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MARILYN MONROE

2010-06-04T05:53:00.001-07:00

MONROE, MARILYN (Norma Jean Mortenson, Norma Jean Baker) (1926–1962) Actress

With the possible exception of Elvis Presley, no performer has become a greater American icon than film star Marilyn Monroe. Born as Norma Jean Mortenson in Los Angeles on June 1, 1926, Monroe was raised as Norma Jean Baker in a series of foster homes and orphanages. Her unmarried mother, Gladys, was mentally ill and unable to care for her. Gladys was ultimately committed to a mental institution and diagnosed as a schizophrenic.

Largely to escape living with still another foster family, Baker at 16 married James Dougherty in 1942. He soon left to join the merchant marine, while Baker found a wartime job with the Radio Plane Company in Van Nuys, California. There, she was spotted by army photographers, who chose her as their model for photos to accompany an article about female factory workers in Yank magazine. Her freshness, beauty, and ease in front of the camera attracted other photographers, and she began to model regularly for advertisements and promotions.

Eager for a Hollywood career, Baker divorced her husband in 1946 and convinced Twentieth Century-Fox to give her a silent screen test, designed to showcase her looks while de-emphasizing her lack of acting experience. The studio signed her up, assigning her Marilyn as her new first name. She herself chose Monroe, her mother’s maiden name.

Fox placed Monroe in bit parts in two films before letting her go. She was briefiy picked up by Columbia Pictures, where she made Ladies of the Chorus (1949). Without a studio, she made an appearance in the Marx Brothers’ Love Happy (1949), but had to resort to posing for nude photographs when no more film work came her way. After she achieved stardom, these photographs resurfaced in 1955 in the first issue of Playboy magazine.

Monroe had better luck after she became romantically involved with Johnny Hyde, a powerful Hollywood agent. Hyde taught her how to handle herself in the film industry, but more important, he found parts for her in two distinguished films, The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and All About Eve (1950). The roles were small, but in them Monroe showed herself to be an accomplished scene-stealer. Her enthusiastic fan mail convinced Twentieth Century-Fox to re-sign the actress, this time to a seven-year contract.

Now confident in Monroe, Fox made her the center of a publicity campaign that sold her to the public as a classic “dumb blonde.” Her first starring role, however, was in a thriller, Don’t Bother to Knock (1952), in which she played a psychotic babysitter. The next year, she stayed closer to her image, playing a beautiful gold digger in both Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and How to Marry a Millionaire. Also in 1953, Monroe solidified her growing star status in Niagara, in which she played a scheming adulteress. Monroe’s fame was furthered by her marriage to baseball star Joe DiMaggio in January 14, 1954. Her studio-created reputation as a sexpot, however, soon came between them, as DiMaggio grew increasingly uncomfortable with the unrelenting attention she received from the public and press.

He was particularly repelled by the publicity surrounding The Seven Year Itch (1955), a comedy that cast her as a young actress who inspired romantic fantasies in her married neighbor. A famous shot, exploited by the studio, had Monroe standing atop a street grating, allowing the wind to blow her skirt up. Although the film showcased Monroe’s budding skill as a comedian, it infuriated and offended DiMaggio, thereby contributing to the end of their nine-month marriage.

Monroe herself grew weary of playing a blonde bombshell. Always embarrassed about her lack of formal education, she became determined to be taken seriously as an actress not by Hollywood but by the intellectual elites of the theater world. Breaking her contract with Fox, she left for New York City to study acting with Lee and Paula Strasberg, the directors of the Actors Studio and leading proponents of the “Method” acting technique.

At the Strasbergs’ suggestion, Monroe began to undergo psychoanalysis to help relieve her personal and professional insecurities. While in New York, she also met playwright Arthur Miller, whom she married in 1956. Eager to keep one of their most popular stars, Fox renegotiated Monroe’s contract. She agreed to make four more pictures for the studio, but only if she could also appear in movies made by her own company, Marilyn Monroe Productions. The advantageous contract ushered in the most creatively successful era of Monroe’s film career.

Though she continued to play beautiful but dim women, her roles better allowed her to comment on this image. In 1956, she appeared in Bus Stop as Cherie, a saloon singer frustrated by men’s inability to see the woman behind her sexual facade. In 1959, in perhaps her best performance, Monroe hilariously parodied herself in Some Like It Hot. And in 1961, she had her most complex role in The Misfits as the sensitive and disillusioned Roslyn, a part written especially for her by Miller.

Despite these successes, Monroe grew increasingly disturbed. Her natural emotionalism combined with overuse of alcohol and pills helped brand her as one of the film industry’s most “difficult” actresses. She was unpredictable on the set and chronically late, if she showed up for work at all. While filming Some Like It Hot, director Billy Wilder had to write her lines on furniture to aid her failing memory and focus. It took scores of takes for her deliver the simple line, “It’s me, Sugar.” Contributing to her personal difficulties were a series of miscarriages and her troubled marriage to Miller, which ended in divorce in 1961.

After a brief stay in a mental institution the same year, she went back to work on the film Something’s Got to Give. Her working habits, though, were so erratic that Fox fired her in June 1962. On August 5, Monroe’s housekeeper discovered her body at her home in Brentwood, California. At 36, she had died of a drug overdose. The tragedy invited various interpretations. Many people assumed she committed suicide, while others speculated that she was murdered, perhaps because of an affair she had with President John F. Kennedy. Most Monroe biographers, however, have since concluded that the overdose was accidental.

The life and death of Marilyn Monroe have inspired countless books, films, plays, paintings, and songs. Many have attempted to “explain” Monroe, though frequently their interpretations say less about their subject than the authors’ own agendas. She is most often seen as a waif victimized and ultimately destroyed by the film industry and her adoring public. Her movie legacy, however, shows something more extraordinary: a performer with presence so luminous it has rarely been equaled on film.

Portrayals
    * 1975 Tessa Bill-Yield in Adam Darius' ballet Marilyn
    * 1980 Catherine Hicks in Marilyn: The Untold Story
    * 1987 Constance Forslund in This Year's Blonde
    * 1987 Heather Thomas in Hoover vs. the Kennedys: The Second Civil War
    * 1991 Susan Griffiths in Marilyn and Me
    * 1991 Eve Gordon in A Woman Named Jackie
    * 1993 Melody Anderson in Marilyn & Bobby: Her Final Affair
    * 1996 Ashley Judd in Norma Jean & Marilyn
    * 1996 Mira Sorvino in Norma Jean & Marilyn
    * 1998 Barbara Niven in The Rat Pack
    * 1999 Kerri Randles in Introducing Dorothy Dandridge
    * 2001 Holly Beavon in James Dean
    * 2001 Poppy Montgomery in Blonde
    * 2004 Sophie Monk in The Mystery of Natalie Wood
    * 2006 Samantha Morton in Mister Lonely
    * 2009 Suzie Kennedy in "Io e Marilyn"

Filmography
    * 1947    The Shocking Miss Pilgrim
    * 1947    Dangerous Years
    * 1948    You Were Meant for Me
    * 1948    Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay!
    * 1948    Green Grass of Wyoming
    * 1948    Ladies of the Chorus
    * 1949    Love Happy
    * 1950    A Ticket to Tomahawk
    * 1950    Right Cross
    * 1950    The Fireball
    * 1950    The Asphalt Jungle
    * 1950    All About Eve
    * 1951    Love Nest
    * 1951    Let's Make It Legal
    * 1951    Home Town Story
    * 1951    As Young as You Feel
    * 1952    O. Henry's Full House
    * 1952    Monkey Business
    * 1952    Clash by Night
    * 1952    We're Not Married!
    * 1952    Don't Bother to Knock
    * 1953    Niagara
    * 1953    Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
    * 1953    How to Marry a Millionaire
    * 1954    River of No Return
    * 1954    There's No Business Like Show Business
    * 1955    The Seven Year Itch
    * 1956    Bus Stop
    * 1957    The Prince and the Showgirl
    * 1959    Some Like It Hot
    * 1960    Let's Make Love
    * 1961    The Misfits
    * 1962    Something's Got to Give (Unfinished)

Songs

    * 1948 -Ladies of the Chorus : "Every Baby Needs A Da Da Daddy," "Anyone Can See I Love You," "Ladies Of The Chorus"
    * 1953 -Niagara: "Kiss"
           -Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: "Two Little Girls From Little Rock," "When Love Goes Wrong," "Bye Bye Baby," "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend"
    * 1954 -River of No Return: "I'm Gonna File My Claim," "One Silver Dollar," "Down In The Meadow," "River Of No Return"
           -There's No Business Like Show Business: "Heatwave," "Lazy," "After You Get What You Want," "A Man Chases a Girl"
    * 1956 -Bus Stop: "That Old Black Magic"
    * 1959 -Some Like It Hot: "Some Like It Hot," "Runnin' Wild," "I Wanna Be Loved By You," "I'm Through With Love"
    * 1960 -Let's Make Love: "My Heart Belongs To Daddy," "Specialization," "Let's Make Love"
    * 1962 -"Happy Birthday Mr. President"

Awards and nominations

    * 1951 Henrietta Awards: The Best Young Box Office Personality
    * 1952 Photoplay Award: Fastest Rising Star of 1952
    * 1952 Photoplay Award: Special Award
    * 1952 Look American Magazine Achievement Award: Most Promising Female Newcomer of 1952
    * 1953 Golden Globe Henrietta Award: World Film Favorite Female.
    * 1953 Photoplay Award: Most Popular Female Star
    * 1954 Photoplay Award for Best Actress: for Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and How to Marry a Millionaire
    * 1956 BAFTA Film Award nomination: Best Foreign Actress for The Seven Year Itch
    * 1956 Golden Globe nomination: Best Motion Picture Actress in Comedy or Musical for Bus Stop
    * 1958 BAFTA Film Award nomination: Best Foreign Actress for The Prince and the Showgirl
    * 1958 David di Donatello Award (Italian): Best Foreign Actress for The Prince and the Showgirl
    * 1959 Crystal Star Award (French): Best Foreign Actress for The Prince and the Showgirl
    * 1960 Golden Globe, Best Motion Picture Actress in Comedy or Musical for Some Like It Hot
    * 1962 Golden Globe, World Film Favorite: Female
    * Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame 6104 Hollywood Blvd.
    * 1999 she was ranked as the sixth greatest female star of all time by the American Film Institute in their list AFI's 100 Years... 100 Stars.
    * Sweetheart of The Month 1953 (Playboy)

Further Reading
McCann, Graham. Marilyn Monroe. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1987.
Monroe, Marilyn. My Story. New York: Stein and Day, 1974.
Spoto, Donald. Marilyn Monroe: The Biography. New York: HarperCollins, 1993.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953). Twentieth Century-Fox, VHS, 1998.
The Misfits (1961). MGM/UA, VHS, 1996.
The Seven Year Itch (1955). Twentieth Century-Fox, VHS, 1998.
Some Like It Hot (1959). MGM/UA, DVD/VHS, 2001/1999.

NATALIE WOOD (Natasha Gurdin)

2010-06-04T05:53:00.000-07:00

WOOD, NATALIE (Natasha Gurdin) (1938–1981) Actress

In a career that spanned almost 40 years, Natalie Wood succeeded in making the difficult transition from child star to ingenue to serious actress. On July 20, 1938, she was born Natasha Gurdin in San Francisco, California. Her parents were Russian immigrants who found work in the entertainment industry—her father as a set designer, her mother as a ballet dancer.

At five, Natasha made her film debut in Happy Land (1943). Her next movie had her playing opposite Orson Welles in Tomorrow Is Forever (1946). While working on the film, she was first dubbed Natalie Wood—“Natalie” as an Americanization of her given name and “Wood” as a tribute to the film director Sam Wood. Throughout the rest of her youth, Wood was in constant demand. Her winsome combination of intelligence and sweetness was most memorably captured in Miracle on 34th Street, in which she played a practical little girl who comes to believe in the magic of Christmas. At 17, Wood re-created herself as a teen star in Rebel Without a Cause (1955). The film captured the anxieties of 1950s adolescents and made her an icon to her generation. Revealing a tender vulnerability, Wood won her first Academy Award nomination for the film.

Rebel also made Wood a star of the tabloids due to her romance with costar James Dean. She was linked with other rising celebrities, including singer Elvis Presley and actor Robert Wagner. Wood and Wagner were married in 1957 and starred in All the Fine Young Cannibals (1960). They were divorced in 1962. In Splendor in the Grass (1961), which costarred Warren Beatty in his film debut, Wood made the jump to adult dramatic actress. Playing a young woman driven insane by sexual repression, she was nominated for her second Oscar. Wood also found success as a musical star, even though she could not sing or dance. She appeared (with her singing dubbed) as Maria in West Side Story (1961) and as GYPSY ROSE LEE in Gypsy (1962).

Throughout the 1960s, Wood played young women searching for their identity in a series of films. The most effective was Love with the Proper Stranger (1963), for which she received another Oscar nomination. At the end of the decade, she showed a newfound talent for comedy in Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969), a satire of middle-class sexual mores.

In 1969, Wood married Robert Gregson, with whom she had a daughter, Natasha. After divorcing Gregson in 1972, she remarried her first husband, Robert Wagner. They had one child, Courtney, and Wagner adopted Natasha, who would grow up to become a film actress. In the 1970s, Wood teamed with Wagner for several television projects, including a production of Tennessee Williams’s Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1976). She had less success finding suitable film roles. Among her last movies were the disaster film Meteor (1979) and the science fiction thriller Brainstorm (1983). While still filming Brainstorm, Wood disappeared during a yachting vacation with Wagner and their guest, Wood’s costar Christopher Walken. On November 29, 1981, her body was found off the coast of California’s Santa Catalina Island. The victim of an accidental drowning, Natalie Wood died at the age of 43.

Filmography

Year    Film
1943    Happy Land
1946    The Bride Wore Boots
            Tomorrow Is Forever
1947    Driftwood
            The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
            Miracle on 34th Street
1948    Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay!
1949    Father Was a Fullback
            The Green Promise
            Chicken Every Sunday
1950    Never a Dull Moment
            The Jackpot
            Our Very Own
            No Sad Songs for Me
1951    The Blue Veil
            Dear Brat
1952    The Star
            Just for You'
            The Rose Bowl Story
1954    The Silver Chalice
1955    Rebel Without a Cause
            One Desire
1956    The Girl He Left Behind
            The Burning Hills
            A Cry in the Night
            The Searchers
1957    Bombers B-52
1958    Kings Go Forth
            Marjorie Morningstar
1960    All the Fine Young Cannibals
            Cash McCall
1961    West Side Story
            Splendor in the Grass
1962    Gypsy
1963    Love with the Proper Stranger
1964    Sex and the Single Girl
1965    Inside Daisy Clover
            The Great Race
1966    Penelope
            This Property Is Condemned
1969    Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice
1972    The Candidate
1973    The Affair
1975    Peeper
1976    Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
1979    From Here to Eternity
            The Cracker Factory
            Meteor
1980    The Memory of Eva Ryker
            The Last Married Couple in America
            Willie & Phil
1983    Brainstorm

Further Reading
Finstad, Suzanne. Natasha: The Biography of Natalie Wood. New York: Crown, 2001.
Nickens, Christopher. Natalie Wood: A Biography in Pictures. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1986.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Gypsy (1962). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 2000.
Miracle on 34th Street (1947). Twentieth Century-Fox, DVD/VHS, 1999/1999.
West Side Story (1961). MGM/UA, DVD/VHS, 1998/1998.

MADONNA LOUISE CICCONNE

2010-06-04T05:52:00.003-07:00

MADONNA (Madonna Louise Ciccone) (1958– ) Singer, Actress, Dancer, Songwriter

A pop icon on the level of Elvis Presley and MARILYN MONROE, Madonna was arguably the most infiuential female performer of the late 20th century. Born Madonna Louise Ciccone on August 16, 1958, she was the third of six children in a Roman Catholic family living in Pontiac, Michigan. When Madonna was six, her mother also named Madonna, died of cancer. As the eldest daughter in the Ciccone household, she was largely responsible for taking care of the home and her younger siblings, even after her father remarried. Hemmed in by her religion and her father’s discipline, she later recalled that she “grew up feeling repressed. I was really a good girl.” An honor student and cheerleader, Madonna also studied ballet with instructor Christopher Flynn. He provided Madonna with welcome relief from her oppressive home life by taking her to dance clubs in downtown Detroit. Madonna won a dance scholarship to the University of Michigan. She soon dropped out, however, to seek her fortune in New York. Madonna arrived in the city the summer of 1978 with $37 in her pocket. To earn her rent, she worked as an artists’ and photographers’ model, while performing in the third company of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.

In the thick of New York’s underground culture, Madonna soon gravitated toward the music scene. With the encouragement of her live-in boyfriend, musician Dan Gilroy, she began learning to play the drums and the guitar and experimenting with writing songs. She also sang with various bands, having a brief stint in Paris as a singer in a French disco group. Back in New York, her singing caught the attention of Mark Kamis, a disc jockey at Danceteria, then one of the city’s leading clubs. With Kamis’s help, Madonna cut a demo recording of the song “Everybody,” which landed her a contract with Warner Brothers. Her first album, Madonna (1983), initially sold badly. Sales took off only after three of its tracks “Holiday,” “Lucky Star,” and “Borderline” became dance club favorites. Adding to the appeal of her disco-infiuenced pop sound was her fashion sense. In music videos played on the then-fiedgling cable station MTV, Madonna presented herself as streetwise urchin. Badly dyed, teased hair, lace gloves, underwear worn as outerwear, and crucifixes were all hallmarks of her early style. With the success of her first album, Madonna was able to insist on having the best producers and musicians work on her next, Like a Virgin (1984).

The album and two singles from it the title track and “Material Girl”—charted at number one. Again Madonna successfully used MTV to market her music. As in the video for “Like a Virgin,” she wore a white wedding dress to perform the song on the MTV Video Music Awards. Writhing on stage as if in sexual ecstasy, Madonna’s performance was considered shocking at the time. In her music video for “Material Girl,” Madonna was made up as MARILYN MONROE in a clever send-up of the film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953). Giving up her usual dance club look for a glamorous red ball gown, Madonna went through the first of the many physical transformations that define her career. In 1985 Madonna made her first foray into film with a small part in Vision Quest. She became a full-fledged movie star with Desperately Seeking Susan (1985), playing a fashionable free spirit, a character who closely resembled herself.

The same year, she made her stage debut in David Rabe’s Goose and Tom-Tom, opposite Sean Penn. Madonna and Penn were married for four tumultuous years before divorcing in 1989. Madonna continued her recording career with two more hit albums, True Blue (1986) and Like a Prayer (1989). Turning to slightly more serious material, she provoked national controversies with several songs. “Papa Don’t Preach,” from True Blue, confounded Madonna’s conservative critics by telling the story of a pregnant teen who opts for motherhood instead of abortion. The title track on Like a Prayer angered the Catholic Church because of the video’s provocative images, which included Madonna kissing an African-American Christ and dancing in a field ablaze with burning crosses. Because of the uproar over the video, Pepsico pulled its sponsorship of Madonna’s upcoming tour, though the singer was able to keep her $5 million fee.

In the late 1980s, Madonna repeatedly struck out at the box office. Her films Shanghai Surprise (1969), Who’s That Girl (1987), and Bloodhounds of Broadway (1989) were all commercial fiops. She had better luck playing the small part of Breathless Mahoney in Dick Tracy (1990), starring Warren Beatty, with whom she had a well-publicized romance. Tying into the film, she released the album Breathless, featuring the single “Vogue.” Revered in the gay community, Madonna introduced mainstream America to “voguing,” a dance involving posing like a fashion model that was popular in gay clubs in the mid-1980s.

Also in 1990, Madonna released The Immaculate Collection, a greatest hits album. It featured several new songs, including “Justify My Love.” Because of its suggestions of voyeurism, bisexuality, and group sex, its video was banned from play on MTV before 11 o’clock at night. The resulting publicity helped sell some 250,000 copies of the “Justify My Love” videotape and propelled The Immaculate Collection to number one. Madonna also delighted her fans with Truth or Dare (1991), a documentary film she commissioned about her “Blond Ambition” world tour. Presenting Madonna as every inch a star, the film contained Beatty’s memorable assessment of the melding of her life and art: “She doesn’t want to live off camera.”

In 1992, Madonna signed a seven-year, $60 million contract with Time Warner that gave her nearly total creative control over her recordings and films. It also gave her her own record label, Maverick. Unlike most vanity labels fronted by stars, it would become highly profitable, signing such artists as Alanis Morissette, Candlebox, and Me’Shell Ndegéocello. In the wake of her Time Warner deal, Madonna’s Sex (1992) was released. The $50 coffee table book contained photographs of a mostly nude Madonna acting out her sexual fantasies. Though condemned as an attention-getting stunt by her critics, the book’s first run sold out quickly.

Her album Erotica (1992), however, was a disappointment, suggesting to some in the music industry that Madonna’s popularity was fading. Her movie career provided further evidence. Though she appeared in a small role in the successful A League of Their Own (1992), her star vehicle Body of Evidence (1993) was a disaster.

Perhaps sensing that she had gone too far, Madonna displayed a softer, more soulful sound on the album Bedtime Stories (1994). A year later, she released Something to Remember, a collection of her hit ballads. Hoping to finally establish herself as a movie draw, she also lobbied hard for the role of Eva Perón in the musical Evita. Although the movie received a lukewarm response from critics and audiences, it helped to establish Madonna as a credible actress.

During the filming, Madonna became pregnant by her boyfriend and personal trainer, Carlos Leon. On October 14, 1996, she gave birth to Lourdes Maria Ciccone Leon and later described the experience to People magazine as “the greatest miracle of my life.” In addition to motherhood, Madonna publicly embraced the Jewish kabbalah and Far Eastern religions and culture. She showcased her new spiritual side on Ray of Light (1998), which many critics consider her best album.

Madonna had another success with her next album, Music (2000), which marked a return to the playful dance songs that had made her a star. A month before its release, she had her second child,Rocco. Madonna married Rocco’s father, British film director Guy Ritchie, in December 2000. The following year, her Drowned World tour—the first tour since 1993—sold out across Europe and the United States.

In an MTV interview, Madonna once said, “The whole reason I got into show business wasn’t because I thought I had a spectacular voice. It was because I thought I had something to say.” Since her early days as a performer, the public has been listening. A worldwide sensation for more than two decades, Madonna now has generations of fans who consider her the last word on what’s next in popular culture.

