[Cutlass]

There’s a new book on Mae West titled Mae West and her Adonises written by Michael Gregg Michaud. He doesn’t tell us too much that we don’t already know, but her relationships with Dick Dubois and Mickey Hargitay are given prominence. Dick was infatuated with Mae and probably wanted to marry her, but she was not marriage material and didn’t want a husband, to say nothing of their age difference. Mae wanted to keep Mickey Hargitay for herself, but he started seeing actress Jayne Mansfield, and Mae went ballistic and tried to break them up. Mae didn’t want marriage (she married once but stayed away from her husband), didn’t want children (they would’ve interfered with her independent life), probably never had sex despite her attempts to promote the idea of being a sex goddess, and her appeal was only to gay men, but didn’t appeal to straight men. Parade magazine said Mae never kissed a man on screen, so she was a paradox while she tried to give the impression that she was some sort of sex siren. Chuck Krauser, one of her act’s musclemen whom she renamed Paul Novak, lived with her, took care of her and escorted her, cooked for her, chauffeured her, protected her, and watched her health and diet, but it doesn’t appear they slept together (her swan bed could only accommodate one person). I doubt they had sexual relations, and you never saw pictures of them kissing. He seemed like a boy toy, but he didn’t seem to mind since he said he was put on earth to take care of Mae West.