Dirty Blonde (play)

Conceived by Shear and James Lapine and featuring songs from I'm No Angel and She Done Him Wrong, it explores the phenomenon of the legendary Mae West, one of America's most enduring and controversial pop culture icons.

The play, which draws its title from the West film quip "I made myself platinum, but I was born a dirty blonde",[1] tells the story of Jo, an office temp and aspiring actress, and Charlie, who works in the New York Public Library's film archives, both lonely and obsessive West fans who meet at her grave and form a unique relationship as they swap stories about the career highlights and eventual decline into parody of the woman they worship.

[2] The play then opened on Broadway at the Helen Hayes Theatre on May 1, 2000 after previews from April 14 and closed on March 4, 2001 after 352 performances.

[5] Najimy reprised her role at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego, California, in July to August 2003, along with original actors Chamberlin and Stillman.

Ben Brantley, in his review for The New York Times of the Off-Broadway production, called it "a beautifully written work... with a shiver-making pinnacle..."[11] The CurtainUp reviewer of the Off-Broadway production wrote: " 'Dirty Blonde' ...is very much a play; in fact, it has enough music, including Bob Stillman's eponymous original song, to be classified as a play with music The monologist has become a mature playwright.