American Rose

by Karen Abbott

  June comes one day to visit while Gypsy is getting her usual “ass pounding,” the masseuse chopping at her midsection while she lies spread-eagle across her mattress, her hands strangling the bedposts. “All that garbage, censor this, censor that,” Gypsy mutters. “Well, I am Gypsy Rose Lee from now on, and the Ladies Mutual Admiration Society can stuff it up their noses.” Her tone softens. “I don’t know when I’m going to work again.… God alone knows what’s next. Look over there—that’s all I’ve been offered since I came back covered with glory.” She pushes the masseuse away and sifts through a pile of paper, coming up with a sheet of music. “Wait a minute,” she says. “There’s a great song there. The writers are wonderful, June.” She thrusts the page into her sister’s hands. “They don’t know I can’t sing this, and I’ll be damned if I’ll prove I can’t in public. Why don’t you do it?” She has been taking from June for so many years, filching chapters from her life and diverting its path, and in a small, tentative way she seeks to atone.

  June does do it. Through this project she meets Michael Todd and repays Gypsy the favor, suggesting that her sister be his star attraction at the New York World’s Fair. Just like that Gypsy’s grand reentrance is valid; she is no longer an impostor in her own skin.

  The first time they meet, Gypsy knows Michael Todd instantly and makes an uncharacteristic decision, deciding to let him know her. Years later, after he damages her in places that were already broken, she realizes he also gave her a gift. When he marries Elizabeth Taylor in 1957, Gypsy says simply, “I hope he’s finally found the person who is right for him” and means it, at long last happy for someone for the sake of it instead of for the show of it. He dies a year later when his private plane, Lucky Liz, crashes in New Mexico. Gypsy locks herself in her room at the 63rd Street mansion and cries for three days. (Joan Blondell, the actress he married instead of Gypsy, says, “I hope the son of a bitch screamed the whole way down.”) Now, at the World’s Fair, she tries not to mind that he calls her one of the two “greatest no-talent queens in show business”—the other being her Chihuahua, Popsy—or that in every photograph they take together, she gazes directly at him while he focuses on the lens.

  At showtime, though, his eyes are heavy on Gypsy and she can’t see him at all; he is one of thousands collected in the Hall of Music waiting to learn her private thoughts. She has just given an interview that asks her precisely that: what is she thinking when she performs her famous routine “A Stripteaser’s Education”? Reclining on a chaise longue in her dressing room, done floor to ceiling in ivory and gold, Gypsy sips a brandy and considers her answer. “So, basically, you want to know what I think about?” she says. “Well, I don’t think about love, and I don’t think of marriage, and I truly don’t think too far ahead.… I can’t help but fervently hope that my lines are getting across, and that the audience doesn’t really think I mean what I’m saying.”

  And here she is, dressed in an outfit that evokes gaslights and horse cars—a welcome glimpse of nostalgia, on the eve of World War II—the ruffles under her voluminous gown swishing with each step, hands folded primly at her waist, eyes batting beneath the shadow of her hat. Her inside-out strip, as she calls it, is inverted in both deed and word: she first sheds the layers closest to her skin, all the while explaining the aristocratic origins one must possess to become a stripteaser. Like Gypsy herself it is a double-sided creation, the nuances intriguing to many but understood by few, a tragic fable wrapped inside a brilliant joke.

  Peeling off white, elbow-length gloves, she cranes her languorous neck and speaks as if the words were a poem:

  Have you the faintest idea of the private life of a stripteaser?

  My dear, it’s New York’s second largest industry.

  Now a stripteaser’s education requires years of concentration

  And for the sake of illustration, take a look at me.

  I began at the age of three …

  The crowd roars; she knows to wait for it. Just a hint of a smile, and then she continues:

  … learning ballet at the Royal Imperial School in Moscow.

  And how I suffered and suffered for my Art.

  Then, of course, Sweet Briar, oh those dear college days.

  And after four years of Sociology

  Zoology, Biology, and Anthropology—

  She ticks each subject off on her fingers.

  My education was complete

  And I was ready to make my professional debut for the Minskys on 14th Street.

  The laughter rises and falls but never quite dies.

  Now the things that go on in a stripteaser’s mind

  Would give you no end of surprise,

  But if you are psychologically inclined,

  There is more to see than meets the eye.

