk and Into the Deep. She is a member of The Axial Theatre Company, and was recently accepted into The Actor's Project NYC. Gloria is a member of AFTRA.
• • Slipping into Peg Rourke's Irish brogue was an interesting flashback for Gloria Buccino, who has come in contact with many an Irishman while in uniform.
• • A versatile thespian, Gloria Buccino also takes the role on the Prison Matron and Matilda West, Mae's beloved mother. As Mrs. Matilda West, the actress will deliver the poignant lines that (Marsha Norman predicted) will be talked about during Intermission.
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" opens at 6 o'clock on Saturday night July 19, 2008 at the Algonquin Theatre [East 24th Street and Park Avenue South].
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" — — showtimes
• • July 19th, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 20th, 2008 — — 2:00 PM matinee
• • July 21st, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 22nd, 2008 — — 9:00 PM
• • Tickets to "COURTING MAE WEST" are $18 per adult.
• • Theatermania.com sells the tickets — — http://www.theatermania.com/content/show.cfm/show/144297
• • Questions? Phone 212-779-3051.
• • The play is 95 minutes.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae West, Texas Guinan, and the gang onstage in mid-July 2008.
_____________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West cast • • actress Gloria M. Buccino • •
NYC
Mae West.

Go Magazine Loves Mae West

MAE WEST was in the spotlight in "The Pride Issue" of Go Magazine: The Cultural Roadmap for the City Girl.
• • July 19 — 22, "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship & Secrets" takes the stage at the Algonquin Theatre. The play is based on true events during the 1920s when actress Mae West was jailed in New York City for trying to stage two gay plays on Broadway. Maybe she broke the law, but the law couldn’t break her! Yvonne Sayers takes on the role of West with plenty of sex appeal and industrial-strength charisma in a performance that’s also part of the Fresh Fruit Festival.
— — Source: — —
• • GOMAG.COM — — THEATRE — — http://www.gomag.com/articleprint.php?id=499
• • The Very Best of NYC Theatre
• • by Juliet Macey
• • Published on 12 June 2008
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • Tickets to "COURTING MAE WEST" are $18 per adult.
• • Theatermania.com sells the tickets — — http://www.theatermania.com/content/show.cfm/show/144297
• • Questions? Phone 212-779-3051.
• • The play is 95 minutes.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae West, Texas Guinan, and the gang onstage in mid-July 2008.
______________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West • • 1928 • •
NYC
Mae West.

Eileen Glenn is cast as Texas Guinan

MAE WEST had a good friend (and a bankroll for her shows) in Texas Guinan. In "Courting Mae West," Eileen Glenn will portray "The Queen of the Night Clubs" herself.
• • Born in New Jersey, Eileen Glenn was raised in East Tennessee. A trailblazer since childhood, she produced her first show, Cinderella, on her front porch while still in grammar school. She discovered her passion for Prokofiev’s "Peter & The Wolf" and Herb Albert's Tijuana Brass; soundtracks of "The Sound of Music," "Jesus Christ Superstar," and "Godspell" became bliss-driven engines that transported her soul straight to Broadway.
• • Ms Glenn graduated from the University of Tennessee with a BA in theatre. Three years later she discovered improvisational theatre and — — over the course of 4 days — — she flew to Chicago to audition for The Second City, returned home, packed her bags, and set up digs at The Hotel Lincoln (former home of John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd).
• • Ms Glenn’s post-graduate instruction was working. She performed in everything: musicals, improv reviews, Shakespeare, Chekov, Greater Tuna, Caligula, The Mikado. Her experience in Chicago culminated with a summer trip to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts. Upon returning, she produced and starred in her one-person show, Margaret Atwood’s Good Bones and Simple Murders — — which earned rave reviews and has since been produced in New York City, Texas, and Arkansas.
• • Ms Glenn has performed regionally at Mill Mountain Theatre, VA; Arkansas Repertory; Shadowlawn Theater, NJ; and several seasons with Texas Shakespeare Festival. In New York she was a company member with Jean Cocteau Repertory and Lightning Strikes Theatre Company. She performs frequently with The Phoenix Theatre Ensemble and has appeared on many occasions with Judith Shakespeare Company and Actors Stock Company.
• • Inspired at an early age by the likes of Annie Oakley, The Unsinkable Molly Brown, and Amelia Earhart, and strong independent women everywhere, not to mention her mother, she is not surprised her journey has led her here. It seems Ms Glenn was almost destined to play an independent, gun toting, cowgirl with a heart of gold, living life by her rules and running her own empire.
• • In the immortal words of Texas Guinan, "I would rather have a square inch of New York than all the rest of the world.”
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" opens at 6 o'clock on Saturday night July 19, 2008 at the Algonquin Theatre [East 24th Street and Park Avenue South].
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" — — showtimes
• • July 19th, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 20th, 2008 — — 2:00 PM matinee
• • July 21st, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 22nd, 2008 — — 9:00 PM
• • Tickets to COURTING MAE WEST are $18 per adult.
• • Theatermania.com sells the tickets — — http://www.theatermania.com/content/show.cfm/show/144297
• • Questions? Phone 212-779-3051.
• • The play is 95 minutes.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae West and Texas Guinan and the gang onstage in mid-July 2008.
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Texas Guinan • • Eileen Glenn • •
NYC
Mae West.

