Bette Midler: Trash With Class
R. Alien Leider

Special thanks to Steve Weiner for sharing this article


"I'm the last of the truly tacky women," says singing sensation Bette Midler. "Even as a child in Hawaii, of all places, I noticed that the bad girls had all the fun."

But tacky is hardly the word for the busty chanteuse, whose renditions of songs from the '40s and '50s have put her into the limelight and earned her (aside from lots of greenbacks) vast critical acclaim. Her concert tours have busted records for attendance all over the country, a fact that makes those who had laughed at her just a few years ago, stop and rethink. She travels a lot, but hangs her hat and sleazy-breezy dresses in New York's Greenwich Village. Her anonymity is protected by the singular lack of name plates on the bell or door, but those in the know can be found at strange hours waiting around the block for a glimpse of her, or scrounging, in of all places, in her garbage cans for souvenirs.

The Divine Miss M has a unique way of moving, a sort of choreographed stride that takes her from one place to another... she never looks like she's walking. Her attitudes and approach to people and show business also follow suit. Variety said that she possesses "enormous chutzpah although the quality of her voice and choice of material take precedence." That chutzpah is probably the reason she made it big on her trip down the garden path that might have led to oblivion in Hawaii.

Bette's rags to riches story is a bit unusual, but then she's always been a bit unusual. As a child in Hawaii, where her family moved when she was young, Bette was the only Jewish kid in a middle class Eurasian neighborhood. As a result she was always getting into fights with the other kids.  She spent a lot of time in the movies to avoid seeing her neighbors as a result. It was there she discovered the wonderful world of Hollywood. She was influenced by the stars and the great pictures of Hollywood's Golden Era. She fell in love with many of the top leading men of the day and tried to emulate the sexy ladies of the screen. It was the glamour bug that bit Bette in the movie house in Hawaii. Of course, she was prone to this sort of thing, having been named after Bette Davis. Only her mother mispronounced it Bet. Oh well, you can't win them all, besides it was unique. 

Bette remembers the most glamorous place in the city was the Red Light district where she walked about, cautiously admiring the excitement there. It seemed to be the only place on the Island where there was any passion or feeling of drama to Bette.

Glamorous or not, a pineapple farm was the place Bette got discovered. She was packing slices for a pineapple company when the film crew making Hawaii came to the island seeking extras for the film.  Bette got the part, if you can call it that, and got for her labors a few hundred dollars and a trip to Los Angeles. She skimped on her budget and finally got to New York in time to be out of work. One of her fondest memories of those early days is, the hotel she stayed at.

It was a real rat trap called the Broadway Central. That experience helped Bette in a lot of ways. She developed a good wind for running down the halls to her room with weirdoes in every doorway. Everything lived in that hotel... everything you could imagine. She eventually moved to the village... Greenwich Village where her neighbors included people like Marc Stevens of 10.1/2 fame and other upcoming stars. Bette walked the streets looking for work and Bob Dylan, whom she idolized.  

Dylan wasn't about town, but work was.  Bette landed a job in the Broadway production of Fiddler on the Roof. It was luck. She just saw the ad in the trade papers for a chorus part audition and she answered it. She worked her way up through the ranks and soon she was one of Tevye's daughters. She stayed there comfortably until the show folded.

By that time, Bette was longing for something completely different and she began to look around for a new and more challenging area than Broadway, besides, there weren't any parts open on the Great White Way.  The answer was the Catskills where the mountain resorts are the training grounds for new talent hot to trot the boards. But even the excitement of the mountains was short-lived and soon the smell of the greasepaint on old Broadway drew Bette Midler back to the Big Apple for another try at the brass ring.  It was there that she discovered the only open job for a singer was at... the Continental Baths, a gay turkish bath complete with live entertainment.  Each night, Bette would sing her heart out for the boys in the towels who loved every minute of it.

The job wasn't exactly an open one, though. Bette got it by chance and luck when she was performing at the Improvisation, a night club that allots free time to anyone who wants to perform for an audience. Lots of talented people got the chance to get seen by an agent here and Bette was no exception. Her admirer turned out to be the proprietor of the Baths, who offered her $50 a night to entertain the clientele. That was a historical night. The appearance in the Continental Baths led to a stint on the Johnny Carson Show and Bette was off like a rocket and has been ever since.

