She was the Madonna of her time, parlaying a modest talent into international celebrity with a carefully cultivated, outsized personality and an unerring instinct for just how outrageous to be without alienating her audience. Mae West (1893-1980) crafted the persona that made her the biggest movie star of the early 1930s during her vaudeville and Broadway apprenticeship. Those formative years are the subject of this absorbing cultural biography, which closes in 1938 when Paramount dropped her contract. A generous sampling of West one-liners adds sparkle to the text.
Leider (California's Daughter: Gertrude Atherton & Her Times, LJ 11/15/90) traces West's development from child performer to coltish shimmy dancer to the drawling, wise-cracking persona recognized today. The author's focus on West's early career allows her to examine significant changes in American culture as the population became predominantly urban and the new media of film and radio began encroaching on established forms of entertainment. Yet the heart of the story is West, already a veteran performer with over 30 years' experience when she arrived in Hollywood. But once West honed her persona, she was reluctant to deviate from the successful formula, stifling her arresting creativity and originality. This combined with perennial censorship problems caused the decades-long break in her film career. Recommended for large public libraries and subject collections.?Marianne Cawley, Enoch Pratt Free Lib., Baltimore, Md