Discography

Releases (from oldest to newest):
    Everybody (Single, Maxi) < (11 versions)
    Borderline (Maxi, Single) < (14 versions)
    Burning Up / Physical Attraction (Maxi, Single) < (8 versions)
    Holiday (Maxi, Single) < (24 versions)
    Lucky Star (Maxi, Single) < (9 versions)
    Madonna (Album) < (29 versions)
    Angel (Maxi, Single) < (14 versions)
    Like A Virgin (Album) < (39 versions)
    Like A Virgin (Maxi, Single) < (16 versions)
    Like A Virgin & Other Big Hits (Maxi, EP) < (6 versions)
    Madonna (Comp) < (3 versions)
    Material Girl (Single, Maxi) < (20 versions)
    Crazy For You (Maxi, Single) < (17 versions)
    Dress You Up (Maxi, Single) < (20 versions)
    Gambler (Single, Maxi) < (11 versions)
    Into The Groove (Single, Maxi) < (14 versions)
    Madonna Mix (12", Mixed)
    Over And Over / Borderline (12")
    The First Album (Album) < (7 versions)
    The Virgin Tour Live < (3 versions)
    Cosmic Climb (Maxi) < (9 versions)
    La Isla Bonita (Maxi, Single) < (20 versions)
    Live To Tell (Single, Maxi) < (18 versions)
    Lucky Star/Like A Virgin (7", RE, Single)
    Open Your Heart (Maxi, Single) < (13 versions)
    Over And Over (7")
    Papa Don't Preach (Maxi, Single) < (26 versions)
    True Blue (Album) < (44 versions)
    True Blue (Maxi, Single, EP) < (20 versions)
    Causing A Commotion (Maxi, Single) < (15 versions)
    In The Beginning (EP) < (3 versions)
    Into The Groove / Everybody (12", Promo)
    It's That Girl (Cass, Promo)
    Non Si Nasce Mai Una Volta Sola / Causing A Commotion (7", Single)
    The Look Of Love (Maxi, Single) < (8 versions)
    True Blue Super Club Mix (Cass, EP)
    Where's The Party / Spotlight (12", Promo)
    Who's That Girl (Maxi, Single) < (18 versions)
    Wild Dancing (12")
    You Can Dance (Album) < (25 versions)
    Ciao Italia: Live From Italy < (5 versions)
    Spotlight < (2 versions)
    Cherish (Maxi, Single) < (16 versions)
    Dear Jessie (Single, Maxi) < (8 versions)
    Express Yourself (Maxi, Single) < (17 versions)
    Into The Groove (Cass, Single, Car)
    Into The Groove / Who's That Girl / Causing A Commotion (Maxi) < (2 versions)
    Keep It Together (Maxi, Single) < (12 versions)
    Like A Prayer (Album) < (29 versions)
    Like A Prayer (Maxi, Single) < (24 versions)
    Like A Prayer/Oh Father (Cass, Single)
    Lucky Star / Borderline (Maxi) < (2 versions)
    Oh Father (Maxi, Single) < (9 versions)
    On The Street (Maxi) < (3 versions)
    Pray For Spanish Eyes (7", Promo)
    Remixed Prayers (MiniAlbum) < (3 versions)
    The Early Years (Comp) < (2 versions)
    Time To Dance (Maxi) < (3 versions)
    Blond Ambition World Tour Live < (4 versions)
    Hanky Panky (Maxi, Single) < (18 versions)
    I'm Breathless - Music From And Inspired By The Film "Dick Tracy" (Album) < (20 versions)
    Into The Groove / Dress You Up (CD, Single)
    Justify My Love (Maxi, Single) < (29 versions)
    Justify My Love / Vogue (From MTV's Video Music Awards) (Comp) < (2 versions)
    Rescue Me (Maxi, Single) < (23 versions)
    Shake < (2 versions)
    The Immaculate Collection (Album, Comp) < (36 versions)
    The QSound Experience (Excerpts From Madonna's Immaculate Collection) (CD, Single, Promo)
    The Royal Box (CD + VHS + Box)
    The Very Best Of Madonna (Comp) < (3 versions)
    Vogue (Maxi, Single) < (27 versions)
    Get Down < (2 versions)
    Give It To Me < (3 versions)
    The Holiday Collection (Maxi) < (2 versions)
    Bad Girl (Maxi, Single) < (15 versions)
    Cosmic Climb (Album) < (2 versions)
    Deeper And Deeper (Maxi, Single, EP) < (20 versions)
    Erotica (Maxi, Single) < (28 versions)
    Erotica (Album) < (21 versions)
    Fever (Maxi, Single) < (6 versions)
    Rain (Maxi, Single) < (17 versions)
    Shine A Light (Single) < (3 versions)
    This Used To Be My Playground (Single) < (10 versions)
    Wild Dancing (Album) < (2 versions)
    Bye Bye Baby (Maxi) < (6 versions)
    Deeper And Deeper EP (Maxi, EP) < (3 versions)
    Fever / Rain (2x12")
    Rain (Cass, Single, Car)
    Rain EP (EP) < (2 versions)
    The Best Of & The Rest Of - Volume 2 (CD, Album)
    The Girlie Show - Live Down Under < (5 versions)
    Toy Boy (CD, P/Mixed)
    Wild Dancing (CD, Maxi)
    Bedtime Stories (Album) < (17 versions)
    Bedtime Story (Maxi, Single) < (22 versions)
    Favourite Mixes No. 1 (CD)
    I'll Remember (Maxi, Single) < (14 versions)
    Secret (Maxi, Single) < (21 versions)
    Take A Bow (Maxi, Single) < (20 versions)
    The Girlie Show (CD, Maxi)
    Human Nature (Maxi, Single) < (23 versions)
    La Isla Bonita / Human Nature (CD, Mini)
    One More Chance (Maxi, Single) < (5 versions)
    Something To Remember (Comp, Album) < (23 versions)
    Wild Dancing (Album) < (3 versions)
    You'll See (Maxi, Single) < (17 versions)
    Buenos Aires (Maxi, Single) < (4 versions)
    CD Single Collection (40xCD, Mini, Single + Box, Ltd)
    Don't Cry For Me Argentina (Maxi, Single) < (19 versions)
    Love Don't Live Here Anymore (Single, Maxi) < (11 versions)
    Pre-Madonna (1980-´81 New York City - Unauthorized) (Album) < (2 versions)
    Wild Dancing (CD, Shape, Ltd)
    Wow! (CD, Shape, Ltd)
    You Must Love Me (Maxi, Single) < (8 versions)
    Another Suitcase In Another Hall (Maxi, Single) < (4 versions)
    Drowned World / Substitute For Love (Maxi, Single) < (11 versions)
    Frozen (Single, Maxi) < (22 versions)
    Frozen / Take A Bow (7")
    Little Star (CD, Promo)
    Nothing Really Matters (Maxi, Single) < (30 versions)
    Ray Of Light (Maxi, Single) < (27 versions)
    Ray Of Light (Album) < (28 versions)
    Ray Of Light (Special Limited Edition) (VHS)
    The Power Of Good-Bye (Maxi, Single) < (19 versions)
    Words + Music (CD, Maxi, Promo)
    Beautiful Stranger (Maxi, Single) < (10 versions)
    The Video Collection 93:99 (Comp) < (6 versions)
    American Pie (Maxi, Single) < (20 versions)
    Best 'Music' (CD)
    Don't Tell Me (Maxi, Single) < (21 versions)
    GHV2 The Dance Remixes (3xLP, Promo)
    Impressive Instant < (3 versions)
    Music (Maxi, Single) < (41 versions)
    Music (Album) < (23 versions)
    Skin (CDr, TP)
    The Ultimate Collection (Comp) < (2 versions)
    Amazing (CD, Single, Promo)
    Don't Tell Me (CDr, Promo, clo)
    Drowned World Tour 2001 < (3 versions)
    Early Years (CD)
    GHV2 (Album, Comp) < (19 versions)
    GHV2 < (4 versions)
    GHV2 Remixed (The Best Of 1991-2001) (2xCD, Promo)
    Lo Que Siente La Mujer (CD, Single, Promo)
    Music (Dan-O-Rama Remix) (VHS, PAL, Pro)
    Ray Of Light / Beautiful Stranger (7")
    Thunderpuss GHV2 Megamix (Maxi) < (5 versions)
    What It Feels Like For A Girl (Maxi, Single) < (23 versions)
    2 CD Hit Collection (Erotica / Madonna) (CD, Album + CD, Album, RM + , RE)
    Die Another Day (Maxi, Single) < (25 versions)
    Die Another Day - Music From The Motion Picture < (6 versions)
    True Blue / Like A Virgin (Coffret 2 CD Originaux) (Box + 2xCD, Album)
    A New Groove. A New Jean (Into The Hollywood Groove) (CD, Single, Promo)
    American Life (Maxi, Single) < (24 versions)
    American Life (Album) < (19 versions)
    Hollywood (Maxi, Single) < (25 versions)
    Into The Hollywood Groove (CDr, Single, Promo)
    Love Profusion (Maxi) < (14 versions)
    Me Against The Music (Maxi, Single) < (12 versions)
    Nobody Knows Me (Remixes) (12", Promo)
    Nothing Fails (Maxi) < (11 versions)
    Remixed & Revisited (EP, Maxi) < (7 versions)
    Un Nouveau Groove. Un Nouveau Jean. (Into The Hollywood Groove) (CD, Single, Promo)
    House Music (Volume 1) (CD, Comp, Dig)
    House Music (Volume 2) (CD, Comp, Dig)
    Who's That Girl: Live In Japan (Mitsubishi Special) (DVD)
    2CD (American Life / Music) (2xCD, Album)
    3CD (American Life / Music / Ray Of Light) (3xCD, Album)
    Confessions On A Dance Floor (Album) < (19 versions)
    Dance To The Beat (CD)
    Hung Up (Maxi, Single) < (21 versions)
    The Girlie Show in Japan (DVD-V, Dig)
    Confessions Remixed (3x12", Ltd)
    Get Together (Maxi, Single) < (16 versions)
    I'm Going To Tell You A Secret < (6 versions)
    Jump (Maxi, Single) < (15 versions)
    Sorry (Maxi, Single) < (20 versions)
    Hey You (File, MP3, 128)
    The Confessions Tour (Album) < (6 versions)
    4 Minutes (Single, Maxi) < (25 versions)
    4 Minutes / Give It 2 Me (2x7", Single, Whi)
    Give It 2 Me (Single, Maxi) < (21 versions)
    Hard Candy (Album) < (16 versions)
    Miles Away (Single, Maxi) < (16 versions)
    Celebration (Album, Comp) < (11 versions)
    Celebration (Single, Maxi) < (17 versions)
    Celebration - The Video Collection (Comp) < (5 versions)
    Revolver (One Love Remix) (CDr, Single, Promo)
    3 For One (The First Album / Like A Virgin / True Blue) (3xCD, Album)
    Classic Party Rockers Vol. 3 - The Madonna Edition (12")
    Golden Madonna (Cass, Comp)

Further Reading
Benson, Carol, and Allan Metz, eds. The Madonna Companion: Two Decades of Commentary. New York: Schirmer Books, 1999.
Bego, Mark. Madonna: Blonde Ambition. Updated edition. New York: Cooper Square Press, 2000.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Evita (1996). Hollywood Pictures Home Video, DVD/VHS, 1998.
The Immaculate Collection (1991). Warner/Electra, DVD/VHS, 1991/1999.
The Immaculate Collection.Warner Brothers, CD, 1990.
Madonna: Truth or Dare (1991). Artisan Entertainment, DVD/VHS, 2000/2001.
Ray of Light.Warner Brother, CD, 1998.

ELIZABETH TAYLOR

2010-06-04T05:52:00.002-07:00

TAYLOR, ELIZABETH (1932– ) Actress

Elizabeth Taylor remains perhaps the quintessential movie star, as legendary for her messy private life as for her glamorous screen performances. She was born in London, England, on February 27, 1932, to prosperous parents. Fleeing Europe during World War II, the Taylor family moved to Los Angeles when Elizabeth was seven. Her mother, a former actress, then set about grooming her daughter for Hollywood. In 1941, Elizabeth was signed to Universal and cast in her first film, There’s One Born Every Minute (1942). After appearing in Lassie Come Home (1943) opposite her lifelong friend Roddy McDowall, Elizabeth was given a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the studio best positioned to make her into a star. At 12, Elizabeth Taylor fulfilled her early promise in National Velvet (1944), the story of a young girl’s obsession with riding her horse in England’s Grand National steeplechase. Initially, Taylor was considered too slight for the role, but after a fourmonth regime of exercise, she proved herself physically robust enough to take it on. On the set, she further showed her dedication by continuing to perform even after a throw from a horse left her with a serious back injury.

Emerging from National Velvet a star, Taylor was placed in a series of small ingenue roles, most successfully in Little Women (1949) and Father of the Bride (1950). By her 15th birthday, gossip columnist Hedda Hopper had declared that Taylor was the most beautiful woman in the world. Blessed with raven hair, violet eyes, and a heart shaped face, the young Taylor established a standard of beauty for the 1950s.

In A Place in the Sun (1951), Taylor graduated to adult roles as a woman so desirable that a man is willing to kill to have her. Although thought of more as decoration than as a great talent, she slowly proved herself a skillful actress in such dramas as Giant (1956), Suddenly Last Summer (1959), and Raintree County (1957), for which she received her first Oscar nomination. Taylor had her greatest early success in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), the film version of Tennesee Williams’s controversial play. Wearing a form-fitting white slip, she portrayed a woman seething with sexual frustration as her alcoholic husband (Paul Newman) draws away from her. The performance won her a second Academy Award nomination. Throughout the 1950s, Taylor was as big a star in the gossip columns as she was onscreen.

In just seven years, she married three famous men—hotelier Conrad “Nicky” Hilton (1950), actor Michael Wilding (1952), and producer Michael Todd (1957). Divorced from Hilton and Wilding, Taylor became a widow when Todd’s plane, ironically named “the Lucky Liz,” crashed in 1958. The great outpouring of public sympathy that ensued quickly dried up as Taylor became romantically involved with singer Eddie Fisher, who was still married to film star Debbie Reynolds. When Fisher left his wife and children to marry Taylor in 1959, she was condemned as the ultimate other woman. Her fans, though, again embraced Taylor after she fell ill from an almost-fatal case of pneumonia. Perhaps out of sympathy for her near-death experience, Academy voters awarded Taylor the best actress Oscar for Butterfield 8 (1960). Taylor’s next role was as the title character in the four-hour extravaganza Cleopatra (1963). For her performance, she was paid a record-setting $1 million. The production itself cost $40 million, then the most ever spent on a film.

Cleopatra paired Taylor with British actor Richard Burton in the role of Marc Antony. Nearly from their meeting, rumors fiew about a romance between the stars, who were both married at the time. Adding to the gossip, Taylor and Burton were prone to making scenes and having loud drunken arguments. An unapologetic hedonist, Taylor was denounced by members of Congress and condemned by the Vatican as “a woman of loose morals.” Though Cleopatra was a box-office disaster, the public had a seemingly insatiable appetite for stories of Taylor and Burton’s extravagant misbehavior. As Burton once observed, “For some reason, the world has always been amused by us two maniacs.” After their marriage in 1964, Taylor and Burton made nine more movies together. Most were forgettable, though two were among Taylor’s best films. In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolffi (1966) and Taming of the Shrew (1967), Taylor played two very different, yet equally difficult women, creating these characters out of intense, raw emotion. Her role as Martha in Woolf was especially impressive.

Although only 34 at the time, Taylor was wholly convincing as a decidedly unglamorous, middleaged harridan. The part won Taylor her second Academy Award for best actress. In the 1970s, Taylor’s career began to decline as she appeared in a string of lackluster films. Her relationship with Burton fell apart as well. They were divorced in 1974 and remarried in 1975, though their second marriage lasted only four months. In 1978, Taylor wed for seventh time, becoming the wife of future U.S. senator John Warner. Finding fewer appropriate roles in movies, Taylor moved to the stage in the early 1980s. She was nominated for a Tony Award for her theater debut in The Little Foxes (1981) but was slammed by critics for her performance in Private Lives (1983) opposite Burton. Taylor also began working in television in such films as Poker Alice (1987) and Sweet Bird of Youth (1989). In the 1990s, she made occasional guest appearances on situation comedies, most notably providing the voice for baby Maggie on an episode of the animated series The Simpsons.

Even when she was not performing, Taylor remained in the public eye, often through less-than-fiattering gossip about her weight gain and problems with alcohol and painkillers. In 1983, she checked into Washington, D.C.’s Betty Ford Clinic, becoming the first high-profile celebrity to admit to her addictions. Returning to the clinic in 1988, she met construction worker Larry Fortensky. They were married in 1991 and divorced five years later. While dealing with her own problems, Taylor began a new career as a crusader for AIDS awareness and research. In 1985 she cofounded the American Foundation for AIDS Research (AmFAR) and soon organized the first Hollywood gala fund-raiser for the cause. Also the founder of the Elizabeth Taylor Foundation for AIDS, she has helped raise more than $50 million for AIDS research. At the 1992 Academy Awards, she was given the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award for her charitable work. Taylor added to her own bottom line with several perfume lines. Expertly marketed using her status as a cultural icon, her perfumes White Diamonds and Passion approached $200 million in annual sales by the early 1990s.

The mother of four children and grandmother of nine, Taylor has been plagued by health problems in recent years. During the late 1990s, she suffered from a broken back and a spinal fracture and had to have surgery for recurring hip problems and a benign brain tumor. As in the past, her personal difficulties have only seemed to add to her legend and endear her even more to her fans. In recognition of her charitable work and acting career, Taylor was named Dame—the female equivalent of knight—by Queen Elizabeth in 2000. The tribute seemed particularly fitting for the still glamorous Taylor, who had previously been dubbed by People magazine “the platinum grande dame of celebrities.”

Further Reading
Amburn, Ellis. The Most Beautiful Woman in the World: The Obsessions, Passions, and Courage of Elizabeth Taylor. New York: Cliff Street Books, 2000.
Heymann, C. David. Liz: An Intimate Biography of Elizabeth Taylor. New York: Birch Lane Press, 1995.
Kelley, Kitty. Elizabeth Taylor: The Last Star. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1981.
Spoto, Donald. A Passion for Life: The Biography of Elizabeth Taylor. New York: HarperCollins, 1995.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 2000.
National Velvet (1945). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 2001/2000.
A Place in the Sun (1951). Paramount, VHS, 1996.
Taming of the Shrew (1967). Columbia/Tristar, DVD/VHS, 1999/1998.
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolffi (1966). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 1998/2000.

LANA TURNER

2010-06-04T05:52:00.001-07:00

TURNER, LANA ( Julia Jean Mildred Frances Turner) (1920–1995) Actress

The epitome of the Hollywood glamour girl, Lana Turner was as famous for her melodramatic life as for her film performances. On February 8, 1920, she was born Julia Jean Mildred Frances Turner in Wallace, Idaho. Her family moved frequently as her father struggled to find work. When Julia was nine, he was murdered during a craps game. She and her mother subsequently moved first to San Francisco, then Los Angeles, where Julia attended Hollywood High School. An unenthusiastic student, 15-year-old Julia attracted the attention of Billy Wilkerson, the editor of the Hollywood Reporter, while she was cutting class. (Legend has it that they met at the lunch counter at Schwab’s drugstore, but some accounts cite other locations.) Wilkerson introduced her to Zeppo Marx of the Marx Brothers, who was then working as a casting director. Marx sent Turner to Warner Brothers producer Mervyn LeRoy. He was looking for a young actress who could project both sexiness and innocence. LeRoy placed her under contract and probably renamed her Lana, though Turner later claimed to have made up her stage name herself. Turner’s first film role was a small part in They Won’t Forget (1937). While attending a screening with her mother, Turner was horrified when male audiences began to whistle when she appeared on screen wearing a tight sweater. Her appearance was so memorable that she became known as the “sweater girl.”

After playing several more small roles, Turner followed LeRoy to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), She appeared in such films as Love Finds Andy Hardy (1938) and Rich Man, Poor Girl (1938) before winning her first starring role in Dancing Coed (1939). On the set, she met bandleader Artie Shaw, whom she wed on a whim in 1940. During their four-month marriage, Turner became pregnant, but had an illegal abortion under pressure by MGM. Shaw was the first of Turner’s seven husbands. She also had many high-profile lovers, including Clark Gable, Tyrone Power, and Howard Hughes. Turner’s reckless romantic life and her affection for the nightclub scene made her a regular feature in Hollywood gossip columns. While emerging as a major MGM star, Turner married entrepreneur Stephen Crane in 1941. Soon after she learned she was again pregnant, she discovered that Crane had never divorced his first wife. At MGM’s insistence, she married Crane after his divorce was finalized. She gave birth to a girl, Cheryl Crane, before dissolving the marriage. In 1946, Turner played Cora Smith in The Postman Always Rings Twice. Wearing white in most scenes, she exuded a sinister sexuality while looking like the girl next door. The movie solidified her image as a femme fatale. It also helped to make her a favorite pinup during the war years.

Though popular with moviegoers, Turner was considered more of a beauty than an actress. Hoping to be taken more seriously, she effectively played a troubled starlet in the hit The Bad and the Beautiful (1953). Turner also won praise starring as Constance MacKenzie in Peyton Place (1957). That performance earned Turner her only Academy Award nomination.In 1958, Turner found herself at the center of a nationwide scandal. On April 4, her daughter, Cheryl, stabbed and killed Johnny Stompanato, a mobster who was dating Turner, at her Beverly Hills home. A sensational trial followed, during which Turner’s explicit love letters to Stompanato were read as testimony.

The stabbing was determined to be a justifiable homicide because Cheryl believed the abusive Stompanato was going to kill her mother. Still, the scandal tarnished Turner’s reputation. Rumors spread that she herself had killed Stompanato, then forced Cheryl to take the rap. While Hollywood insiders debated over whether Turner’s career was over, she was asked to star in the melodrama Imitation of Life (1959) for Universal. Unsure about whether moviegoers were eager to see Turner, the studio required that she take a percentage of the profits rather than a salary up front. The deal was a boon to Turner, earning her $1 million when it became Universal’s most profitable film ever.

Turner continued to act through the 1960s, though increasingly she was considered too old for the sexy roles she was best known for. She appeared in her final film, Bittersweet Love, in 1974. In her later years, Turner tried acting onstage, but was overwhelmed by fear when performing before a large audience. She also appeared on television periodically, most notably as a regular on the prime time soap opera Falcon Crest (1981–90). In 1983, Turner officially retired from show business. After 1992, when Turner was diagnosed with throat cancer, she rarely left her Los Angeles home. Nevertheless, she was image-conscious to the end: she kept up a regime of facials, manicures, and hairstyling even as she was dying. On June 29, 1995, Turner died at the age of 75.

Further Reading
Crane, Cheryl, with Cliff Jahr. Detour: A Hollywood Story. New York: Arbor House, 1988.
Turner, Lana. Lana: The Lady, the Legend, the Truth. New York: Dutton, 1982.
Wayne, Jane Ellen. Lana: The Life and Loves of Lana Turner. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Peyton Place (1957). Twentieth Century-Fox, VHS, 1992.
Imitation of Life (1959). Universal, VHS, 1997.
The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946). Warner Home Video, VHS, 1996.

JULIA ROBERTS

2010-06-04T05:52:00.000-07:00

ROBERTS, JULIA (1967– ) Actress

Since her meteorite rise to fame in 1990, Julia Roberts has been one of the few actresses considered “bankable” by the Hollywood elite. The youngest of three children, she was born on October 28, 1967, in Smyrna, Georgia. Her parents ran a theatrical workshop for actors and writers in Atlanta. As a child, Julia wanted to become a veterinarian, but Roberts admits the idea of acting was “just kind of there in my mind all the time.”Her parents divorced in 1971, and her father died of cancer five years later—two events that cast a pall over an otherwise happy childhood. In her teenage years, Roberts developed a contentious relationship with her stepfather. Eager to leave home, she moved to New York City just days after her high school graduation. There, she joined her sister Lisa, who was pursuing an acting career. Her brother Eric had already found success starring in such films as Star 80 (1983) and The Pope of Greenwich Village (1984).

Roberts intended to study acting but after a few classes concluded that they were not “very conducive to what I wanted to do.” For a year, she signed on with a modeling agency and auditioned for acting roles with little success. Eric helped her get her first part playing his sister in Blood Red (1988), a drama that was not released until Roberts became a star. After a guest spot on the television series Crime Story, she appeared in the films Satisfaction (1988) and Baja Oklahoma (1988). Her breakthrough role came in Mystic Pizza (1988), in which she stole the picture playing a sexy Portuguese-American waitress. She then won the part of Shelby, a doomed diabetic, in Steel Magnolias (1989). Playing opposite such veteran actresses as Sally Field, Shirley MacLaine, and Olympia Dukakis, Roberts was the only cast member to receive an Academy Award nomination.

Roberts’s next film—Pretty Woman (1990)— made her a star. In this romantic comedy, Roberts played a prostitute who enchants a ruthless tycoon (Richard Gere). Although dismissed by critics as formulaic, the movie was an enormous success with moviegoers, becoming the year’s second most successful film. Much of its popularity was due to Roberts, who was hailed for the warmth and humor that she brought to her role. Critic Roger Ebert prophetically wrote, “[Roberts] gives her character an irrepressibly bouncy sense of humor. . . . Actresses who can do that and look great can have whatever they want in Hollywood.” Now Hollywood’s hottest actress, Roberts appeared in two thrillers—Flatliners (1990) and Sleeping with the Enemy (1991). Both were boxoffice hits, largely because of her star power. However, her films Dying Young (1991) and Hook (1991) failed to find an audience. Beginning in 1991, Roberts took a two-year hiatus from film. Tabloids spread unfounded rumors that, feeling the pressure of sudden fame, she was headed for a breakdown. The press also widely reported her affairs with costars Liam Neeson and Dylan McDermott and her last-minute decision not to marry actor Kiefer Sutherland. Her brief marriage to singer Lyle Lovett also fed the rumor mills.

In 1993, Roberts returned to acting in The Pelican Brief (1993), a popular legal thriller that paired her with Denzel Washington. Over the next few years, her career stumbled with a series of boxoffice failures, including I Love Trouble (1993), Something to Talk About (1995), and Mary Reilly (1996). Just as some critics began to dismiss Roberts’ early success as a fiuke, she had a hit with the romantic comedy My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997). Roberts stayed with the genre for her next two films, both of which were great commercial successes. In Notting Hill (1999), Roberts played a world-famous actress uncomfortable with her fame, a role that seemed to echo her own experiences. In Runaway Bride (1999), she played a marriage-shy young woman opposite her Pretty Woman costar Richard Gere. Roberts’s next role was the title character in Erin Brockovich (2000), the story of a crusading law office clerk who uncovers a pollution scandal involving a utility company. For her work, Roberts earned $20 million, at the time the highest paycheck ever given to an American actress. The film became her eighth movie to earn more than $100 million, firmly reestablishing her as one of the most popular movie stars in the world. In 2001, Roberts won the Academy Award for best actress for her role in Brockovich.

Filmography

Firehouse
Blood Red
Mystic Pizza
Satisfaction
Steel Magnolias
Flatliners
Pretty Woman
Hook
Dying Young
Sleeping with the Enemy
The Player
The Pelican Brief
Pret-a-Porter
I Love Trouble
Something to Talk About
Everyone Says I Love You
Michael Collins
Mary Reilly
Conspiracy Theory
My Best Friend's Wedding
Stepmom
Runaway Bride
Notting Hill
Erin Brockovich
Ocean's Eleven
America's Sweethearts
The Mexican
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
Grand Champion
Full Frontal
Mona Lisa Smile
Ocean's Twelve
Closer
Charlotte's Web
Beslan: Three Days In September
The Ant Bully
Charlie Wilson's War
Fireflies in the Garden
Duplicity
Valentine's Day
Eat, Pray, Love

Further Reading
Heath, Chris. “Portrait of a Trash-Talking Lady.” Rolling Stone. April 13, 2000, pp. 70–80+.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Erin Brockovich (2000). Universal/MCA, DVD/VHS, 2000.
Mystic Pizza (1988). MGM, DVD/VHS, 2001.
Pretty Woman (1990). Buena Vista Home Entertainment, DVD/VHS, 2000.
Steel Magnolias (1989). Columbia/Tristar, DVD/VHS, 2000.

AUDREY HEPBURN

2010-06-04T05:51:00.003-07:00

HEPBURN, AUDREY (Edda Kathleen van Hemmstra Hepburn-Ruston) (1929–1993) Actress

During her lifetime, film star Audrey Hepburn was celebrated both for her elegant beauty on screen and for her tireless charity work. On May 4, 1929, she was born Edda Kathleen van Hemmstra HepburnRuston in Brussels, Belgium. The wealth of her mother, who was a Dutch baroness, provided her with a happy, though sheltered, upbringing, even after her English father abandoned the family in 1935. As part of the divorce settlement, Edda was sent to school in England in order to be closer to him. At nine, she began taking ballet lessons with an eye toward pursuing a professional dance career.

