The entry begins:
In 1952, Twentieth Century-Fox released The I Don’t Care Girl, a movie putatively about the life of Eva Tanguay. Alas (as you can read in my book Queen of Vaudeville: The Story of Eva Tanguay) they didn’t get it much right. It had Mitzi Gaynor and Oscar Levant and lots of flashy sets and Bob Fosse-style choreography. But it ended up really being about a bunch of movie producers on the Fox lot trying to cobble together Eva Tanguay’s history. It was their story, not hers.Learn more about Queen of Vaudeville at Andrew L. Erdman's website.
If I could have some say in a film about the actual life of the Twentieth Century’s first true lady megastar, it’d be different. Who would I cast? Here are some thoughts…
As Eva Tanguay, I could see Renée Zellweger, her shiny blonde mane all curled up and her demeanor nothing but up-and-down wild, crazy, lovely, and sad. There is also the comic Maria Bamford, who I adore. Not sure if she can sing, dance, or act—but then, Eva Tanguay considered that she herself could in fact do none of those things.
Eva never got along very well with men. But the women in her life—her sister and nieces, and her lady vaudevillians—formed her closest-knit sorority of intimates. As the corpulent comedienne Trixie Friganza, I could see...[read on]
The Page 99 Test: Queen of Vaudeville.
My Book, The Movie: Queen of Vaudeville.
--Marshal Zeringue