Meet Mae West: Yvonne Sayers

When director Louis Lopardi was casting for the role of MAE WEST in "Courting Mae West," he was seeking a powerhouse of an actress with sex appeal and industrial strength charisma. He discovered his leading lady portraying Mae West in Sam Shepard's play "Mad Dog Blues."
• • Born on September 25th, actress Yvonne Sayers was raised in Shreveport, Louisiana.
• • Surrounded by a family of fun-lovers who enjoyed entertaining, her passion for performing flowered at a young age.
• • During high school, Yvonne enrolled in a local acting school while immersing herself in ballroom dancing and modeling — — which led to several local gigs, one of which was working on the set of the movie “The Firm” filmed locally in Memphis, TN.
• • It was there that she approached Sydney Pollack for his advice as to whether she should move to New York or LA to be an actress, to which he replied, “If you really want to be an actress, you should move to New York.” Kismet! The decision was made.
• • After graduation, she headed to The Big Apple and enrolled in T. Schreiber Studio and studied under the acclaimed Mary Boyer, who later opened her own studio, MTB Studio, where Yvonne continued her studies under Mary.
• • Still pursuing an acting career, she also directed some off-off Broadway plays.
• • Her passion for cinema and acting in film, as well as the art of filmmaking, led her to film school where she wrote, directed, and produced several films and graduated with special recognition for her work as a Cinematographer. She then began working behind the scenes professionally as a Cinematographer as well as in Production on several independent films and TV serials such as “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” and “Ed.” While working on the set of “Law & Order: CI” she was advised by producer John L. Roman to focus solely on her acting career. He said, “While this is all great experience, you have to stop doing this kind of work and just start performing and acting as much as possible.” And that’s exactly what she did.
• • Currently, the five-foot-five stunner is exclusively focused on an acting career and to being the best actress she can.
• • Yvonne has appeared on TV in: “Chappelle’s Show,” CourtTV’s “Till Death Do Us Part,” “The Maury Show,” and has performed live all over New York at the American Globe Theatre, in the Samuel French Festival, the PIT, Village Playwrights, the Wings Theatre, and in several productions at the 45th Street Theatre as a proud member of the Michael Chekhov Theatre Co.
• • Rehearsals for "Courting Mae West" will begin on June 7th in Manhattan in midtown under the watchful eye of Mr. Lopardi, his stage manager, and the playwright.
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" opens at 6 o'clock on Saturday night July 19, 2008 at the Algonquin Theatre [East 24th Street and Park Avenue South].
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" — — showtimes
• • July 19th, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 20th, 2008 — — 2:00 PM matinee
• • July 21st, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 22nd, 2008 — — 9:00 PM
• • Tickets to "COURTING MAE WEST" are $18 per adult.
• • Theatermania.com sells the tickets — — http://www.theatermania.com/content/show.cfm/show/144297
• • Questions? Phone 212-779-3051.
• • The play is 95 minutes.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae West, Texas Guinan, and the gang onstage in mid-July 2008.
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West actress • • Yvonne Sayers • •
NYC
Mae West.

Courting Mae West: Showtimes

MAE WEST gets her day in court — — when she returns to the Times Square area on Saturday 29 March 2008.
• • COURTING MAE WEST will be featured at The Producer's Club [358 West 44th Street, NYC] on March 29th under the direction of Louis Lopardi, who has selected a number of actors to do a table reading.
• • COURTING MAE WEST opens at the Algonquin Theatre (NYC) on 19 July 2008 at 7:00 PM.