At the beginning of World War II, Edda and her mother moved to Holland, hoping to escape Nazi control. The Nazis, however, soon invaded the country and seized her mother’s fortunes. They were forced to fiee into the countryside, where young Edda nearly died from malnutrition. Her life was saved only by food and supplies provided by relief workers. The experience was so traumatic that Hepburn later turned down a chance to play Holocaust victim Anne Frank, feeling that Frank’s wartime experiences in Holland had too many uncomfortable parallels to her own.

After the war, Hepburn returned to London and resumed her ballet studies. Convinced she could not succeed as a ballerina, she began modeling and dancing in musical theater. She also took bit parts in English movies, including The Lavender Hill Mob (1951) and Monte Carlo Baby (1952). The filming of the latter took her the Riviera, where she had a chance meeting with the French author Colette. Colette became Hepburn’s champion, insisting that the young actress be cast in the Broadway show Gigi, based on one of the writer’s novels. Hepburn initially refused the part, convinced that with her limited acting experience she could not carry a show on her own. She was eventually persuaded to take on the role, though she was fired and rehired twice during rehearsals. Her performance steadily improved, and when the show premiered, she was hailed as a major new talent.

Hepburn’s success as Gigi earned her the lead in the American movie Roman Holiday (1953). In it, her natural grace and charm were used to their best advantage as she played a runaway princess looking for a brief escape from her official duties during a tour of Italy. For her first major film performance, the 24-year-old Hepburn won an Academy Award for best actress. Three days later, she took home a Tony Award as well for the Broadway show Ondine (1954). Hepburn soon afterward married her Ondine costar, Mel Ferrer; the couple had a son in 1960.

Almost overnight, Hepburn emerged as one of Hollywood’s greatest stars. She used the situation to negotiate an advantageous, long-term contract with Paramount. In addition to guaranteeing her the opportunity to fit theater roles into her schedule, it allowed her script approval of her movie projects. As a result, Hepburn escaped being cast just as the romantic partner for male stars. Instead, most of her movies focused on her, often telling stories of young women who grow and mature through new experiences and hardships.

In her second major role, Hepburn played the titular character in Sabrina (1953), a comedy that had her character bloom from an innocent into a sophisticate during a sojourn in Paris. The film improbably paired her romantically with Humphrey Bogart, who was then more than twice her age and looked it. Such “May-December” relationships became a common feature in Hepburn’s movies. In nearly half of her films, her romantic partners were more than 20 years her senior. Sabrina brought Hepburn a second Oscar nomination. She would be so honored three more times for the films The Nun’s Story (1959), Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961), and Wait Until Dark (1967).

During the filming of Sabrina, Hepburn became acquainted with the fashion designer Hubert de Givenchy, who remained her close friend throughout her life. As Givenchy’s muse, Hepburn set fashion trends on- and offscreen by wearing his classic, simple designs. His sophisticated clothes on her slender frame helped create an alternative to the then-prevailing standard of Hollywood beauty as personified by curvy bombshells such as MARILYN MONROE. To this day, Hepburn’s impeccable sense of style has continued to have a significant impact on popular fashion. In the 1960s, Hepburn appeared in two of her signature roles: Holly Golightly in the romantic comedy Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961) and Eliza Doolittle in the musical My Fair Lady (1967). In both parts, she played a poor girl who re-creates herself as a fashionable urbanite, though Hepburn’s innately regal manner made her fairly unconvincing as the characters before their glorious transformations. Critics were particularly hard on her for her performance in My Fair Lady, largely because many felt the then-lesser-known Julie Andrews, who had originated the role on Broadway, had deserved the part. Hepburn herself was disappointed when the filmmakers decided to dub over her own sweet but weak singing voice in the musical numbers.

The decade saw Hepburn in several more memorable films, including Two for the Road (1967) and Wait Until Dark (1967), which was produced by her husband Mel Ferrer. The next year, the couple divorced, and in 1969 Hepburn married Italian psychiatrist Andrea Dotti. They had a son in 1970 and were divorced in 1982. After retiring in 1967 to spend more time with her family, Hepburn returned to the screen in the mature love story Robin and Marian (1976). The film costarred Sean Connery, who proved to be one of her strongest leading men. Hepburn continued to appear occasionally in small roles in feature films and made-for-TV movies. Her final screen part was an angel in Steven Spielberg’s disappointing Always (1989).

Hepburn devoted her final years to what she regarded as her most important role: serving as the international “goodwill ambassador” for the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF). Fueled by her own gratitude to the relief workers who saved her as a child, Hepburn took her position extremely seriously. She not only raised millions of dollars in relief funds, she also traveled constantly, making personal appearances in the most war-torn and disease-ridden areas of the globe to bring world attention to the miserable living conditions of the people there. Hepburn’s efforts were particularly instrumental in escalating the United States’s relief for famine victims in Somalia. Her devotion to UNICEF ended only with her death from colon cancer on January 20, 1993. Later that year, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences posthumously gave Hepburn the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award for her charitable works.

Further Reading:
Keogh, Pamela Clarke. Audrey Style. New York: Harper Collins, 1999.
Paris, Barry. Audrey Hepburn. New York: Putnam, 1996.
Vermilye, Jerry. The Complete Films of Audrey Hepburn. Secaucus, N.J.: Carol Publishing, 1995.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961). Paramount, DVD/VHS, 1999/1996.
My Fair Lady (1964). Warner Home Video, DVD, 1998.
Sabrina (1954). Paramount, VHS, 1998.

JOAN BAEZ

2010-06-04T05:51:00.002-07:00

BAEZ, JOAN (1941– ) Singer, Songwriter, Musician

The queen of 1960s folk music, Joan Baez is as well known for her political activism as for her pure soprano. She was born on January 9, 1941, in Staten Island, New York but her family moved frequently in her youth. Her father, a physicist of Mexican heritage, was an academic researcher who had eschewed more lucrative defense work on moral grounds. Joan’s parents, both Quakers, nurtured her social conscience. Her mistreatment by schoolmates because of her dark skin also contributed to her sympathy with the less fortunate.

While attending high school in Palo Alto, California, Baez began playing the guitar. After graduating in 1958, she enrolled at Boston University but soon became caught up in the renaissance of folk music pioneered by Pete Seeger and the Kingston Trio. Playing coffeehouses in Boston and Cambridge, Baez developed a reputation as a keen interpreter of classic folk. In the summer of 1959, she was invited to perform at the first Newport Folk Festival. Her performance made her an overnight star of the folk scene. Baez refused better-paying offers to sign with Vanguard Records, then the premier folk label. In 1960, Vanguard released Joan Baez, an album of traditional folk songs, including “House of the Rising Sun.” The first of Baez’s eight gold records, it reached number three on the charts. Baez continued to tour concert halls and campuses to growing crowds. In 1963, she played to an audience of more than 20,000 at Los Angeles’s Hollywood Bowl. Baez constantly broadened her repertoire, singing spirituals, hymns, and country and western tunes. She also sang songs by contemporary folk and rock artists, including Phil Ochs, Leonard Cohen, the Beatles, and most notably Bob Dylan. In addition to touring frequently together, Baez and Dylan became linked romantically.

By the mid-1960s, Baez was using her celebrity status to bring attention to political and social causes she held dear. In 1964, she refused to pay 60 percent of her income tax as a protest against the United States’s military arms buildup. A vehement opponent of the Vietnam War, Baez was arrested two years later for blocking the doors of an armed forces induction center. She married draft resister David Harris in 1968. Soon after she became pregnant with their son Gabriel, Harris was arrested and sent to federal prison for 20 months.

Baez’s antiwar stance won her both supporters and detractors. She was scheduled in 1967 to perform at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C., a venue controlled by the conservative Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR). When the DAR refused to allow her to play the hall, Baez gave an outdoor concert at the Washington Monument that attracted a crowd of more 30,000. Baez was also well-received when she performed at the legendary Woodstock concert in 1969.

In the 1970s, Baez developed her talents as a songwriter with such albums as Blessed Are . . . (1971) and Diamonds & Ruse (1975). The decade also brought her her greatest commercial successa cover of The Band’s “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,” one of the biggest singles of 1972. The same year, Baez began a long-term association with the human rights watchdog group Amnesty International and took a controversial tour of North Vietnam. In 1979, she helped found Humanitas International Human Rights Committee, an organization devoted to promoting human rights and nuclear disarmament through educational seminars.

In her autobiography And a Voice to Sing With (1987), Baez wrote of “the ashes and silence of the 1980s”—a decade that largely ignored both her music and politics. Nevertheless, she performed to acclaim at the Live Aid concert of 1985 and garnered a Grammy nomination for “Asimbonanga,” a song from Recently (1987), her first studio album in eight years.

Baez devoted much of the early 1990s on what she called “inner work,” including therapy to help her overcome stage fright and other phobias that had plagued her for years. At the same time, she discovered a new generation of singer-songwriters playing, in Baez’s words, “this folk/rock kind of music that still suits me best.” Baez’s own work was revitalized as she began touring with younger artists such as Dar Williams, Indigo Girls, and Sinead Lohan. Heading into her sixth decade in music, Baez maintained that she could now perform “a freer concert than I ever thought I could give.” As she told the New York Times in 2000, in recent years she has succeeded in “get[ting] past the myth of being Joan Baez and learn[ing] to enjoy my life.”

Further Reading
Baez, Joan. And a Voice to Sing With: A Memoir. New York: Summit Books, 1987.
Fuss, Charles. Joan Baez: A Bio-Bibliography. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1996.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Rare, Live and Classic. Vanguard, CD set, 1993.

GRACE KELLY

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KELLY, GRACE (Princess Grace,Grace Patricia Kelly) (1929–1982) Actress

Although Grace Kelly’ s film career lasted only five years, she remains one of the most luminous stars in Hollywood history. On November 12, 1929, she was born Grace Patricia Kelly into a wealthy Philadelphia family. Her mother was a former model, and her banker father had been a champion oarsman in the 1920 Olympics. Although shy as a girl, she made her stage debut at the age of 10. A blue-eyed blond with aristocratic features, Kelly embarked on a successful modeling career while studying at New York’s American Academy of Dramatic Arts in the late 1940s. She longed to act on the stage, a goal aided by her uncle George, a Pulitzer prize–winning playwright. Kelly first appeared on Broadway in 1949 in August Strindberg’s The Father but, to her disappointment, had trouble landing other stage roles, perhaps because
of her weak voice. She had much more success in television. In 1949 and 1950, she appeared in some 60 television programs.

In 1950 Kelly set her sights on feature films. Moving to Los Angeles, she appeared in Fourteen Hours (1951) before being cast in her breakthrough role as Gary Cooper’s Quaker wife in the classic western High Noon (1952). Signed to a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), Kelly was nominated for an Academy Award for best supporting actress for Mogambo (1953), in which she acted opposite Clark Gable. The following year, she won the best actress Oscar for The Country Girl (1954), beating out the favorite, JUDY GARLAND. In the film, she played down her stunning beauty to portray the bitter wife of an alcoholic. More characteristic of her film roles were the three movies she subsequently made with director Alfred Hitchcock: Dial M for Murder (1954), Rear Window (1954), and To Catch a Thief (1955). In these films, Hitchcock made the most of her “ice queen” facade that always suggested a red-hot passion smoldering just beneath the surface. The director once characterized Kelly’s unique appeal as “sexual elegance.”

By 1955, Kelly was the most popular female star in American film. That spring, while attending the Cannes Film Festival in France, she met Prince Rainier III during a photo shoot for the French magazine Paris Match. Hailing from one of Europe’s oldest royal families, Rainier ruled over Monaco, a tiny country smaller than the MGM lot in Los Angeles. The two met again months later at the house of a friend of the Kelly family. Within a week, they announced their engagement. On April 19, 1956, Kelly married Rainier in a televised ceremony and thereafter became known to the world as Princess Grace. Her professional career effectively came to an end. Her final two films, High Society and The Swan, were both released in 1956.

As Princess Grace, Kelly devoted the rest of her life to raising her three children—Caroline, Stephanie, and Albert—and to performing charity work. She earned the affection of the people of Monaco and, through her glamour, helped revive the country’s tourist industry, particularly by making its casinos a favored destination of the rich. Although she was said to be living a fairy tale, she seemed to have missed acting. It is rumored that Hitchcock offered her the lead role in Marnie in 1964, but she hesitantly turned it down because her husband objected. (The role then went to Tippi Hedren, who bore a superficial resemblance to Kelly.) In her final years, Kelly took an apartment in Paris and began spending less and less time at her husband’ s palace.

On September 12, 1982, while driving home to Monaco with her daughter Stephanie, Kelly lost control of her car, which plunged off the twisting mountain road. Stephanie was largely unhurt, but Kelly sustained substantial injuries. Two days later, she died without regaining consciousness. Doctors later determined that she had probably suffered a mild stroke just before the crash. The sudden death of Grace Kelly stunned her fans around the world, who could scarcely believe that such a seemingly charmed life could end so tragically.

Further Reading
Bradford, Sarah. Princess Grace. New York: Stein and Day, 1984.
Lacey, Robert. Grace. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1994.
Spada, James. Grace: The Secret Life of a Princess. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1987.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
The Country Girl (1955). Paramount, VHS, 1998.
High Noon (1952). Republic, DVD, 1999.
Rear Window: Collector’s Edition (1954). Universal, DVD/VHS, 2001/2000.

RITA HAYWORTH

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HAYWORTH, RITA (Margarita Carmen Cansino, Rita Cansino) (1918–1987) Actress, Dancer

Dubbed the “American Sex Goddess” by Time magazine, Rita Hayworth was one of the 1940s’ most popular film stars. Born Margarita Carmen Cansino on October 17, 1918, she was the daughter of a Spanish dancer in vaudeville and a Ziegfeld chorus girl. Hoping to break into movies, her father, Eduardo, moved the family from Brooklyn to Los Angeles when Margarita was nine. He found work teaching dance and staging film dance sequences until his adolescent daughter emerged as a great beauty. At 12, she left school to become Eduardo’s professional dance partner. Billed as the “Dancing Cansinos,” they performed as many as 20 shows a week.

Margarita soon drew the attention of Hollywood talent scouts. In 1934, a screen test won her a sixmonth contract with the Fox studio, which shortened her first name to Rita. She appeared as a dancer in one scene in Dante ’s Inferno (1935). Her other work for Fox was left on the cutting room fioor. Released from her contract, Rita Cansino put her career in the hands of Edward Judson, a shady businessman to whom she was married from 1937 to 1942. Judson found her freelance acting jobs in B movies until Columbia signed the starlet to a sevenyear contract. The studio re-created Cansino, positioning her as a glamour girl instead of as an “ethnic” actress as Fox had. To complete this transformation, they raised her hairline through electrolysis and christened her Rita Hayworth. (Her new surname was a variant spelling of her mother’s maiden name.) Hayworth, a shy woman whoconsidered herself a dancer with a fiair for comedy, was not wholly at ease with her new, sexier image.

At Columbia, Hayworth continued to be cast in forgettable low-budget films before appearing as the second female lead in Howard Hawks’s Only Angels Have Wings (1939). The role led to substantial parts in Blood and Sand and The Strawberry Blonde (both 1941). But she finally achieved stardom when cast as Fred Astaire’s dance partner in the musical You’ll Never Get Rich (1941). With its success, Hayworth performed in series of wartime musicals, playing a young, all-American beauty. The most notable included You Were Never Lovelier (1942), again costarring Fred Astaire, and Cover Girl (1944) with Gene Kelly. During World War II, Hayworth was also famous for a photograph that appeared in the August 11, 1941, issue of Life magazine. Showing her facing the camera while kneeling in lingerie, the image became one of the most popular pin-ups of soldiers overseas. In a dubious tribute to Hayworth, the photograph was taped to a test atomic bomb dropped on the Bikini Atoll in 1946.

After the war, Hayworth found several of her best roles in films noir. In Gilda (1946), she was both smoldering and vulnerable in the title role. In perhaps her most indelible screen moment, she performed in the film a memorable striptease, pulling off long black gloves while singing “Put the Blame on Mame.” (As in most of her films, her singing voice was dubbed.) The sexy image of Gilda haunted Hayworth’s personal life. She was famously quoted as saying, “Every man I’ve known has fallen in love with Gilda and wakened with me.”Hayworth cut her trademark red hair and dyed it blond to play another femme fatale in The Lady from Shanghai (1948). The film’s director was the acclaimed Orson Welles, who became Hayworth’s second husband in 1943 and the father of her daughter Barbara. Called “the beauty and the brain” by the press, they were one of Hollywood’s most sensational couples until she divorced Welles soon after their one film together was completed. Of the marriage’s failure, she once said, “I just can’t take his genius anymore.”

The year before her divorce, Hayworth took a vacation to Europe, where she met Prince Aly Khan. Although both were married at the time, they began a public romance. The tabloid coverage on the couple made Hayworth an international celebrity. Their marriage in May 1949 and the birth of their daughter, Yasmin, seven months later were also widely reported. Like all of Hayworth’s marriages, this union did not last long, probably because of Aly’s philandering. They were divorced in 1953. In 1951, Hayworth returned to Hollywood after a three-year absence. She had successes with films such as Affair in Trinidad (1952), Pal Joey (1957), and Separate Tables (1958), but she was unable to revive the popularity she had achieved during the 1940s. Even worse for Hayworth, she weathered two disastrous, violent marriagesthe first to singer Dick Haymes (1953–55), the second to Separate Tables producer James Hill (1958–1961).

In 1962, Hayworth tried to boost her failing career by appearing in Step on a Crack on Broadway. However, the show was canceled because of the star’s inability to memorize her lines and her increasingly violent mood swings and emotional outbursts. Rumors spread that Hayworth had become an out-of-control alcoholic. Still, she continued to find some film work, although primarily in Europe. Hayworth made her last film, a western titled The Wrath of God, in 1972. With her mental condition deteriorating steadily, the underlying cause of Hayworth’s instability was finally discovered when she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in the early 1980s. In her final years, she was cared for by her daughter Yasmin, who became a leading advocate for Alzheimer’s research. Hayworth died at her home in New York City on May 14, 1987.

Further Reading
Leaming, Barbara. If This Was Happiness: A Biography of Rita Hayworth. New York: Viking, 1989.
Ringgold, Gene. The Films of Rita Hayworth. Seacaucus, NJ: Citadel Press, 1991.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Gilda (1946). Columbia/Tristar, DVD, 2000.
The Lady From Shanghai (1948). Columbia/Tristar, DVD/VHS, 2000/1992.
Separate Tables (1958). MGM/UA, VHS, 1999.
You Were Never Lovelier (1942). Columbia/Tristar, VHS, 1992.

JODIE FOSTER

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FOSTER, JODIE (Alicia Christian Foster) (1962– ) Actress, Director

Known for her subtle acting and fierce intelligence, Jodie Foster is perhaps the most widely respected actress in Hollywood. On November 19, 1962, she was born Alicia Christian Foster in Los Angeles, California. Only months before, her father had left her mother, Brandy. Raising Jodie and her three siblings alone, Brandy supported the family by working as a publicist, until Jodie’s brother Buddy began finding jobs as a child actor. With Brandy as his manager, he appeared in many commercials and as a regular on the Mayberry R.F .D. television series (1968–71).

Jodie began her own career at age three. Taken along on one of Buddy’s auditions, she was spotted and hired to appear in an ad for Coppertone suntan lotion. Over the next five years, she made 45 commercials. When she was eight, her mother considered her ready for acting. After her debut on Mayberry R.F .D., she guested on more than 50 shows and starred in two short-lived situation comedies—Bob, Carol, Ted, and Alice (1973) and Paper Moon (1974–75). As Buddy’s career stalled, Jodie’s began to fiourish. She was soon her family’s primary breadwinner. At 10, Jodie started acting in feature films. She became a staple of live action Disney films, appearing in Napoleon and Samantha (1972), Freaky Friday (1977), and Candleshoe (1977). She found more challenging work playing a spirited troublemaker in Martin Scorsese’s Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (1974). Two years later, Scorsese invited her to play a far grittier role—that of a teenage prostitute in his nihilistic Taxi Driver (1976). Jodie initially wanted to turn down the part. “I was the Disney kid,” she later explained. “I thought, ‘What would my friends sayfi’” Brandy Foster, however, refused to let her give up the chance to work with Scorsese and the film’s star, Robert De Niro. After undergoing a series of psychological tests to prove that she could cope with the movie’s violence, Jodie at 14 delivered one of the most lauded performances of her career. In addition to an Oscar nomination, she won the New York Film Critics Circle and Los Angeles Film Critics awards for best supporting actress.

Under Brandy’s supervision, Foster continued to choose offbeat roles. She played a vamp in the all-child musical Bugsy Malone (1976) and a murderer in the thriller The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane (1976). In 1980, Foster portrayed unusually complex teenagers in two well-received films, Foxes and Carny.

After 17 years in front of the camera, Foster stunned the film industry in 1980 by deciding to attend Yale University full time. Always an avid reader and brilliant student, she saw her college years as way of, at least temporarily, escaping the limelight. In a horrific twist of fate, Foster instead was thrust into the headlines when John Hinckley attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagan on March 30, 1981. Obsessed with Foster’ s character in Taxi Driver, Hinckley stated that he was in love with Foster and had shot the president as a way of winning her affection. Subsequently receiving death threats from several other deranged admirers, Foster had to be escorted around campus by armed bodyguards. While still at Yale, Foster acted occasionally, including taking a starring role in the film The Hotel New Hampshire (1984). Yet, after graduating with honors, she had difficulty finding acting jobs. Only after vigorous lobbying was she able to win the part of Sarah Tobias, a foul-mouthed gangrape victim, in The Accused (1988). Endowing her character with a powerful sense of dignity, Foster was rewarded with an Oscar for best actress.

After having minor critical successes acting in Five Corners (1988) and Stealing Home (1988), Foster took a turn at directing with Little Man Tate (1991). The story of a child prodigy raised be a single mother echoed many aspects of her own youth. In 1992, she formed her own productioncompany, Egg Pictures. Her deal with Polygram Filmed Entertainment allowed her to act, direct, or produce the films made by Egg, giving her fiexibility and power enjoyed by few movie actresses.

In 1991, Foster received her second Oscar for best actress, playing an FBI agent battling a serial killer in The Silence of the Lambs. She had less success with Sommersby (1993), a Civil War romance, and Maverick (1994), a comedy set in the Old West. In her first Egg production, Nell (1994), Foster was nominated for another best actress Oscar, but the film failed to find an audience. Her second directorial effort, Home for the Holidays (1995), met a similar fate. Even though many films in the 1990s were box-office disappointments, Foster remained one of Hollywood’s leading actresses. For her performance in Anna and the King (1999), Foster received $15 million, a pay rate higher than that of any other film actress at the time, with the exception of JULIA ROBERTS. Self-assured in both her private and professional life, the unmarried Foster gave birth to a boy, Charlie, in 1998. She had a second child in 2001, refusing to answer any questions regarding either’s paternity. With equal confidence, Foster in 2000 bowed out of Hannibal, the big-budget sequel to The Silence of the Lambs, to direct Flora Plum (2002), signaling her increasing interest in working behind the camera.

Further Reading
Kennedy, Phillipa. Jodie Foster: A Life on Screen. New York: Birch Lane Press, 1996.
Smolen, Diane. The Films of Jodie Foster. Secaucus, N.J.: Carol Publishing, 1996.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
The Accused (1988). Paramount, VHS, 1996.
Little Man Tate (1991). MGM/UA, VHS, 2000.
The Silence of the Lambs (1991). Image Entertainment, DVD, 1998.
Taxi Driver (1976). Columbia/Tristar, DVD/VHS, 1999.

MERYL LOUIS STREEP

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STREEP, MERYL (Mary Louise Streep) (1949– ) Actress

Arguably Hollywood’s most respected actress, Meryl Streep was born Mary Louise Streep in Summit, New Jersey, on June 22, 1949. Her first foray into the performing arts came at 12, when she began studying with renowned singing teacher Estelle Liebling. In high school, she took on what might be called her first acting role, when she decided to transform herself into “the perfect Seventeen magazine knockout.” As she would do so many times in the future, she played her part well, becoming a popular cheerleader and the homecoming queen.

Streep became more serious about acting while attending Vassar College. Her acting teacher Clinton Atkinson, who cast her in her first lead role in Miss Julie, once described her talents as “hair-raising, absolutely mind-bog-gling.” On a scholarship, Streep continued her education at Yale Drama School, yet she had doubts about pursuing an acting career. “I still didn’t think it was a legitimate way to carry on your life,” she later recalled. By the time Streep graduated from Yale, she already had a reputation as one of the country’s best young actresses. She fulfilled her early promise first on the stage, appearing in several Shakespeare plays directed by Joseph Papp. During a production of Measure for Measure, Streep began a romantic relationship with costar John Cazale. For her performance in Tennessee Williams’s 27 Wagons of Cotton (1976), she was nominated for a Tony Award.

Streep was soon lured to Hollywood, making her first appearance on film in the television movie The Deadliest Season (1977). She made her feature film debut the same year in a small role in Julia. The movie’s star, JANE FONDA, immediately recognized her promise and told director Sydney Pollack, “This girl is great. This girl is a genius.”In 1978, Streep won an Emmy Award for the miniseries Holocaust. That year, she also had in her first major role in The Deer Hunter. Although her character appeared on only seven pages of the script, Streep made an indelible impression, subtly playing a quiet, working-class woman with a strong sense of dignity. Streep received the first of many Academy Award nominations for her performance. The movie also starred Cazale, who became ill with bone cancer during the filming. Streep nursed him until his death in March 1978. Six months later, she married sculptor Don Gummer, with whom she has four children.

