Mae West Biography

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Writer, stage performer, screen actress, and nightclub entertainer, Mae West emerged as a ray of light during the Great Depression as a uniquely independent, outspoken and erotic woman. Mae West was a young child, ready to work. In her Broadway days, she was loved by her fans. In Hollywood, her popularity grew with each film she starred in. Eventually, her life settled and she became a nightclub act. Mae West kept her life going and did not stop to think. ("Mae West."). Mary Jane West, also known as Mae West, was born on August 17, 1893 in Brooklyn, New York. She was the eldest of three children. Her father, John P. West, had various jobs. He worked as a livery stableman, a detective, a salesman, and a prizefighter. Her mother,…show more content…
In 1926, Mae West wrote a play that was co-produced with Jim Timony, a lawyer and her supposed lover. The play, Sex, became a popular success and the target of censorship groups. The play included “prostitutes caught in arousing embraces, knockout drinks, a jewelry heist, sops, an offstage suicide, bribery, and the threat of a shootout.” Forty-one weeks into the play’s production, police arrested the cast and West. Mae West was found guilty of corrupting the morals of youth. She was sentenced to ten days in a New York City prison, but was released two days early for good behavior. ("Mae West."). In 1926, her second play, The Drag, was about homosexuality. West was persuaded not to bring it to Broadway. In 1928, her third play, Adamant Lil, was a great success. She played the role of a 1980s saloon singer with underworld connections. In this play, she said her famous line, “Why don’t you come up and see me sometime?” Will Hayes, who enforces the Production Code, saw her as a major threat to the morality of the nation. (“Mae West: a Brief…show more content…
Her husband, Frank Wallace, began to tour the country with a nightclub act “Mae West’s Husband.” In 1942, Wallace filed for a divorce and wanted alimony from West. They both eventually settled with an undisclosed financial agreement. When Mae West was well over sixty, she tried to revive her career by creating a nightclub act “Mae West and her Adonises.” Paul Novak, one of her “adonises” became her companion for the last twenty-six years of her life. West published an autobiography, Goodness Had Nothing to Do with It, in 1959. The book contains humorous stories about her career and love life. In the 1960s, Mae West recorded an album of Bob Dylan and The Beatles songs in Way Out West. ( "Mae West."). Despite her professional image, West did not drink, or smoke. She lived in the same apartment in Los Angles for about half a century. A few months after suffering a stroke, Mae West died November 22, 1980 in Los Angeles. As West said in her autobiography, West had no regrets about her life: “I freely chose the kind of like I lead because I was convinced that a woman has as much right as man to live the way she does if she does no actual harm to society.” ("Mae

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