Bette Midler as The Rose
Author Unknown


The occasion was the post-premiere party for “The ROSE", in which rock queen Bette Midler makes her major movie debut. The setting was the Roseland Ballroom in New York, decorated for the party with 2,999 roses. The 3,000th rose was clenched, Carmen-style, in the teeth of the wildly excited guest-of-honor.   

“The Divine Miss M." took the rose out of her mouth long enough to exult triumphantly: "It was the most exciting opening I've even been to -- and I've been to a few. Thank God this one was mine!" 

The pint-sized "Queen of Trash" with the flashy red frizz has plenty to be thankful about. Her screen debut in "The Rose" has been received as rapturously as Barbra Streisand's in "Funny Girl" and Diana Ross' in "Lady Sings The Blues". Like Streisand and Ross before her, Miss M. is almost a dead cert, to be up for Academy Awards honors for her portrayal of a successful star whose private life is a shambles. 

Streisand played unlucky-in-love comedienne Fanny Brice. Ross was cast as drug-addicted singer Billie Holiday. Now in "The Rose", Miss M. portrays a self-destructive singer on the skids who dies at the height of her fame in the 1960's. Miss M. and her producers insist that the character is a composite of many real-life singers of the 60's. But the main component of that composite is plainly the late Janis Joplin. 

The film's story, concocted by "Lenny" producer Marvin Worth and "Deer Hunter" director/writer Michael Cimino, tells the story of the last dramatic month in the life of a hard-rock superstar known as "The Rose". It is  1969, and Rose is on tour, filling auditoriums with 10,000 fans screaming "Rose! Rose! Rose!" 

On stage, Rose is flamboyant and self-assured.  But off-stage, she is revealed as a vulnerable small-town girl who has never been able to cope with success. Her private life is a frantic, self-destructive whirl of brawls, booze, sex, and pills, that reaches a dramatic on-stage climax during her last concert. 

Directed by '"The Fox” and "Cinderella  Liberty" maker Mark Rydell, "The Rose" co-stars noted British actor Alan Bates as Rose's ruthless manager Rudge. Frederic Forrest, currently on view in "Apocalypse Now, as Rose's chauffeur / lover Dyer.  While the supporting cast includes “Alien" star Harry Dean Stanton. 

But Miss M. is the show -- and what a show!  As one ecstatic American reviewer raves: "MidIer's performance as Rose is so electrifying, so shattering, so geometrically intensive that the picture's end finds the viewer physically limp and emotionally depleted." 

And so at 34, Miss M. is well on her way to becoming Hollywood's latest superstar.  But like all "overnight success" stories, Bette Midler's has been many years in the making… 

The little Jewish girl was born in Hawaii, where her father -- a New Jersey house painter -- had earlier moved his family in search of his Paradise. Named after Bette Davis (it's pronounced "Bet"), Bette M. grew up with her two older sisters and a younger brother in a working-class Samoan neighborhood. 

Bette decided on an acting career while she was still in high school. "Ah the highlights of my life had been performing things. Then wasn't much else I was interested in". 

She spent a year at the University of Hawaii, studying drama. Then after a brief period working on the assembly line in a pineapple cannery, she was hired as an “extra,” playing a missionary’s wife in the 1966 Julie Andrews film "Hawaii". It paid Bette $350.00 per week, and took her to Los Angeles for final shooting. From there, she went as quickly as possible to New York to become an actress. 

"It never occurred to me that I could fail", she says. "So of course I never made any alternative plans. Oh, there was a time when I considered being a foreign diplomat. But I didn't think they were appointing women to that sort of post then -- and besides, I wasn’t very diplomatic!" 

In New York, Bette started lessons (which she still continues in her free time) in singing, dancing, piano, mime, stage make-up, and costuming.  She supported herself with daytime bread-and-butter jobs such as typing and filing at Columbia University, or selling gloves at a department store. 

She performed for little or no pay in New York clubs and restaurants for experience.  “I worked as a go-go dancer for a while", she recalls. "That was my happiest job -- even though you had to belt the guys off with a club.  I loved to dance, I loved to move. This wasn't topless, but it was the height of the dance rage. I had jobs in the daytime and would dance at night.” 