Perhaps the most pivotal year in Streep’s career was 1979. She played three high-profile supporting roles that, taken together, showcased her extraordinary range. In Manhattan, she was a sophisticated New Yorker; in The Seduction of Joe Tynan, a sexy southerner; and in Kramer vs. Kramer, a young mother on the verge of mental collapse. Her part in Kramer also displayed her willingness to play complex and often unsympathetic women. Her risk-taking in this role paid off with her first Oscar for best supporting actress. After only three years of working in film, Streep had established herself as one of the leading actresses in Hollywood by the beginning of the 1980s. She became renowned for being able to disappear into nearly any role. She proved equally convincing as a working-class martyr in Silkwood (1983), a Danish aristocrat in Out of Africa (1985), and a skidrow lcoholic in Ironweed (1987). During the decade, she received an astounding six Academy Award nominations. She had her only win with Sophie’s Choice (1982), for which she awarded the best actress Oscar. Although almost universally hailed as a great actress, Streep had her detractors. Her flawless technique left some critics cold, while the public often had trouble warming to the serious, often depressing projects she seemed to favor. Streep’s amazing felicity at mastering accents became almost a cliché in Hollywood. She herself grew somewhat defensive: “For me, it’s the least interesting part of the discussion of my work,” she once insisted in an interview.

Perhaps responding to criticism of her downbeat roles, Streep experimented with lighter fare in the early 1990s. She appeared in the comedies Defending Your Life (1991) and Death Becomes Her (1992) and sang a country tune at the conclusion of the comedy-drama Postcards from the Edge (1990). These films, however, were only moderately successful, and by the end of the decade Streep had returned to drama, most notably in The Bridges of Madison County (1995), Marvin’s Room (1996), and One True Thing (1998).

In 2000, Streep made film history when she was nominated for a best actress Oscar for Music From the Heart (1999). With 12 nominations, she tied the record set by KATHARINE HEPBURN. Notably, it took 50 years for Hepburn to become the most frequently nominated actress, while Streep earned nominations in less than half that time. With Streep still in mid-career, she seems poised to become the most honored American film actress of not only her generation but perhaps of all time.

Further Reading
Harris, Mark. “Depth Becomes Her.” Entertainment Weekly. March 24, 2000, pp. 50+.
Maychick, Diana. Meryl Streep: The Reluctant Superstar. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1984.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Kramer vs. Kramer (1979). Columbia/Tristar, VHS, 2000.
Out of Africa (1985). Universal, DVD/VHS, 2000/1999.
Silkwood (1983). Anchor Bay Entertainment, DVD/VHS, 1999/1998.
Sophie’s Choice (1982). Artisan Entertainment, DVD/VHS, 1998/2000.

CANDICE BERGEN

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BERGEN, CANDICE (1946– ) Actress, Talk Show Host

After an early career in film, Candice Bergen created one of television’s most intriguing characters in Murphy Brown. Born May 6, 1946, Bergen is the daughter of radio and film comedian Edgar Bergen. At her birth, the press announced that Charlie McCarthy—the dummy Edgar used in his famed ventriloquist act—now had a sister. Candice indeed had an intense case of sibling rivalry with the wooden puppet. In her autobiography, Knock Wood (1984), she recalled the haunting memory of her father placing her on one knee and Charlie on the other, using his voice to speak for both of them.

Candice was raised in Beverly Hills, California, where most of her playmates were the children of Hollywood stars. Disturbed by the effect this pampered environment was having on their daughter, the Bergens sent Candice to a finishing school in Switzerland when she was 14. After a few months, Candice greeted her visiting parents, offering them one of her cigarettes and a drink. The Bergens immediately took her back to Beverly Hills for the rest of her high school education.

In 1963, Candice Bergen enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania to study art history. However, she was more interested in her burgeoning modeling career than in her studies. After fiunking out, Bergen moved to New York City, where she attracted the attention of the director Sidney Lumet. He cast her in The Group (1966), in the daring role of Lakey, a young lesbian. Now in demand for ingenue parts, Bergen appeared in a string of undistinguished films, including The Sand Pebbles (1966), T. R. Baskin (1971), and The Wind and the Lion (1975). Critics inevitably were awed by her beauty, though most shared Bergen’s own sense that her acting was stiff and stilted.

Reviews were far kinder to her layered performance in Carnal Knowledge (1971), a black comedy in which she played a Smith College student romanced by two roommates played by Jack Nicholson and Art Garfunkel. In the 1970s, Bergen also developed an accomplished career as a photojournalist. With her Hollywood pedigree, she was able to interview top stars, such as Paul Newman and Lee Marvin. In addition, she won coveted international assignments, including the job of reporting on Kenya’s Masai tribe for National Geographic. Esquire, Life, and Playboy were among the other national magazines that published Bergen’s work.

As an actress, Bergen had a breakthrough in Starting Over (1979), in which she had a small role as Burt Reynolds’s self-indulgent ex-wife. Not wanting to compete with her father, she had previously shied away from comedy. The film’s showcase of her comedic fiair, however, won her some of her best reviews as well as an Oscar nomination for best supporting actress. She returned to comedy in 1981 in the critically disparaged Rich and Famous. In 1979 Bergen met French film director Louis Malle, whom she married the next year. The couple split their time between homes in Los Angeles, New York, and the countryside of France. Bergen gave birth to their daughter, Chloe, in 1985.

Bergen set off on still another career path in 1988, when she lobbied for the lead role on Murphy Brown, a television situation comedy about a straight-talking journalist working on a television news magazine. Contrasting Murphy’s professional success with her personal loneliness, the show’s cre ator, Diane English, called it “a sort of cautionary tale about getting what you wished for.” From the outset, the series was a hit, and earned Bergen five Emmy Awards. It also placed her at the center of a national controversy when Vice President Dan Quayle denounced as immoral a story line that had the pregnant and unmarried Murphy deciding to have her baby and raise him on her own. During the 10-year run of Murphy Brown, Malle fell ill. He died of cancer in 1995. Five years later, Bergen married real estate mogul Marshall Rose, a longtime friend. Also in 2000, Bergen began hosting Exhale, an hour-long talk show for the cable channel Oxygen. A fitting showcase for Bergen’s intelligence and charm, the show has featured such high-profile guests as JODIE FOSTER, Hillary Clinton, and Madeleine Albright. Bergen also returned to film acting in 2001 with a supporting role in the comedy Miss Congeniality.

Further Reading
Bergen, Candice. Knock Wood. New York: Linden Press, 1984.
Ehrman, Mark. “The US Interview: Candice Bergen.” US Weekly. April 24, 2000, pp. 54–61.
Stoddard, Maynard. “Candice Bergen: Sweet Success.” Saturday Evening Post. May/June 1992, pp. 38+.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Carnal Knowledge (1971). MGM/UA, DVD/VHS, 1999.
The Group (1966). MGM/UA, VHS, 1996.
Starting Over (1979). Paramount, VHS, 1993.

DORIS DAY

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DAY, DORIS (Doris Mary Anne von Kappelhoff) (1924– ) Singer, Actress

Radiating an open-hearted optimism, Doris Day become one of America’s favorite big band singers of the 1940s and film stars in the 1950s and 1960s. Born Doris Mary Anne von Kappelhoff on April 3, 1924, she grew up in a suburb of Cincinnati, Ohio. As a girl, she studied tap dancing and ballet with an eye toward becoming a professional dancer. She had already joined the Fanchon and Marco stage show when her career was cut short by a car accident, which shattered her right leg. Giving up her dream of dancing, Doris started studying voice. By 1938, she was singing on local radio and performing in Cincinnati clubs. At about this time, Doris took the stage name “Day,” inspired by “Day by Day,” one of her most requested tunes.

Doris Day worked with Bob Crosby’s orchestra in Chicago before being hired by bandleader Les Brown in 1939. While singing with Brown’s band, she married trombonist Al Jorden, who beat and terrorized her during their brief relationship. They had a son, Terry, in 1942, and divorced the following year.

In 1943, Day returned to Les Brown’s “Band of Renown,” with whom she recorded 12 hit records. Among them were “My Dreams Are Getting Better All the Time” (1943) and “Sentimental Journey” (1943). With excellent vocal control, she was known for communicating deep emotions without being overly theatrical. Day left Brown’s band in 1946, the same year she married saxophonist George Weidler. She was devastated when, eight months into the marriage, he suddenly asked for a divorce. Day married a third time in 1951 to agent Marty Melcher.

Day began her career in Hollywood in 1948, when she played a nightclub singer in Romance on the High Seas. Establishing a pattern in her early years in film, she had a hit single with “It’s Magic,” one of the songs she performed in the movie. Other popular songs she introduced in her films included “Secret Love” (from Calamity Jane, 1953) and “Que Sera Sera” (from The Man Who Knew Too Much, 1956).

In the 1950s, Day displayed a remarkable versatility as an actress. She excelled in such light musicals as April in Paris (1952) and The Pajama Game (1957). But she proved equally adept in dramas, including Young at Heart (1954) and Love Me or Leave Me (1955). Day, however, found her greatest film success in the 1960s. Well into her thirties, she reestablished herself as the most popular female star of romantic comedy. She was paired successfully with many leading men, including Clark Gable (Teacher’s Pet, 1958), James Garner (Move Over, Darling, 1963; The Thrill of It All, 1963), and Cary Grant (That Touch of Mink, 1962). Yet her most fondly remembered onscreen relationship was with Rock Hudson. Day and Hudson starred in three comedies—Pillow Talk (1959), Lover Come Back (1961), and Send Me No Flowers (1964). In the first two, Day portrayed happy career women, a rarity at the time. Wearing stylish clothes and frequenting sophisticated New York nightspots, these heroines were successful and secure professionals, excited primarily by their work. Day’s characters, however, were inevitably tamed by romance, and in the process accepted the roles of wife and mother as the mores of the era required.

Day had her last film role in the family comedy With Six You Get Eggroll (1968). In the year of its release, her husband Marty Melcher died. She soon discovered that he had committed her to a television series without her consent. Day also found out not only that the money she had earned over her career had disappeared because of bad investments but also that she was more than $500,000 in debt. Hesitantly, Day accepted her new role as a television star, appearing in a situation comedy titled The Doris Day Show (1968–73). In her caustic autobiography, she wrote that the unexpected obligation was “doubly repulsive” to her because of the sitcom’s hackneyed premise: “A farm. A widow with a couple of little kids living on a farm. With Grandpa, naturally.” After the show, Day largely retired from show business. Except during a brief fourth marriage to Barry Comden (1976–81), Day has since devoted herself to campaigning for her literal pet cause—animal welfare—from her home in Carmel, California.

Further Reading
Freedland, Michael. Doris Day: The Illustrated Biography. London: Andre Deutsch, 2000.
Hotchner, A. E. Doris Day: Her Own Story. New York: William Morrow; Co., 1976.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Love Me or Leave Me (1955). Turner Home Entertainment, VHS, 2000.
The Pajama Game (1957). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 1999.
Pillow Talk (1959). Universal, DVD/VHS, 1999/2000.
16 Most Requested Songs: Doris Day. Sony/Columbia, CD, 1992.

TINA TURNER

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TURNER, TINA (Anna Mae Bullock, Little Anne) (1939– ) Singer, Actress

Overcoming an impoverished childhood and an abusive marriage, Tina Turner emerged as a rock superstar in the 1980s. Born Anna Mae Bullock on November 26, 1939, she was the daughter of a farm overseer in Nutbush, Tennessee. She later remembered that in her poor community “white people own[ed] the land and black people work[ed] the crops.” She herself spent time picking cotton on the fields her father managed. Anna Mae and her older sister, Alline, were shuttled from relative to relative during her parents’ stormy marriage. After they divorced, her mother moved to St. Louis, Missouri, and sent for her daughters to join her in 1956. Both Bullock girls became intrigued by the city’s rhythm-and-blues scene. Alline started dating the drummer of the Kings of Rhythm, a local band headed by Ike Turner. Anna Mae, billed as Little Anne, soon began singing with the group. She had a son, Craig, with the band’s saxophone player before transferring her affections toward Turner. The relationship led to pregnancy, and Bullock had her second child, Ronald, in 1960. The same year, she and Ike, billed as Ike and Tina Turner, had their first hit single with “A Fool in Love.” Married in Mexico in 1962, the couple began performing as the Ike and Tina Turner Revue. While Ike managed the band, Tina sang lead vocals backed by three singers known as the Ikettes and an eight-piece band. Specializing in energetic rhythm and blues, the group released 15 albums in the 1960s. The Turners also perfected their stage act, which featured sexually charged dancing by Tina and her backup singers. Their biggest hit of the period was “River Deep, Mountain High” (1966). Though virtually ignored in the United States, it went to number three on the British charts, bringing the Turners to the attention of many influential English bands. The Rolling Stones were so impressed that they invited them to open their 1969 U.S. tour. Legend has it that Tina taught Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger how to dance in concert.

By the early 1970s, the Ike and Tina Turner Revue had achieved mainstream success in the United States. The group’s first top 10 American hit, a cover of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Proud Mary” (1971), became their signature tune. Memorably, Tina growled on the song’s introduction, “We never do anything nice and easy, we always do it nice—and rough.” The record was awarded a Grammy in the rhythm and blues category in 1972. The Turners’ other hits of the period included “I Want to Take You Higher” (1970) and “Nutbush City Limits” (1973), Tina’s own composition about her hometown. By the mid-1970s, the Turners career began to wane as their marriage fell apart. Fueled by a growing cocaine habit, Ike Turner mentally and physically abused Tina, who turned to Buddhism for relief. After recording several solo albums and appearing as the Acid Queen in the film musical Tommy (1976), she decided to shed herself of Ike once and for all. She left him in the middle of a 1976 tour, with only a gasoline credit card and 36 cents in her pocket. In 1978, they were divorced.

The same year, Tina Turner released the album Rough (1978), but it was virtually ignored by the critics and the public. Still popular in Europe, she spent the next few years touring there. She was given the break she needed to get her career on track in 1982, when the Rolling Stones asked her open their sold-out U.S. tour. She had a dance hit with a cover of Al Green’s “Let Stay Together” (1983) before recording her comeback album, Private Dancer (1984). Aided by music videos that showcased her dynamic stage presence and shapely legs, the album was a worldwide sensation. The two biggest hits from Private Dancer—“What’s Love Got to Do with It” and “Better Be Good to Me” earned Turner three awards at the 1984 Grammys. Turner followed Private Dancer with a second successful solo album, Break Every Rule (1986). She also appeared as Aunt Entity in the futuristic thriller Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome (1985).

Two songs from the soundtrack—“We Don’t Need Another Hero” and “One of the Living”—scored as hits for Turner. The next year, she aired her life story in the best-selling autobiography I, Tina. It was made into the award-winning movie What’s Love Got to Do with It (1993) starring Angela Bassett as Tina and Laurence Fishburne as Ike. Turner was inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991. She spent much of the rest of the decade touring in the United States and in Europe, where she had moved in 1986 to be with her boyfriend, Erwin Bach, a German record executive. With lavish houses in France and Switzerland, Turner has embraced Europe as fondly as Europe has embraced her. As Turner has explained, “I am as big as MADONNA in Europe. I am as big, in some places, as the Rolling Stones.” In 2000, Turner released the album Twenty Four Seven to coincide with her farewell tour. At 61 years old, she performed her last concert in Anaheim, California, in December of that year. Proud to be retiring from live concerts while still at the top of her game, she told People magazine, “What a way to go. I can step down and say, ‘I did it, I enjoyed it, and I went out the right way.’”

Studio albums

Year Album details
1974 Tina Turns the Country On
1975 Acid Queen
1978 Rough
1979 Love Explosion
1984 Private Dancer
1986 Break Every Rule
1989 Foreign Affair
1996 Wildest Dreams
1999 Twenty Four Seven

Live albums

Year Album details
1988 Tina Live in Europe
1999 VH1 Divas 1999
2009 Tina Live

Soundtracks

Year Album details
1985 Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome
1993 What's Love Got to Do with it

Compilations

Year Album details
1991 Simply the Best
2004 All the Best
2008 Tina!: Her Greatest Hits

Singles

Year Song
1975 "Baby Get It On" (Ike & Tina Turner)
1976 "Whole Lotta Love"
         "Acid Queen"
1978 "Viva La Money"
         "Root, Toot Undisputable Rock N Roller"
         "Sometimes When We Touch"
         "Night Time Is the Right Time"
1979 "Love Explosion"
         "Back Stabbers"
         "Music Keeps Me Dancin'"
1983 "Let's Stay Together"
1984 "Help!"
         "What's Love Got to Do With it"
         "Better Be Good to Me"
1985 "Private Dancer"
         "I Can't Stand the Rain"
         "Show Some Respect"
         "We Don't Need Another Hero"
         "One of the Living"
1986 "Typical Male"
         "Back Where You Started"
         "Two People"
         "Girls"
1987 "What You Get Is What You See"
         "Break Every Rule"
         "Paradise Is Here"
         "Afterglow"
1988 "Addicted to Love (Live)"
         "Tonight (Live)" (w/ David Bowie)
         "634-7589 (Live)" (w/ Robert Cray)
         "Nutbush City Limits (Live)"
         "A Change Is Gonna Come (Live)"
1989 "The Best"
         "I Don't Wanna Lose You"
         1990 "Steamy Windows"
         "Look Me in the Heart"
         "You Can't Stop Me Loving You"
         "Foreign Affair"
         "Be Tender with Me Baby"
1991 "Nutbush City Limits (The 90s Version)"
         "Way of the World"
         "Love Thing"
         "I Want You Near Me"
         1992 "(Simply) The Best" (w/ Jimmy Barnes)
1993 "I Don't Wanna Fight"
         "Disco Inferno"
         "Why Must We Wait Until Tonight"
1995 "GoldenEye"
1996 "Whatever You Want"
         "On Silent Wings" (featuring Sting)
         "Missing You"
         "Something Beautiful Remains"
         "Unfinished Sympathy"
         "In Your Wildest Dreams" (w/ Barry White)
1999 "When the Heartache Is Over"
2000 "Whatever You Need"
         "Don't Leave Me This Way"
         "Twenty Four Seven"
         "I Will Be There"
         "Talk to My Heart"
2004 "Open Arms"
2005 "Complicated Disaster"

Video albums

Year Video details
1978 Wild Lady of Rock
1982 Nice 'n' Rough
1984 Private Dancer - The Videos
1985 Private Dancer Tour
1986 What You is What You Get
         Break Every Rule: The Videos
1988 Live in Rio '88
1989 Foreign Affair - The Videos
1991 Do you want some action?
         Foreign Affair live Barcelona 1990
         Simply the Best: The video collection
1992 The Girl from Nutbush
1993 What's Love...? Live
1996 Live in Amsterdam - Wildest Dreams Tour
1997 Behind the Dreams
1999 Celebrate! - 60th Birthday Special
2000 One Last Time Live in Concert!
2005 All the Best - The Live Collection
2009 Tina Live: 50th Anniversary Tour

Music videos

Year Song
1983 "Let's Stay Together"
1984 "Help!"
         "What's Love Got to Do with It"
         "What's Love Got to Do with it" [black and white version]
         "It's Only Love" [live] (w/ Bryan Adams)
         "Better Be Good to Me"
         "Private Dancer"
1985 "I Can't Stand the Rain" [live]
         "Show Some Respect" [live]
         "We Don't Need Another Hero" [concept version]
         "One of the Living"
1986 "Typical Male"
         "Two People"
1987 "What You Get is What You See"
         "Break Every Rule"
         "Paradise is Here"
1988 "A Change is Gonna Come" [live]
         "We Don't Need Another Hero" [live version]
         "Tonight" [live] (w/ David Bowie)
         "Addicted to Love" [live]
1989 "The Best"
         "Steamy Windows"
         "I Don't Wanna Lose You"
1990 "Foreign Affair"
         "Look Me in the Heart"
         "Be Tender with Me Baby" [live]
         "It Takes Two" (w/ Rod Stewart)
1991 "Nutbush City Limits"
         "Way of the World" [USA version]
         "Way of the World" [UK version]
1992 "Love Thing"
         "I Want You Near Me"
1993 "I Don't Wanna Fight"
         "Why Must We Wait Until Tonight"
         "Disco Inferno"
         "Proud Mary"
1995 "GoldenEye"
1996 "Whatever You Want"
         "On Silent Wings"
         "Missing You"
         "Something Beautiful Remains"
         "In Your Wildest Dreams"
         "In Your Wildest Dreams" [live]
1997 "Can't Stop Thinking of You" (w/ Eros Ramazzotti)
1999 "When the Heartache is Over"
2000 "Whatever You Need"
2006 "Teach Me Again" (w/ Elisa)

Further Reading
Espinoza, Galina, and Fannie Weinstein. “Stage Flight.” People. December 4, 2000, pp. 230+.
Ivory, Steve. Tina! New York: Putnam, 1985.
Turner, Tina, with Kurt Loder. I, Tina: My Life Story. New York: William Morrow, 1986.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
The Best of Tina Turner: Celebrate! (2000). Image Entertainment, DVD/VHS, 2000.
The Collected Recordings. Capitol, CD set, 1994.
Tommy (1975). Columbia Tristar, DVD, 1999.

DOROTHY DANDRIDGE

2010-06-04T05:45:00.001-07:00

DANDRIDGE, DOROTHY (Dorothy Jean Dandridge) (1922–1965) Actress, Singer

The first African-American leading lady to be nominated for a best actress Oscar, Dorothy Jean Dandridge was born in Cleveland, Ohio, on November 9, 1922. She made her show business debut at four, encouraged by her ambitious mother, Ruby. Ruby concocted a song-and-skit show featuring Dorothy and her older sister Vivian. Billed as the “Wonder Kids,” the Dandridge sisters toured throughout the South for five years.

To advance her daughters’ careers, Ruby relocated the family to Los Angeles in the early 1930s. There, she made a living playing bit parts on radio and in films, generally playing a domestic—then one of the few roles open to African-American actresses. Rudy also recruited a third singer, Etta Jones, and reshaped the Wonder Kids into the Dandridge Sisters. The new act had its greatest success in 1936, when the group began appearing regularly at Harlem’s famed Cotton Club. The trio also appeared in several films—most notably the Marx Brothers’ classic A Day at the Races (1937)—before parting ways in the early 1940s.

Dorothy Dandridge’s solo career was interrupted by her 1942 marriage to Harold Nicholas, one half of the tap-dancing duo the Nicholas Brothers. The union was already strained by Nicholas’s infidelities, when Dandridge in 1945 gave birth to a severely brain-damaged girl, whom the couple named Harolyn. Dandridge suffered enormous guilt after the birth and throughout her life blamed herself for Harolyn’s condition. Unwilling to deal with the difficult situation, Nicholas deserted his family, and Dandridge returned to show business to pay for Harolyn’s placement in a private institution.

Though hobbled by insecurities, Dandridge quickly found fame performing as a nightclub singer. Elegant, sultry, and astoundingly beautiful, she was sought after by the most exclusive venues, many of which had never before featured an African-American performer. Dandridge routinely insisted that the clubs she played reserved a table for members of the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), thereby, at least for a night, integrating formerly segregated establishments. Dandridge also sought work in Hollywood.

After appearing in several undistinguished films, she won her signature role, the title character in Carmen Jones (1954). A recasting of Georges Bizet’s opera Carmen with new lyrics written by Oscar Hammerstein II, the film featured an all-black cast and told the story of a sensual woman whose infidelity leads to the ruin of her lover, played by Harry Belafonte. As the sashaying Carmen, Dandridge made a spectacular femme fatale, and her performance was hailed by critics and the public alike. In addition to becoming the first African American nominated for a best actress Oscar, she was the first black performer to present an award during an Academy Awards telecast. In November 1954, Dandridge also became the first African American to appear on the cover of Life magazine.

Despite her fabulous success in Carmen Jones, Dandridge was soon disappointed by the lack of serious roles open to her. Her beauty and glamour made her a natural to be cast in romances, but at the time African-American couples were a rarity on screenand interracial romances were all but unheard of. Dandridge did make history in the controversial and unsuccessful Islands in the Sun (1957), in which her character was the first black leading lady to be held in the arms of a white actor. Her only other notable film role was in Porgy and Bess (1959), in which she played Bess opposite Sidney Poitier.

As Dandridge watched her film career fade, her personal life also began to unravel. After her longtime affair with Carmen Jones’s director, Otto Preminger, fell apart, she married restaurateur Jack Dennison in 1959. Dennison fiooded Dandridge’s money into his own restaurants and persuaded her to invest in risky oil deals. By the time the couple divorced in 1962, Dandridge was so debt-ridden that, much to her dismay, she had to place Harolyn in a public institution. Despite her desperate circumstances, Dandridge had begun to launch a successful comeback in the nightclub circuit, when on September 8, 1965, she was found dead in her Hollywood home at the age of 42. Dandridge had overdosed on an antidepressant, but it remains unclear whether her death was intentional or accidental.

Even though her career was short, Dandridge was never forgotten by her fans, especially African Americans who were inspired by her success at breaking Hollywood’s color barriers. In 1977, she was inducted into the Black Film Hall of Fame, and in 1983, with the lobbying of costars Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte, she was given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. By the mid 1990s, leading young African-American actresses, including WHITNEY HOUSTON and Vanessa Williams, were vying to portray Dandridge on screen. The first to succeed was Halle Berry, who starred in the acclaimed HBO television movie Introducing Dorothy Dandridge in 1999.

