Sally Rand (born Helen Gould Beck; April 3, 1904 – August 31, 1979)[3] was an American burlesque dancer, vedette, and actress, famous for her ostrich-feather fan dance and balloon bubble dance. She also performed under the name Billie Beck. Rand got her start as a chorus girl before working as an acrobat and traveling theater performer. Her career spanned more than forty years and she appeared on stage, screen and in television. Through her career she worked alongside Humphrey Bogart, Karl Malden and Cecil B. DeMille. She was a trained pilot and briefly dated Charles Lindbergh.

Early life

Rand was born in the village of Elkton, Hickory County, Missouri.[4] Her father, William Beck, was a West Point graduate and retired U.S. Army colonel, while her mother, Nettie (Grove) Beck, was a school teacher and part-time newspaper correspondent.[5] The family moved to Jackson County, Missouri while she was still in grade school.[6]

Helen started on the stage quite early, working as a chorus girl at Kansas City's Empress Theater when she was only 13. An early supporter of her talent was Goodman Ace, a drama critic for the Kansas City Journal, who saw her performing in a Kansas City nightclub and wrote glowing reviews. After studying ballet and drama in Kansas City, the teenaged Helen decided her future lay in Hollywood. For a short time, as she worked her way to the west coast, she was employed as an acrobat in the Ringling Brothers Circus.[5] She also performed in summer stock and traveling theater, including working with a then-unknown Humphrey Bogart.[7]

Career

During the 1920s, she acted on stage and appeared in silent films. Cecil B. DeMille gave her the name Sally Rand, inspired by a Rand McNally atlas. She was selected as one of the WAMPAS Baby Stars in 1927.

After the introduction of sound films, she became a dancer, known for the fan dance, which she popularized starting at the Paramount Club, at 15 E. Huron, in Chicago.[8] Her most famous appearance was at the 1933 Chicago World's Fair, known as the Century of Progress, accompanied by her backing orchestra, directed by Art Frasik. She would play peek-a-boo with her body by manipulating her fans in the front and behind her, like a winged bird as she swooped and twirled on the stage, usually to "Clair de Lune".[9] She was arrested four times in a single day during the fair due to perceived indecent exposure after a fan dance performance and while riding a white horse down the streets of Chicago, where the nudity was only an illusion,[10] and again after being bodypainted by Max Factor Sr. with his new makeup formulated for Hollywood films.[11] She also conceived the bubble dance, in part to cope with wind while performing outdoors. She performed the fan dance on film in Bolero, released in 1934.[10] She performed the bubble dance in the film Sunset Murder Case (1938).[12]

In 1936, she purchased The Music Box burlesque hall in San Francisco, which later became the Great American Music Hall. She starred in "Sally Rand's Nude Ranch" at the Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco in 1939 and 1940.[13] To advertise for her upcoming Treasure Island Nude Ranch, she organized a stunt on February 17, 1939, wherein lingerie clad women on horses rode down Market Street in downtown San Francisco.[14]

Rand took an interest in flying due in part to her brief relationship with Charles Lindbergh. By 1923, Rand had learned to fly, and she would later receive her pilot's license.[15] Rand often flew herself to her performances. On August 1, 1939, she reportedly broke the speed record for a light plane flight she made from San Francisco to Reno, completing the trip in 1 hour and 54 minutes.[14]

In the early 1940s, Rand did summer stock in Woodstock, New York. She signed on to star in Rain and Little Foxes whose cast also included Karl Malden. He remembered being stressed that she was unprepared and seemed to care more about her costumes than learning her lines, costumes which he admitted were dazzling to the point that he forgot his own lines during a performance. “Her burlesque days were written all over her, especially in her hygiene habits,” wrote Malden in his memoirs. “One could assume she rarely bathed, and the college kids who cleaned the rooms at the playhouse confirmed that the tub was never used. Instead, she just kept dousing herself with perfume and shoveling on the makeup, layer upon layer, until it began to cake and separate so that you could see the dirt buildup in the creases around her neck.”[16]

