OPEN POST: Manor Music Monday With Gypsy Rose Lee!

Welcome, music prostitots, to another edition of Manor Music Monday, today with a li'l bump, a li'l grind, and lots of razzmatazz. And yes, our songstress of the day has a gimmick, because, as you might know, you gotta get a gimmick. Those last four words were probably enough to cause all of you Broadway Babies out there to squeal with happiness - and for good reason. But this ain't no Broadway post, bub. It's about the Real McCoy, as they say, or the genu-wine article. Tonight, DJ Li'l Scratch will be playing all of her hot-cha! songs at the Manor's "Tuna Pole!" lounge and Shirako dinette. Yes, it's times like these that call for Gypsy, don't you think?

No, not the movie or stage Gypsy. I'm talking about the actual person. Yes, it's true, there really was a burlesque queen named Gypsy. I know, right? It's like finding out the tooth-fairy is real. And yes, she and her audience frequently had to make a mad dash for the streets whenever police raided her burlesque houses. Which was often.

Famously, she wrote her biography, titled "Gypsy," about her early years with her sister and their tyrannically controlling stage-mother, known as Mama Rose, which became the basis for the landmark Jule Styne/Stephen Sondheim musical, "Gypsy" starring Ethel Merman. Merman's gone, and the movie version is "meh," but don't worry. If you want to see a version of "Gypsy" that fires on all cylinders, see it for free RIGHT HERE. It stars Imelda Staunton, who gives a towering performance as the ultimate Mama Rose.

Which leads us here. In 1958, Gypsy recorded her very own LP, and it's as bawdy and giggly as you could hope for. She doesn't sing, exactly, but chants and coos and rawrs her way through several tracks in which she shares her tricks of the trade. And trust me, she knew a whole lot of them. 

She also, as you may not know, wrote most of her stripper songs, including a delightful ditty called, "I Can Cook, Too," whose lyrics include:

"Oh, I can cook, too, on top of the rest,
My seafood's the best in the town.
And I can cook, too, my soufflé′s renown,
My cheesecake has been all around.
I'm a man's ideal of a perfect meal
Right down to the demi-tasse.
I′m a pot of joy for a hungry boy.
Daddy, I′m cookin' with gas!"

Poetry, n'est pas? Give a listen: 

She was so popular in her day that she co-starred in a very good 1959 film-noir, "Screaming Mimi," with Anita Ekberg, and in it, gave it her all when she performed "Put The Blame on Mame." 

In addition to stripping, acting and songwriting, Gypsy was a novelist, too. Her popular novel, "The G-String Murders," was turned into a smashing 1943 Barbara Stanwyck mystery-comedy, "Ladies of Burlesque," and she followed this up with her equally acclaimed novel, "Mother Finds a Body." Gypsy did everything, all while paling around with W.H. Auden, Marc Chagall, Ernest Hemingway and Judy Garland. As one does. 

Are you ready to give a listen to her album? I know you are. Let her en-ter-tain you right here (you'll haver to click through to play the songs in full): 

What are you listening to this week? DJ Li'l Scratch wants to know.
Till next time...purr, bitches, purr! 🐾

Photo Credits: Getty Images, Screenland Records