  She swans across the stage and offers her hat to the bandleader. Strolling back to the center, she pulls at the shoulder of her gown to reveal a strip of collarbone.

  For example—when I lower my gown a fraction

  And expose a patch of shoulder

  I am not interested in your reaction

  Or in the bareness of that shoulder.

  I am thinking of some paintings

  By Van Gogh or by Cézanne

  Or the charm I had in reading Lady Windermere’s Fan

  And when I lower the other side, and expose my other shoulder

  Do you think I take the slightest pride in the whiteness of that shoulder?

  She shakes her head, marveling at such a silly thought.

  I am thinking of my country house

  And the jolly fun in shooting grouse.

  On to the pins now, dropping one at a time into the orchestra pit, the drummer tapping a cowbell as each one falls. Her blouse sways open just enough to expose her breasts, each covered by a black lace bow. She glances down and notices that one of the bows is askew. “Oh dear!” she exclaims, and adjusts it back into place. More laughter, and the music picks up tempo.

  And the frantic music changes, then off to my cue

  But I only think of all the things I really ought to do.

  Wire Leslie Howard, cable Noël Coward

  Go to Bergdorf’s for my fitting, buy the yarn for my mother’s knitting

  Put preserves up by the jar, and make arrangements for my church bazaar.

  But there is the music, and that’s my cue

  There is only one thing left for me to do, so I do it.

  She lifts her skirts and holds the pose, a blooming flower of ruffles and lace, her long, lovely legs the stem.

  And when I raise my skirts with slyness and dexterity

  I am mentally computing just how much I’ll give to charity.

  She leans and rolls down her stockings to the sweet, sliding notes of a violin, her hand imitating the dramatic flourishes of a conductor.

  Though my thighs I have revealed, and just a bit of me remains concealed

  I am thinking of the life of Duse

  Or the third chapter of “The Last Puritan.”

  None of these men are obscene

  They leave me apathetic, I prefer the more Aesthetic,

  Things like dramas by Racine … “Gone with the Wind.”

  She removes her garter belt and drapes it around the neck of a man in the front row. “Oh, darling, you look so sweet,” she coos, and turns him around for all to admire. The future fashion critic Richard Blackwell, just eighteen years old, watches, rapt. “Every slight smile, curved hip, raised arm and seductive thrust created a frenzy among the wide-eyed, open-mouthed men,” he later writes. “She loved her audiences, as animalistic as they were.”

  Next she unhooks her petticoats, whirls them in a circle, and sends them soaring into the crowd. Suddenly she’s shy again, realizing just how far she’s gone.

  And when I display my charms in all their dazzling splendor

  And prove to you, conclusively, I am of the female gender

  I am really thinking of Elsie de Wolfe, and the bric-a-brac I saw


  And that lovely letter I received from George Bernard Shaw

  I have a town house on the East River because it’s so fashionable

  To look at Welfare Island, coal barges, and garbage scows.

  I have a Chinchilla, a Newport Villa …

  She unfastens her skirt next and dangles it in front of her, a matador teasing with her cape.

  And then … I take the last thing off!

  The crowd screams a chorus of “No!” and laughs with her. The skirt drops and she tucks herself into the velvet curtain, holding it far enough to one side to show her G-string, lacy and black and adorned with a tiny pink bow, one last illusion for those who know to look. Her voice is a lullaby now, lolling and low, until the final punchline.

  And stand here, shyly, with nothing on at all

  Clutching an old velvet drop, and looking demurely at every man

  Do you believe for a moment that I am thinking of sex?

  Well, I certainly am!

  She heeds their whistles and calls and reappears just once, giving what she has to, keeping all she can.

  Acknowledgments

  First and foremost, thank you to the late June Havoc—a fierce and lovely lady and a true national treasure—who so generously shared her time and her memories. Talking with her was like being magically escorted back to the 1920s and ’30s, and I relish every moment I spent there. And my deepest gratitude to and affection for Tana Sibilio, who invited me into June’s world, answered a million questions, supported me in a multitude of ways that have nothing to do with this book, and introduced me to the sublime grilled-cheese sandwich at the Lakeside Diner. The world is lucky to have you.

  To Erik Preminger, for kindly inviting me into his home and sharing anecdotes and insights that made this a much richer book.

