Mademoiselle Fifi (dancer)

Mary Elizabeth Dawson, née Elizabeth Buzby and better known as Mademoiselle Fifi (February 7, 1890 – July 21, 1982),[1][2][3] was a dancer credited with an onstage performance at Winter Garden Theatre on the night of April 20, 1925 in the book The Night They Raided Minsky's.[4]

Early life

A Philadelphia native, her given name was Mary Dawson. Her mother was a devout Catholic and her father was a Quaker who worked as a policeman.[5]

Performances

According to legend, on the evening of April 20, Mademoiselle Fifi wore a skintight black net from her toe tips to her bra. As the orchestra played a medley of Puccini, ragtime music, and Gaite' Parisienne by Offenbach, she pulled one of her straps from her shoulder and then removed her bra. Mademoiselle Fifi concluded her strip act that evening bare chested.[6] She was later arrested by John Sumner, the secretary of the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice under the action of public obscenity.[4] Fond of classic subjects, Mademoiselle Fifi performed The Dance of the September Morn. She is also known for performing an oriental shimmy with a live garter snake.[7] However, this account, based only on an article adapted from a work of fiction, is likely apocryphal; no evidence exists in local newspapers, police files, or NYSSV archives of a raid on that date, and Dawson herself denies ever stripping onstage.[8]

References

  1. ^ "She was Minsky's young Fifi". The Spokesman-Review. Cowles Publishing Company. 1975-12-30. p. 22. Retrieved 2015-07-24.
  2. ^ "M'lle Fifi Postcard". DigitalCommons@UMaine. University of Maine. Retrieved 2015-07-24.
  3. ^ "Dawson, Mary, 1890-1982". Social Networks and Archival Context. University of Virginia. Retrieved 2015-07-24.
  4. ^ a b Striptease: the untold history of the girlie show, Rachel Shteir, Oxford University Press, 2004, pg. 363.
  5. ^ American Rose: A Nation Laid Bare The Life and Times of Gypsy Rose Lee, Karen Abbott, Random House, 2010, pg. 152.
  6. ^ Horrible prettiness: burlesque and American culture, Robert Clyde Allen, UNC Press, 1991, pg. 248.
  7. ^ The Sudden Raid That Ruined Real Burlesque, Life Magazine, May 2, 1960, pg. 123.
  8. ^ Pullen, Kirsten (2002). "They Never Raided Minsky's". Performance Research. 7 (4): 116–120 – via Taylor & Francis.


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