Niles Marsh
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Niles Marsh was a
female impersonator An organism's sex is female (symbol: ♀) if it produces the ovum (egg cell), the type of gamete (sex cell) that fuses with the male gamete (sperm cell) during sexual reproduction. A female has larger gametes than a male. Females and males ...
who began his career on the
Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street ** Broadway Theatre (53rd Stre ...
stage and then, from the early 1920s to the mid-1940s, rose to become one of the best known drag performers on the American
vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment which began in France in the middle of the 19th century. A ''vaudeville'' was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a drama ...
and
nightclub A nightclub or dance club is a club that is open at night, usually for drinking, dancing and other entertainment. Nightclubs often have a Bar (establishment), bar and discotheque (usually simply known as disco) with a dance floor, laser lighti ...
circuits. He was one of many such artists who, during that period, encapsulated what was known as the
Pansy Craze The Pansy Craze was a period of increased LGBT visibility in American popular culture from the late 1920s until the mid-1930s. During the " craze," drag queens — known as "pansy performers" — experienced a surge in underground popularity, ...
.


Performing career


On Broadway

According to a programme biography from the 1940s, Niles Marsh "was a child prodigy and started his career as a boy soprano, touring for four years".''Finocchio's: America's Most Unusual Night Club''
theatre programme, circa 1940s.
A producer who heard him sing immediately cast him in a Broadway show, playing a female role. From a show biography, Marsh subsequently performed several seasons on Broadway.


Vaudeville Circuit

By the 1920s, Marsh had become a performer on the lucrative vaudeville circuit. Typical of his early appearance was one that opened at the Strand Theater in
Modesto, California Modesto ( ; ) is the county seat and largest city of Stanislaus County, California, United States. With a population of 218,069 according to 2022 United States Census Bureau, U.S. Census Bureau estimates, it is the List of cities and towns in Ca ...
, on January 1, 1924. One of four acts to perform in a continuous show from 2pm to 11pm, Marsh was singled out by the local press as "the one which is going to prove a real sensation... This act has a great volume of scenery and changes costume several times. Niles Marsh will prove one of the cleverest acts to visit Modesto in some time". He performed at the same venue again a year later, in March 1925, in what was billed as "a novel surprise." In July 1927, Marsh appeared at the Liberty Theatre in
Benton Harbor, Michigan Benton Harbor is a city in Berrien County, Michigan, Berrien County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is 46 miles southwest of Kalamazoo, Michigan, Kalamazoo and 71 miles southwest of Grand Rapids, Michigan, Grand Rapids. According to the 2020 2 ...
, in a dance revue entitled ''Stepping Along''. As the local press noted, he and another artiste, Doral Mack, "impersonate flappers in a highly diverting comedy number in which these fashion pirates offer singing and dancing of the highest type." According to his biography, Marsh toured the vaudeville circuit in United States and also its equivalents in Australia, England and Africa. His Australian tour is known to have taken place during 1929, where he appeared for several months at Melbourne's Tivoli Theatre. Credited as a female impersonator, Marsh first performed there on June 22, 1929, alongside English comedian Jack Edge, film actor Horace Kenney, and ventriloquists David Poole and Johnny Green. A month later, he participated in a special farewell season at the same venue, when he was billed as "an experiment in femininity." Marsh appeared at the Tivoli again in September, as part of a revue entitled ''The Vanities'', impersonating the Italian opera singer
Amelita Galli-Curci Amelita Galli-Curci (18 November 1882 – 26 November 1963) was an Italian lyric coloratura soprano. She was one of the most famous operatic singers of the 20th century and a popular recording artist, with her records selling in large numbe ...
. Returning to the United States, Marsh continued to perform on the vaudeville circuit (and especially the
Orpheum Circuit The Orpheum Circuit was a chain of vaudeville and movie theaters. It was founded in 1886, and operated through 1927 when it was merged into the Keith-Albee-Orpheum corporation, ultimately becoming part of the Radio-Keith-Orpheum (RKO) corporatio ...
) despite the fact that, after the advent of
talkies A sound film is a Film, motion picture with synchronization, synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, bu ...
in 1929, the popularity of live variety theater was starting to decline. Nevertheless, he still made regular live appearances, often as the opening act before a feature film. During this period, Marsh is known to have appeared at: *Capitol Theater, Hartford, Connecticut (April 1931; described as "a none-too-serious feminine impersonator") *Orpheum Theater, Oakland, California (December 1931), * Warner Brothers Theater, Fresno, California (April 1933; billed as "America's well-known
travesty A travesty is an absurd or grotesque misrepresentation, a parody, or grossly inferior imitation. In literary or theatrical contexts it may refer to: *Burlesque, a literary, dramatic, or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the m ...
artist"), *Orpheum Theater, Salt Lake City, Utah (September 1933), * Wilshire Ebell Theater, Los Angeles (December 1934). By his own account, Marsh also spent five years as a regular performer at the De Luxe Picture Theater in New York City.


