Mink Syndicate

Earl Carroll ran the hottest night spot in Hollywood, headlined by Beryl Wallace and The Most Beautiful Girls in the World.

Seven showgirls chip in to share a mink coat.

What could go wrong?

Listen back to the new original radio play from Sass Mouth Dames productions, written and directed by Megan McGurk.

Part One is here

Part Two is here

Part Three is here

Art design by Mot Collins.

Sound editing and special effects by Tom O’Mahony.

Thomas O’Mahony is a London based Irish Podcast Producer who specialises in storytelling and audio design. He hosts a tattoo history show called Beneath the Skin, and is passionate about how we can use audio to tell new and innovative stories.
You can find Thomas on all social media @gotitatguineys or contact him for business related inquiries at thomasomahony.media

Tom’s podcast is here

Meet the stars of Mink Syndicate:

Clara Higgins plays Beryl Wallace.

Clara is an Irish artist and writer perhaps better known as her pseudonym Mot Collins. Under this moniker, she creates illustrations, zines, and tattoos. Mot is interested in subversive expressions of femininity, sexuality, occultism, and comedy. She is highly influenced by pulp and punk culture. She can be found on Twitter as @heavydutywoman and @motcollinsart on Instagram.

Olympia Kiriakou plays Sheba LeMaire.

Olympia Kiriakou is a film historian specializing in stardom and genre in classical Hollywood. She is the host of “The Screwball Story” podcast, and the author of BECOMING CAROLE LOMBARD: STARDOM, COMEDY, AND LEGACY (Bloomsbury, 2020). She is currently writing VIRGINIA GREY: GOOD LUCK CHARM for the University Press of Kentucky. Visit her website The Screwball Girl and find her on Twitter: @thescrewballgrl and @screwballstory.

M. Shawn plays Rocky Beaumont.

M. is a former television news producer, a writer, a researcher, an accidental homemaker, and a full-time Jean Harlow fan. After a year in quarantine, her blood type is banana bread, and if people were allowed to be fictional characters in a past life, she’d be Blondie Johnson.

Savannah Monroe plays Olga Fury.

Savannah Monroe is a film writer and historian based in Colorado. Her focus is in the films and women of the classical Hollywood period. She has been researching and writing about Anne Bancroft, her life and legacy, since 2018. Her work can be found through her website Garbo Talks and on Twitter as @garbo_talks.

Renee Smith plays Esme Chiffon.

Whenever Renee spent a weekend at her grandmother’s house, Nanna, who was a the best seamstress in town, would call Renee to her side to watch “the black and white movies” and point out all the great style. Renee and her sisters loved to play in Nanna’s closet with its furs, hats, lucite pumps and bejewelled bags. So of course she was drawn to Sass Mouth Dames and became a huge fan. Her mildly sardonic spouse and cheeky kids have accepted her recent insistence on wearing classic hats, big wrap shawls and gloves when she walks their muzzled dog, as she struts through the un-classic streets of her neighbourhood in Toronto, Canada.

Laura Mawson plays Libby Branch.

After living in England for twenty years, Laura is planning to return to her beloved home city of Edinburgh in Scotland, with her husband. She has worked as a ceramics instructor, graphic designer and in communications. A life-long film fan with a special interest in Old Hollywood photography, graphics and fashion design. On Twitter @romanpbone1 and Bluesky @romanbone.bsky.social named after her much loved and missed dog, Roman.

Patrick McGurk plays Earl Carroll.

Pat is a resident of SWFLA, enjoying the proximity to the Ocean and the Gulf. He has been active in community theatre since high school as an actor, director and producer. Pat’s stage credits include such diverse roles as the Narrator in The Rocky Horror Show, Bud Frump in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Richard III, and various other parts in Shakespeare. He has also directed over 15 shows from Shakespeare to most recently Private Lives by Noel Coward. When not working on a show, or working, you can find Pat on the water with dive gear or a fishing rod.

Shane McCormack plays Sully.

Shane McCormack is a freelance illustrator specializing in movie and pop culture subjects.Recent licensed work includes Halloween and Ghostbusters. When not drawing he collects physical media especially 1930/40s movies and any Barbara Stanwyck film. He also enjoys photography and has a BA in Visual Art. He’s on Twitter as @mrharrylime

You can see his work at www.mrharrylime.com

Megan McGurk plays Pam Deasy.