Further Reading

Bogle, Donald. Dorothy Dandridge. New York: Amistad Press, 1997.
Dandridge, Dorothy, and Earl Conrad. Everything and Nothing: The Dorothy Dandridge Tragedy. New York: Abelard-Schuman, 1970. Reprint: New York: HarperPerennial, 2000.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Carmen Jones (1954). Twentieth Century-Fox, VHS, 1994.
Introducing Dorothy Dandridge (1999). HBO Home Video, DVD/VHS, 2000.

CHER (Cherilyn Sarkisian, Cher Bono)

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CHER (Cherilyn Sarkisian, Cher Bono) (1946– ) Singer, Actress

Throughout her up-and-down career, Cher has continually emerged as one of America’s most durable performers. Born Cherilyn Sarkisian on May 20, 1946, she survived a difficult childhood in El Centro, California. Her mother, Georgia, a part-time fashion model and country singer, was married eight times, including twice to Cher’s father, John Sarkisian. Helping to bring up her half-sister Georgeanne, Cher later remembered being so poor that she “went to school with rubber bands wrapped around my shoes to keep the soles on.” At 16, Cher moved out of her mother’s house and dropped out of high school, intending to pursue an acting career. Her plans changed after meeting 27-year-old record promoter Sonny Bono at a coffee shop. Finding her work as backup singer, Bono became her professional mentor and lover. On October 27, 1964, they were married in Tijuana, Mexico.

Bono developed a nightclub act for himself and Cher, billed first as “Caesar and Cleo,” then as “Sonny and Cher.”After recording two modestly successful singles, they struck gold in June 1965 with their recording of Bono’s song, “I Got You Babe.” A number-one hit, the single eventually sold 4 million copies. Sonny and Cher recorded six albums, although they became as well known for their hippie-style clothing—most memorably bellbottom pants and furry vests—as for their music. Sonny and Cher also tried, with less success, to break into movies. They both appeared as themselves in Good Times (1967), and Cher starred as a runaway in Chastity (1969), which Bono wrote and produced. Their only child, born in 1969, was named after the latter film. As their pop music career began to fade, Bono, against Cher’s wishes, revived their nightclub act.

To help shed their hippie image, Cher wore slinky, low-cut evening gowns and perfected a joking banter with Bono between songs. An appearance on The Merv Griffin Show caught the attention of CBS, which signed them to star in a six-week variety series. Premiering on August 1, 1971, The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour was an instant hit, making television stars out of Sonny and Cher overnight. Cher also launched a new career as a solo recording artist. Her singles included “Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves” and “Half Breed,” a reference to her part-Cherokee heritage. Sonny and Cher’s series ran for three years. At its height in 1974, Cher shocked their fans by filing for divorce, maintaining that Bono had kept her in “involuntary servitude.” Soon after the divorce was granted, Cher married rock musician Gregg Allman, but she left her new husband after nine days.

Cher and Allman had one son, Elijah Blue. After the failure of their marriage, both Cher and Bono launched unsuccessful solo series before trying to revive their variety show in 1976. For the public, however, their divorce had destroyed the magic of the Sonny and Cher duo. The show was swiftly canceled. With the encouragement of her boyfriend, record executive David Geffen, Cher returned to nightclubs, becoming a Las Vegas headliner. Creatively, however, this bored her and she quickly abandoned her $350,000-a-week paycheck to fulfill her childhood dream of becoming a serious actress.

In New York, she was hired to star in the Broadway production of Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean in 1982. The same year, she appeared in the film adaptation, which brought her to the attention of director Mike Nichols. He hired Cher for a supporting role in Silkwood (1983), for which she was nominated for an Academy Award. Now an acclaimed actress, she starred in Mask (1985), Suspect (1987), and Mermaids (1990). The pinnacle of her film career came with her performance as a frumpy widow transformed by love in the romantic comedy Moonstruck (1987). The role won her the Oscar for best actress. In the 1990s, Cher fell victim to Epstein-Barr disease, leaving her too exhausted to sustain her music and film careers. She did, however, appear in a series of cosmetics infomercials, which led many in entertainment industry to declare she was a hasbeen. “I became a joke on Letterman and Saturday Night Live,” she recalled of this period. “It was just a huge, devastating misjudgment of what people would accept from me.”

Even as her work was being dismissed, Cher’s personal life kept her in the public eye. In 1994, her daughter, Chastity, publicly announced that she was a lesbian, detailing for the press Cher’s initial difficulty in coming to terms with the fact.Four years later, Sonny Bono, now a congressman from California, died in a skiing accident. Cher delivered an emotional eulogy, which without her knowledge the major television networks broadcast live. To her fellow mourners, she described her moving tribute to Bono as “the most important thing I’ve ever done in my life.”

The loss of Bono ironically ushered in another career upswing for Cher. In 1999, she released a new album, featuring the surprise hit “Believe.”The dance song became the number-one single in 23 countries, making it her greatest success as a recording artist. Just one in a series of many dramatic comebacks, this rebirth of Cher’s career inspired a joke often repeated in entertainment circles: After a nuclear war, the only creatures sure to survive are roaches and Cher.

Further Reading
Cher, and Jeff Coplon. The First Time. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1998.
Taraborrelli, J. Randy. Cher: A Biography. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1986.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Cher: Live in Concert (1999). HBO Studios, DVD/VHS, 1999.
Moonstruck (1988). MGM/UA Studios, DVD/V, 2000/2001.
Sonny and Cher: Nitty Gritty Hour (1970). View Video, VHS, 1992.
The Way of Love: The Cher Collection. Uni/MCA, CD set, 2000.

GLORIA ESTEFAN

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ESTEFAN, GLORIA (Gloria Fajardo) (1958– ) Singer

Drawing on her Cuban roots, Gloria Estefan has been largely responsible for introducing Latin rhythms into American pop music. Born Gloria Fajardo on September 1, 1958, she left Cuba with her family the following year when Fidel Castro came to power. Her father, José, had been a bodyguard for the wife of the former president, Fulgencio Batista. After the Fajardos were settled in Miami, Florida, José was recruited for the CIA’s Bay of Pigs operation in Cuba, where he was captured and imprisoned for a year and a half. Further casting a pall on Gloria’s youth, José Fajardo was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis several years after his release. While her mother worked to support the family, Gloria was in charge of caring for her father and younger sister. Burdened by her respon sibilities, she found her only escape in listening and singing to records.

In 1975 she met Emilio Estefan, a keyboardist who headed a local band called Miami Latin Boys. Soon after, she joined the band as the lead singer, performing on the weekends while attending the University of Miami. Somewhat plump and very shy, Gloria slowly gained con?dence onstage, in large part because of Emilio’s encouragement. After she graduated from college, Gloria and Emilio married on September 1, 1978. Two years later, their son Nayib was born. In 1980 Emilio left his day job to become a fulltime manager of the band, by then renamed the Miami Sound Machine. He secured a contract with the Hispanic division of CBS Records, and the group recorded four successful Spanish-language albums. Although they had hits in Spanish-speaking countries around the world, the Miami Sound Machine made little headway in the United States.

Wanting to promote the group in the lucrative American market, CBS encouraged the band to write and sing songs in English. One of their ?rst, “Conga,” became a crossover hit, making an appearance on the pop, dance, black, and Latin charts. The band followed up with the all-English albums Primitive Love (1985) and Let It Loose (1987). Specializing in dance songs with a Latin beat, they had hits with “Bad Boys,” “Words Get in the Way,” “Rhythm Is Gonna Get You,” and “1-2-3.” Internal disagreements led several band members to leave the group, which allowed Estefan to play an increasingly important role as the frontwoman. Recognizing the public’s affection for Estefan, the group’s billing changed ?rst to Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine, then simply to Gloria Estefan. By the late 1980s, Estefan had also started singing more of the ballads she loved and fewer of the dance tunes that had made her a star.

Estefan promoted her records with constant touring, until March 20, 1990, when a tractor trailer collided with her tour bus. Estefan’s back was broken in the accident. After a four-hour operation, in which steel rods were embedded along her spine, it was unclear whether or not she would be con?ned to a wheelchair. During her long recuperation, Estefan received an enormous outpouring of support from her fans. To the surprise of her doctors, after a year of physical therapy she made a complete recovery. In March 1991 she was once again able to set out on tour to market her album Into the Light. Estefan remained remarkably prolific during the 1990s. She returned to recording in Spanish with the acclaimed Mi Tierra (1993); produced an album of covers titled Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me (1994); and reexplored heavily produced dance tracks with Gloria! (1998). Amidst her heavy recording schedule, she took off time to have a second child, Emily Marie, in 1994.

Driven by a need to experiment with new gen res, Estefan released Alma Caribena, an exploration of Afro-Caribbean music, in 2000. In addition, she began an acting career, making her movie debut as a grade-school teacher in Music of the Heart (1999) opposite MERYL STREEP . Estefan also appeared in the HBO ?lm For Love or Country: The Arturo Sandoval Story (2000), which told the true story of a jazz musician’s efforts to leave Cuba to achieve creative freedom.

Throughout her career, Estefan has helped to push Latin music into the American mainstream. In 1994, she became the ?rst artist to sing a song in Spanish at the Grammy Awards. Six years later, she cohosted the ?rst Latin Grammy Awards ceremony in Los Angeles.

Unafraid of entering the political realm, Estefan has drawn criticism for her support of Cuban-based artists and for visiting the Miami family of Elián Gonzáles, who sought to keep the boy in the United States against the wishes of his Cuban father. Her outspokenness has made her the United States’s highest-pro?le representative of the Cuban American community. Many Cuban Americans hold her in high regard as the embodiment of their American dream. Still a resident of Miami, Estefan is affectionately known in her hometown as “nuestra Glorita”—our Gloria.

Filmography

- Club Med (1986)
- The Hypnotic World of Paul McKenna (1993)
- Music of the Heart (1999)
- Little Angelita (voice narrator) (2000)
- Frasier (2000)
- For Love or Country: The Arturo Sandoval Story (2000)
- Famous Documentary (2003)
- A Capitol Fourth (2005)
- 90 Millas Documentary (2007)
- Marley & Me (2008) Cameo appareance as herself

Videography

- Homecoming Concert (1989)
- Evolution (1990)
- Coming Out Of The Dark (1991)
- Into The Light World Tour (1992)
- Everlasting Gloria! (1995)
- The Evolution Tour Live In Miami (1996)
- Don't Stop (1998)
- Que siga la tradición (2001)
- Live In Atlantis (2002)
- Famous (2003) (Video journal about making-of Unwrapped LP; included in CD package)
- Live & Unwrapped (2004)

Books

- The Magically Mysterious Adventures of Noelle the Bulldog (2005)
- Noelle's Treasure Tale: A New Magically Mysterious Adventure (2006)
- Estefan's Kitchen (2008)

Gloria Estefan - Discography

Studio albums

Year Title

1989    Cuts Both Ways
1991    Into the Light
1993    Mi Tierra
1994    Hold Me Thrill Me Kiss Me
1995    Abriendo Puertas
1996    Destiny
1998    Gloria!
2000    Alma Caribena
2003    Unwrapped
2007    90 Millas

EPs

Year Title

1993    Christmas Through Your Eyes
1993    Twelve Inch Mixes
1998    Bailando!
1998    Party Time!
2004    Unwrapped: Remixes

Compilations

Year Title

1990    Exitos de Gloria Estefan
1992    Gloria Estefan Greatest Hits
1997    Best of Gloria Estefan
2001    Greatest Hits Vol. II
2004    Amor y Suerte: Exitos Romanticos
2006    Oye Mi Canto!: Los Grandes Exitos
2006    The Very Best of Gloria Estefan
2006    The Essential Gloria Estefan
2007    iTunes Originals

Miami Sound Machine - Discography

Studio albums

Year Title

1977    Renacer/Live Again
1978    Miami Sound Machine
1979    Imported
1980    MSM
1981    Otra Vez
1982    Rio
1984    A Toda Maquina
1984    Eyes Of Innocence
1985    Primitive Love
1987    Let it Loose a.k.a. Anything For You

EPs

Year Title

1988 12" Mixes
1989 The Best Remixes

Compilations

Year Title

1983 Lo Mejor de Miami Sound Machine

DIANA ROSS

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ROSS, DIANA (1944– ) Singer, Actress

With extraordinary talent and fierce ambition, Diana Ross has become one of the most successful recording artists in history. Born on March 26, 1944, she grew up in Detroit, Michigan, the second of six children. Her family was so poor that all the children had to share the same bed, but Ross remembers her childhood as a happy one. She later described the Brewster-Douglass housing project in which she lived as “a warm, loving family environment.”Through her church choir, Ross became acquainted with Florence Ballard and Mary Wilson, members of the local vocal group the Primettes. (The male counterpart, the Primes, was founded by Eddie Kendricks, later a member of the Temptations). After joining the Primettes, Ross and her friends began to hang out at the Motown recording studio, hoping to be discovered. Once they had graduated from high school, Ross, Wilson, and Ballard were signed to the record label by Motown head Berry Gordy and renamed the Supremes. Initially, the Supremes sang backup during performances by headliners such as Marvin Gaye and Mary Wells. But when the group was paired with the songwriting team of Eddie Holland, Lamont Dozier, and Brian Holland, they began to develop their own unique sound. After a few moderately successful recordings, they hit number one with “Where Did Our Love Go” (1964) and quickly became Motown’s hottest act. With Ross’s girlish voice in lead vocals, their pop tunes easily crossed over into mainstream market. To make the Supremes more marketable to whites, Gordy dressed them in evening gowns in live performances. They quickly became icons of glamour to both black and white fans.

Between 1964 and 1967, the Supremes had 14 top 10 hits, including the classics “Baby Love” (1964), “Stop! In the Name of Love” (1965), and “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” (1966). In 1967, Florence Ballard was replaced by Cindy Birdsong. In the same year, the group was of?cially renamed Diana Ross and the Supremes, re?ecting Ross’s increasing push toward the center stage. Few were surprised when Ross announced in 1970 that she was going solo. Her last hit with the Supremes “Someday, We’ll Be Together” (1969)—was the group’s 12th number-one song.

With the strong support of Berry Gordy, Ross began developing her solo career, scoring an early success with the hit “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” (1970). Concentrating on ballads, she would have a dozen top 10 singles between 1970 and 1985. Among her hits were “Touch Me in the Morning” (1973), “Love Hangover” (1976), and “Endless Love” (1981), a duet with former Commodores lead singer Lionel Richie. Ross also found success in ?lms. In 1972, she appeared as BILLIE HOLIDAY in Lady Sings the Blues. Although the reaction to the ?lm was mixed, her performance won universal acclaim and was honored with an Academy Award nomination for best actress. Ross’s star power also propelled Mahogany (1975), a slight story of the trials of a fashion designer, into a commercial hit. Her recording of the theme from Mahogany received an Oscar nomination for best song. Ross had less success with the ?lm version of the theatrical musical The Wiz (1978), based on the movie The Wizard of Oz (1939). Critics savaged her for playing Dorothy, although the 34-year-old Ross has the character changed from a girl to a teacher to better suit her age.

Despite her active career, Ross worked hard to create a family life. In 1971, she married manager Robert Silberman, with whom she had three daughters. Ross and Silberman were divorced in 1975. Ten years later, Ross wed Norwegian shipping tycoon Arne Naess Jr. They had two sons before terminating their marriage in 2000. In the 1990s, Ross suffered several personal and professional setbacks. Her brother Arthur, a successful songwriter, was found murdered in his house in 1996. Four years later she was arrested for assault after a scuf?e with a security of?cer at London’s Heathrow Airport. Ross was also drawn into a controversy involving the 2000 concert series billed as the “Return to Love” tour. Promoted as a Supremes reunion, the tour was originally intended to bring Ross together with Wilson and Ballard’s replacement, Cathy Birdsong. When Wilson and Birdsong balked at their proposed compensation, Scherrie Payne and Lynda Laurence were hired to replace them. Payne and Laurence had performed with the Supremes only after Ross had left the group. Audiences, eager to see the original Supremes, were unenthusiastic about the tour lineup. Due to low ticket sales, the concert tour was canceled midway in July 2000.

During the 1990s, Ross had also seen her share of career triumphs. In the television movie Out of the Darkness (1994), she solidi?ed her reputation as a dramatic actress in her skilled performance as a schizophrenic. She also had a popular success with Double Platinum (1999), a television movie that cast her as the celebrity mother of an aspiring singer, played by the pop star Brandy. In celebration of 30 years as a recording artist, the box set Forever, Diana (1993) brought together her greatest hits. Equally well-received was her performance on “VH1 Divas 2000: A Salute to Diana Ross,” a cable television special that reached an audience of more than 20 million. Singer, actress, and diva, Diana Ross remains as beloved an artist now as she was in the 1960s.

Further Reading
Ross, Diana. Secrets of a Sparrow. New York: Villard, 1993.
Taraborrelli, J. Randy. Call Her Miss Ross: The Unauthorized Biography of Diana Ross. New York: Birch Lane Press, 1989.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Double Platinum (1999). Columbia/Tristar, DVD/VHS, 1999.
Forever, Diana. Motown, CD set, 1993.
Lady Sings the Blues (1972). Paramount, VHS, 1996.
The Wiz (1978). Universal Studios, DVD/VHS, 1999/1998.

JUDY GARLAND

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GARLAND, JUDY (Frances Ethel Gumm) (1922–1969) Singer, Actress

On film, Judy Garland largely defined the Hollywood musical during its heyday in the 1930s and 1940s. Onstage, she emerged as one of the most dynamic performers of the 20th century, earning a legion of fans whose ardor for Garland has scarcely diminished since her death in 1969.

The youngest of three sisters, she was born Frances Ethel Gumm in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on June 10, 1922. Her father managed a movie theater, where he sang between films, accompanied on the piano by Frances’s mother. When still a toddler, Frances and her older siblings also began per forming for moviegoers as the Gumm Sisters.The act continued to play local theaters after the family moved to southern California in 1927. Placed in a theatrical school by her ambitious mother, Frances soon became the group’s star, singled out as the “little girl with the great big voice.” In 1934 while performing in Chicago, the singing Gumms adopted the name Garland, perhaps at the suggestion of vaudeville comedian George Jessel. A year later, Frances herself decided to change her first name to “Judy” after the title of a popular song. As her reputation grew, Judy was invited to audition for movie studio head Louis Mayer in 1936. Without a screen test, he signed her to a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM),which immediately set about grooming her for stardom. Her first screen appearance was in a short titled Every Sunday (1936), in which she appeared with fellow teenage singing sensation Deanna Durbin. Unsure how best to use Garland, MGM then loaned her out to Twentieth Century-Fox for the campus comedy Pigskin Parade (1936). In her next movie, Broadway Melody of 1938 (1937), she caught the attention of all Hollywood. Stealing the movie from stars ELEANOR POWELL and RobertTaylor, Garland memorably performed a love song to a photograph of movie heartthrob Clark Gable to the tune of “You Made Me Love You.” The music was arranged by Roger Edens, a vocal coach and composer who would have a long, fruitful working relationship with Garland.

Her next great screen role was the one for which she is still best known—Dorothy in the classic musical film The Wizard of Oz (1939). Although the movie now seems inconceivable without Garland, she won the coveted part only because MGM could not get its first and second choices, child star SHIRLEY TEMPLE and Garland’s former costar Deanna Durbin. In another irony, her performance of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”—which later became her signature song—was nearly cut from the film at the last minute because the studio feared the song was too melancholy for a children’s film. Despite their worries, both Garland and the song were embraced by the public. For her work in Oz, she received her only Academy Award—a special Oscar for the best juvenile performance of the year.

Garland spent much of her late teens starring in two popular series of films with former schoolmate Mickey Rooney. She appeared in three “Andy Hardy” movies as Andy’s spirited but somewhat insecure pal Betsy Blake. Garland also shared star billing with Rooney in four films of the “Babes” series of lighthearted, frivolous musicals. In Babes in Arms (1939), Strike Up the Band (1940), Babes on Broadway (1941), and Girl Crazy (1943), they played would-be performers inspiring their friends to “put on a show. "Offscreen, Garland was far from the happy girl next door she so often played on film. Her boss, Louis Mayer, and her mother (who Garland later called “the real Wicked Witch of the West”) dominated the young star, pushing her to meet a r elentless schedule of filmmaking, recording, radioperformances, and personal appearances. As a result of the stress, Garland developed insomnia. To help her sleep, she was given barbiturates. To help her wake up and maintain her weight, she was given amphetamines. By the end of her teens, Garland was addicted to pills. Despite her difficult personal life, Garland did much of her best film work during the 1940s. She appeared in a string of popular musicals including For Me and My Gal (costarring with Gene Kelly in his screen debut, 1942), The Harvey Girls (1946),and the classic Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), on the set of which she first met director Vincente Minnelli. In 1945 she wed Minnelli after dissolving her marriage of four years to composer David Rose.

The couple had one child, LIZA MINNELLI, who would grow up to become an accomplished performer in her own right. Minnelli went on to direct Garland in The Clock (1945), a romantic drama, and The Pirate (1947), a Cole Porter musical that reteamed her with Kelly. By this time, however, her workinghabits had grown erratic. Her drug addiction, combined with an ever-present insecurity about her talents, made her chronically late and often too frightened to leave her trailer. After filming ThePirate, Garland was briefiy confined to a mental institution before returning to the screen in still another successful musical, Easter Parade (1948), opposite Fred Astaire. She was set to star again with Astaire in The Barkleys of Broadway (1949), but because of her mental instability, she was replaced by Astaire’s old dance partner GINGER ROGERS. Her fragile condition also lost her leads in the films Annie Get Your Gun (1950) and Show Boat (1951), musical properties bought by MGM with Garland in mind.

In 1950 Garland had hit with Summer Stock (1950), in which she performed “Get Happy,” a song that became a popular part of her repertoire. However, on the set of her next movie, Royal Wedding (1951), her difficult behavior compelled MGM to fire their star. Soon afterward, she made a highly publicized suicide attempt, the first of several. With no offers from other studios, Garland, with the help of agent Sid Luft, began to perform in concert. Luft booked her for an astoundingly successful run at the Palladium in London, followed by an even greater triumph at New York’s Palace Theater. She broke box-office records during her 19-week engagement, which won her a Tony Award. Her concerts also earned Garland one of the most devoted followings a singer has ever enjoyed. Singing many of the songs she made famous in her films, Garland created a sense of intimacy with her audiences with her emotionally intense performances.

Divorced from Minnelli in 1951, Garland married Luft the next year. (The couple would have two children, Lorna and Joey.) Soon after their marriage, the couple established their own produc tion company at Warner Brothers in order to make A Star Is Born (1954). A musical remake of the 1937 film of the same name, the movie told the show-business story of a rising young star who eclipses her husband, a once-famous actor caught in the grip of alcoholism. The melodrama inspired perhaps Garland’s most stirring dramatic performance. She was nominated for an Academy Award for best actress, but lost, possibly because Hollywood had trouble forgiving her for her past temperamental behavior. In her next film, Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), her brief role earned her another Oscar nomination, this time for best supporting actress.

After A Star Is Born, Garland returned to the concert stage, although ill health often interfered with her work. During one of several comebacks, however, she turned in possibly her greatest performance on April 23, 1961, at New York’s Carnegie Hall. The live recording of the concert sold more than 2 million copies and brought her two Grammy Awards. In September 1963, Garland made her debut in her own variety show on television. The programs varied in quality, though some episodes (such as one in which Garland sang with the then largely unknown BARBRA STREISAND) contain excellent performances. Nevertheless, the show failed to find an audience and was canceled before finishing a season.

In need of money, Garland went back to singing in concert, with mixed results. After a bitter custody battle, she divorced Luft in 1965 and married actor Mark Herron the same year. They separated after six months and divorced in 1967. Two years later, Garland wed for the fifth and last time, marrying discotheque owner Mickey Deans. While on tour in London, Deans found Garland collapsed in her hotel room on June 22, 1969. She died at 47 from an apparently accidental overdose of sleeping pills. The enormous impact she had had on American culture was evident at the outpouring of grief from her devoted fans. More than 20,000 came to her funeral to pay their last respects.

Further Reading
Clarke, Gerald. Get Happy: The Life of Judy Garland. New York: Random House, 2000.
Edwards, Anne. Judy Garland. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1975.
Frank, Gerold. Judy. New York: Da Capo Press, 1999.
Shipman, David. Judy Garland: The Secret Life of an American Legend. New York: Hyperion, 1993.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Broadway Melody of 1938 (1937). MGM/UA, VHS, 1992.
The Judy Garland Show Collection (1963). Pioneer Video, DVD set, 1999.
Meet Me in St. Louis (1945). Warner Home Video, VHS, 2000.
A Star Is Born (1954). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 2000.
The Wizard of Oz (1939). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 1999.

KATHARINE HEPBURN

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HEPBURN, KATHARINE (1907 or 1909– ) Actress

During her 62-year film career, Katharine Hepburn embodied the independent American woman both onscreen and off. Born in Hartford, Connecticut, on May 12 in 1907 or 1909, she was one of six children in a well-to-do New England family. From an early age, her parents encouraged her to think for herself and stand up for what she believed. Her mother was a wellregarded suffragist, while her father, a physician, was an early advocate for educating the public about venereal disease.

Katharine received an excellent private school education before enrolling at Bryn Mawr College, the alma mater of both her mother and her grandmother. By the time she graduated in 1928, she had decided to become an actress. In a 1992 interview, she explained that she chose her profession for no other reason than “I wanted to be famous.” In 1928, Hepburn married the socially prominent Ludlow Ogden Smith. She wrote in her 1991 autobiography that she was “an absolute pig” in her dealings with Smith. The couple separated after only three weeks, although they were not divorced until 1934. Hepburn never married again.