• • SYNOPSIS [100 words] • •

• • Based on true events during the Prohibition Era, this 95-minute play follows a vaudeville veteran whose frustrations with the rules of male-dominated Broadway have led her to write her own material and cast her own shows. Is the Gay White Way ready for love stories that feature New York City drag queens instead of card-carrying members of the union? Is the legitimate theatre ripe for racially integrated melodramas set in Harlem? Is the Rialto raring to reward a working-class heroine determined to sin and win?
• • Come up and see Mae West as she challenges bigotry, fights City Hall, and climbs the ladder of success wrong by wrong.

• • How about a date?
• • Plan ahead. Get ready to come up and see Mae onstage in New York City when the Annual Fresh Fruit Festival presents "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship and Secrets" (based on true events 1926 — 1932 when Mae West was arrested and jailed) under the direction of Louis Lopardi at the Algonquin Theatre [123 East 24th Street, NYC 10010] July 19th — 22nd, 2008.
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" opens at 7 o'clock on Saturday night July 19, 2008 at the Algonquin Theatre [East 24th Street and Park Avenue South].
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" — — showtimes
• • July 19th, 2008 — — 7:00 PM
• • July 20th, 2008 — — 1:00 PM matinee
• • July 21st, 2008 — — 6:00 PM
• • July 22nd, 2008 — — 9:00 PM
• • Tickets to COURTING MAE WEST will only be about $20 - $25 per person.
• • The theatre has 99 seats.
• • SPECIAL: $100 - $150 donation — — donor gets name in the Program — — and 1 free ticket to the play.
• • $151 - $500 donation — — donor gets name in Program and TWO free tickets to the play and invited to all parties.
• • Fresh Fruit Festival: a non-profit group organizes this ambitious annual festival [now in its 7th year]. The colorful two-week arts festival is a money-losing venture sustained by funds from The New York City Council, a culture grant from New York State, a stipend from Senator Tom Duane, and donations from good people.
• • Come up and see Mae during July in New York City!
• • http://CourtingMaeWest.blogspot.com/
______________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • Jefferson Market Police Court • • 1927
NYC
Mae West.

Mae West Always Triumphs

"Mae West always triumphs!" is what MAE WEST wanted to convey in Goodness Had Nothing to Do with It. How much of her autobiography should a Mae-maven believe?
• • And here's another question. Is there a DRAFT in here?
• • Dramatists realize that, frequently, the play they begin writing is not the play they wind up with. Usually, in the process of creating the scenes, the playwright will realize what the play is really about. When she was writing "Sex" and "Diamond Lil," Mae West probably came to this realization as well.
• • My first draft of "COURTING MAE WEST: Sex, Censorship and Secrets" was a double narrative focused on true events during the Prohibition Era in the life of MAE WEST [1893 — 1980] and the parallel storyline of the (fictional) reporter who is "courting" her. At the first Staged Reading [February 2004], the S.R.O. (standing room only) audience made it clear they wanted more Mae and less of him.
• • With the first revisions came a process called "re-centering." My goal was to make the beginning more like the ending, and to minimize his story while enhancing her story. The manuscript grew in complexity and possibility. It was also way too long.
• • More retooling, more trimming, more hand-wringing. The plot orbits around the legal woes of the actress and writer who was arrested and jailed for staging two gay plays during the 1920s. But Mae West never took the stand in her own defense, so creating those courtroom scenes — — with other individuals taking the witness stand but not Mae — — were a problem. My own dictates were also rebelling. I did not want to portray Mae as a passive listener, a silent spectator at her own trial. But after the second Staged Reading [February 2005], the feedback was clear: people expected to see Mae at her trial.
• • Courtroom scenes are predictable. Why? Because trials end in a verdict — — guilty or not guilty. Where's the suspense when the audience expects the scene to end in a verdict? And anyone who has read a biography of Mae West would know which trial ended with a guilty verdict and which trial ended with an acquittal. How do you create a surprising climax during a verdict when the Mae-mavens in the audience know to EXPECT a certain outcome?
• • A dramatist's dilemma, to be sure.
• • Break a leg . . .
• • To get some distance, I took a break to work on new plays and projects. Then a real BREAK occurred. I had an accident and broke several leg bones. And so I decided to regard this "wheelchair interval" as my lucky break.
• • I stacked every book I owned about Mae West on my bedside table and re-read them all. Each time I noticed something new I made notes in the margin. I played games with my brain and fed my conscious mind a "story question" before I slept. Sometimes my dreams formed a response.
• • Dramatic structure: In every two-act play, the end of act one is the precipitator — — which raises the question what will happen now?. Typically, this will be an event or incident involving the central character (Mae West), so that the question could become: "what will Mae do?" or "how will Mae get out of this?" or "what's going to happen to Mae now?".
• • This tension gives the audience a good reason to return after the Intermission for act two.
• • In "COURTING MAE WEST," the two trial scenes fall in critical places. The 1927 "Sex" trial concludes Act I — — where the stakes must be raised. HOW?
• • In "COURTING MAE WEST," the 1930 "Pleasure Man" trial is the penultimate scene in Act II — — and even though Mae was acquitted, the stakes must increase and the tension must mount. HOW?
• • In her autobiography and media interviews, Mae West refused to acknowledge her failures and disappointments. "Mae West always triumphs" is the message she claimed her fans wanted to hear. But "COURTING MAE WEST" reveals the humanity behind that bullet-proof facade and the struggles of a vaudevillian who got fairly dreadful reviews for 25 years before she had a hit. In the face of so much discouragement, why didn't Mae West give up? One buffer was that Mae knew how to surround herself with people with the right attitude. This reassurance and support helped sustain Mae West through decades of setbacks.
• • Saturday March 29, 2008 will be the first time I get to hear my drastically revised manuscript read aloud by professional actors. Under the guidance of director Louis Lopardi, the reading will take place at The Producer's Club on West 44th Street.
• • If the script meets our expectations, we will move to the next phase. If not, I've got some rapid rewriting to do.
• • "COURTING MAE WEST" opens at 7 o'clock on Saturday night July 19, 2008 at the Algonquin Theatre.
• • http://CourtingMaeWest.blogspot.com/
______________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • attorney Nathan Burkan • • 1930
NYC
Mae West.

Mae West: "Sex" Black-out

MAE WEST fan and drama critic Glenn Loney pens a fascinatin' column for New York Theatre Wire called "Glenn Loney's Show Notes."
• • The text below is a brief excerpt from Glenn Loney's in-depth article that appeared in the month of March eight years ago [on 1 March 2000].
• • Glenn Loney wrote: Over a decade ago, the trio of talents who run Glasgow's Citizens' Theatre asked me to get them a copy of "Sex." They wanted to produce it as part of their brilliantly eclectic repertory.
• • I found it impossible to get a copy of the script. Nor were performance rights available.
• • When I was advising Dr. Richard Helfer on his CUNY PhD Dissertation research for a study of Mae West and her banned plays we found it impossible even to quote lines from the plays.
• • The Mae West Estate must have had a recent change of heart. ...
— — Excerpt: — —
• • Article: "Sex" a Play by Mae West
• • Byline: Glenn Loney
• • Published on: www.nytheatre-wire.com/
• • Published on: 1 March 2000
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • Since that bleak black-out period, "Sex" has been performed by companies in New York City; by Icarus Falling in Lansing, Michigan during October 2005; and (most recently) by the Aurora Theatre Company in Berkeley, California, where the well-received production starring Delia MacDougall was held over until 23 December 2007.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae onstage in New York City when the Annual Fresh Fruit Festival presents "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship and Secrets" (based on true events 1926 — 1932 when Mae West was arrested and jailed) under the direction of Louis Lopardi at the Algonquin Theatre [123 East 24th Street, NYC 10010] July 19th — 22nd, 2008.
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West at 33 years old • • "Sex" 1927 • •
NYC
Mae West.

