GERTRUDE NIESEN - TYPED LETTER SIGNED - HFSID 31944

GERTRUDE NIESEN
Her affectionate, typed letter to a Broadway columnist about the differences between working in New York and Hollywood, signed "Scorchy Torchy"
Typed Letter signed: "Scorchy Torchy", 1 page, 6¼x9¼. Undated. On personal letterhead to "Dear Lou-Lou" [New York entertainment columnist Louis Sobol], in full: "Now I can pick you up and have you with my morning coffee, or rather I can see your shining wordings scampering across the printed sheet. It makes New York a little nearer to have your throbbing style quicken the pulse of this California village. Aye, aye, darling, it is a village and sometimes I long for the hard stone face of New York. New York is hard and strong and ruthless like ambition, and Hollywood with its trees and screening palms is soft and falsely subtle, like corruption or secret love. How I do take on for a girl wot is going to do a hot truck in her next picture (or maybe only on the cutting-room floor). They are giving me short cunning dresses and changing my hair comb and are trying to make me look as if I just left my milk bottle or mother's substitute for same. Do you follow me, or are you too tired? Your columns grow more fabulously luminous and brilliant as the days go on and if you would just follow them here to Hollywood, I would be startlingly happy. Thankya', my sweetheart, for writing, and I hope I shall always be close to your columnistic heart." Big band and cabaret singer Gertrude Niesen (1911-1975) performed pop standards by all the great songwriters of her era (1930s-1950s). Her stage performances included the lead in the Broadway musical Follow the Girls (1944-1946). Two of her albums have recently been re-released: My Best Wishes (1938) and I Wanna Get Married (1945). She played singers in several films, including This is the Army and her last movie, The Babe Ruth Story (1948). She was born in New York and died in Hollywood. New York-based Louis Sobol (1896-1986) wrote an entertainment column, "New York Cavalcade" for the Hearst Newspapers for 40 years until his 1967 retirement. Fold creases not at signature. Fine condition.