  To the immensely talented Laura Jacobs, who provided me with every article, note, and interview transcription she used to write her groundbreaking piece on Gypsy, which ran in the March 2003 issue of Vanity Fair. I don’t know another journalist who would have been so helpful and generous.

  To my amazing editor, Susanna Porter, for her guidance, support, and superior editorial eye, and for finding Gypsy’s story as fascinating as I do. And to her assistant, the efficient and ever-patient Sophie Epstein, for cracking the whip gently.

  To Simon Lipskar, agent extraordinaire, for his general brilliance, unerring logic (his slavish devotion to the Yankees notwithstanding), tireless advocacy, and willingness to tell it like it is, even when I don’t want to hear it. You gave me the single best piece of career advice I’ve ever received, a printout of which hangs on my office wall: “Just shut the fuck up and write the book.” Indeed.

  To the people who found files, checked facts, or lent a helping hand: the entire staff at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts (a special shout-out to the unfailingly cheerful Tanisha Jones), Su Kim Chung of the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, Charlene Peoples at the Washington State Department of Health, Dotty King, Dianne Durante, Martha Davidson, Trish Nicola, Peter Dizozza, David Williams, Noralee Frankel, and, especially, the intrepid and delightful Carolyn Quinn.

  To everyone who shared personal memories of Gypsy, the Minsky brothers, burlesque, and vaudeville, or who helped facilitate interviews: Arthur Laurents, Liz Smith, Dr. Edward Orzac, Bette Solomon, Dardy Minsky, George Bettinger, Satan’s Angel, Kaye Ballard, D. A. Penne-baker, Gus Weill, Liz Goldwyn and Dominique Porter, Frank Cullen, Ava Minsky Foxman, and Mike Weiss. Thanks, also, to the vast and extraordinary neo-burlesque community, especially Laura Herbert, Franky Vivid and Michelle L’Amour, and the incomparable Jo Boobs.

  To Sara Gruen and Joshilyn Jackson, my critique partners and dearest darlings (as Gypsy would say), who sustain me on a daily—even hourly—basis. Thank you for our decadent yet productive retreats, for reading this book more times than I care to count, for encouraging my inner Julia Child, for enduring my insufferable sore-winner poker-victory dance (okay, okay, I occasionally lose), for hating me hard, and for perfectly matching my own level of batshit crazy. Without you two I’d have quit this business long ago. My love and thanks, also, to the members of my writing group at large: the outrageously gifted Anna Schachner, the magnificent Lydia Netzer, the wicked and sharp Gilbert King, the whip-smart Emma Garman, the savvy Elisa Ludwig, and the fabulous and forgiving Renee Rosen.

  To Julia “Edipist” Cheiffetz, Benjamin Dreyer, Tom Perry, Tom Nevins, Barbara Fillon, Sally Marvin, Debbie Aroff, Lynn Buckley, Susan Kamil, Gina Centrello, Steve Messina, Caroline Cunningham, Sandra Sjursen, Tom Schmidt, Rick Kogan, Erik Larson, Stephen J. Dubner, Steven D. Levitt, Nick Barose, Jack Perry, Kathy Abbott, Melisa Monastero, Laura Dittmar, Beth France, Nora Skinner, Chip and Susan Fisher, Rachel Shteir, Jonathan Santlofer, Andrew “P. Pokey” Corsello, Mary Agnew, Sue Taddei, Jennifer Fales, and everyone who has supported me during my career, including the three-year process of writing this book. To quote old-time stripteaser Mae Dix, I’d do anything for all of you, within reason.

  To Chuck Kahler, with whom, incredibly, I’ve spent half of my life: thanks for seeing through me, and for seeing me through.

  And finally, a gutsy, ballsy, Ethel Merman–style squawk! to Poe and Dexter.

  Notes and Sources

  1 “Genius is not a gift”: Quoted in Joyce Carol Oates, Blonde, x.

  2 “May your bare ass”: Telegram, Eleanor Roosevelt to Gypsy Rose Lee, May 8, 1959, Series I, Box 6, Folder 8, Gypsy Rose Lee Papers, Billy Rose Theatre Division (hereafter BRTD), New York Public Library.

