A Dangerous Woman:
The Life, Loves, And Scandals
of Adah Isaacs Menken, 1835-1868,
America’s Original Superstar

Tuesday, October 13th, 6:30-8 PM
The Graduate Center, CUNY
Skylight Room

Marilyn Monroe might never have become the legend she did without America’s original tragic starlet: actress and poet Adah Isaacs Menken. In a century remembered for Victorian restraint, her modern flair for action, scandal, and unpopular causes revolutionized show business. Born in New Orleans to a “kept woman of color,” she became an outspoken protégé in the Midwest of the rabbi who founded Reform Judaism, a disciple of Walt Whitman in New York, was arrested as a Confederate agent during the Civil War, and then became America’s first pin-up superstar. On stage, she was the first actress to bare all. Off stage, she originated the front-page scandal. Before dying mysteriously at thirty-three, she was the world’s most highly paid actress — celebrated on Broadway, as well as in San Francisco, London, and Paris.

Please join us for a lecture by Barbara Foster, who will speak about this new biography, the first to tell Menken’s fascinating story.
Free and open to the public; no RSVP required.
Seating, as always, is “first come, first served.”
For more information, call (212) 817 8471,
or visit www.gothamcenter.org[gothamcenter.pmailus.com]