Eventually, Bette got a job with the La Mamma theatre group, and from there, landed in the chorus of the Broadway production of "Fiddler On The Roof".  She soon graduated to the role of the eldest daughter, which she played for three years. 

About the same time, Bette was deeply impressed by a Theatre for the Ridiculous production that she saw. “There was this character, the Waterfront Woman – I’ll never forget her. I wanted to be lust like her." That perhaps formed the early nucleus for Bette's own portrayal of "The Divine Miss M."   

Bette brought her "Miss M." for an appearance at the Downstairs at the Upstairs where  Atlantic Records president Ahmet Ertegun saw her performing for a frenzied hairdresser’s convention. "She was overwhelming," he said later. "It was hard to believe that a young person like her could not only understand those old musical styles so well, but capture the flavor of the period so accurately. And it was extraordinary how she could take all these styles and make them a part of herself. It was the wittiest musical performance I've ever seen". He signed her up immediately. 

But Bette's biggest break came when she learned through some friends that New York's Continental Baths (a gay sauna) had decided to put on entertainments. She got the booking, opened -- and the sensation she created is now show business history.  Sold-out concerts followed. Typical was a two-week booking at New York's Palace Theatre in 1973. Tickets went on sale two months in advance, and every ticket was sold out within a few hours. This broke all records and established the largest one-day gross in Broadway history. A third week was immediately added -- and just as immediately sold out. 

When Bette triumphantly returned to Broadway in 1975 in her "Clams On the Half-Shell Revue," she broke her own box office records, chalking up more than $200,000 in one day. The show was extended from four to ten weeks, and eventually grossed more than $1.8 million -- the largest gross in Broadway history for a 10-week engagement. 

It was the same story all over again when Bette came to Australia late last year. As fast as her concerts were scheduled, they were just as quickly sold out, and extra concerts had to be put on. In Sydney, 10,000 tickets went on sale at 9 am, and had all been sold by noon. In the end, Bette's world tour had to be reprogrammed so that she could perform in Australia for an extra week. 

On stage a performance is as much of a treat for Bette as it is for her fans. "I just try to have a good time, and let the audience in on the secret", Bette has said. "It's like giving a party at which I am the Grand Hostess." 

Obviously, whatever is Bette's essence communicates itself dramatically to her audiences. Charles Michener, in a “Newsweek”  cover story, wrote: "Burlesque? Parody?  Camp?  Yes - but only on the surface. For whether in song or patter, what galvanized the audiences' tumultuous cheers and laughter, was Bette's ability to reveal an unmistakable vulnerability and heart-stopping innocence – which has been the not-so-secret weapon of every great entertainer from Fanny Brice to Judy Garland to Janis Joplin." 

“In private life, however, Bette is a very different personality to brash, bawdy, flamboyant performer seen on stage. As serious about her lifestyle as she is about her art, Bette is determined not to be caught up in the "star" syndrome. She still lives alone in a modest, comfortably-furnished, one-bedroom garden apartment in Greenwich Village. A natural fireplace, upright piano, stacked bookshelves, records, and plants dominate the cheerful living room. 

When not touring or recording, Bette avidly attends concerts, theatre, ballet, and cabarets. She reads constantly. "Lately, I've been reading about women -- how other women handle their lives. I especially loved the biographies about Dorothy Parker and Sarah Bernhardt." 

"The Rose" has given Bette the challenge of portraying the life of a complex woman quite different from herself. And she certainly plans to make more films. "It's such simple work", she says.  “They pick you up at 6.30 in the morning, give you pieces of paper with the words written on them, and let you do everything a hundred times till you get it right." 

But all joking aside, "Miss M." says: "I want to do something WONDERFUL. And I want to put it in front of people and have them say: 'I understood what she was saying. I wish I could have done that and I'm so glad that she did it because I'm glad somebody did it.’” 

Moviegoers and moviemakers alike are glad that Bette Midler did "The Rose". Come April and the Academy Awards, and they'll probably be even gladder still!