The Show Girl
Page 31
When I first moved to New York, I had marveled at how elaborately people dressed for the theater, but I’d never seen such splendor as I saw that day. Some women on deck wore fanciful, wide-brimmed hats with ostrich plumes and bird-of-paradise feathers, silk-and-velvet-trimmed shawls and dresses with ruffles and lace and beading, topped with the most extravagant jewelry. It was quite a display of wealth, as if everyone were fleeing the woes of Manhattan and taking their most expensive jewels with them.
The horns sounded and a brass band began to play as we felt the ship—assisted by a fleet of tugboats—start to pull out of the harbor and toward the Atlantic.
“Let’s find a spot at the railing,” I said, taking Addie’s hand and linking my other arm through Archie’s.
I was wild with excitement for all that lay ahead. It was shocking to think it had been only two and a half years since I’d arrived in Manhattan and knocked on Ziegfeld’s door, all but demanding to be cast in the Follies, thinking that was the only thing that could make me truly happy. And yet now here I was, with the two people I desperately loved, two people whom only days ago I thought I’d lost forever, and soon I’d be onstage rehearsing with one of the most talented and well-respected tenors of our time.
Passengers leaned over the railing, waving frantically to their families and loved ones who stood on the pier to see them off. We’d already said our goodbyes in Brooklyn, but Addie started waving madly anyway.
“Goodbye,” I said, joining her. “Goodbye!”
I picked Addie up so she could see everything that we could see, and Archie wrapped his arms around us both.
“I can’t believe we’re really doing this,” I said, looking up at him.
“You bet your bottom dollar we’re doing it, Olive Shine,” he said, squeezing me tighter.
Everything had happened so fast. We were starting a new life together, the three of us, setting off on an adventure that was both thrilling and uncertain. As I looked out to the island of Manhattan, its tall buildings catching the last of the late afternoon sun, I’d never felt more confident that this would be my greatest adventure yet.
HISTORICAL NOTE
While I thoroughly enjoyed researching the life of a Ziegfeld show girl and all the details that go into the rehearsals and performances, I did take some liberties with show dates. Florenz Ziegfeld Jr.’s renowned Follies revues, inspired by the Folies Bergère of Paris, ran on Broadway from 1907 to 1931, with a break when his shows Betsy, Rio Rita and Rosalie ran 1928–1929. The Midnight Frolic ran from 1915 to 1922 and again from 1928 to 1929. For the purposes of this story I kept the Ziegfeld Follies and the Midnight Frolic running all the way through to 1929. The majority of the songs that were performed were taken from the 1927 Follies and 1928 Frolic, though I added in a few numbers from earlier shows, such as the The Follies Salad from 1919, when they were a good fit for Olive. The Pines, the fictionalized Adirondacks retreat where Olive and Archie spend time, was loosely based on a real-life retreat called White Pine Camp, where I stayed twice during the research for this novel and which I found to be a wonderful source of inspiration. In 1926 White Pine Camp was also where President Calvin Coolidge spent his summer and set up his “Summer White House.” I first learned about the Great Camps of the Adirondacks when I wrote an article for a luxury travel magazine about a fancy seventy-five-acre estate and hotel called The Point that was originally the creation of William Avery Rockefeller II and used as his family’s summer compound. Today it’s a five-star resort that promises guests a taste of times gone by while “roughing it” in extreme luxury. Through my research for this article I learned about several other Great Camps built by Guided Age magnates along the rugged lakeshores of Upstate New York. Many of these camps were built in a similar design and construction, which became known as Adirondack Style, characterized by the use of local timber, Adirondack granite and rocks from the rivers. Families such as the Vanderbilts, Astors, Guggenheims and Rockefellers commissioned the building of these vast estates as an escape from the city. In learning about these camps I knew I had to set part of my story there and that Olive would fall in love with the wilderness in the end.