Megan carries a torch for studio era woman’s pictures. She has hosted Sass Mouth Dames film club since 2017 and the podcast from 2018. She has written and directed nine original radio plays set in the 1930s (Salon Devine, Mannequins, Stenographers, A Star Was Born, House of the Seven Garbos, Red Gardenia, Hollywood Medusa, Myrna Loy’s Nose, and Mink Syndicate). Megan wrote an essay for Criterion on Love Affair. She is on Twitter @MeganMcGurk and @SassMouthDames and sometimes remembers to use Instagram @sassmouthdames.

Podcast Highlights

Looking for stories about ambitious women who climbed to the top in Hollywood?

Step this way–>

RKO thought Lucille Ball was only good enough for ‘B’ pictures–then she bought the studio

Joan Crawford showed Depression-era women how to survive by their wits

Sheilah Graham was the gossip columnist who sobered up F. Scott Fitzgerald enough to write his last novel

Lynn Bari started out as an MGM showgirl at 13. She came of age when Hollywood was a woman’s town

June Havoc endured a monstrous stage mother in vaudeville and then horrors in the dance marathon racket before she went to Hollywood

June’s sister Gypsy Rose Lee survived by turning burlesque into a highbrow art form even though censors prevented her name from appearing in the credits

Susan Hayward lost an Oscar to scandal but ignored bad publicity as Queen of 20th Century Fox

Two studios shared Mae Clarke’s contract, worked her relentlessly, until she was under care of shady doctors who nearly let her die in a psychiatric ward

Carole Landis had a famous figure but was really born for screwball comedy

Ann Todd had a smoking hot affair with James Mason while they made a picture where she played the genius

Geraldine Fitzgerald earned an Oscar nomination for her first Hollywood picture yet had Jack Warner insist she wasn’t in Ingrid Bergman’s league.

Yvonne De Carlo paid her dues in burlesque then leveraged ballet training into top-billing

After Esther Williams scolded Louis B Mayer, she gained the first lucrative endorsement deal for an MGM star

The World’s Dead and Everybody in It’s Dead But You: Podcast ep 85

Joan Crawford has her pick between a troubled veteran (Henry Fonda) and a smug married man (Dana Andrews). Does she want the man who has good lines (‘The world’s dead and everybody in it’s dead but you’) or does she stay with the same old masculine lines (‘It won’t be over til we’re dead’)? Crawford looks good in the back street as well as the sunshine, thanks to the poetic photography of Leon Shamroy, who believed that every light had to be justified ‘like words in a sentence’.

Career gal Joan has a cute flat, the freedom to lose herself in work, and a great wardrobe by Charles LeMaire. I’m not sure why she wants a husband, but my interest in woman’s pictures is always seeing a woman who gets what she wants.

Catch up with podcast episode 85 on Daisy Kenyon (1947).

If you’re looking for more podcast episodes on Joan Crawford, step this way—>

In episode 60, I talk about Sadie McKee (1934) , the gold standard Crawford picture. It has everything I desire: Joan absorbs the slings and arrows of unworthy men, triumphs over their low opinion, has the support of a dear friend (Jean Dixon), and parades in exquisite designs by Adrian. And it has a scene set in the Automat, which is what I use to centre my best intentions each time when I sit down to write. Joan has a few coins in her pocket, but fortified by a smart wool topper and hat, she uses great style as a shield against pity and misfortune.

For episode 50, I talk about how Joan Crawford just wants to be left alone in her beach house. She foils the plot of a rough trade grifter and his backers, sidestepping the fate of women of a certain age.

In episode 36, Joan stars in a fabulous spy caper to defeat the Nazis.

Matt Harris, archivist and fellow Joan Crawford obsessive, joins me for episode 20 to talk about Joan in Flamingo Road (1949) and in episode 66 for Queen Bee (1955).

In episode 77, I admire the way Adrian develops his signature metallic look for Joan Crawford in No More Ladies (1935). The picture evades the usual tropes about a woman driven witless by a cheating husband. Joan turns the tables on Bob Montgomery until he sobs in her arms and begs forgiveness.

In episode 4, I talk about how watching Joan Crawford in Torch Song (1953) as she tries to do nothing on a Sunday leaves me with white knuckles.