With the help of acting coaches, she gradually moved from summer stock to Broadway. In 1932, she played the role of a scantily-clad Amazon queen in the satire The Warrior’s Husband. David O. Selznick offered her a contract with RKO. Citing this as the first overture made to her by Hollywood, Hepburn later quipped, “They didn’t like me until I got into a leg show.” Ambivalent about film, she asked for an outrageous salary of $1,500 a week. When RKO unexpectedly agreed to her terms, she set off for Los Angeles. Hepburn made her film debut in A Bill of Divorcement (1932), opposite John Barrymore. The movie paired her with director George Cukor, with whom she would work on many of her best films. Though her acting was unpolished, she emerged from the movie a promising new talent. After suffering a popular disappointment with Christopher Strong (1933), she became a star with her third film, Morning Glory (1933), the story of an aspiring actress. The movie won Hepburn the first of three best actress Oscars.

Naturally thin and athletic, Hepburn had an aristocratic beauty unusual in 1930s Hollywood. She had her greatest successes in the decade playing assertive heroines (Little Women, 1933; Stage Door, 1937) and eccentric socialites (Bringing Up Baby, 1938; Holiday, 1938). However, her studio, RKO, seemed to have little confidence in her future. Irritated by their lack of interest in building her career, Hepburn attempted a return to theater in a disastrous production of The Lake (1934). The play was a commercial fiop, and Hepburn’s performance was critically scathed. Famously, theater critic Dorothy Parker wrote that in the play Hepburn ran “the gamut of emotion, from A to B.”In 1938, RKO wanted Hepburn to star in Mother Carey’s Chickens, a melodrama about the struggles of a poor farm family. Feeling her studio was placing her in projects unsuitable to her talents, she bought out her contract for more than $200,000. Hepburn then returned to the stage, this time in a comedy especially tailored for her by Philip Barry, who had written the play on which her film Holiday was based. Titled The Philadelphia Story, Barry’s new play focused on Tracy Lord, a spoiled socialite who needed to learn to respect human weakness before she could find love. The production, in which Hepburn had invested, was an enormous hit. Controlling the movie rights herself, she sold them to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) at a profit with the stipulation that the film version had to star her under Cukor’s direction. The resulting movie was a great commercial and critical success that brought Hepburn back to Hollywood’s A-list.

Her next film at MGM was Woman of the Year (1942), her first of nine movies costarring Spencer Tracy. The comedy dealt with the relationship between two reporters, casting Hepburn as an accomplished professional as her movies with Tracy often did. In both comedy and drama, they usually played a couple who constantly sparred with one another, all the while exploring the things that drive men and woman together and apart. Among their most effective pairings were Adam’s Rib (1949), in which Hepburn was cast as a prominent lawyer, and Pat and Mike (1952), in which she had the chance to display her athletic talent while playing a professional athlete. Offscreen, Hepburn and Tracy had a love affair, which they succeeded in keeping from the public eye for many years. Tracy had separated from his wife before meeting Hepburn but stayed married throughout their 25-year relationship.

By the 1950s, as Hepburn moved into her 40s, she was no longer cast as the spirited socialite or professional woman. Instead, her independence took on a more negative light. Hepburn delivered excellent performances in The African Queen (1951) and Summertime (1955), though in both romances she played a somewhat priggish spinster. She also increasingly portrayed eccentrics in films such as Suddenly, Last Summer (1959). The 1960s, however, brought Hepburn several memorable roles. She had perhaps her greatest critical triumph in Long Day’s Journey Into Night (1962), in which she starred as the drug-addicted matriarch of Eugene O’Neill’s autobiographical play. Hepburn also had popular successes with Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967) and The Lion in Winter (1968), for which she won her second and third Oscars.

Hepburn continued to act in the 1970s, though appropriate vehicles proved harder to find. She again collaborated with George Cukor in Love Among the Ruins (1975), a ade-for-television romance that coupled Hepburn with Laurence Olivier and won her an Emmy Award. Other television roles included an adaptation of Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie (1972) and a remake of The Corn Is Green (1979), her final work directed by Cukor.

Hepburn had less success on the big screen. Her most prominent film of the 1970s, Rooster Cogburn, had little to recommend it except the novelty of seeng her costar with the legendary John Wayne, in one of his final film appearances. However, a 1981 pairing with another acting great, Henry Fonda, brought Hepburn her last substantial role. In the film On Golden Pond, Hepburn played the stalwart wife of Fonda’s aging professor. For her performance, Hepburn won her fourth best actress Oscar, a record that has yet to be surpassed.

After appearing in a small role in Love Affair (1994), Hepburn retired from film, leaving behind a legacy of 47 movies. Much of her work, particularly her performances from the 1930s and 1940s, remains fresh, largely because Hepburn and the characters she portrayed were far ahead of their time. Decades before the idea of the liberated woman was widely accepted, Hepburn had consistently played the part—both in film and in life. In a fitting tribute to her infiuence on American culture, a 1999 American Film Institute poll of leading critics named Katharine Hepburn the greatest female star of the movies.

Further Reading
Hepburn, Katharine. Me: Stories of My Life. New York: Knopf, 1991.
Leaming, Barbara. Katharine Hepburn. New York: Crown Publishers, 1995.
Ryan, Joal. Katharine Hepburn: A Stylish Life. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Adam’s Rib (1949). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 2000.
Bringing Up Baby (1938). Turner Home Video, VHS, 1997.
On Golden Pond (1982). Artisan Entertainment, DVD/VHS, 1998.
The Philadelphia Story (1940). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 2000.

SHIRLEY TEMPLE (Shirley Jane Temple Black)

2010-06-04T05:42:00.001-07:00

TEMPLE, SHIRLEY (Shirley Jane Temple Black) (1928– ) Actress, Singer, Dancer

The most successful child performer in Hollywood history, Shirley Jane Temple was born in Santa Monica, California, on April 23, 1928. Determined to make Shirley a star, her mother enrolled her in dance lessons when she was three. Two years later, Shirley was signed to a contract with a small movie studio, Educational Pictures. She sang and danced in two series of shorts, Baby Burlesks and rolics of Youth. Temple later remembered how her mother, before each take, would yell “Sparkle!” as “a code word meaning concentrate.”Shirley’s early efforts earned her contract with Fox paying $150 a week. In 1934, she was cast in Carolina, the first of eight features she would film that year. Among them was Stand Up and Cheer, in which she stole the picture singing and dancing to “Baby Takes a Bow.” Its popularity led to Little Miss Marker, her first starring role. Also in 1934, she sang her signature song, “On the Good Ship Lollipop,” in Bright Eyes and danced possibly her most famous routine with veteran tapper Bill “Bojangles” Robinson in The Little Colonel. Filmgoers immediately embraced Shirley Temple as their favorite star. In the desperate years of the Great Depression, the cute and confident Temple became an icon, whose constant cheeriness inspired a comforting optimism that better times were ahead. In many of her films, her character’s simple wisdom helped the adults around her deal with their problems. This formula earned Temple the nickname “Little Miss Fix-It” from movie industry insiders.

Temple’s costars inevitably admired, however begrudgingly, her astounding professionalism. Though only five years old when she was thrust into movie stardom, she was able to master complex song-and-dance routines far faster than most of her adult partners. An amazingly quick study, she also memorized not only her own lines but all the other actors’ as well. Actress Alice Faye once recalled, “She knew everyone’s dialogue. If you forgot a line, she gave it to you. We all hated her for that.”Only a year after her feature debut, Temple won a special miniature-sized Oscar for her “outstanding contribution to screen entertainment.” Her studio, which had merged with Twentieth Century, also appreciated her outstanding contribution to its bottom line. The $30 million Temple’s pictures earned for Twentieth Century-Fox kept the fiedging studio afioat.

As the number-one box-office star between 1935 and 1938, Temple received a salary of $10,000 a week. She earned even more from a series of lucrative endorsements. Merchandise featuring her likeness became a significant industry. Nearly every little American girl in the late 1930s had a Shirley Temple doll or coloring book. Wanting to cash in on the Shirley Temple phenomenon, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) tried to convince Twentieth Century-Fox to loan out its greatest star for MGM’s musical extravaganza The Wizard of Oz (1939). When Temple’s studio refused, MGM had to settle for the up-and-coming JUDY GARLAND instead. Few could see then that as Garland’s star rose, Temple’s would quickly fall. In 1940, she starred in her own musical fantasy, The Blue Bird, which proved to be her first substantial box-office failure.

As Temple moved into her teens, she tried to reconnect with her audience, who seemed to lose interest in her as she aged. She appeared in 15 films during the 1940s, but as a minor player rather than a star. Temple also struggled in her personal life. In 1945, she married John Agar, who subsequently became a film actor. They had one child, Susan, before his heavy drinking led them to divorce in 1950. The same year, Temple met and married California businessman Charles Black and retired from the movie business.

Now calling herself Shirley Temple Black, she moved with her husband to San Francisco, where they raised Susan and two children of their own, Charles and Lori. Black largely stayed out of the public eye until 1967 when she ran for Congress as a Republican. Although she was defeated in the primary, her political aspirations caught the attention of President Richard Nixon, who appointed her a United Nations representative. Widely respected for her intelligence, grace, and composure, Black later served as the ambassador to Ghana (1974–76) and Czechoslovakia (1989–92). Despite her distinguished diplomatic career, Shirley Temple Black is still remembered by many as the smiling, curly-haired five-year-old beloved by millions of Americans during one of the country’s darkest periods. Although she has not appeared on film for 50 years, she continues to receive hundreds of fan letters a week.

Further Reading
Black, Shirley Temple. Child Star: An Autobiography. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1988.
Edwards, Anne. Shirley Temple: American Princess. New York: William Morrow, 1988.
Hammontree, Patsy Guy. Shirley Temple Black: A Bio-Bibliography.Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1998.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
The Little Colonel (1935). Twentieth Century-Fox, VHS, 1988.
Little Miss Marker (1934). Universal, VHS, 1996.
Stand Up and Cheer (1934). Twentieth Century-Fox, VHS, 1989.

MARLENE DIETRICH

2010-06-04T05:42:00.000-07:00

DIETRICH ,MARLENE (Maria Magdalena Dietrich) (1901–1992) Actress, Singer

Mysterious and alluring, Marlene Dietrich brought to Hollywood a European sophistication that made her an icon. She was born in Berlin on December 27, 1901, as Maria Magdalena Dietrich. Nicknamed Leni, she trained to become a concert violinist but decided to become an actress instead after injuring her hand.

Sporting bobbed hair and often men’s suits, Dietrich embraced the freewheeling atmosphere of post–World War I Berlin. While studying at Max Reinhardt’s acting school, she sang in cabarets and played small roles in films. Professionally, she called herself Marlene (pronounced Mar-LAY-na), a confiation of her first and middle names. While on the set of Tragedy of Love (1923), she met Rudolf Sieber, a casting assistant. She and Sieber married and had one child, Maria. They soon separated but never divorced, though Dietrich had many affairs with lovers of both sexes during their marriage. By the 1930s, Dietrich had established herself in German film and theater. On the strength of one of her performances, director Josef von Sternberg invited her to star in his film version of Professor Unrath, a novel by Heinrich Mann. The film, Der Blaue Engel (1930), told the story of an amoral nightclub singer, Lola Lola, who uncaringly destroys a pompous professor who has fallen in love with her. As Lola Lola, Dietrich sang her trademark song, “Falling in Love Again,” and created an indelible femme fatale that made film an enormous hit with German audiences. During the filming, Mann predicted, “The success of this film will be found in the naked thighs of Miss Dietrich.”

The film’s English-language version, titled The Blue Angel (1930), became Dietrich’ s ticket to Hollywood. With von Sternberg, she was courted by Paramount, which hoped they could have the same success with Dietrich as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer had with its exotic European beauty, GRETA GARBO. The studio set about giving Dietrich a glamorous new image. She lost 30 pounds, had cosmetic surgery to slim her nose, and possibly had molars removed to make her sunken cheeks even more dramatic. For Paramount, Dietrich made six more films with von Sternberg at the helm. They included Morocco (1930), Dishonored (1931), and Shanghai Express (1932). In these Dietrich–von Sternberg collaborations, Dietrich played variations on the same character, a world-weary woman with no illusions about romance who nevertheless in the end sacrifices all for love. The formula was embraced by American moviegoers, who made Dietrich one of the highest paid stars of the early 1930s.

Dietrich and von Sternberg’s last film, The Devil Is a Woman (1935), failed at the box office. Feeling defeated by the American film industry, von Sternberg returned to Germany. Dietrich stayed on but found her popularity slipping away. After making the disappointing Angel (1937) with director Ernst Lubitsch, Dietrich was labeled by film distributors as “box-office poison.”

Paramount dropped her contract, and she considered permanently returning to Europe to try to revive her career there. Instead, Dietrich took a chance, playing a saloon girl named Frenchy in satire of Westerns titled Destry Rides Again (1939). She approached
the role with enthusiasm, drawing on her cabaret experience to give a first-rate comedy performance. Her old fans enjoyed this new Dietrich, and once again she was considered a major star.

Her comeback, however, was soon interrupted by World War II. Dietrich was invited by Joseph Goebbels to come back to Germany to star in Nazi propaganda films. She refused, instead renouncing the Nazi regime and her German citizenship. During the war, she traveled widely, performing in more than 500 shows for the USO. For her efforts to build troop morale, she was awarded the Medal of Freedom.

After the war, Dietrich returned to Hollywood and acted in films by many of the world’s greatest directors, including Billy Wilder (A Foreign Affair, 1948; Witness for the Prosecution, 1957), Fritz Lang (Rancho Notorious, 1952); and Orson Welles (A Touch of Evil, 1958). Few were profitable, however. By the late 1950s, Dietrich tried to branch out. After two failed attempts of radio shows, she developed a nightclub act, following the example of JUDY GARLAND. Dietrich’s show was a great success and had runs in Las Vegas, New York, and London. She even briefly appeared in Berlin, although many Germans still considered her a traitor for her anti-Nazi stance. Dietrich recast the act as a full-scale musical revue, which ran on Broadway for six weeks in 1967.

Dietrich moved to Paris in 1972. She gave her final live performance in 1975 and appeared in her last film—Just a Gigolo, opposite David Bowie—in 1978. Dietrich also lent her voice, though not her face, to Marlene (1979), a documentary made by her friend, actor Maximilian Schell. She refused to appear on camera, explaining to Schell in the film, “I’ve been photographed to death and I don’t want any more.” On May 6, 1992, Marlene Dietrich died at 90, leaving behind a wealth of celluloid images showing her as wished to be rememberedintriguing, seductive, and always beautiful.

Further Reading
Dietrich, Marlene. Marlene. New York: Grove Press, 1989. Spoto, Donald. Blue Angel: The Life of Marlene Dietrich. New York: Doubleday, 1992.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
The Blue Angel (1930). Madacy Entertainment, VHS, 1997.
Destry Rides Again (1939). Universal, VHS, 1993.
An Evening with Marlene Dietrich (1973). MPI Home Video, VHS, 1999.
A Touch of Evil (1958). Universal, DVD/VHS, 2000.

ARETHA FRANKLIN

2010-06-04T05:41:00.000-07:00

FRANKLIN, ARETHA (1942– ) Singer

Fittingly known as the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin has been the premier female singer of rhythm and blues for more than four decades. Franklin was born on March 25, 1942, in Memphis, Tennessee, but at age two moved with her family to Detroit, Michigan, where she still lives. The fourth of five children, she grew up surrounded by gospel music. Her father, C. L., was the minister of the 4,500-member New Bethel Baptist Church, where her mother, Barbara, often sang. When Aretha was 10, Barbara Franklin died, leaving C. L. as her primary adult infiuence. Aretha sang her first solo at her father’s church when she was 12. She stunned the congregation with her mature and expressive voice. By 14, she had begun recording hymns for Chess Records and traveling with her father’s revival tours. Aretha’s education ended when, at 15, she gave birth to her first child. She would have two more children during her teens.

Taken with the singing of DINAH WASHINGTON, Franklin decided to switch from gospel to the blues. With her father’s blessing, she left for New York in 1960 to seek out a career in secular music. Her demo tape reached Columbia Records executive John Hammond, who called Franklin “the best natural since BILLIE HOLIDAY.” Hammond had signed Holiday to her first record contract and did the same for Franklin. Her albums with Columbia, however, did not provide the best showcase for her talent. To make her more commercial, Hammond reined in her raw and powerful voice in a light jazz nightclub sound. Although she won the Down Beat magazine critic’s poll for the best new vocalist of 1962, Franklin’s Columbia recordings were only moderate successes. When her contract with Columbia elapsed, Franklin signed with Atlantic. She was encouraged to find her own singing style by Ted White, who began acting as her manager after their marriage in 1961. Atlantic allowed Franklin to take an active role in choosing her material and developing its arrangement. The label also sent her to work with world-class musicians at a recording studio in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. The result was a powerful merging of gospel expression with the soul music tradition.

The first song Franklin recorded, “I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You),” went to number one in the spring of 1967. It was only the first in a string of hits. In 1967 and 1968, Franklin released three top 10 albums and six top 10 singles, including “Chain of Fools,” “(You Make Me Feel Like a) Natural Woman,” and “I Say a Little Prayer.” Her signature song became “Respect,” which Franklin claims she never grows tired of singing. In her voice, the Otis Redding song becomes a woman’s demand for her lover to acknowledge her worth and dignity. It was adopted as an anthem by both the civil rights movement and the women’s movement.

Franklin continued to record to popular and critical acclaim. Through 1975, she won at least one Grammy every year. Her success, however, strained her marriage. She and White divorced in 1969 and she had a six-year relationship with her road manager Ken Cunningham, by whom she had a son. She married actor Glynn Turman in 1978; they were divorced in 1984. Franklin suffered another blow in 1979 when her beloved father was shot by a burglar. He remained in a coma for five years before his death in 1984. Emerging from a creative dry spell, Franklin gave her career a boost with her movie-stealing appearance in the hit film The Blues Brothers (1980), which helped introduce her music to a new, younger audience. The same year, she signed with a new company, Arista. After a few modestly successful records, Franklin had one of her biggest hits with “Freeway of Love,” a song from the album Who’s Zooming Who (1985). She also hit the charts in the 1980s with two duets—“Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves” (1985) with Annie Lennox and “I Knew You Were Waiting for Me” with George Michael.

In 1987 Franklin was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the first woman to be so honored. For lifetime achievement, she was also given a special Grammy in 1994, one of 17 she has earned throughout her career. During the 1990s, Franklin began exploring new interests. She established Crown Productions, a television and film production company that optioned Jesse Jackson’s autobiography as its first project.

In 1998, Franklin appeared in The Blues Brothers 2000 and recorded the popular A Rose Is Still A Rose, her first album in seven years. The same year, she sang on the VH1 television special Divas Live. Although she shared a stage with Mariah Carey, Celine Dion, GLORIA ESTEFAN, Carole King, and Shania Twain, it was Franklin’s performance that stopped the show, proving that even among popular music’s royalty she still reigns as the queen. The famously shy Franklin published her own autobiography, Aretha: From These Roots, in 1999. In 2001, she was honored with her own VH1 special, “VH1 Divas Live: The One and Only Aretha Franklin.”

Further Reading
Bego, Mark. Aretha Franklin: Queen of Soul. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989.
Franklin, Aretha, and David Ritz. Aretha: From These Roots. New York: Villard Books, 1999.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Aretha Franklin: The Queen of Soul. WEA/Atlantic, VHS, 1991.
The Very Best of Aretha Franklin, Vol. 1.WEA/Atlantic/Rhino, CD, 1994.
The Very Best of Aretha Franklin, Vol. 2.WEA/Atlantic/Rhino, CD, 1994.

Aretha Franklin discography

Year - Album
1956 - Songs of Faith
1961 - Aretha (with the Ray Bryant Combo)
1962 - The Electrifying Aretha Franklin, The Tender, The Moving, The Swinging Aretha Franklin
1963 - Laughing on the Outside
1964 - Unforgettable: A Tribute to Dinah Washington, Runnin' Out of Fools''
1965 - Yeah!: Aretha Franklin in Person
1966 - Soul Sister
1967 - Take It Like You Give It, I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You, Aretha Franklin's Greatest Hits, Aretha Arrives, Take a Look
1968 - Lady Soul, Aretha Now, Aretha in Paris
1969 - Soul '69, Aretha's Gold
1970 - This Girl's in Love with You, Spirit in the Dark
1971 - Aretha Live at Fillmore West, Aretha's Greatest Hits, Young, Gifted and Black
1972 - Amazing Grace, In the Beginning/The World of Aretha Franklin 1960-1967
1973 - Hey Now Hey (The Other Side of the Sky)
1974 - Let Me in Your Life, With Everything I Feel in Me
1975 - You
1976 - Sparkle, Ten Years of Gold
1977 - Sweet Passion
1978 - Almighty Fire
1979 - La Diva
1980 - Aretha, Aretha Sings the Blues
1981 - Love All the Hurt Away
1982 - Jump to It
1983 - Get It Right
1985 - 30 Greatest Hits, Who's Zoomin' Who?
1986 - Aretha
1987 - One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism
1989 - Through the Storm
1991 - What You See Is What You Sweat
1992 - Queen of Soul: The Atlantic Recordings
1994 - Greatest Hits (1980-1994) , The Very Best of Aretha Franklin: The 60's, The Very Best of Aretha Franklin: The 70's
1996 - Aretha Sings Standards
1997 - Love Songs
1998 - The Delta Meets Detroit: Aretha's Blues, A Rose Is Still a Rose
1999 - Greatest Hits
2001 - Aretha Franklin Greatest Hits
2002 - Queen in Waiting: Columbia Years 1960-1965 , Respect: The Very Best Of Aretha Franklin
2003 - So Damn Happy
2007 - Jewels in the Crown: All-Star Duets with the Queen , Rare & Unreleased Recordings from the Golden Reign of the Queen of Soul
2008 - This Christmas, Aretha
2009 - A Woman, Fallin' Out of Love

IDA LUPINO

2010-06-04T05:39:00.000-07:00

LUPINO, IDA (1918–1995) Actress, Director

A leading actress in American film noir, Ida Lupino today is best remembered as one of the few female movie directors of the 1940s and 1950s. She was born on February 4, 1918, in London, England, into a family whose show-business roots could be traced to the Renaissance. According to Hollywood legend, Lupino secured her first film role when she accompanied her mother, musical comedy actress Connie Emerald, to an audition. Ida was cast in the movie, while her mother walked away empty-handed. While still in her teens, Lupino signed a contract with Paramount. Following a string of ingenue roles, she found her greatest screen roles in the early 1940s, playing determined, often desperate women in popular melodramas, most notably They Drive By Night (1940) and High Sierra (1941). As her star was rising, she married actor Louis Hayward in 1938. The couple divorced seven years later.

Though Lupino was enjoying a successful acting career, by the mid-1940s she was looking to work behind the camera. In a 1945 interview, she stated, “I see myself developing new talent. . .. I am genuinely more interested in the talent of others than I am in my own.” With this in mind, she founded Emerald Productions (later named Filmmakers) with her second husband, Collier Young, whom she married in 1948. On the production company’s first effort, Not Wanted (1949), Lupino was credited as producer and coscreenwriter. She had also, however, taken over the director’s chair, after the credited director, Elmer Clifton, had a heart attack.

Filmmakers Productions made seven more features, which Lupino and Young cowrote and coproduced. Six were also directed by Lupino. Lupino’s films, made on tight budgets with no stars, were distinguished by the tough social issues they addressed, including single motherhood, female sexuality, and bigamy. Unlike most Hollywood fare, they not only presented modern problems but also offered no easy answers to how they might be solved. Although none of Lupino’s features were highly profitable, she did produce two films now considered classics of film noirThe Bigamist (1953) and The Hitch-Hiker (1953).

After a misguided attempt to become a film distribution company, Filmmakers was dissolved in 1954. Lupino subsequently directed only one other film, The Trouble with Angels (1966). During the 1960s, however, she found a new career in directing episodes of television series. With a reputation for working quickly, Lupino directed more than 100 programs, including episodes of The Donna Reed Show, Gilligan’s Island, and Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Somewhat to her dismay, Lupino was eventually typed as an action director and was most often sought after to work on westerns, such as Have Gun, Will Travel and Gunsmoke.

Lupino also appeared on television as an actress. Her most notable role was as the costar of the short-lived series Mr. Adams and Eve (1957–58), which was also starred Howard Duff, whom she married after divorcing Young in 1950. (Lupino and Duff had one daughter but were also divorced in 1984.) From time to time, Lupino guest-starred on series as well, including her final acting performance on an episode of Charlie’s Angels in the mid-1970s.

In her final years, she lived to see her directorial career reexamined by film scholars in the 1970s and 1980s. Although she resisted being seen as a feminist director, she enjoyed that, fitting with her own preferences, her directing came to overshadow her more publicized success as an actress. Lupino died on August 3, 1995, in Burbank, California.

Further Reading
Donati, William. Ida Lupino: A Biography. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1996.
Kuhn, Annette, ed. Queen of the ‘B’s: Ida Lupino: Behind the Camera.Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1995.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
They Drive by Night (1940). Warner Home Video, VHS, 2000. (V).
The Hitch-hiker (1952). Kino Video, DVD/VHS, 2000/1997.
Biography: Ida Lupino. A&E Entertainment, VHS, 1998.

