There are only a very few moments of absolute awe which I can recall in my life. What is not reflected in the blurb about this film, and the comments referring to Miss West's embarrassing appearance in this film, is the effect she had on the cast and crew when she entered the set on the Paramount lot. We were in the "gym" waiting to begin shooting, talking and yapping away as actors will do at 7 AM before anything gets going, when the double doors to the set opened, and as each person turned and looked at the lady entering and realized it was Mae West, they fell silent - until you could have heard a pin drop or your heart beating just a bit faster and louder. Miss West may have been a poor shadow of what she had been years before, but she was still Mae West. Incredible as it may seem, at eighty years old she radiated a presence I have felt from very few others. Later on, while shooting a scene with her, and the director was loudly yelling at her through her ear-piece, rather than becoming angry at the rude treatment she was getting, she simply turned to me with that Mae West smile; and in one look she said, "It's okay kid, I'm Mae West, who the hell gives a damn about him." When I looked back at her, somewhat in awe, she winked. Ultimately, she did the take the way she wanted to do it. Maybe the public will never see that scene as I saw it played out, but I will never forget it.
