Miss Mina Murray

I was honored and humbled to be asked to create a tribute act to April March, The First Lady of Burlesque. Little did I know what I was getting myself into. To truly due justice to this living legend of burlesque, everything had to be perfect: costume, music, prop, choreography, hair make-up, and all presented their own challenges. I've chronicled below all that went into creating this act, which had its debut at the Great Burlesque Expo of 2011.

I went on to perform this act with the touring show, Madame Burlesque and at the New York Burklesque Festival. I presented the costume at Costume-Con 32, winning the “Minksy Award” for Presentation and Best Documentation, Historic Dress Category in the Master Division. The information below is from that documentation.
 

The costume I replicated is one of Miss March's few existing costume sets. The original costume was made by Simon Sorr in Morristown, New Jersey. He always told her that she was so beautiful she didn't need an excess of glitz. Her costumes were simple and elegant in design, but used rich and luxurious fabrics. Her costumes were made from brocade and velvet with a lot a beadwork, but very few rhinestones.

This costume was replicated predominantly from photographs that I took and a few examinations of the original garments. Its not an exact replica, but as close as I could make it. The pictures below are from the reference photos I took.
 

The original gown was made of red velveteen with a black lining. It has a slit at the back hem and a back zipper. It is decorated with 3 beaded floral motifs around the neckline and one slightly off center at the hem.

The petals on the flowers are outlined in pearl beads, then filled in with pink seeds beads with an iridescent finish. The centers of the flowers are made from clear red seed beads. The calyx of the flowers are made from silver-lined red bugle beads. Each motif is completely outlined with silver-lined silver seed beads.

The original beads were worked on net as separate appliques, but I discovered that detail too late. All my beadwork has been done directly on the garments.

I used Vogue V8666 pattern in the sleeveless variation. Its not exactly the same (the original gown doesn't have vertical darts for fitting), but gives a similar shape. The original dress was lined in black, but I used red cotton because didn't want hints of black poking through. The original fabric is an orange-red, while mine shades closer to scarlet.

In April 2012, I curated an exhibit of vintage and significant modern burlesque costumes at The West End Museum. Of course, it included April March's red costume and my reproduction. When setting up the display I was embarrassed to discover that I had completely overlooked the fact that the zipper on the gown runs all the way down to the back slit. The gown opens entirely and never has to be dropped to the floor to step out of it. I have replaced the zipper in my gown, using a plastic zipper instead of the original metal one, and reworked the choreography for the gown remove.



 

The original bra was a black commercial bra, covered with red velveteen on the cups. The back and shoulder straps were left black. The same floral motif as on the gown was used, one on each cup. Above each flower is a leaf motif, outlined in pearl beads and filled in with bugle beads, a stripe of gold down the center of the motif and silver around it. Then the entire leaf motif was outlined with silver bugle beads. The motifs were outlined with a mixture of gold and silver seed beads interlaced through the outer row of beads.

The rest of the cups are covered with a random pattern of gold and silver beads. The shoulder and back straps were decorated with prong-set aurora borealis rhinestones. On the original bra, one of the strap is twisted and the rhinestones are attached on the underside. I did not replicate that quirk.

The replica bra has a mesh back strap, like the original, but is shaped somewhat differently and doesn't have as much padding as the original. Miss March notes that she wasn't very busty; perhaps Mr. Sorr was just giving her a little help.

The biggest discrepancy here is the beaded swags at the top. I just couldn't find beads of the same shape and the same size, so I went for the correct shape. The original beads were about half the size of the replicas, so my swags are twice as large. Originally the ends of each loop were an inch apart and here they're two inches.
 

The original was a commercial black garter belt, covered with red velvet. You can still see the black poking around the edges. As I could not find a commercial belt similar to the original, I drafted my own pattern based on the photos. The velvet is interlined with black denim and lined with red cotton. The original has a bit of black elastic across the back, which I included and ended up not using. The garters themselves are purchased and detachable.

The beading motifs are the same as on the bra, without the fill of gold silver seed beads. Instead, the garter belt is decorated with prong-set aurora borealis rhinestones.



 

This was the hardest part of the project for me. I never made panties before and fitting them was a challenge. This is the only garment for which I enlisted outside help: Kristen Augenfeld checked the fit and gave the second opinion I needed. I chose to make the reproduction fuller cut in the back than the original, as its a better look for me. Of course, that meant more surface area to bead.

The loops of beads over the hips are made from a random mixture of the same gold silver seed beads that were used for fill.

The original fastened with a single hook eye over each hip. For extra security and comfort, I used flat hooks and bars.

 

Robe

The original sleeveless robe is made of a sheer nylon with feather trim around the neckline.

At the time the tribute act debuted, I was unable to finish the robe, so Miss March graciously let me wear the original. Since Miss March also used a boa, as an alternative to a robe, I am using a boa in the video that was shot prior to the debut of the act.

The replica was made of crystal organza with a chandelle boa for trim.


 

The original pasties weren't preserved. Although Miss March remembers wearing gold ones, I made red velveteen pasties with gold and silver beads to match the g-string.
 

The g-string is a triangle of red velveteen with a scatter pattern of gold and silver beads. The original had flesh-colored elastic, but the flash from my camera made it look gold, so that's what I used. I rather like the look so I haven't changed it.








 

I used commercially purchased red satin gloves. The original gloves were simple opera gloves with no decoration. Miss March says she was always "matchy-matchy", wearing the same color gloves as gown.
 

Miss March remembers wearing gold pumps with a 4 to 5 inch heel and I was fortunate enough to find a pair that she declared perfect. In keeping with her simple, elegant style, they are unadorned.
 

When April March worked for Harold Minsky, he preferred she wear sheer black stocking with a seam up the back, which he purchased for her. Left to her own choice, she wore Hanes nude stockings. I used vintage-style black stockings.
 

April March never wore necklaces or bracelets, so the only jewelry I wear is a pair of rhinestone earrings.

In the early 1960s, when April March was working at the Victory Theatre in Toronto, Canada, a musician, known only as Aries, wrote “April's Blues for Miss March”. She doesn't remember anything else about him and research has failed to turn up any further information.

Since a standard headliner's act could be 20 minutes long, Miss March used a medley of songs, often incorporating songs with “April” in the title. She still has sheet music for "April March Medley" which consists of "Rhapsody", "I'll Remember April", "Stairway to the Stars", "The Stripper", "Floating Pad", and "Like Young". She believes she used “April's Blues” for the stocking remove and leg tease portion of her act.

Boston jazz musician and composer Dave Daranjo took the original hand-written sheet music, and arranged a new version for me. He coordinated the musicians, the recording, and mixing. I'm very grateful to him and the rest of the band: Mario Castro, Takeshi Ohbayashi, Yuto Kanazawa, Zwe Bell le Pere, Noriko Terada, and Jonathan Pinson.

I'm so thrilled we could bring April's special song back to life.
 

Original sheet music Courtesy April March		New arrangement Courtesy Dave D'aranjo

• Greet the audience. Parade around the stage. Remove boa or wrap.
• Remove gloves, because a lady always removes her gloves first.
• Then the gown, facing sideways to the audience.
• I was surprised that the bra came next, since for most modern performers the bra comes off last.
• Unhook one garter, then move to the prop to unhook the second garter.
• Remove garter belt
• Sit to remove shoes, lay down to remove stockings.
• Last, remove the panties, while still on the prop.
• Put shoes back on. Put on boa or wrap.
• Exit.