Mae Murray: The Girl with the Bee-Stung Lips

5. From Footlights to Kliegs

5 From Footlights to Kliegs 1915 Mae had plenty of trepidation about breathing new life into the Sans Souci. Vernon and Irene Castle had tried the previous year to reopen the basement club beneath the Heidelberg Building, but with their limited experience in club management, including the city’s concerns about fire codes, they abandoned the venture, and the business folded by the spring of 1914. Mae felt she was a dancer, not a businesswoman. She had never been a smart manager of money; she often made poor, unsound business decisions when on her own. She did, however, have enormous faith in herself and her talent. Paul Salvain, the money and brains behind Rector’s, the Moulin Rouge, Palais Royale, and several other Manhattan restaurants and clubs, convinced Mae that she could double or triple her income as a dancer by assigning her name to her own place. They provided her the financial backing , and Gilliard Boag and George Pierce signed on as managers. Mae put together an act with Donald Crane and Paul de Cardo, the father of Paula de Cardo, premier ballerina for the Los Angeles and San Francisco Grand Opera associations. Mae Murray’s Sans Souci opened in January 1915 to daily “brilliant teas” at three o’clock in the afternoon, “sparkling suppers,” and exhibition dancing.1 When it came time to open the doors, Mae was all but immobile with stage fright. “I had to tell her fifty times that she was going to be great,” Sam Salvain , son of Paul, said later. “She was so scared that she almost forgot her routine.”2 40 Mae Murray By mid-January, Variety was reporting that Mae was drawing in “good business” and a “desirable clientele” to Sans Souci.3 She was just settling in at her club when, one afternoon in late January, highly successful songwriter Irving Berlin came bounding into Sans Souci and told her she should drop everything and come with him to the New Amsterdam Theatre. Irene Castle had taken ill and was taking a leave from Watch Your Step. The musical, with songs by Berlin, had opened in midDecember 1914 to sold-out crowds and was turning out to be one of the smash hits of the season. Vernon Castle was playing a dancing teacher, and Irene was billed simply as “Mrs. Vernon Castle.” In the middle of this crisis, Vernon remembered working with Mae years before in About Town and had recently seen her perform at Sans Souci. She seemed a natural fill-in for Irene. The problem was, they had only four hours to prepare her for the evening performance. According to Mae’s version of the story, Vernon took her by the hand and introduced her to the cast. “This is little Mae Murray,” Vernon said. “She’s going to see we’re not dark tonight.”4 After some quick costume fittings, Mae met with Vernon for an hour to go over a few lines of dialogue and song. She claimed she had seen every matinee and knew most of the routines from memory. “Vernon was such a marvelous dancer, I had no difficulty in mastering the different steps. Learning the songs was hardest, on such short notice,” she said later.5 Mae went on stage at eight o’clock that evening. For her, it was “the proudest moment of my life. Mrs. Castle is the premiere dancer in the country ; to be chosen as her substitute was an honor that made me very happy. Vernon is an ideal partner, he doesn’t seem to touch the floor, he seems rather to fly through the air than to dance.”6 Advertisement for Mae’s San Souci club. Author’s collection. From Footlights to Kliegs 41 By all accounts, Mae filled Irene’s shoes eloquently. The New York Telegraph reported that she “made a decided hit and received round after round of applause.”7 When she finished her performance at the New Amsterdam , Mae hurried to the Sans Souci, where she went onstage for her nightly show. Large numbers from the Watch Your Step audience followed her to the club to congratulate her and to get a close-up look at the dancing phenomenon. Mae had no idea when, or if, Irene would return to the show. However, after about a week of recuperation from her mysterious illness, Irene was back in Watch Your Step. Mae returned to Sans...