Lauren Rebecca Sklaroff - Red Hot Mama: The Life of Sophie Tucker

Red Hot MAMA

THE LIFE OF SOPHIE TUCKER

LAUREN REBECCA SKLAROFF

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS PRESS

AUSTIN

Copyright 2018 by Lauren Rebecca Sklaroff

All rights reserved

First edition, 2018

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Book design by Lindsay Starr

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Sklaroff, Lauren Rebecca, author.

Title: Red hot mama : the life of Sophie Tucker / Lauren Rebecca Sklaroff.

Description: Austin : University of Texas Press, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017037715

ISBN 978-1-4773-1236-0 (cloth : alk. paper)

ISBN 978-1-4773-1633-7 (library e-book)

ISBN 978-1-4773-1634-4 (nonlibrary e-book)

Subjects: LCSH: Tucker, Sophie, 18841966. | SingersUnited StatesBiography.

Classification: LCC ML420.T89 S55 2018 | DDC 782.42164092 [B]dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017037715

doi:10.7560/312360

For my mom, Ellen Sklaroff, with love

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

In the first half of the twentieth century, children of immigrants created the world of American entertainment. These newcomers honed their talents and built an industry on the stages of palatial vaudeville theaters, in the noisy offices of Tin Pan Alley songwriters, amid the scurry to promote multiple motion pictures. Although they felt the rush of creativity and camaraderie, life was not easy. Estranged from families who clung to Old World values, always wondering whether they would be welcomed or rejected, these determined men and women navigated the geography of American politics, beliefs, and instincts. They changed their ethnic names, updated their clothes and makeup, and over time became the most influential figures in show business. By the time the United States restricted immigration for a new generation in the 1920s, no one rivaled these former outsiders in catering to the desires of American consumers.

Sophie Tucker was one of these ambitious second-generation immigrants who found their home on the stage. Born to Russian-Jewish parents, Charles and Jennie Kalish, as the family sought refuge in the United States, Tucker came into the world with virtually nothing. Yet over the course of six decades she rose to the top as show business royalty, alleviating audiences troubles, bringing families together, and exciting people in ways they had never experienced. Tucker succeeded in living outside all of the expectations for her gender while becoming beloved by fans and industry heads alike.

Despite fame in her own day and her subsequent role as a hero to Bette Midler, Tucker is not as well remembered as some of her peers. When she is, it is as an overweight blonde woman, bedazzling in diamonds, sometimes appearing jokingly on the Ed Sullivan show, bawdy and risqu for her time. Historians position her in a long line of Jewish women who have performed outside convention, such as Molly Picon, Fanny Brice, Joan Rivers, and Sarah Silverman. These characterizations are undoubtedly true, yet Tucker was much more complex, and there is infinitely more to know about her life history.

Tucker began her career in 1907 and continued working until her death in 1966, becoming a giant in popular culture. She performed on an almost daily basis for sixty years, with a career spanning and shaping the major technological developments of the modern eravaudeville, radio, film, and television. Tuckers life reflects a common struggle to belong in a new, changing nation. Yet she was also irreplaceable. More than most of her contemporaries, she understood how to keep her act fresh, how to change branding when audiences grew tired, and, most important, how to connect with her fans, the press, and entertainment moguls. She learned how to entertain with her own signature flair, inimitable by others in the business.

Tuckers career longevity is astounding; there are not many who can claim sixty years in entertainment and the public eye. Her time in the limelight paralleled and intersected with that of many famous actors and entertainers, including Eva Tanguay, Clara Bow, and Shirley Temple. She outlasted all of them. Unlike others who could not move across genres or who fell into one archetype, Tucker was determined to constantly adapt to changing tastes and fads. Whether this meant rebranding herself from Americas Renowned Coon Shouter to Last of the Red Hot Mamas, or moving from cabaret work to musicals to film, Tucker was always thinking ahead. Even in her fifties she happily embraced becoming a piece of nostalgia, inviting audiences who had grown up with her to celebrate a relic of their youth. Aunt Sophie, as fans often called her, was a constant in their lives. She accepted the charge to learn more songs, sing with more gusto, and adore her fans more deeply than anyone in the industry, becoming a force unto herself. Tucker could never stand still, even at the end of her life, when she called retire a dirty word.

She pioneered strategies for staying relevant. With the help of her astute agent, William Morris, Tucker learned the value of working internationally. Beginning in the mid-1920s she traveled to Great Britain, where she found a bevy of new fans and established a larger-than-life reputation as an international sensation. Every time she returned to the United States from performing across the Atlantic, she made a major debut with new songs and tales of adventures abroad, including her three command performances for British royalty. She thrived while traveling and opening herself up to new publics; she performed in Australia and South Africa, and she visited Israel three times. Although performers now travel the world as a necessary part of their career, Tucker was blazing new ground for her time.

In addition, she developed a marketing strategy that kept her current, rivaling social media marketing decades before its existence. Tucker compiled the names of every individual who saw her shows and always alerted audiences when return engagements were scheduled. She welcomed interviews and sent thank-you notes to reporters and critics who covered her. It is no wonder that even into her seventies, she never lost the interest of the media in the United States and abroad. Stories of her continuing returns to popular nightclubs such as the Latin Quarter and Copa City amazed the public.

Tucker moved through show business with an authority that few other women commanded. Whether she served as a mentor, as she did for Judy Garland, or a partner, as she did with Eddie Cantor and George Jessel, she was able to dictate the parameters of her career. She ultimately became an equal to her male peers: she was the first woman honored at the all-male Friars Club and the first female president of the American Federation of Actors, and she received many other honors that had previously been bestowed on men. Combining maternal concern with a sense of humor that was like a mans, Tucker was remembered as everyones pal, neither sexually threatening nor dangerously ambitious. Her weight and unconventional beauty ironically allowed her to move into spaces that women did not traditionally occupy, and once she was at the top, she would never back down.

Fiercely independent from a young age, Tucker delivered songs about womens empowerment and sexual satisfaction, and she warranted respect that was a product of her own experiences. Much of her repertoire was comedic and lighthearted, but it came from a place of deep conviction that women could succeed outside of marriage and motherhood. Songs such as I Dont Want to Get Thin, Life Begins at Forty, and You Cant Sew a Button on a Heart spoke to her firm belief in womens self-acceptance no matter their size or age. In an environment of slender, perfectly coiffed celebrities, Tucker stood as an alternative model of womanhood. Her use of double entendre and tales of her own sexual expertise encouraged women to feel less ashamed of their autonomy. She provided reassurance that their own racy thoughts were more common than they imagined. In making her anxieties and delights part of her act, Tucker gave her audience license to examine many of societys norms and turn them on their head.