Mae West: Wales Padlock Law

Several New Yorkers had seen Mae West's play "Sex" more than once — — including Sergeant Patrick Keneally, who had taken an exhaustive number of notes while attending three performances at Daly's 63rd Street Theatre in the line of duty.
• • Police action against "Sex" had been more in opposition to "The Drag" than to Margy LaMont's lascivious adventures, explains Jill Watts in her impeccably researched bio: Mae West: An Icon in Black and White.
• • According to Jill Watts: While efforts to mothball "The Drag" succeeded, "Sex" played to capacity crowds for several more weeks. However, by the beginning of March [1927], attendance had died off and profits shrank. Desperate to keep the production alive, the Morals Production Corporation ordered a 25% pay cut for everyone. Several players handed in their notices. Finally, on Sunday, March 19, after the evening's performance, Morganstern announced that Mae West was physically exhausted and was closing the play. Yet he also emphasized her determination to fight the case to its end.
• • According to Jill Watts: Only a few days later, the New York State senate passed the Wales Padlock Bill, which required the district attorney to prosecute everyone associated with an indecent production and to lock down for one year any theatre that hosted such shows. It was less severe than mandating a stage censor and allowed the power over Broadway to remain with the district attorney, who in New York was the Tammany Hall loyalist Banton. The bill now sat waiting on Al Smith's desk.
• • In Jefferson Market Police Court (on Sixth Avenue and West Ninth Street) the defendants from the "Sex" raid came to trial on 28 March 1927. The prosecution's case rested on the testimony of Sergeant Keneally and his ability to take rapid, accurate stenography in a darkened playhouse. New York's district attorney, perhaps addicted to the fortissimo eloquence of inner lives magnificently thwarted by the law, was prepared to step into his gladiator mode to do battle with the dauntless leonine jezebel of the Jazz Era — — Mae West.
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • The serious-minded comedy "Courting Mae West" by Greenwich Village playwright LindaAnn Loschiavo, set during 1926 — 1932, explores Mae West's legal woes. Act I, Scenes 3 — 4 dramatize both the police raid on 9 February 1927 and the tense aftermath at Jefferson Market Police Court.
• • Using fictional elements, the text is anchored by true events and has several characters who are based on real people: actress Mae West; Beverly West; Jim Timony; Texas Guinan; Mr. Isidore, a news seller on Sixth Avenue and West 9th Street; and Sara Starr, based on the Greenwich Village flapper Starr Faithfull, whose death inspired John O'Hara's novel "Butterfield 8" and a dozen other books.
• • "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship, and Secrets" will be onstage at the Algonquin Theatre [123 East 24th Street, New York, NY 10010] by July 19th, 2008.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae onstage in mid-July 2008.
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West at 33 years old • • "Sex" 1927 • •
• • Illustration: Jefferson Market Court
NYC
Mae West.

Mae West: A Sex Encounter

The audience had finished their last round of applause and MAE WEST was heading towards her dressing room when she spotted some young men — — but these were no star-struck stage-door johnnies. Instead this was a uniformed detail from New York City's vice squad taking stock of Daly's 63rd Street Theatre on 9 February 1927. The cast and crew of "Sex" were herded into Black Marias and hauled downtown to Jefferson Market Police Court on Sixth Avenue. Mae West, the last one escorted in the paddy wagon, was forced to stand all the way to West Tenth Street.
• • Two other plays would be raided the same evening.
• • Hours earlier, some police stenographers sat in the dark writing down all of the dialogue.
• • In this scene from "Sex: A Comedy Drama" [1926] prostitute Margy LaMont (who has been dating the well-heeled Jimmy Stanton) tells off society lady Clara Stanton. Listen to how angry the playwright (Mae West) is towards the hypocrites who comprise the tony upper-crust league in Connecticut.
CLARA: I'll not listen.
MARGY: Oh, yes you will. You've got the kind of stuff in you that makes women of my type. If our positions were changed — — you in my place, and I in yours — — I'd be willing to bet that I'd make a better wife and mother than you are. Yeah, and I'll bet without this beautiful home, without money, and without any restrictions, you'd be worse than I have ever been.
CLARA: No, no — —.
MARGY: Yes, you would. You'd do it and like it.
CLARA: For God's sake stop it, I can't endure any more — —
MARGY: Now you're down off your pedestal. You're down where you can see — — it's just a matter of circumstances. The only difference between us is that you could afford to give it away.
• • Dialogue between Margy LaMont, a prostitute, and Clara Stanton, a wealthy woman, from Mae West's play Sex, a Comedy Drama, 1926. Published by Routledge, New York.
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • The serious-minded comedy "Courting Mae West" by Greenwich Village playwright LindaAnn Loschiavo, set during 1926 — 1932, explores Mae West's legal woes. Act I, Scenes 3 — 4 dramatize both the police raid on 9 February 1927 and the tense aftermath at Jefferson Market Police Court.
• • Using fictional elements, the text is anchored by true events and has several characters who are based on real people: actress Mae West; Beverly West; Jim Timony; Texas Guinan; Mr. Isidore, a news seller on Sixth Avenue and West 9th Street; and Sara Starr, based on the Greenwich Village flapper Starr Faithfull, whose death inspired John O'Hara's novel "Butterfield 8" and a dozen other books.
• • "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship, and Secrets" will be onstage at the Algonquin Theatre [123 East 24th Street, New York, NY 10010] by July 19, 2008.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae onstage in mid-July 2008.
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West at 33 years old • • February 1927 • •
NYC
Mae West.