Nightclub Appearances

By the mid-1930s, vaudeville was effectively dead, so Marsh turned to the booming nightclub industry, which had burgeoned following the end of
Prohibition Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic b ...
. In 1935, he headlined the gala floor show at the Blue Ribbon Night Club in
Albuquerque, New Mexico Albuquerque ( ; ), also known as ABQ, Burque, the Duke City, and in the past 'the Q', is the List of municipalities in New Mexico, most populous city in the U.S. state of New Mexico, and the county seat of Bernalillo County, New Mexico, Bernal ...
, where he was described as "America's foremost female impersonator, presenting his famous impressions in dazzling gowns." During a subsequent nightclub appearance, Marsh was seen by Mrs. Eve Finocchio, wife of the proprietor of a new drag nightclub
Finocchio's Club Finocchio's Club was a former nightclub and bar in operation from 1936 to 1999 in North Beach, San Francisco, California. The club started as a speakeasy called the 201 Club in 1929 located at 406 Stockton Street. In 1933, with the repeal of proh ...
in San Francisco, which had recently opened in June 1936. Marsh was soon signed as a regular performer at ''Finnochio's'' and remained "one of the highlights of the show" for at least the next eight years. During this period, Marsh also appeared in other nightclubs around the country. In August 1942, billed as "vaudeville's greatest satirical artist," he headlined
Karyl Norman George Francis Peduzzi (June 13, 1897 – August 25, 1947), known professionally as Karyl Norman, was an American female impersonator who was popular in vaudeville, nightclubs, and on Broadway in the 1920s. Biography Norman was born in Balt ...
's All American Male Revue at the Castle Farms Night Club in
Lima, Ohio Lima ( ) is a city in Allen County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the city had a population of 35,579. It is located in northwest Ohio along Interstate 75 in Ohio, Interstate 75, appr ...
.


Later life

Virtually nothing is known of Niles Marsh's later life. In the early 1980s,
Blue Pear Records Blue Pear Records was a semi-fictitious record label based in Longwood, Florida, which is best known for re-issuing rare cast recordings of obscure Broadway and off-Broadway musicals in the mid-1980s. The lack of production credits and other help ...
, a Florida-based record label that specialised in cast recordings from obscure Broadway and off-Broadway musicals from the 1960s, released a series of theatre-related LPs with liner notes attributed to Niles Marsh (or someone using his name). In a 1987 article in the ''Los Angeles Daily News'', this Niles Marsh, described as a "theatre historian and record annotator" expressed his dissatisfaction with the then-popular fad of using well-known opera singers to make new cast recordings of classic stage musicals such as ''
My Fair Lady ''My Fair Lady'' is a musical theatre, musical with a book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner and music by Frederick Loewe. The story, based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play ''Pygmalion (play), Pygmalion'' and on the Pygmalion (1938 film), 1938 film ...
'' and ''
West Side Story ''West Side Story'' is a Musical theatre, musical conceived by Jerome Robbins with music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and a Book (musical theatre), book by Arthur Laurents. Inspired by William Shakespeare's play ''Romeo an ...
''."Experts not always lyrical about Broadway shows by Opera Singers", ''Los Angeles Daily News'', November 11, 1987.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Marsh, Niles American drag queens