TAMMY WYNETTE

2010-01-08T08:21:00.000-08:00

WYNETTE, TAMMY (Virginia Wynette Pugh) (1942–1998) Singer

In the late 1960s, such hits as “Stand by Your Man” and “D-I-V-O-R-C-E” earned Tammy Wynette the title “First Lady of Country Music.”On May 5, 1942, she was born Virginia Wynette Pugh in Itawamba County, Mississippi. When she was only nine months old, she experienced the first of many personal tragedies, the death of her father from a brain tumor. Five years later, Virginia’s mother remarried. Because of tensions between Virginia and her stepfather, she spent much of her youth on her grandparents’ farm, where she was often called upon to pick cotton. Exhausted by farm work, she was determined “to get away as fast as I could,” as Wynette later remembered. Just months shy of her high school graduation, she dropped out to marry Euple Byrd in 1959. For five years, they struggled to make ends meet while living in a shack with no electricity. When the couple separated in 1964, Virginia Pugh was pregnant with her third daughter. Soon after birth, the baby contracted spinal meningitis, leaving Pugh with $6,000 in medical bills. Desperate to earn a decent living, Pugh moved to Birmingham, Alabama, where she worked as a beautician. At the same time, she harbored a grander ambition—to become a country singer. Pugh’s first step was winning a regular spot on The Country Boy Eddie Show, a local television program. With the host’s encouragement, Pugh moved her family to Nashville, Tennessee, to further her career.

Pugh went door to door, visiting every record company lining the city’s Music Row, but no one seemed impressed by her. After a battery of rejections, she met Billy Sherrill at Epic Records. The oung producer had been looking for a female soloist, then an oddity in country music. Sherrill signed Pugh to Epic and christened her “Tammy Wynette,” taking her first name from the popular film Tammy (1965) starring Debbie Reynolds. In 1966, Wynette’s recording of the Johnny Paycheck song “Apartment No. 9” became her first hit. It was followed by a string of successful singles, including “D-I-V-O-R-C-E” and “I Don’t Want to Play House,” for which she won a Grammy Award in 1967. She received her second Grammy two years later for “Stand by Your Man,” which, sold more than 6 million copies and became her signature song. The song drew criticism from feminists, who interpreted its lyrics as encouraging women to accept any type of treatment from their spouses, including physical abuse. Wynette was deeply offended by the suggestion, maintaining “the song doesn’t say anything at all about being a doormat.” In fact, Wynette had her own difficulties standing by her man. In 1965, the year she divorced her first husband, she met Don Chapel, whom she married two years later. As her star rose, Wynette developed a close friendship with her childhood idol, country star George Jones. After Wynette’s marriage to Chapel was annulled, she and Jones married in 1969.

The couple worked together on a series of recordings, including the classic duets “We’re Going to Hold On” and “Near You.” Many of their collaborations seemed to chronicle their own stormy romance, also a favorite subject of tabloids and music industry gossip. As Wynette later assessed, “I was naggin’ and he was nippin’,” referring to Jones’s addiction to alcohol and cocaine. Wynette and Jones divorced in 1975, though they continued to record together for several more years. After a 44-day marriage to realtor Michael Tomlin and a brief affair with actor Burt Reynolds, Wynette finally settled down with George Richley, a singer-songwriter who became her manager. Married in 1978, the couple remained together until Wynette’s death. Beginning in the late 1970s, Wynette suffered a string of personal setbacks. In 1975, much of her house was destroyed by a fire. Three years later, she was kidnapped at a Nashville shopping mall and severely beaten. Her captor was never arrested. Wynette also found herself bankrupt in 1988 after investing her money in several unsuccessful real estate ventures in Florida.

Worst of all, Wynette suffered from serious health problems. Chronic infiammation of her bile ducts led to 17 operations. In constant pain, Wynette began abusing prescription painkillers. She eventually had to enter the Betty Ford Clinic in Washington, D.C., for treatment for her addiction. Despite her ailments, Wynette continued to perform and record. In addition to recording duets with rock artists such as Sting and Elton John, she had a surprise international dance hit in 1992 with “Justified and Ancient,” which she performed with the British synth-pop band KLF. The next year, Wynette joined fellow country legends LORETTA LYNN and DOLLY PARTON on the successful album Honky Tonk Angels. She also reunited with Jones on the album One in 1995. To the shock of her fans, Tammy Wynette died in her sleep on April 6, 1998, at the age of 55. A blood clot that reached her lungs was given as the cause of death, but three of her daughters in a lawsuit alleged that painkillers contributed to her demise. Just five months after her death, Wynette was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.

Further Reading
Daly, Jackie, with Tom Carter. Tammy Wynette: A Daughter
Recalls Her Mother’s Tragic Life and Death. New York: Putnam, 2000.
Wynette, Tammy, with Joan Dew. Stand By Your Man. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1979.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Honky Tonk Angels. Sony/Columbia, CD, 1993.
Tammy Wynette in Concert (1986). Rhino, VHS, 1995.
Tears of Fire: The 25th Anniversary Collection. Sony/Columbia, CD set, 1992.

ANNA MAY WONG

2010-01-08T08:01:00.000-08:00

WONG, ANNA MAY (1907–1961) Actress

Most often cast as an “Oriental villainess,” Chinese-American actress Anna May Wong was born in Los Angeles’s Chinatown on January 3, 1907. Her parents ran a laundry where Anna May worked after school, though she much preferred spending her time at early movie theaters known as nickelodeons. Unbeknownst to her conservative parents, at 12 she first appeared as a film extra in The Red Lantern (1914). She continued her work in secret for two more years. She finally confessed about her new career to her father when she obtained her first real role in Bits of Life (1921). Wong’s high cheekbones and straight black bangs made her a striking presence on screen. But it was not until she compellingly played a Mongol slave girl in the 1924 extravaganza The Thief of Bagdad that she earned international fame. In the late 1920s, she was widely sought for roles in mystery films, many of which were then set in urban Chinatown districts. Although appreciating the work, Wong resented that these films generally presented Asians only as villains, employing the crudest of stereotypes.

By 1928, she was so disgusted by the roles she was offered that she abandoned Hollywood for Europe. As Wong later told a London interviewer, “Why should [Asian characters] always scheme, rob, killfi I got so weary of it all.” In Europe, she found more satisfying parts in the German film Song (1928) and the English movie Piccadilly (1930). Wong also made her stage debut opposite Laurence Olivier in The Circle of Chalk, a play based on a Chinese legend that was written specifically for Wong. As talkies replaced silents, Wong also learned to speak French and German fiuently in order to keep her film career alive. Wong’s return to the United States in late 1930 ushered in the height of her film career. Although she had no problem finding film roles, the negative portrayals of Asian women continued to disturb her. Her greatest disappointment came with the casting of the film adaptation of Pearl Buck’s novel The Good Earth (1937). Wong lobbied hard for the lead role as the selfiess, stoic O-Lan. The part, however, was given to Luise Rainer, a German actress who won an Academy Award for her performance. Instead of the lead, Wong was offered the part of a scheming concubine. Insulted, she refused to appear in the film at all.

With the Good Earth fiasco fresh in her mind, Wong happily left the United States to visit China for the first time. Half hoping she could restart her career there, she was surprised to find herself vilified by Chinese officials for the stereotyped Chinese characters she had played. When she explained these were the only parts available to her, she was able to fend off further criticisms. Yet, disheartened by the experience, Wong returned home after 10 months. In Hollywood, she resumed her movie career, most notably playing a high-minded detective in the action film Daughter of Shanghai (1937). As the United States entered World War II, however, she found herself less in demand as an actress than as a consultant. As war movies came in vogue, producers were eager to hire her to teach Caucasian actors to act more convincingly Asian. Disgusted by this new indignity, Wong largely retired from film work. She only appeared in one more film and a few undistinguished television programs before her death of a heart attack on February 3, 1961.

Further Reading
“Anna May Wong.” In Notable Asian Americans. Detroit: Gale Research, 1995.
Gee, Emma. “Wong, Anna May.” In Notable American Women: The Modern Period, 744–745. Edited by Barbara Sicherman and Carol Hurd Green. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, 1980.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Shanghai Express (1932). Universal, VHS, 1993.
The Thief of Bagdad (1924). Image Entertainment, DVD, 1998.

OPRAH WINFREY

2010-01-08T07:54:00.000-08:00

WINFREY ,OPRAH (Orpah Winfrey) (1954– ) Talk Show Host, Actress

The phenomenal success of Oprah Winfrey’s daytime talk show has made her the wealthiest and most powerful woman in the American entertainment industry. Born on January 29, 1954, she was raised in rural poverty in Kosciusko, Mississippi, on a pig farm owned by her maternal grandparents. Her parents never married. She was originally given the name Orpah from the biblical Book of Ruth, but when it proved to difficult to pronounce, her relatives rechristened her Oprah. Oprah’s grandmother taught her to read when she was only two and a half. By the time she was ready to enter kindergarten, she was literate enough to write a note convincing her teacher that she belonged in first grade. Despite her academic promise, Oprah’s early childhood was otherwise grim. She later commented that “it was very lonely out in the country” and that her grandmother “could beat me for days and never get tired.”Oprah found little relief when at six she was sent to live with her mother, Vernita, at a rooming house in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Vernita worked as a housecleaner and was rarely at home. Eager for her attention, Oprah became rebellious, especially after she was sexually abused by a teenage cousin when she was nine. Vernita had so little control over her daughter that she considered placing her in a detention center. Instead, she sent Oprah to live with her father, Vernon, in Nashville, Tennessee, when she was 14. Soon after arriving, Oprah confessed that she was pregnant, a condition she had managed to hide for seven months. She gave birth prematurely, and the baby died two weeks later.

A successful business owner and city councilman, Vernon imposed strict discipline on Oprah, which she later credited with putting her on the right path in life. She was inspired to meet his high expectations of her, particularly in her school work. Oprah became an excellent student and an enthusiastic member of her high school’s drama and debate clubs. Her love of reading was also nurtured by her stepmother, Zelma. She took Oprah to the library every two weeks to pick out five books. Oprah was then expected to read them and write a report on each for her parents. While still a teenager, Oprah began her broadcasting career. After being named Miss Fire Prevention, she impressed the management of WVOL radio with her poise and speaking ability. The station hired her as a part-time newscaster in 1971. The same year, while attending Tennessee State University, she won the titles Miss Black Nashville and Miss Black Tennessee. The exposure led to her first television job. At 19, she was hired as a news reporter and anchor for WTVF, Nashville’s CBS affiliate. Before graduating from college, Winfrey was lured to Baltimore, where she anchored the news at WJZ-TV. Her frequent on-air mispronunciations led to her firing, although the station gave her a second chance as the cohost of a morning talk show, People Are Talking. Winfrey has said that “the day I did that talk show, I felt like I’d come home.” The audience embraced Winfrey with equal enthusiasm. Although she brought the show excellent ratings, the station continually criticized her appearance, particularly her weight. In their efforts to mold Winfrey’s image, the management sent her to a New York City hair salon, where a botched permanent left her bald. The experience made her vow never to listen to image consultants again.

In 1984, Winfrey took a new job as the host of AM Chicago (soon retitled The Oprah Winfrey Show), which was then last in the ratings. Within four months, the show was leading in its time slot, besting even the show hosted by talk show pioneer Phil Donahue. One of her fans was composer Quincy Jones—a producer of the film adaptation of Alice Walker’s novel The Color Purple (1985). He invited Winfrey to audition for the role of Sofia, a powerful African-American woman whose spirit is broken by prejudice. Her acting debut earned her an Academy Award nomination. In 1986, The Oprah Winfrey Show was syndicated nationally. Within five months, it became the number-one talk show, drawing more than 10 million viewers a day. Its success owed much to Winfrey’s quick wit and empathy. As guests confessed their personal problems, Winfrey often held their hands and cried as they cried. She, too, made confessions. In 1991, on an episode about child abuse, Winfrey discussed the abuse she had suffered at the hands of male relatives. Her audience also became involved in her continual struggle with her weight. In 1988, thousands of viewers went on the liquid diet that allowed her to lose 67 pounds. After regaining the weight, she again inspired her audience to exercise as she advocated a responsible diet and physical activity as the keys to weight control. Of equal fascination to her fans has been Oprah’s romantic life. Since 1993, she has been engaged to Chicago businessman Steadman Graham. Her hesitancy to marry has fueled speculations that she is gay. I 1997, she answered the rumors with a public statement declaring that she is heterosexual. As Winfrey’s infiuence grew, so did her fortune. With her show owned by her own corporationHarpo Productions (Oprah spelled backward), Winfrey was earning about $80 million a year by 1990. Her personal worth is estimated at more than $725 million.

Her finances secure, Winfrey began producing movies dealing with subjects of importance to her. In 1989, she produced and starred in the television film The Women of Brewster Place, a drama based on the 1982 novel by Gloria Naylor about seven African-American women living in a tenement. The movie spawned a short-lived television series, in which Winfrey also appeared. Harpo has also produced There Are No Children Here (1993), Beloved (1998), and Tuesdays with Morrie (1999). On September 17, 1996, Winfrey announced on her show that she wanted “to get the country reading.” She introduced viewers to Oprah’s Book Club, a monthly feature during which an entire show would be devoted to discussing a book of Winfrey’s choosing. Within a month after making her first selection, Deep End of the Ocean (1996), more than 750,000 copies of the novel were in print. Oprah’s Book Club has since made bestsellers of dozens of titles and made Winfrey herself the most powerful book marketer in the United States.

After the 1997 death of Princess Diana, Winfrey reevaluated her life and career. As a result, she recast her show, calling it “change-your-life TV.”By emphasizing self-help and advice, she tried to make the program “a catalyst for people beginning to think more insightfully about themselves.” Among the show’s new features was Oprah’s Angel Network, a campaign for donations of spare change for college scholarships. In 1998, the charity collected more than $1 million from viewers, which Winfrey matched penny for penny. She has also made substantial donations to Morehouse College, the United Negro College Fund, and many other charities.

In anticipation of ending her talk show in 2002, Winfrey, in partnership with television executives Marcy Carsey and Geraldine Lay bourne, formed Oxygen Media to create a female-oriented cable channel. In association with Hearst magazines, she also launched O, The Oprah Magazine, in April 2000. Targeted to women in their 30s, the glossy magazine features articles on family, health, spirituality, and books. The first issue was so successful that Hearst had to go back to press for 500,000 copies after the initial run of 1 million quickly sold out. Attesting to Winfrey’s unending ability to attract an audience, Winfrey herself appears on the cover of each issue.

Further Reading
Mair, George. Oprah Winfrey: The Real Story. Revised edition. Secaucus, N.J.: Carol Publishing Group, 1998.
Pasternak, Judith Mahoney. Oprah. New York: Metro Books, 1999.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Beloved (1998). Buena Vista Home Entertainment, DVD, 1999.
The Color Purple (1985). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 1997/1999.
The Women of Brewster Place (1989). Xenon, DVD/VHS, 2000/1998.

MAE WEST

2010-01-08T07:46:00.000-08:00

WEST, MAE (1893–1980) Actress, Singer

Clever and sultry, Mae West conquered both stage and screen, becoming America’s favorite “sex goddess” of the 1920s and 1930s. Born in Brooklyn, New York, on August 17, 1893, West was the daughter of a former prizefighter and a model. Her mother encouraged her to enter amateur talent contests. Billed as “Baby Mae,” she won her first contest at age eight with a song-and-dance act. Mae was soon in demand for child parts in stage shows. Almost immediately, she began rewriting her roles to better suit her talents, a habit she would practice throughout her performing career. By her teens, Mae was finding work in traveling shows. She briefiy teamed up with Frank Wallace, whom she married in a secret ceremony in 1911. They soon separated, and they divorced in 1942. At 18, West began appearing in musical revues in New York City. She also found success on the vaudeville circuit. Unlike most women in vaudeville, she usually performed as a solo act. Often dressed in satin and fur, she developed a sensual swagger while perfecting her comic gifts. West quickly emerged as a master of the double entendre. Even when she spoke a seemingly innocent line, her audience interpreted it as risqué. As West herself explained, “It wasn’t what I said, but how I said it.”

Disappointed with the roles she was offered, West decided to write her own. After penning three unproduced plays, she finally decided to produce her fourth herself. The play was provocatively titled Sex (1926) as a conscious bid for publicity. Broad sheet newspapers refused to run ads for the play, but the tabloids were plastered with stories about West and her production. She also sent boys all over New York with stickers featuring the play’s title. West later wrote, “If you stopped for a minute when one walked by, why you got a sticker stuck clean across your back, with SEX printed on it.”The play was an enormous success. West starred as Margy Lamont, a former prostitute with a heart of gold. Far from ashamed of her past, Lamont is unrepentant over how she earned the money to pay for her mansion. She jeers at a snobbish socialite, “The only difference between us is that you could afford to give it away.”Despite its racy subject matter, the play ran without incident for 41 weeks, in part because New York’s major was an admitted West fan. While the mayor was out of town, however, the vice mayor ordered a raid on the production. Sex was shut down, and West was arrested. In court, the city failed to prove that the play’s text was obscene. West, though, was found guilty of “corrupting the morals of youth.” Although she was fully clothed, her navel was said to move in an obscene manner during one of her dances. West was sentenced to 10 days in prison, though she was let out after eight for good behavior. She complained about the scratchy prison underwear but gleefully told the press that her jail experience had given her enough material for a dozen more plays. West’s next work, The Drag (1927), was among her most provocative. A comedic plea for tolerance of male homosexuality, it featured a great ball attended by drag queens. The play was produced in Paterson, New Jersey, but was deemed too controversial for Broadway. The next year saw the play that would make her a legend, Diamond Lil (1928). Set in New York’s Bowery, the play featured West as a singer hobnobbing with a variety of underworld figures. Showing an unerring instinct for how best to present herself on stage, West set Diamond Lil in the 1890s. Her full figure was too plump to dress in the slim, linear fiapper style that defined 1920s sexuality. Her physique was ideal, however, for the low-cut, corseted look of Gay Nineties fashions.

The play also showcased West’s own style of humor to its best advantage. As a critic in The New Republic wrote, “it uses every tried and trusted trick, hokum, motive and stage expectation, but always shrewdly.” However old-fashioned the plot, the play offered West plenty of wisecracks. Her favorite targets were sexual repression, hypocrisy, and romantic ideals. To West’s Diamond Lil, sex was nothing but a pleasure to be enjoyed, and the only person a woman could depend on was herself. After a raid shut down her next play, The Pleasure Man (1928), West went on tour with Diamond Lil. In 1932, she welcomed the chance to take on Hollywood, when her friend George Raft got her a small part as his girlfriend in Night After Night. West sparkled in her role, ad-libbing what became one of her most famous lines. After a coatchecker admires her jewelry with “Goodness, what beautiful diamonds,” West replied, “Goodness had nothing to do with it.” The line became the title of her 1959 autobiography.

Excited by its new star, Paramount Studios decided her next film would be an adaptation of Diamond Lil. The studio suggested calling it He Done Her Wrong, but West, offended by the passivity that title implied, insisted it be titled She Done Him Wrong. She also got her way in the selection of her costar—Cary Grant, a handsome actor 10 years her junior whom she spotted on the lot. The film broke box-office records, as did West’s next movie, I’m No Angel, which teamed her again with Grant. These two films brought Grant to stardom, saved Paramount from bankruptcy, and made West the most powerful woman in Hollywood. They also inspired Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America to inaugurate a strict code of what could and could not been seen and heard on screen. West made seven more films during the 1930s and 1940s, but the strict rules of the production code increasingly reined in her risqué humor. She also wore out her welcome with audiences by playing over and over again variations on her Diamond Lil character. By the late 1930s, West had fallen so out of favor that she was considered box-office poison. She had a modest success with My Little Chickadee (1940), costarring W. C. Fields, but by 1943 she was forced to retire from films.

West returned to the stage, first with a misguided new play titled Catherine Was Great (1944), then with a touring revival of Diamond Lil. During the late 1950s, West, now in her 60s, developed a musical comedy revue, in which she shared the stage with a troupe of male bodybuilders. One of her troupe, Paul Novak, became West’s companion for the last 25 years of her life. West’s brand of sexual humor found a new, young audience in the 1960s and 1970s. She tried to capitalize on the renewed interest in her movies by recording three record albums and appearing in two widely reviled films, Myra Breckinridge (1970) and Sextette (1978). At 87, West suffered a stroke. She died three months later, on November 22, 1980. West’s Diamond Lil has since emerged as iconic a film character as Charlie Chaplin’s Little Tramp. Those who have never seen her movies are still familiar with her face, her voice, and her sashay. Even better known are West’s bons mots—from “Come up sometime and see me” to “Peel me a grape”—making her perhaps the most quoted movie star of all time.

Further Reading
Curry, Ramona. Too Much of a Good Thing: Mae West as Cultural Icon. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996.
Leider, Emily Wortis. Becoming Mae West. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1997.
West, Mae. Goodness Had Nothing to Do With It. Revised edition. New York: Macfadden-Bartell, 1970.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
I’m No Angel (1933). Universal, VHS, 1993.
My Little Chickadee (1940). Universal, VHS, 1993.
She Done Him Wrong (1933). Universal, VHS, 1993.
Sextette (1979). Rhino, DVD/VHS, 2000/1997.

ETHEL WATERS

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WATERS, ETHEL (1896–1977) Singer, Actress

“Ethel Waters was the mother of us all,” said LENA HORNE about Waters’s infiuence as an interpreter of the American popular song. Born in Chester, Pennsylvania, on October 31, 1896, Waters was the result of the rape of her 12-year-old mother, who never fully recovered from the trauma. Unable to accept Ethel as her child, she sent the girl to live with her own mother. Though strong and devout, Ethel’s grandmother, a live-in maid, had little time to instill her values in her granddaughter. Left largely on her own, Ethel essentially had to raise herself, becoming a leader in street gangs in her poor neighborhood. Her only experience with close adult supervision was two years spent in a Catholic school. The kindness of the nuns there made her a dedicated Christian throughout her life.

After a brief marriage when she was 13, Waters left school and began working as a hotel chambermaid. At night, she frequented black theaters and nightclubs, perfecting her skill at mimicking popular performers. Soon she began performing as a singer herself with the African-American vaudeville circuit around Baltimore. Billed as “Sweet Mama Stringbean” because of her tall, lanky frame, Waters became the first woman to sing W. C. Handy’s “St. Louis Blues,” a song that later became associated with BESSIE SMITH. In 1921 Waters began making recordings, and in the next year she became one of the first African-Americans to sing on the radio. Her early hits included “Down Home Blues,” “Dinah,” and “Sweet Georgia Brown.” Eventually recording more than 250 songs, Waters would be honored by the Popular Song Association in 1933 for introducing 50 hit songs to the American public.

Water’s singing style was clear and natural, though her soft voice did not have the power of many of her contemporaries’. Her singing, however, was distinguished by her tendency to dramatize the lyrics. She once wrote that “A song is a story—that’s how it is to me—and I sing it so it tells the story.”Throughout the 1920s, Waters performed in African-American clubs, but gradually also moved into the lucrative white vaudeville circuit. After appearing in the revue Africana (1927), she made it to Broadway in the all-black musicals Blackbirds of 1930 and Rhapsody in Black (1931–32). Waters also broke into movies with her first feature, On with the Show (1929). The first full-color talkie, it featured Waters singing “Am I Blue,” which became one of her many hit records. A year earlier, she had married Clyde Edward Matthews; the couple was divorced in 1934.

In 1933, Waters became the highest-paid performer ever to play New York City’s famed Cotton Club. There, she was seen by composer Irving Berlin, who invited her to join his Broadway show As Thousands Cheer (1933). Her gift for impersonation was well-used in a song Berlin wrote especially for her, “Thief in the Night,” which parodied the international sensation JOSEPHINE BAKER. Waters also delivered a dramatic rendition of “Supper Time,” a dirgelike song that told of a black mother’s sorrow over her husband’s lynching. The only African American in an otherwise white cast, Waters challenged racial barriers when the show toured the segregated South. After the success of As Thousands Cheer (1933), Waters appeared in another musical, At Home Abroad (1935), but longed to star in a drama. She appeared as a band vocalist for years, waiting for funding to come through for Mamba ’s Daughter, a play about an African-American family. In 1938 Water finally got her chance to play the hardworking, long-suffering grandmother in the piece, thereby becoming the first black actress to perform the lead role in a Broadway drama. Although the critical reception was mixed, audiences loved the play. On opening night, Waters received 17 curtain calls.

Thrilled with her acceptance as a dramatic actress, Waters denounced singing and looked for more plays to showcase her newly discovered talents. She found, however, that there were few roles in straight plays for African Americans. She instead settled for a part in Cabin in the Sky (1940), an all-black musical inspired by AfricanAmerican folklore. Waters, however, insisted that her character be rewritten, making her into a respectable, pious woman instead of the passive victim of her husband’s philanderings. The successful show became an equally successful film in 1943. Playing opposite such accomplished performers as Louis Armstrong and Lena Horne, Waters created one of the movie’s most memorable moments in her performance of “Happiness Is Just a Thing Called Joe,” a song written for her for the film adaptation.

In the late 1940s, Waters again had trouble finding dramatic work, but also discovered that, middleaged and overweight, she was no longer in demand as a club singer. After several lean years, she made a comeback in the film Pinky (1949), in which she played the grandmother of a young African-American woman trying to pass as white. Her performance in the controversial film earned her an Academy Award nomination for best supporting actress. With her renewed acclaim as a dramatic actress, Waters returned to the theater in Carson McCullers’s play The Member of the Wedding. She had earlier turned down the part of Berenice, the wise housekeeper and caretaker of Frankie, a sensitive 12-year-old white girl. She took on the role only when McCullers agreed to rewrite the part, emphasizing Berenice’s religious piety. Waters also insisted that she sing during the play “His Eye Is on the Sparrow,” a song she remembered from her youth. (She later used its title for her 1951 bestselling autobiography.) In part because of Waters’s changes, Berenice avoided the stereotypes associated with African-American “mammies,” instead becoming a full character that, in the words of poet Langston Hughes, was “one of both dignity and gentleness.”