That performance on the Carson Show (Bette sang Sh-Boom) was the start of it all. Atlantic Records saw her and signed her up quick for an album.  Then the New Year's Eve concerts came and sold out in five hours.  Selling out Lincoln Center is not an event that passes easily. Bette is still somewhat amazed. Those sellouts were spectacular. There on stage was Bette, diapered like a baby 1974, singing her lungs out and bouncing her pendulous bust as she sang and danced about the stage. The audience went nuts!

"A lot of people come just to see me shake my boobs," Ms. Midler says, "but the music lovers still hold the majority in the audience."

What they hear is what's important... Bette Midler and the Harlettes. The Harlettes? That's Bette's backup group. She named them herself, thinks they're divinely decadent and loves ‘em.

But despite the joking and camping it up, Bette is a true artist singing in her own, practiced style. "It isn't easy getting up there," she says, "Art isn't easy. There's a lot of energy and emotion that goes into it. I just don't go up and kill a few hours on stage. First I have to look inside myself to find the meaning of the song."

Bette's art is a fully developed one, a conglomeration of campy clothes, burlesque movements, mime, impersonations, songs and outright exhibitionism. It's great, too, and it's fun. The audience adores her, howls for more and packs the auditorium.

"Trash with Flash" and "Sleaze with Ease" may not be the usual compliments due an artist, but they're words of pure gold to Ms. Midler.

"I look at it like this," Bette Midler states, "I'm an artist and when people pay their hard earned dollars to see me do my thing, I think I have to work my buns off to give them one hell of a show."

How does she pick a song?

"I have to think about the character who's singing it, for one thing. I like to parody the cheap music and nostalgia pieces mostly. I don't know why. It's fun, dumb fun, but fun all the same. The song must have a solid tune, though. And I have to understand the character because I think theatrically."

Bette is still, for all her success, a unique person. She's always been liberated, so the women's lib thing never really bothered her. She's never had trouble with it. As an artist, Bette has a different position in society. She sees people as human beings and treats them as such. The men and women thing is clearly not her bag.

The truth is, that Bette Midler is a very intelligent person. She had to be. As a child... a Jewish child in an
all-Oriental school, she had to use her head... nothing else to do... that's why. A spectacled girl in her senior class, Bette was elected class president and her brains remained intact through the whole ordeal. She did, and still does, however, have the craving for attention and a need to entertain people. This, coupled with her natural flair for mimickery and satire and her voice... a very flexible instrument if there ever was one... make her a special person in a very commendable way.

She still lives in the village, despite the financial means to move to more luxurious digs. The plants fill the rooms and the dog wanders from room to room sniffing. It's a comfortable way of life. And it's real... that's very important to Bette... that it's real.  Amidst her pink velvet sofa and wall to wall racks of records... some real antiques... she spends her off hours being herself in a world that seldom permits that luxury to anyone.

Her music is real, too. The intricacies of the arrangements, the tones of the band, the orchestrations of her voice with those of the Harlettes, all blend to form a symphony of sounds.  Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy, is, perhaps, one of her most famous numbers right from the 40's. Boy, can they sing up a storm! Modern songs, too, make the Midler repertoire, like the Helen Reddy ballad Delta Dawn. Bette did it two ways. First, as a mournful country lament, then as a black soul-gospel hand-clapping inspiration.

The character of the Divine Ms. M derived from the need for something that would appeal to the boys in the Tubs. "I was playing for people who were on the outside looking in," Bette states. "They were Always on the outside looking in. I mean. I guess the character of Ms. M came out of a need to give them something of their own. She's a fantasy character I created. She gives everyone their own perspective on things." It gives Bette a perspective, too. "The more I see of stardom," she says, "the sillier it looks to me. I used to want to be big so I could be someone else. Now, I'm happy as is."

The sum total of Bette Midler and her act is the finale of the show where she shimmies, shakes and turns to the audience and says... "It's your turn now!" You know something... they do it! They all do it with Bette.
Standing, swaying and sashaying about the aisles they join in song.

Trash with flash never looked... or felt so good.