Mae West: The Evening Graphic

"MAE WEST Defies Cops" read the cover of the Evening Graphic on 2 October 1928. But the month of March brought even more trouble into her life than the police raid in autumn.
• • Thanks to Mae's arrest on 9 February 1927, during the very next month — — March 1927 — — the New York State Legislature passed legislation [Section 1140-a of the Penal Code] banning all depictions of homosexuality on the stage.
• • Three years later, when Mae West's "Pleasure Man" trial before Judge Bertini began on 17 March 1930, the District Attorney would charge that Mae violated Section 1140-a by writing another gay play and he also charged her with the crime of maintaining a public nuisance — — an insulting legal handslap typically aimed at speakeasies and skidrow saloons, not playwrights.
• • Lillian Schlissel wrote a fine introduction to her 1997 edition of Mae West's "obscene" plays. Copies of trial transcripts in her Schlissel's book expose the homophobia quietly tolerated in the United States during the 1920s.
• • When Mae West called on Actors Equity for help after the police raided her Broadway plays, the union demured. Why? Because homosexuals were not permitted to join any unions during the Prohibition Era.
• • Mae West's attempts to right a great civil injustice against gay people are dramatized in the play "Courting Mae West," which will be presented in Manhattan by The Annual Fresh Fruit Festival in mid-July. Director Louis Lopardi is leading the fundraising effort currently.
• • According to Artistic Director Carol Polcovar, The Annual Fresh Fruit Festival encompasses theater, performance, poetry, comedy, spoken word, music, dance, visual arts, and some talents that defy categorization. Lesbian and gay artists come from around the city, nation and, indeed, the world.
• • "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship, and Secrets" will be onstage at the Algonquin Theatre [123 East 24th Street, New York, NY 10010] by July 19, 2008.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae onstage in mid-July 2008.
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West at 35 years old • • October 1928 • •
NYC
Mae West.

Mae West's Arresting Drama

The past is another country — — and MAE WEST was most comfortable there.
• • However, in her Broadway blockbuster "Diamond Lil" [1928] Mae's aim was not to resurrect the naughty nineties — — but to present that bygone decade's sins in shifty soft focus. The world of Diamond Lil, restrained by Victorian morality despite a certain cheeky daring, was a backwards glance to a time of innocence, picturesque entertainment, well-behaved wildness, corset-clad temptresses, The Police Gazette's seductions, and 5-cent beer.
• • Drama critic Stark Young [1881—1963] analyzed Mae's clever maneuvers in his article for The New Republic:
• • "Diamond Lil" is as daring in the end [as 1926's "Sex"], the same sexy morsels, embraces, interventions of the law with rank suspenses, frank speeches, underworld, and so on. But it is more covered, continuous, and studied than the other production, and the crowd of characters, the costuming and vaudevillistic intervals, pull the whole of this later play into a more familiar style, less crudely, and sheerly singular than "Sex" appeared to be [excerpt from The New Republic — 27 June 1928].
• • Louis Lopardi, who will direct "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship and Secrets" in July at the Algonquin Theatre, also feels enriched by the past. His own production — — The Purgatory Project, Part 2 — — reimagined the lives led by four famous historical figures: Sigmund Freud, Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky, J. Robert Oppenheimer, and Lee Harvey Oswald.
• • A history buff as well as a thespian, Lopardi especially enjoys plays with a classical echo, texts rooted to a mythic past. For instance, he found "Metamorphoses," a play based on the Greek poem Metamorphoses by Ovid, fascinating and he relished the modernized adaptation written by Mary Zimmerman a few years ago. Ovid works onstage because those depictions of yearning and confused desires are timeless, feels Lopardi.
• • Since he has frequently decanted Ovid's ancient songs, he noticed right away the mythic skin underneath "Courting Mae West" — — the Brooklyn bombshell's story reimagined as the metamorphosis of King Midas. How you get the golden touch is one of the subtle sub-plots here. As Mae's career goals recalibrate her box office appeal, she will earn her hard cold slice of success — — but at a cost.
• • "I like a multi-layered comedy," admits Lopardi. "The best shows make you laugh for an hour and a half — — and then, untethered from your Playbill, you mull it over at home."
• • Bringing "Courting Mae West" to an audience requires funding. To support A Company Of Players, a non-profit theatre group established in 1979 to present meaningful theatre, please click on this link — — http://www.companyofplayers.com/support.htm
• • A Company Of Players is recognized by the IRS as a 501(c)3 type organization, and donations to the group are considered a charitable, tax-deductible contribution.
• • Contribute through "Pay Pal" or you can mail a check to: A Company Of Players, 545 Eighth Avenue, #401, New York NY 10018-4307.
• • "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship, and Secrets" will be onstage at the Algonquin Theatre [123 East 24th Street, New York, NY 10010] soon after the Independence Day holidays.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae onstage during July 2008 at the Algonquin Theatre.
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West • • 1927 • •
NYC
Mae West.