I referred to many invaluable sources in the research of this book, in particular:
The Ziegfeld Touch: The Life and Times of Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. by Richard and Paulette Ziegfeld
The Days We Danced: The Story of My Theatrical Family from Florenz Ziegfeld to Arthur Murray and Beyond by Doris Eaton Travis with Joseph and Charles Eaton, as told to J. R. Morris
Ziegfeld Girl: Image and Icon in Culture and Cinema by Linda Mizejewski
Ziegfeld and His Follies: A Biography of Broadway’s Greatest Producer by Cynthia Brideson and Sara Brideson
The Village: 400 Years of Beats and Bohemians, Radicals and Rogues by John Strausbaugh
Capital of the World: A Portrait of New York City in the Roaring Twenties by David Wallace
Great Camps of the Adirondacks by Harvey H. Kaiser
White Pine Camp: The Saga of an Adirondack Great Camp and Summer White House by Howard Kirschenbaum
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you to my editor, Leslie Gelbman, for believing in this book; your astute editing skills, support and guidance are invaluable. And a special thank-you to my agent, Stephanie Kip Rostan, for your expertise and for guiding me through the world of publishing.
I am grateful to the entire team at St. Martin’s Press for bringing this book to life and sharing it far and wide, especially Erica Martirano, Marissa Sangiacomo, Dori Weintraub, Danielle Christopher, Donna Sinisgalli Noetzel, Sona Vogel, Gail Friedman, Elizabeth R. Curione and Lisa Bonvissuto. Thank you also the team at Levine Greenberg Rostan, particularly Courtney Paganelli, Melissa Rowland, Cristela Henriques and Miek Coccia. I understand now that publishing a book really does take a village.
I wrote most of The Show Girl at The Writers Room in New York City, which has provided me a peaceful and productive space to write for close to ten years, and I’m so thankful for my talented writing workshop novelists who continue to inspire me every Thursday night: Donna Brodie, Mario Gabriele, Barbara Gaines, Sam Garonzik, Joanie Leinwoll, Meryl Branch-McTiernan, Barbara Miller, Steve Reynolds and Rob Wolf, and especially our fearless leader, Jennifer Belle.
To my author and book-loving friends, and my early readers: Jamie Brenner, Fiona Davis, Suzy Leopold, Lynda Loigman, Amy Poeppel and Susie Orman Schnall, who have kept me sane through the last year with our weekly Zoom calls. I am extremely grateful to you all for your friendship and advice.
A huge thank-you to my friend and early reader Elisa Moriconi for your incredible friendship and support, to Suzanna Filip, for letting me write in your beautiful home, to my mother-in-law and trusted early reader Ginny Ray, and especially my parents, Michael and Jayne Harrison, for their constant love and support, and their tolerance for reading numerous revisions.
Much love to my boys, Christopher and Greyson, for joining me on this wild writing adventure—the books tours, the research trips, the many, many books lining our walls. And, above all, my love and gratitude to my husband, Greg—I cannot imagine any of this being possible without you.
Also by Nicola Harrison
Montauk
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
NICOLA HARRISON is the author of Montauk. Born in England, she is a graduate of University of California, Los Angeles and she received her MFA from Stony Brook University. She lives in Manhattan Beach, California, with her husband, two sons, and one high-maintenance chihuahua. You can sign up for email updates here.
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Contents
Title Page
Copyri
ght Notice
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Historical Note
Acknowledgments
Also by Nicola Harrison
About the Author
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
First published in the United States by St. Martin’s Press, an imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group
THE SHOW GIRL. Copyright © 2021 by Nicola Harrison. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Publishing Group, 120 Broadway, New York, NY 10271.
www.stmartins.com
Cover design by Danielle Christopher
Cover image by Chronicale/Alamy
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Names: Harrison, Nicola, 1979- author.
Title: The show girl / Nicola Harrison.
Description: First edition. | New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021006970 | ISBN 9781250200150 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781250200167 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Showgirls—Fiction. | Ziegfeld follies—Fiction. | GSAFD: Historical fiction.
Classification: LCC PS3608.A7835785 S56 2021 | DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021006970
e-ISBN 9781250200167
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First Edition: 2021