  CHAPTER 1: NEW YORK WORLD’S FAIR, 1940

  1 “Everybody thinks”: Havoc, More Havoc, 160.

  2 the fair’s 1,216 acres: Gelernter, 18.

  3 seven hundred feet high: The New York Times, October 29, 1939. (Other sources say 610 feet; see Gelernter, 16.)

  4 Joe DiMaggio: The New York Times, May 28, 1940.

  5 “aquabelles”: Gelernter, 308.

  6 “We will be dedicating”: Ibid., 344; The New York Times, December 29, 1938.

  7 Westinghouse Time Capsule: The New York Times, September 24, 1938; Goldfield, 545.

  8 General Motors’ Futurama exhibit: Gelernter, 19–25.

  9 “undesirable slum areas”: Wood, 60.

  10 They witness a robot: The New York Times, April 30, 1940.

  11 “Sooner than you realize it”: Trager, 515.

  12 “Peace and Freedom”: The New York Times, May 12, 1940.

  13 hourly war bulletins: The New York Times, May 18, 1940; Philip Hamburger, “Comment,” The New Yorker, June 1, 1940.

  14 foreign section: The New York Times, May 18, 1940.

  15 “American Common”: The New York Times, May 19, 1940.

  16 Fairgoers line up: The New York Times, June 4, 1940.

  17 larger than the turnout: Gypsy received a louder ovation—based on an applause meter—than Roosevelt and Wilkie combined: J. P. McEvoy, “More Tease Than Strip,” Reader’s Digest, July 1941.

  18 outpolling even Eleanor Roosevelt: John Richmond, “Gypsy Rose Lee, Striptease Intellectual,” American Mercury, January 1941.

  19 “larger than Stalin’s”: Preminger, 56.

  20 “What’s the matter in there?”: Preminger, 57.

  21 babies cry: Interview with Bette Solomon, granddaughter of Jack Hovick (through his second marriage), September 18, 2009.

  22 dogs urinate: story by June Havoc as told to Tana Sibilio.

  23 “I don’t like poison darts”: Geoffrey T. Hellman, “Author,” The New Yorker, December 7, 1940.

  24 “I hope you are well”: Rose Thompson Hovick to Gypsy Rose Lee, undated, Series I, Box 1, Folder 14, Gypsy Rose Lee Papers, BRTD.

  25 “Have you the faintest”: The version of “A Stripteaser’s Education” presented here (and later) is a composite; Gypsy performed this, her signature number, for many years and updated the lyrics every so often. In later years, she called it “The Psychology of a Stripteaser,” likely in homage to Freud.

 
CHAPTER 2: SEATTLE, WASHINGTON, 1910S

  1 “Do unto others”: Cohn, 121.

  2 hurling herself: Havoc, Early Havoc, 14, 92.

  3 scalding water: Havoc, More Havoc, 39.

  4 tearing her mother: Laura Jacobs, “Taking It All Off,” Vanity Fair, March 2003; Havoc, Early Havoc, 122.

  5 A caul: Lee, Gypsy, 44.

  6 dark circles: Ibid., 10.

  7 fit into a teacup: Havoc, Early Havoc, 14.

  8 including her older daughter’s name: Washington State certificate of birth, record number 193, file number 1388. This is the original birth certificate on file and specifies that there is “one child living of this mother”—clearly marking it as Louise’s/Gypsy’s. Though Rose Hovick certainly could have doctored a copy of a birth certificate, it would have been impossible for her to doctor the original. Charlene Peoples, a representative of the Washington State Department of Health, as well as officials at the King County Health Department, confirmed that this certificate is indeed the one that was filed at the time of birth. Though the birth certificate gives “Ellen June’s” date of birth as January 8, 1911, I cite January 9 as Gypsy’s birthday in the book since that is the date she used throughout her life (she also cited 1914 as the year of her birth). It’s also possible, of course, that Rose never registered the name “Rose Louise” at all, and that, after the girls began their vaudeville careers, she requested that Gypsy’s certificate be amended to read “Ellen June.” The King County Health Department was unable to verify when “Ellen June” was added to the certificate, or who, specifically, updated the document. Erik Preminger also believes that his mother was born in January 1911.

  There are several theories and guesses about the Hovick sisters’ true ages and names; I base my own conclusions on this birth certificate and several other pieces of documentation: