Early Career and Betty Boop
Born as Mae Kwestel in New York City to Simon and Freida Kwestel, she attended Morris High School and studied acting at the American Theatre Wing and with the Theatre Guild. Although she wanted to be an entertainer, her parents, who were Orthodox Jews, actively discouraged her from doing so, at one time forcing her to leave the Theatre Guild school.
Nevertheless, at the age of 17 Questel won a talent contest held at the RKO Fordham Theatre in the Bronx by imitating Helen Kane. She was signed by an agent and began performing in vaudeville as an impressionist. Billed as "Mae Questel - Personality Singer of Personality Songs," she did Fanny Brice, Marlene Dietrich, Eddie Cantor, Mae West, Maurice Chevalier and others, as well as doing animal imitations. She was seen by animator Max Fleischer, who was looking for an actress to provide the voice for his Betty Boop character. Questel's "Boop-boop-a-doop" routine, done in a style similar to that of the song's originator, Helen Kane, while at the same time evoking something of the naughty allure of film star Clara Bow, was exactly what Fleischer wanted, and he hired Questel in 1931. She began as one of a number of actresses providing the character's voice, but soon took over the role exclusively.
From 1931 until 1939, Questel provided the voice of Betty Boop in more than 150 animated shorts, the longest run for any actress doing that voice. During the 1930s she released a recording of "On the Good Ship Lollipop" which sold more than two million copies. In 1988, she reprised the role in a cameo appearance in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
Along with her voice work, and occasional on-camera appearance in Paramount shorts, Questel also attended Columbia University, where she studied drama.
Read more about this topic: Mae Questel
Famous quotes containing the words early, career and/or betty:
“Progress would not have been the rarity it is if the early food had not been the late poison.”
—Walter Bagehot (1826–1877)
“He was at a starting point which makes many a man’s career a fine subject for betting, if there were any gentlemen given to that amusement who could appreciate the complicated probabilities of an arduous purpose, with all the possible thwartings and furtherings of circumstance, all the niceties of inward balance, by which a man swings and makes his point or else is carried headlong.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“He could jazz up the map-reading class by having a full-size color photograph of Betty Grable in a bathing suit, with a co- ordinate grid system laid over it. The instructor could point to different parts of her and say, “Give me the co-ordinates.”... The Major could see every unit in the Army using his idea.... Hot dog!”
—Norman Mailer (b. 1923)