December 5

Legally Blond:

Lads in plaid:

J. C. Leyendecker/Charles Beach Love Affair 
Is Subject of New Play at Theatre 80 St. Marks

While on a recent weekend escape to NYC, I was made aware of a stage play about J. C. Leyendecker, the subject of one of my Gay Influence blog’s entries, and I was able to snag a ticket. “In Love with the Arrow Collar Man” is a play about the relationship of one of America’s most successful  illustrators, Joseph C. Leyendecker (1874-1951, portrayed by Ian Brodsky), and his sensationally handsome model and life partner, Charles Beach (Jack D. Martin). The play is based on the true story of a gay male couple whose personal and professional lives together spanned nearly a half century. It is notable that their relationship is mirrored by the 40 years that this production’s playwright Lance Ringel and director Chuck Muckle have lived and worked together.

Before the days of publishing’s exclusive use of photographic images, professional illustrators provided original art for magazine covers and advertisements. “Joe” Leyendecker’s immense popularity and success were a result of his 322 covers for the Saturday Evening Post and the use of his art in advertising – most notably the Arrow Collar Man, for whom Beach was the model (illustration above).  At the height of his popularity, Beach received 17,000 pieces of fan mail a month, and many consider him America’s first advertising sex symbol (decades before the Marlboro Man).  “In Love With the Arrow Collar Man” also chronicles Leyendecker’s complicated relationships with two fellow commercial artists, his talented but self-destructive gay brother Frank (Rupert Simonian) and Norman Rockwell (Steven Trollinger), the protégé who would eventually surpass him in fame.

The play, which closed last weekend, was presented at Theatre 80 St. Marks, an East Village venue with an adjoining tavern that was born as a speakeasy during Prohibition. The nightclub provided a  showcase for a young Frank Sinatra (he first worked there as a singing waiter), John Coltrane and Thelonious Monk. When it later served as a theatre, Billy Crystal was counted among the ushers. “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” enjoyed a four-year run at Theatre 80 St. Marks during the 1960s. Next, and for more than two decades, the venue screened classic films as a repertory house,  always featuring double bills. The personal touches and involvement of owner Howard Otway (a former stage actor) included printed programs, intermissions, uniformed ushers to seat patrons and a coffee shop that served brownies, hot chocolate and a range of treats that far exceeded the standard popcorn and candy counter. Otway also restored many nearly lost movies by coaxing studios to open their vaults. Among the quirks of the theatre was exclusive rear projection and 16-mm prints. 

And Otway knew everybody. Once, when a print of “Sunset Boulevard” failed to arrive the day before its scheduled screening, Otway called Gloria Swanson, who was in Europe at the time. She was delighted to help by contacting a member of her NYC household staff, who delivered Miss Swanson’s personal print of the film to Mr. Otway an hour before the screening – nearly as much drama backstage as on the screen. Your blogger had heard of this highly esteemed venue, but until last weekend had never set foot on the premises. I wondered how many patrons of this play knew of the storied past of this 160-seat theatre. Even if nothing is on offer when you are next in NYC, head to the East Village and stand before the theatre to admire the sidewalk cement castings of handprints, footprints and signatures of the entertainment legends who were friends and patrons of Otway – Joan Rivers, Gloria Swanson, Myrna Loy, Ruby Keeler, Joan Crawford, and Kitty Carlisle among them – a little bit of Hollywood’s Grauman’s Chinese on St. Mark’s Place (near the intersection of 1st Avenue).
The adjacent tavern is called Scheib’s Place these days, but this former speakeasy was where the New York City Council drank during the Prohibition era. But that’s a whole other story.