Table Reading at The Producers Club

"COURTING MAE WEST" will have a table reading in the month of March [2008], under the direction of Louis Lopardi, at The Producers Club.

• • A Company of Players will read the script aloud in preparation for a short Workshop Production in Manhattan.
• • Seeking the next Mae West!
• • Meanwhile, the search continues for the right actress to portray Mae West [1893—1980] — — in this serious-minded comedy that offers a star-making role. During the Prohibition Era, the Brooklyn bombshell was in her thirties. The ideal audition candidate is 25—30 with serious stage training and industrial strength charisma.
• • In Act I, Scene 1, set during December 1926, Mae West is 33 years old and curvy — — but not hefty. The play follows the actress-author through her box office triumph in "Sex"; her arrests, imprisonment, and legal woes (1927—1930); and ends in Hollywood when the 39-year-old is filming "She Done Him Wrong" for Paramount Pictures in December 1932.
• • Rehearsals begin in May 2008 in Manhattan.
________________________
• • Resumes and photo to:
• • A Company of Players
• • Send Email via the web site — — www.CompanyofPlayers.com
_________________________
• • The Producers Club is located at 358 West 44th Street [between 8th-9th Avenue], New York, NY 10036.
• • Meanwhile, a fundraising effort is in progress. Matching funds have been promised for every dollar raised.
• • "Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship, and Secrets" will be onstage at the Algonquin Theatre [123 East 24th Street, New York, NY 10010] by July 19, 2008.
• • Get ready to come up and see Mae onstage in mid-July 2008.
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West at 33 years old • • 1927 • •
NYC
Mae West.

Author! Author!

I wrote the story myself. It's about a girl who lost her reputation and never missed it. — — Mae West
• • Native New Yorker LindaAnn Loschiavo is a journalist and dramatist caught in the spell of a courthouse with Verdi-worthy villains rising up against an actress who climbed the ladder of success wrong by wrong. True events that took place during the Prohibition Era in Jefferson Market's judicial chambers inspired an engaging work, Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship, and Secrets. The storyline uses specifics of Mae West's life to explore issues that still resonate today such as censorship, gay rights, celebrity, and the news media. A regular contributor to several newspapers and magazines, Loschiavo insists that some of her witticisms are not to be lightly tossed aside but rather shaken and stirred. Currently, she's also at work on a museum exhibition: "Mae West's New York, 1899 — 1959."
• • What others are saying:
• • "Loschiavo is a comic Dante, capturing human weakness and balancing tragedy and high hilarity in her dialogue." — — Mario Fratti, "Nine," Tony Award winner
• • "With her whip cracking one-liners, the playwright shows she is as much of a word jockey as Mae West." — — Steve Rossi
• • "In Courting Mae West, we have a sassy, beleaguered Mae West who can keep an audience not just on her side but in her lap." — — Joe Franklin
• • "Fortunately, Mae West was also a flotation device. If no backers materialize, there's always a USO tour!" — — Joe Piscopo

• • Get ready to come up and see Mae onstage during July 2008.
________________________________________________________________
Source:http://courtingmaewest.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Courting Mae West
Mae West
• • Photo: Courting Mae West • • Maebill • •
NYC
Mae West.