She was arrested twice in San Francisco in 1946; while performing at Club Savoy,[17][18][19][20][21][22] she was arrested by six police officers in the audience as she danced, seemingly nude, in silhouette behind a large white fan; the judge, Daniel R. Shoemaker, granted her immunity should she be arrested for the same offense while on trial; however she was arrested during a night of the trial while performing her act, despite her immunity and the fact that she was wearing long underwear and a note that read "CENSORED. S.F.P.D." that time.[23] In an unusual move, the judge viewed her performance at the Savoy and cleared her of all charges after deeming that "anyone who could find something lewd about the dance as she puts it on has to have a perverted idea of morals".[24][25]

In the early 1950s, she was traveling with a 17-member troupe around the Midwest, appearing at state fairs and small theaters. Edith Dahl accompanied Rand's famous fan dance, the finale of the show, on the violin and "cracked a few jokes". According to local newspaper accounts, Rand's large white feathered fans acted as "a guard to keep too much of mother nature from showing." "Smutty jokes" were at minimum in the afternoon performances." The tour was across Oklahoma and Texas, then west toward Washington before returning east. She refused to divulge her age to reporters at the time, but was known to be approaching 50.[26]

Rand was the mystery guest on the December 28, 1952, episode of What's My Line?. Her identity was correctly solved by panelist Robert Q. Lewis.

She appeared on television on March 12, 1957, in episode 13 of the first season of To Tell the Truth with host Bud Collyer and panelists Polly Bergen, Ralph Bellamy, Kitty Carlisle, and Carl Reiner. She did not "stump the panel", but was correctly identified by all four panelists (she was introduced as Helen Beck, her birth name).[citation needed]

She continued to appear on stage doing her fan dance into the 1970s. Rand once replaced Ann Corio in the stage show This Was Burlesque, appeared at the Mitchell Brothers club in San Francisco in the early 1970s and toured as one of the stars of the 1972 nostalgia revue Big Show of 1928, which played major concert venues, including New York's Madison Square Garden. Describing her 40-year career, Rand said, "I haven’t been out of work since the day I took my pants off."[27]

Death

Rand died on August 31, 1979, at Foothill Presbyterian Hospital, in Glendora, California, aged 75, from congestive heart failure.[28] She was deeply in debt at her death. Rand's adopted son told an interviewer that Sammy Davis Jr. stepped in and wrote a $10,000 check, which took care of Rand's expenses.[29]

Football play

Football coaches at the University of Delaware named a football play after Sally Rand. One explanation is that the play misdirected the defense, or in other words, like the dancer herself, the offense was showing more than they actually had.[30] The name migrated to Canada, where a "naked bootleg" became known as a "Sally Rand" and was used to great effect by the BC Lions.[31]

In popular culture

In Tex Avery's cartoon Hollywood Steps Out (1941), a rotoscoped Rand performs her famous bubble dance onstage to an appreciative crowd. A grinning Peter Lorre caricature in the front row comments, "I haven't seen such a beautiful bubble since I was a child." The routine continues until the bubble is suddenly popped by Harpo Marx and his slingshot, with a surprised Rand (her nudity covered by a well-placed wooden barrel) reacting with shock. Rand is referred to as "Sally Strand" here. Closer to the beginning of the cartoon, a coat check girl says "Good evening, Miss Rand," as we see a woman's hand offer her a set of feather fans to hang up.

She was the model of several characters in Robert A. Heinlein's science fiction stories, such as the Mary-Lou Martin character of "Let There Be Light". She was also a guest of Robert and Virginia Heinlein at 1976's 34th World Science Fiction Convention, held in Kansas City, Missouri, where Robert Heinlein was the Guest of Honor; at that Worldcon, she served as a judge for the convention's masquerade costume contest. She was also included in Heinlein's 1987 book, To Sail Beyond the Sunset, as a friend of main character, Maureen Johnson Long, mother of the character Lazarus Long.

In the 1979 book The Right Stuff, the author Tom Wolfe described Sally Rand fan-dancing for the first American astronauts and other dignitaries at the barbecue in Houston celebrating the space center, and referred to the astronauts' observing this sixtyish woman's "ancient haunches".[32] In the 1983 film version of The Right Stuff, Rand was portrayed by actress Peggy Davis.

