Sex by Mae West

— 16th Season —

Sex by Mae West

An Online Benefit Production for Out of the Box Theatre

Produced by Halina Malinowski
Director: Roger Lipson
Technical Director: Bob Johnson
Video Editor: Andrey Piontkovski
Stage Manager: Tenaya Griffin

Out of the Box Theatre Company presents Sex by Mae West.

Mae West wrote and performed in Sex on Broadway in 1926. The comedy-drama is about a sharp-witted sex worker, Margy LaMont, who wants a better life.

The play received many scathing reviews from a variety of critics because of the play's moral implications. The New York Times considered it to be a "crude and inept play, cheaply produced and poorly acted" while Billboard condemned it as "the cheapest most vulgar low show to have dared to open in New York this year." When the show opened, Broadway had been in a commercial slump, yet in spite of this and negative press, Sex played to full audiences. Sex was the only play on Broadway that season to stay open through the summer, into the following year.

There were 375 performances before the New York Police Department raided West and her company in February 1927. They were charged with obscenity, after 325,000 people had watched it, including members of the police department and their wives, judges of the criminal courts, and seven members of the district attorney's staff. West was sentenced to 10 days in a workhouse on Roosevelt Island (known then as "Welfare Island") and fined $500.

So join Out of the Box Theatre for a streaming revival of the play that made Mae West a star.

Running time: 85 minutes.

— 16th Season — ​

Sex by Mae West

— 16th Season —