The Belle of Bedford Avenue by McConnell Virginia

Author:McConnell Virginia
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Kent State University Press

FLO’S FOLLIES

Before he left for Europe, Foster Backus addressed the issue that most intrigued the public: What will Florence Burns do now? Would she go on the stage? Backus had assured everyone that pursuant to a family consultation (likely without input from Florence herself), it had been decided that Florence would not go on the stage but instead live a more subdued life. She should not attempt to “coin her notoriety into money.” “As to Florence’s future, she has now seen the error of her ways, and is a changed girl. She never was a really bad girl, but she liked gay life. It appealed to her. She is dignified and reserved. The examinations in this case have enlightened her as to the kind of men she has been going with. They have revealed to her what she would have become if she had continued to live the way she had been living.”23

Quite possibly, Backus’s speech was intended to send a message to his client, who did not seem to be so inclined to “live a more subdued life.” But the Brooklyn Daily Eagle urged Backus to press home this point to Florence—that although most people in the community were on her side during her hearings, its “moral sense … will rise in protest against any attempt to make capital for her out of the tragic publication of her shame. This is a time for plain talk.”24 In other words, we may have been on her side because of the circumstances (the Unwritten Law), but that doesn’t mean we will support her flaunting herself on the stage through notoriety acquired by the death of that young man.

Foster Backus and the community at large reckoned without the independent and headstrong nature of Florence’s character. No sooner was Backus off to Europe than she arranged her liberation by eloping with Tad Wildrick and, two weeks later, signing a vaudeville contract with Irving Pinover, a dramatic actor and former reporter with William Randolph Hearst’s “yellow” newspaper, the New York Journal. A skilled agent, Pinover had successfully managed the comedy team of Weber and Fields, famous for its slapstick and satire, which included a sketch done in the German dialect.25

The plan was for Florence to begin her vaudeville career with a tour of twenty weeks, to begin in New Jersey or New York, then to the Midwest cities, but instead it was decided that she should start in her hometown of Brooklyn. Her performance was to stay completely away from the Brooks case and would consist of songs, little sketches, and maybe some solo dancing. It was an interesting omission in that theatergoers would expect someone involved in a high-profile murder case to sate their curiosity by discussing it. Someone smarter than Florence—Tad? Her agent?—must have reminded her that there was no statute of limitations on murder and, guilty or innocent, she could say something onstage that would trigger an arrest. Since there had been no trial, double jeopardy did not apply.

Florence was to get $1,500 even though nobody knew if she could act or sing.

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