A fictionalized version of Rand appeared in Toni Dove's interactive cinema project Spectropia, played by Helen Pickett of the Wooster Group.

In the 1936 Merrie Melodie cartoon Page Miss Glory, a robustly proportioned matron performs a parody of Rand's fan dance.

In the "Nathan Heller" mystery series by Max Allan Collins, Detective Heller meets Rand.

In her novel The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand (no relation) mentions a Sally Rand-inspired performer named Juanita Fay "who danced with a live peacock as sole garment" at The March of the Centuries 1936 world fair (which strongly resembles 1933 Century of Progress fair).[33]

Partial filmography

The Dressmaker from Paris (1925) - Mannequin (uncredited)

Fifth Avenue Models (1925) - Mannequin / Dancer (uncredited)

The Texas Bearcat (1925) - Jean Crawford

The Road to Yesterday (1925) - Party Guest (uncredited)

Braveheart (1925) - Sally Vernon

Bachelor Brides (1926) - Maid

Sunny Side Up (1926) - A Dancer

Gigolo (1926) - Tourist Girl in Paris

Man Bait (1927) - Nancy

The Night of Love (1927) - Gypsy Dancer

Getting Gertie's Garter (1927) - Teddy Desmond

The Yankee Clipper (1927) - Wing Toy (uncredited)

The King of Kings (1927) - Mary Magdalene's Slave (uncredited)

His Dog (1927) - Marian Gault

The Fighting Eagle (1927) - Fräulein Hertz

Galloping Fury (1927) - Dorothy Shelton

Heroes in Blue (1927) - Anne Dugan

A Woman Against the World (1928) - Maysie Bell

Crashing Through (1928) - Rita Bayne

Nameless Men (1928)

A Girl in Every Port (1928) - Girl in Bombay (uncredited)

The Czarina's Secret (1928, Short)

Golf Widows (1928) - Mary Ward

Black Feather (1928)

The Sign of the Cross (1932) - Crocodiles' Victim (uncredited)

Hotel Variety (1933)

Bolero (1934) - Annette

The Big Show (1936) - State Fair Performer

Sunset Murder Case (1938) - Kathy O'Connor

Burlesque has seen many incarnations, ups and downs, and even periods of hibernation over the past century, but try as the censors might, it has never really gone away.  The magical connection between burlesque and the American audience can be summed up in the lyrics of Willkommen from the opening of Cabaret: “Leave your troubles outside!  So life is disappointing?  Forget it!  We have no troubles here!  Here life is beautiful…the girls are beautiful…even the orchestra is beautiful!”  Although burlesque has seen success on the stages of Broadway and other high end venues, it remains an essentially working class form of entertainment, aiding escapism from the worries of everyday life through the troubles of the Great Depression and war times.  Miss Georgia Sothern was a big player throughout.  Her career lasted from 1922-1977 and began when she was barely 13!

Raised in vaudeville, Georgia began performing with her uncle when she was a toddler; her father had abandoned the family and her mother struggled to make ends meet for Georgia (then called Hazel) and her sister, Jewel.  Within a week of Hazel’s thirteenth birthday, her mother was in a state-funded hospital being treated for tuberculosis and her beloved Uncle Virgil had died of the same.  Uncle Virgil had entrusted Hazel to another vaudeville act, but that form of entertainment was vanishing quickly and the act soon dissolved, the manager running off without paying Hazel, and she found herself alone on the streets of New York city.  After a week of nearly starving and without finding work in the only field she knew, the brave young girl turned to burlesque.  She had a number of false birth certificates from her vaudeville days and was able to pass herself off as 17!  Later, when Mr. Minsky found out that she was only 14 (and had been working for him for over a year) he nearly hit the roof, but she gave him one of her false birth certificates and assured him that she would never alert the law to this indiscretion.

