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| Thoughts on "Stripping Gypsy" | |
| Posted by: | pepperturtle (hpmaraka@aol.com) 10:15 pm EDT 05/06/09 |
| I was so excited for Noralee Frankel's book "Stripping Gypsy," truly the first real bio of Gypsy Rose Lee not by a family member (her son Erik's book was wonderful on its own). However, I was a little afraid to start after having read the jacket, which seemed intent on portraying the book in the light of anthropology, feminism and other sciences I worried would overwhelm the biography aspect that I so much wanted to read. But, Frankel is pretty darn expert at juggling Gypsy the person and Gypsy the concept. Her main problem is Gypsy herself, who not only wrote one of the great autobiographies ever (truthful or not), but who is so quotable that any other author's attempts to outdo her are bound to fail. Wisely, Frankel doesn't try to overwhelm Gypsy too many times, allowing the woman herself to bloom as humorously and uniquely as she apparently did in life. Frankel actually races through the early part of Gypsy's life, the part we all think we know from her own book and the musical. The vaudeville years are tucked into one chapter and then things slow down so Frankel can show off all she's learned about the part we haven't read about many times. I was particularly interested in reading about Gypsy's mother and sister. As usual, Rose is a gorgon, but with hard documentary evidence. There are letters quoted that show how truly unbalanced she was (it's definitely Frankel's assertion that Rose was crazy). At the end of her life, she was battling terminal cancer in a nursing home, still able to beat up nurses and send her daughters angry letters about their treatment of her, not to mention insisting on money. As horrible as Rose is, Gypsy actually puts up with her. It seemed Gyspy was incapable of genuine hatred for anyone, even remaining very friendly with two of her ex-husbands. As much as Rose was threatening and obnoxious, Gypsy always supported her financially. Gypsy also supported Rose's mother, whom they called Big Lady, and who wasn't much better, than Rose, and one of Rose's alcoholic sisters. As for June, I actually found the relationship between Gypsy and June to be the most touching in Gypsy's life. They were close friends, and even when they were angry at each other, no fight lasted long. We've all heard that June got all litigious when the book and musical were out, and it's true, but June and Gypsy actually shared a lawyer and June told Gypsy exactly why she was protecting herself, which Gypsy seemed to understand. They lived together for a time and June even directed Gypsy in a stock production of The Women (where Gypsy played Sylvia). It was June who constantly reminded Gypsy that she was smarter and more talented than people perceived, a constant source of support. Oh, and Rose's father? He was a railroad man, but actually died fairly young when his car was hit by a train! And Gypsy's father? Yes, there was one. He and Rose divorced early on, but there's a truly beautiful moment in the book during the book tour for "Gypsy" when she's in Seattle and reunited briefly with him. As for other personal relationships, Frankel shows Gypsy to be a devoted person. Her attention to fellow strippers is notable, and it led her to be a lifelong supporter of unions and typical working-class people. She was almost manic about doing benefits and during the war, traveled all over to entertain the soldiers. She was doing USO tours the year before she died! She married three times. The first was to placate Hollywood in the 30s, and the marriage was quick. The second was to make another man jealous and the third seemed the most passionate, but all ended quickly. Gypsy was a single mother when no one was doing that, and her son grew up as her assistant, which he came to resent as he got older because he felt used as cheap labor. His teenage years found the two battling hugely as Gypsy turned into something of the control freak her mother was, but they were happily reconciled by the time Gypsy died. Apparently the loves of Gypsy's life were rough-and-tumble men like a ganster investor, Rags Ragland and, of course, Mike Todd. It was because Todd was carrying on with Joan Blondell during his romance with Gypsy that she married her second husband, who knew it all along (he was pining for another woman anyway). But, the husband was so unbelievably kind that he agreed to pretend to be the father of Gypsy's son Erik, even though they hadn't been together in two years (they were still legally married). It wasn't until Erik was a teenager that the truth came out that his father was Otto Preminger, but up to that point, his supposed father kept up the charade. It's Gypsy the wit who reigns over this frisky book. As has been well-documented, she seemed like a good-time gal, but she was really a very serious person, who put lots of thought into everything she did. She constantly knocked stripping, but it was good press to do so. Her attention to details was staggering. She made all of her own costumes, and refused to use zippers most of the time for fear of a snag ruining her perfect timing. Frankel tries her best to explain what made a Gypsy Rose Lee so special, but without being able to watch one, there's only so far a description goes. As for fitting Gypsy into the social and political climate of her time, it's handled well, especially as the US hit the 50s and Gypsy had to juggle being a single mother and stripper in a society that valued "Momism" as sacred. Gypsy yearned to be a serious actress, but after a point, she didn't even pretend she was giving up stripping because she knew it was always going to be her biggest source of revenue. She had a miserable time in Hollywood in the 30s, and only returned now and then for projects she ended up hating (her cracks at some of her movies are priceless). She loved doing radio and TV, but her TV career was blunted by blacklisting in the early 50s. Frankel is at her studious best when detailing the blacklisting. It was the only time Gypsy remained relatively quiet, so Frankel gets to step out of Gypsy's shadow. If anyone has seen clips of Gypsy's talk show near the end of her life, they will see what a charming and fun host she was. The shows are filled with Gypsy and her celebrity friends doing crafts and talking nonsense. The chapter detailing the horrendous adventure of a play Mike Todd produced of Gypsy's is so interesting (it starred Joan Blondell as Gypsy, and was not only apparently horribly written, but completely done in by awful direction from George Kauffman). Frankel is most adoring of Gypsy the author, deservedly so. Her two novels are actually wonderful and of course her autobiography is singular (though Frankel does a fine job of pointing out the literary faults in it). The most disappointing part of the book is the part that actually deals with the musical. It's full of factual errors that should have been easily cleaned up (such as having the wrong theater mentioned), and it's not at all analytical. The only truly interesting detail in the chapter is Gypsy's secret coaching of Sandra Church for the strip sequences when Jerome Robbins refused to deal with them. I did not know that Gypsy did a stock production of Happy Hunting after Gypsy had been produced, but Frankel doesn't even note the irony that it had been a Merman vehicle originally. Gypsy also did Auntie Mame in stock quite a few times, including one time in San Juan where she was picketed because the rest of the cast was non-Equity (which she didn't know when she signed up for it). Throughout her life, Gypsy assumed writing would be her salvation. Once "The G-String Murders" was published, she thought she would be set for life (she was frantic about financial security, and though she wasn't afraid to spend recklessly, she was also obsessively cheap as the years went on). It didn't happen and stripping was always there for her, even as she approached 50. It wasn't until writing "Gypsy" that she finally gave up stripping for good, but by that time, striptease had changed so much there wasn't a place for her anyway. I've refrained from quoting Gypsy's outrageouly hysterical remarks because I urge you to read the book for them. It's a fast and pleasant read anyway, but Gypsy's own saucy remarks are the hightlights. The woman could ratte off a quip like nobody else. She really was so intelligent and her mind was always working. However, there's a quote near the end of the book that almost had me in tears from laughing so hard. Every time Gypsy wrote something, there were rumors of ghost writers. It was something that plagued her from her two mysteries through articles she wrote and even "Gypsy. This really galled her because she was so passionate about her writing and really did see it as her ticket out of stripping. At a lunch celebrating the publishing her "Gypsy," she went up to speak and "as she slowly removed her hat, gloves and jacket in front of the audience...she purred, 'I don't want you to think that all I can do is write books.'" That's the Gypsy Rose Lee heroine of this book, a woman not afraid to tweak her audience's nose while reveling being the center of attention. | |
