Movie star Mamie Van Doren wants everyone to know about her pet cockatoo
‘A blonde actress of a certain age writing about her 50-year relationship with a parrot is almost as bizarre as a girl who grew up on a South Dakota farm with no electricity or running water becoming a sex goddess’
Mamie Van Doren
Movie star
Mamie Van Doren — a movie star from the same era as Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield — has a written a book about her pet cockatoo.
“China and Me: Wing Flapping, Feather Pulling, and Love on the Wing” from Starlet Suave Books chronicles the tribulations of integrating a wild creature into a human household, matchmaking a mate for China and caring for their inevitable offspring.
“A blonde actress of a certain age writing about her 50-year relationship with a parrot is almost as bizarre as a girl who grew up on a South Dakota farm with no electricity or running water becoming a sex goddess,” Van Doren, 91, told me.
“Our feathers are a bit ruffled by time, but we’re still going strong. China’s been my companion, foil, and wise confidant for so long, I thought it was high time for others to meet him as well.”
Van Doren, who starred in “Teacher’s Pet” with Clark Gable, “Untamed Youth” and “Vice Raid,” recently performed as a guest artist with the band Pink Martini and recorded two songs with them.
She’s also busy writing a memoir, “Secrets of the Goddess.”
“It’s everything you’ll need to know about me, with gloves off and straight shooting. It’s chapter and verse of how I became Mamie, what happened to Joanie Olander — my real name — where the bodies are buried,” Van Doren said.
“It’ll be a collection of the forgotten, overlooked, grotesque, gorgeous, improbable and funny stuff of my life.”