Born in Atlanta, Georgia picked her name on the spot in Phil Rosenberg’s office and in her nervousness, forgot the ‘u’ in Sothern, and so the spelling stuck.  Her unique style of whirling dervish striptease was also born out of nervousness, during her very first performance and this jazz age baby rode it all the way to the bank, eventually having a signature tune written for her, “Hold that Tiger.”  Ann Corio wrote, “The mere sight of this red hot red-headed temptress tossing her hips in fantastic abandon to the wild music of the band caught up everybody in its spell…the audience was almost as exhausted watching as Georgia was performing.”  Sometimes she would get so caught up in her exuberant dance steps that she would end up taking off and putting on her clothing several times during a number, leading one fan to remark, “She strips just like she had dynamite for lunch.”

Georgia Sothern

Georgia Sothern

Not only did she do a fast strip, she led a fast-paced life in the roaring twenties and no matter how conservative she actually was, adventure always seemed to seek her out.  Her skirmishes with the law didn’t always involve burlesque, but often gangsters and bootleggers, as well as her poorly picked husbands.  While still only 13, Georgia witnessed a gangland murder that would have had her dead that very night, but for the fact that she had worn black and the streetlight happened to be burned out, so that the killers didn’t notice her.  The plot thickened later, when she found out that perpetrator was her best friend’s boyfriend!  Months of living in fear that he would discover her identity culminated in his dropping a large wad of stolen cash at their apartment as he fled from the police.  But when he returned much later, to kill his former flame, he was the one that ended up snuffed out in a nearby park, thanks to her friend, Foxie, a rival bootlegger.  The police also became involved in her personal life when her first husband threatened to jump from a tall building, to the amusement of a large crowd and the chagrin of the police squad.  Georgia, however, called him on it, and he flew into a rage, swearing at her and hitting her, and ultimately landed himself in jail.

But back to burlesque.  She was never busted for being underage, but she was escorted out of Philadelphia by the police.  Whenever Mr. Poole, the city’s censor, would come around, the burlesque houses would tame down the show and cut all the bumps and grinds.  He became fixated on finding Miss Sothern doing whatever it was that made her so popular; one night the theatre was not slick enough and Sothern was caught wearing only three sequined rosebuds.  She was given 24 hours to leave town, or end up in jail.  Although Georgia was mortified, the reporters were on her side and it all turned out for the best, with Mr. Cohen selling Georgia’s contract to none other than Billy Minsky.  Burlesque thrived in the city of New York’s emerging nightclub scene for years to come, but further into the thirties, things began to change.  Mayor LaGuardia was doing his best shut down burlesque and issued stricter and stricter edicts, including this one: “You are not allowed to remove an article of clothing.  You may not peel from your person even so much as a glove.”  The biz had to get creative, some operations creating floating nightclubs, modeled after prohibition speakeasies.  However, when the states entered WWII, the art of the striptease didn’t seem so bad.  As Ann Corio wrote in 1941, for Variety, “Burlesque, along with aviation and munitions, is experiencing a wartime spurt.”  During this time, Georgia joined Gypsy Rose Lee on Broadway in Mike Todd’s productions of Star and Garter and The Naked Genius.

But when the war was over, burlesque was booted from The Great White Way and it was back to the nightclubs for the peelers.  In 1948, Georgia was arrested at Club Samoa in Manhattan, under the charge “lewdness in a tent.”  The star was fined $125, but this didn’t stop her.  She spent years fighting the case and finally won, the judge ruling that “the city could not deprive her from earning a living in a lawful occupation.”  Furthermore, Georgia is cited as being the main force behind the abolishment of the ‘police card,’ which performers in New York had to pay for every two years and, if their card was taken up for any reason, they were not allowed to work in the city.  Georgia was a great advocate of her profession and prompted H.L. Mencken to coin the term ‘ecdysiast’ to try and ameliorate the unfavorable image brought to mind by the term ‘stripper.’  Performing the carnival circuit in the later years of her career, Georgia eventually took her own shows on the road, Sothern’s Red-Headed Revue and the Top Hatters.  She didn’t retire from the stage until five years before her death, in 1981.  She was 72, and in my book, this dynamite dame deserves a lifetime achievement award.

For more information on Georgia Sothern, the Red Headed Bombshell, I highly recommend reading her autobiography, Georgia: My Life in Burlesque.