In 1950 Waters became the first black performer to star in a television series, playing the title role in Beulah. Though the series was popular, some African Americans denounced her for playing a maid. The criticism offended Waters, who took it as an insult to her own grandmother. Waters herself was disenchanted with the television industry and left the show after only a year. Once again, Waters had difficulty finding work, though she frequently appeared in revivals of Wedding. Weary of the entertainment industry, she took her career in a new direction after attending a crusade held by Baptist evangelist Billy Graham in 1957. She soon joined Graham’s touring group, first as a member of the choir and later as a soloist. Waters continued to appear with Graham until 1976, when a host of health problems made it impossible for her to perform. She died the next year on September 1 at the age of 79. Waters is remembered for her trailblazing work as both a singer and an actress. In music, she helped bridge the sounds of blues, jazz, and pop. On the stage and in films, she showed that African-American actors could attract audiences to serious drama.

Further Reading
Waters, Ethel, with Charles Samuels. His Eye Is on the Spar-
row. 1951. Reprint, New York: Da Capo Press, 1992.
———. To Me It’s Wonderful. New York: Harper & Row, 1972.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Cabin in the Sky (1943). Warner Home Video, VHS, 1999.
An Introduction to Ethel Waters: Her Best Recordings 1921–1940. Best of Jazz, CD, 1996.
Member of the Wedding (1953). Columbia/Tristar VHS, 1988.
Pinky (1949). Twentieth Century-Fox, VHS, 1994.

DINAH WASHINGTON

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WASHINGTON, DINAH (Ruth Lee Jones) (1924–1962) Singer, Musician

Known as the “Queen of the Blues,” Dinah Washington was the dominant female singer of rhythm and blues during the 1950s. She was born Ruth Lee Jones in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, in August 1924 (her exact birth date is debated). When she was three, her family moved to Chicago. Ruth received her first musical instruction at home, learning to sing and play the piano from her mother. By her teens, she was a well-known gospel singer at the St. Luke’s Baptist Church.

After winning a talent contest, Jones started performing in local clubs. In 1940, she returned to religious music when gospel singer Sallie Martin hired her as her pianist. Two years later, Jones went back to the nightclub circuit, playing piano at the Three Deuces, a Chicago jazz club where her idol BILLIE HOLIDAY was performing. Soon, Jones herself was singing in the back room. There, she was spotted by bandleader Lionel Hampton, who hired her as his vocalist. Hampton later claimed that he gave Jones the stage name Dinah Washington.

While singing with Hampton’s band, Washington began recording blues songs. In 1943, her “Evil Gal Blues” and “Salty Papa Blues” were hits with African-American audiences. Two years later, “Blowtop Blues”—the only song she recorded with Hampton—made her a star of rhythm and blues. After going solo in 1945, Washington was signed by Mercury Records, which would remain her label for 15 years. While a Mercury artist, she recorded more than 400 songs for the burgeoning urban blues market. With records such as “Long John Blues” (1947) and “Trouble in Mind” (1952), she was considered by many to be the successor of blues great BESSIE SMITH. Washington, however, prided herself on being able to sing in any genre. She had great success with covers of Broadway show tunes and even had a country hit with a cover of Hank Williams’s “Cold, Cold Heart” (1952).

Washington also developed a reputation as a jazz artist. On songs such as “Lover, Come Back to Me,” she had a fruitful collaboration with pianist Wynton Kelly, which some compared to the working relationship between Holiday and Lester Young. Washington frequently performed at jazz clubs and festivals. Her triumphant appearance at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1958 was recorded in the concert film Jazz on a Summer’s Day (1959). Washington also played the Palladium in London. With Elizabeth II in the audience, the Queen of the Blues announced, “There is but one heaven, one hell, and one queen, and your Elizabeth is an impostor.”

For most of her recording career, Washington’s music was sold nearly exclusively to African Americans. In 1959, however, she broke into the larger mainstream market with “What a Diff ’rence a Day Makes.” In addition to hitting the top 10 on the R&B charts, the record won a Grammy Award. The next year, Washington had three crossover hits. With fellow Mercury artist Brook Benton, she sang the duets “Baby, You’ve Got What it Takes” and “A Rockin’ Good Way,” while on her own she had a number-one hit with the mournful love song, “This Bitter Earth.” On- and offstage, she had a flair for the flamboyant. She loved tight dresses and mink coats and enjoyed shocking people with her rough language. Washington had at least eight husbands and two sons. Late in her career, Washington became sensitive about her weight. Newly married to Detroit Lions football player Dick “Night Train” Lane, she went on a crash diet with fatal results. On December 14, 1963, Lane found Washington’s body in their Detroit home. Only 39, Washington had died from an accidental overdose of alcohol, sedatives, and diet pills.

Further Reading
Barbera, André. “Washington, Dinah.” In American National Biography, edited by John Arthur Garraty and Mark C. Carnes, vol. 22, pp. 757–758. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.
Haskins, James. Queen of the Blues: A Biography of Dinah Washington. New York: William Morrow, 1987.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
The Essential Dinah Washington: The Great Songs. Mercury, CD, 1992.
First Issue: The Dinah Washington Story. Polygram, CD set, 1993.
Jazz on a Summer’s Day (1958). New Yorker Films, DVD/VHS, 2000.

DIONNE WARWICK

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WARWICK, DIONNE (Marie Dionne Warrick, Dionne Warwicke) (1940– ) Singer

One of the first African-American recording artists to cater to a mainstream audience, Dionne Warwick is best known for her collaborations with songwriting team Burt Bacharach and Hal David. Born Marie Dionne Warrick in East Orange, New Jersey, on December 12, 1940, she began her career as an occasional fill-in singer for the Drinkard Singers, a gospel group managed by her mother, Lee. As a teenager, she formed her own group, the Gospelaires, with her sister Dee Dee and two cousins. On a scholarship, Warrick attended the University of Hartford in hopes of becoming a music teacher.

While at college, she worked as a backup singer. Working with the Drifters on their song “Mexican Divorce,” she was introduced to the then unknown songwriter Burt Bacharach. He was immediately struck by her talent and her presence. As Bacharach later remembered, “Just the way she carries herself, the way she works, her fiow and feeling for the music—it was there when I first met her.” Bacharach and his writing partner, lyricist Hal David, recruited Warrick to sing on a demo recording of several of their songs. The demo won her a contract with Spector Records. In 1962, she had her first hit with “Don’ t Make Me Over,” a song penned by Bacharach and David. Her name was printed as “Warwick” on the label, so Warrick adopted the misspelling as her new stage name. Through the 1960s, Warwick’s collaboration with Bacharach and David yielded dozens of top 10 hits. Among their charting songs were “Walk on By” (1964), “I Say a Little Prayer,” (1968), and “Alfie.” Warwick’ s recordings of “Do You Know the Way to San Josefi” (1968) and “I’ll Never Fall in Love” (1970) also won Grammy Awards. Critics and the public agreed that Warwick’s polished and controlled voice made her the perfect interpreter of Bacharach David’s sophisticated pop songs.

In 1972, the team of Bacharach and David broke up, with acrimony on both sides. Warwick, who learned about split from a newspaper article, later described the news as “devastating.” Under contract with Warner Brothers to deliver an album of Bacharach-David songs, Warwick took her former friends to court for breach of contract. At the same time, she was being sued for alimony by her husband Billy Elliott, whom she had married in 1965. The couple had two sons, David and Damon, before divorcing. Creatively, the 1970s were difficult for Warwick. Although she toured constantly, she had only one hit, “Then Came You,” a collaboration with the Spinners. On the advice of an astrologer and numerologist, she briefiy added an e to the end of her last name, but the new billing did little to change her luck.

In 1979, Warwick finally received a career boost when she signed with Arista Records, which later became the label of her cousin, singer WHITNEY HOUSTON. Arista paired her with singer Barry Manilow as her producer. The resulting album, Dionne (1979), produced two Grammy-winning hits, “I’ll Never Love This Way Again” and “Deja Vu.” Warwick had less success as the host of Solid Gold, a television countdown of the music charts. Hired in July 1980, she was fired in less a year. Officially, the producers maintained they wanted a younger host, but rumors spread that Warwick had been deemed too difficult to work with. Warwick had another hit album with Heartbreaker (1982), produced by Barry Gibb of the Bee Gees. But for the rest of the decade, she did her best work for charitable causes. In 1984, she sang with the all-star group USA for Africa on “We Are the World,” whose proceeds were donated to African famine relief. Two years later, Warwick brought together Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight, and Elton John to sing “That’s What Friends Are For.” Going to number one on the charts, the song earned $2 million for AIDS research. It also marked her public reconciliation with Burt Bacharach, who wrote the song with his wife, Carole Bayer Sager.

In the 1990s, Warwick became the spokeswoman for the Psychic Friends Network, a telephone psychic service advertised on a highly successful infomercial. She also continued to record, making some of the most adventurous albums of her career. Among them were Aquarela do Brasil (1994), a collection of Brazilian music, and Friends Can Be Lovers (1993), which included duets with Houston, Luther Vandross, and Lisa Stansfield. A revival of interest in her classic records of the 1960s inspired her to make Dionne on Dionne (1998). With her sons as backup singers, Warwick reinterpreted her earlier work on the album, which included a hip-hop version of “What the World Needs Now” and a salsa-fiavored remake of “Do You Know the Way to San Jose ?”

Album discography

Year    Album Title
1963    Presenting Dionne Warwick
1963    Anyone Who Had a Heart
1964    Make Way for Dionne Warwick
1965    The Sensitive Sound of Dionne Warwick
1966    Here I Am
1966    Dionne Warwick in Paris
1967    Here Where There is Love
1967    On Stage and in the Movies
1967    The Windows of the World
1968    Dionne Warwick in Valley of the Dolls
1968    The Magic of Believing
1969    Dionne Warwick's Greatest Motion Picture Hits
1969    Promises, Promises
1969    Soulful
1970    I'll Never Fall in Love Again
1970    Very Dionne
1971    The Dionne Warwicke Story: Live
1972    Dionne (1972 Album)
1972    From Within
1973    Just Being Myself
1975    Then Came You
1975    Track of the Cat
1977    A Man and a Woman (w/ Isaac Hayes)
1977    Only Love Can Break a Heart
1977    Love at First Sight
1979    Dionne (1979 Album)
1980    No Night So Long
1981    Hot! Live and Otherwise
1982    Friends In Love
1982    Heartbreaker
1983    How Many Times Can We Say Goodbye
1985    Finder of Lost Loves
1985    Friends
1987    Reservations for Two
1990    Dionne Warwick Sings Cole Porter
1993    Friends Can Be Lovers
1994    Celebration in Vienna ^
1994    Aquarela Do Brazil
1998    Dionne Sings Dionne
2000    Dionne Sings Dionne Vol. 2
2004    My Favorite Time of the Year
2006    My Friends & Me
2008    Why We Sing

Further Reading
“Dionne Warwick.” In Contemporary Black Biography. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998.
Ebert, Alan. “Dionne on Dionne.” Essence. January 1992, pp. 62+.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Dionne Warwick: Her Classic Songs, Vol. 1. Curb, CD, 1997.
Dionne Warwick: Her Classic Songs, Vol. 2. Curb, CD, 1998.
Dionne Warwick: The Definitive Collection. Arista, CD, 1999.

GWEN VERDON

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VERDON, GWEN (Gwyneth Evelyn Verdon) (1925–2000) Dancer, Actress, Singer, Choreographer

The definitive Broadway dancer of the 20th century, Gwyneth Evelyn Verdon was born on January 13, 1925, in Culver City, California. A childhood case of rickets left her legs deformed. As therapy, her mother, a dancer with RUTH ST. DENIS’s Denishawn troupe, enrolled her in dance classes when she was only two. Gwen studied a wide range of dance styles, including ballet, ballroom dancing, and tap. By age six, she was a professional dancer, often billed as “the fastest little tapper in the world.” With fiaming red hair and alabaster skin, her beauty won her the Miss California title when she was 14. In 1941, Verdon eloped with James Henaghan, a Hollywood Reporter journalist. After five years, they divorced, and she resumed her dance career. They had one child, James.

Verdon won a spot as an assistant to Jack Cole, a noted Hollywood dance coach. Under his direction, she made her Broadway debut in 1950 in Alive and Kicking, but the musical was a commercial failure. While working with Cole, she became the leading interpreter of his expressive, sometimes erotic dance style. She appeared as a specialty dancer in several films, including On the Riviera (1951) and Mississippi Gambler (1953), in which she choreographed her own movements. She was also hired to teach stars such as MARILYN MONROE and BETTY GRABLE how to move seductively on screen. Eager to get out from under Cole’s thumb, Verdon accepted an invitation from choreographer Michael Kidd to audition for his Broadway show Can-Can. Cast as the second female lead, she stole the show during its tryouts. The show’s jealous lead, the French actress Lilo, insisted Verdon’s role be cut back. Verdon was so annoyed that she announced that she would soon be leaving the production. The night Can-Can premiered on Broadway, however, Verdon became an instant star. After she performed her first number, she rushed to her dressing room for a costume change. She did not hear the audience chanting her name until a producer brought Verdon, wearing her bathrobe, back onstage for a curtain call. After winning her first Tony for Can-Can, Verdon became the hottest dancer in musical theater.

Her next show was Damn Yankees, the story of a baseball fan willing to sell his soul to see his favorite team win. Verdon appeared as Lola, the devil’s helper, and performed a memorably seductive dance to the song “Whatever Lola Wants.”The musical ran for more than 1,000 performances and won Verdon a second Tony Award. Verdon also starred in the film adaptation in 1958. Damn Yankees marked the beginning of her collaboration with choreographer Bob Fosse. They worked together on New Girl in Town (1957) and Redhead (1959), for which Verdon was awarded two more Tonys. In 1960, she and Fosse were married. After the birth of their daughter, Nicole, in 1963, Verdon briefiy retired from show business. In 1966, she was lured back to star in Sweet Charity, a musical about a dance-hall girl that was directed and choreographed by her husband. Exhausted by its long run, Verdon surrendered the lead to Helen Gallagher before the show’s close.

Shirley MacLaine took over the part for the 1969 film version, though Verdon generously coached her for it. In 1971, Verdon and Fosse were legally separated, though they never divorced. They continued their working relationship, most notably in Verdon’s last musical, Chicago (1975). Verdon originated the role of Roxie Hart, a gold digger acquitted of shooting her lover. Audiences considered the show too dark and cynical in its first run, though it was revived to great acclaim in 1996. Her dancing days over, Verdon began taking straight acting roles in the 1980s. She appeared in small parts in several films, among them Cocoon (1985) and Marvin’s Room (1996). Verdon also was a guest on many television series including Magnum, P .I. and Homicide. Her television work won her three Emmy nominations. After Fosse’s death in 1987, Verdon emerged as a guardian of his artistic legacy. In 1999, she collaborated with dancer Ann Reinking—Fosse’s former lover—on the dance revue Fosse, which was awarded a Tony for best musical. The following year, Gwen Verdon died on October 18 at her daughter’s home in Woodstock, New York. That night, the lights of Broadway were dimmed in her memory.

Further Reading
Berkvist, Robert. “Gwen Verdon, Redhead Who High Kicked Her Way to Stardom, Dies at 75.” The New York Times, October 19, 2000, p. 21.
Grubb, Kevin Boyd. Razzle Dazzle: The Life and Work of Bob Fosse. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Damn Yankees (1958). Warner Home Video, VHS, 1991.

SARAH VAUGHAN

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VAUGHAN, SARAH (1924–1990) Singer

Called by Frank Sinatra “one of the finest vocalists in the history of pop music,” Sarah Lois Vaughan was born on March 27, 1924, in Newark, New Jersey. She began taking piano lessons at seven and by her teens had become a church organist. Vaughan dropped out of high school to work as a singer and pianist in local nightclubs. On a dare, Vaughan entered a talent contest at the famed Apollo Theater in New York City in 1942. Performing “Body and Soul,” she won not only first prize but also the attention of singer Billy Eckstine. Eckstine convinced Earl Hines to hire Vaughan as a singer for his big band, which then included bebop innovators Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. Two years later, Vaughan quit to join Eckstine’s own band, where she worked with many other jazz greats, such as Miles Davis, Art Blakey, and Dexter Gordon. Vaughan began performing as a solo act in 1945. The same year, she made her first important recording, “Lover Man.” Among her other early hits were “If You Could See Me Now” (1946), “It’s Magic” (1948), and “(I Love the Girl) I Love the Guy” (1950). In 1946, Vaughan married trumpeter George Treadwell, whom she divorced 12 years later. She was subsequently married to and divorced from professional football player Clyde Atkins, estaurateur Marshall Fisher, and trumpeter Waymon Reed. With Atkins, she adopted a daughter, Deborah, who later became an actress working under the name Paris Vaughan.

Vaughan started recording with Mercury Records in 1954. The company encouraged her to sing both pop and jazz, releasing each genre on a different label. Although she generally preferred jazz, she recognized few differences between the two styles. “I just sing,” Vaughan explained. “I sing whatever I can.” Vaughan also became known for her phenomenal range. She maintained it was two and a half octaves, though her control over her voice allowed her to make it seemed even greater. In performance, especially, she displayed an enormous talent for improvising. Though Vaughan returned to the same standards throughout her career, she took pride in saying she never sang a song the same way twice. For decades, Vaughan toured jazz venues in the United States and Europe backed by a trio of piano, bass, and drums. Beginning in 1954, she also became a fixture the Newport Jazz Festival. Later in her career, Vaughan frequently sang concerts with major city orchestras. Although some critics complained that Vaughan’s sometimes showy vocal technique detracted from her ability to interpret a song, most lavished praise on her voice, which only became richer with time. Her fans included her contemporary ELLA FITZGERALD, who once claimed that “the greatest singing talent in the world today is Sarah Vaughan.” By the 1980s, Vaughan’s talents were earning her awards and accolades worldwide. In 1981 she won a special Emmy Award for outstanding individual achievement for the television special “Rhapsody and Song: A Tribute to George Gershwin.” Vaughan received her first Grammy Award two years later for best female jazz performance for her album Gershwin Live! Her second Grammy, a special lifetime achievement award, came in 1989.

Widely known by the nickname “The Divine One,” Vaughan spent her final months recording songs for Quincy Jones’s Back on the Block. The album included “Birdland,” the only recorded duet between Vaughan and Fitzgerald. On April 4, 1990, the jazz world mourned when Vaughan died suddenly of lung cancer at her home in Los Angeles, California.

Discography

    * 1944 Sarah Vaughan and Her All-Stars (Continental Records)
    * 1949 Sarah Vaughan in Hi-Fi
    * 1954 The Divine Sarah Sings
    * 1954 Sarah Vaughan with Clifford Brown
    * 1955 In the Land of Hi-Fi
    * 1957 At Mister Kelly's
    * 1957 Swingin' Easy
    * 1957 Passing strangers, duet with Billy Eckstine
    * 1957 Sarah Vaughan and Billy Eckstine: Irving Berlin songbook
    * 1957 Sarah Vaughan Sings George Gershwin
    * 1957 Sarah Vaughan Sings Broadway: Great Songs from Hit Shows
    * 1958 No Count Sarah
    * 1959 After Hours at the London House
    * 1959 Vaughan and Violins
    * 1960 Dreamy
    * 1961 The Divine One
    * 1961 The Explosive Side of Sarah Vaughan
    * 1961 Count Basie/Sarah Vaughan
    * 1961 After Hours
    * 1962 You're Mine You
    * 1962 Sarah + 2
    * 1963 Sarah Sings Soulfully
    * 1963 Snowbound
    * 1963 Lonely Hours
    * 1963 We Three (with Joe Williams and Dinah Washington)
    * 1963 The World of Sarah Vaughan
    * 1963 Sweet 'n' Sassy
    * 1963 Star Eyes
    * 1963 Sarah Slightly Classical
    * 1963 Sassy Swings the Tivoli
    * 1963 Vaughan With Voices
    * 1964 Pop Artistry
    * 1964 Sweet 'N' Sassy
    * 1964 The Lonely Hours
    * 1965 !Viva! Vaughan
    * 1965 Sarah Vaughan Sings the Mancini Songbook
    * 1966 The New Scene
    * 1967 Sassy Swings Again
    * 1967 It's A Man's World
    * 1971 A Time in My Life
    * 1972 With Michel Legrand
    * 1972 Feelin' Good
    * 1973 Live in Japan
    * 1974 Send in the Clowns
    * 1977 I Love Brazil
    * 1977 Ronnie Scott's Presents Sarah Vaughan Live
    * 1978 How Long Has This Been Going On?
    * 1979 The Duke Ellington Songbook, Vol. 1
    * 1979 The Duke Ellington Songbook, Vol. 2
    * 1979 Copacabana
    * 1981 Songs of the Beatles
    * 1981 Send in the Clowns
    * 1982 Crazy and Mixed Up
    * 1982 Gershwin Live!
    * 1984 The Mystery of Man (aka Let It Live, Sarah Vaughan Sings the Poetry of Pope John Paul II)
    * 1986 South Pacific (A studio cast recording with Kiri Te Kanawa, Mandy Patinkin, and José Carreras)
    * 1987 Brazilian Romance
    * 1989 Back On The Block
    * 2009 Everything I Have Is Yours, back in print, featuring 1945-47 session recordings via Shout! Factory

Further Reading
Brown, Denis. Sarah Vaughn: A Bio-Bibliography. New York: Greenwood, 1991.
Gourse, Leslie. Sassy: The Life of Sarah Vaughan. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1993.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
The Essential Sarah Vaughan. Mercury, CD, 1992.
Sarah Vaughan: The Divine One (1993). BMG Video, VHS, 1993.
Sarah Vaughan: Jazz Profile. EMD/Blue Note, CD, 1998.

SOPHIE TUCKER

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TUCKER, SOPHIE (Sophie Abuza) (1884–1966) Singer

For more than 60 years, Sophie Tucker was a dynamic live performer whose bold and sometimes racy singing style won her the title “Last of the Red Hot Mamas.” On January 13, 1884, she was born Sophie Abuza in Russia. Her parents soon immigrated to the United States, first to Boston, then to Hartford, Connecticut, where they opened a restaurant. Sophie, hating working in the family business, was drawn to the performers from a local vaudeville theater who frequented her parents’ establishment. As a girl, she often sang for their entertainment in exchange for a little pocket change. She decided show business was a much better way to earn a living than cooking meals and washing dishes. In 1903 she married Louis Tuck and had a son, Albert. Though she later affectionately referred to Tuck as “a card and a wonderful dancer,” she was disappointed by his inability to provide for the family. She soon left Albert with her family and took off for New York, hoping to carve out her own career as a singer. Calling herself Sophie Tucker, she found work in cafes, beer halls, and movie houses, often singing as many as 100 songs a night. Moving into burlesque, she was initially forced to work in blackface, because theater managers, believing she was unattractive, wanted to hide her features. But when her luggage failed to arrive at one venue, she had to go on stage without makeup. She was such a hit with the audience that night tat she refused to ever perform in blackface again.

In 1909, Tucker had become so successful that she was hired for the prestigious Ziegfeld Follies. She was quickly dismissed, however, when other female stars felt threatened by her show-stopping numbers. She then left for Chicago, where she appeared in several musical comedies and refined her vaudeville act. Tucker found great success belting out songs with suggestive lyrics, most notably the naughty “Nobody Loves a Fat Girl, But Oh How a Fat Girl Can Love.” She also pleased crowds with sentimental ballads, including “M-O-T-H-E-R—A Name That Means the World to Me,” a tear-jerking tribute to maternal love. Carefully crafting her act, Tucker learned to sing a variety of tunes to keep her audiences attentive. In her biography, titled Some of These Days after her signature song, she wrote, “I would start off with a lively rag, then would come a ballad, followed by a comedy song, and a novelty number . . . and finally, the hot song. In this way, I left the stage with the audience laughing their heads off.” Tucker also excited her fans with her extravagant and ever-changing costumes, which cost many thousands of dollars each time she retooled her act. By 1920, Tucker was a headlining star in New York. She achieved equal, if not greater, fame in England during her first tour there in 1922. Fitting well into the British music hall tradition, Tucker earned the adoration of English audiences on two more tours in 1925 and 1934. During the latter, she played a command performance for the royal family.

As vaudeville’s popularity waned in the 1930s, Tucker began to work in films and radio, but neither medium made good use of her talents. She was always at her best with a live audience, and her act lost much of its punch when she had to clean up her language for a mass audience. (She once bemoaned what radio did to her routines, explaining, “I couldn’t even say ‘hell’ or ‘damn,’ and nothing, honey, is more expressive than the way I say ‘hell’ or ‘damn.’”) Tucker felt much more at home in nightclubs, which she continued to play for the rest of her life. She also later appeared regularly on television, enjoying particular success as an early star of British TV.

In her personal life, Tucker, after her first husband’s death in 1914, had two unsuccessful marriages to pianist Frank Westphal (1914–19) and personal manager Al Lackey (1928–33). She remained devoted to her family and used her fortune to make sure her parents lived well. Tucker was also extraordinarily generous to a wide variety of charities, which she supported with sizable donations and benefit performances. Founded from the proceeds from her autobiography, the Sophie Tucker Foundation established a chair for the theater arts at Brandeis University in 1955. According to the New York Times, Tucker donated an estimated $4 million to charity during her lifetime. In 1965, Tucker collapsed onstage while performing in New York. She died four months later, February 9, 1966. A veritable institution of American entertainment, Tucker—with her brassy sound, comic sense, and intimate rapport with her audience—continued to find new generations of fans long after the vaudeville days that made her a star were all but forgotten.

Further Reading
Sochen, June. From Mae to Madonna: Women Entertainers in Twentieth-Century America. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1999.
Tucker, Sophie. Some of These Days: The Autobiography of Sophie Tucker. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1945.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Broadway Melody of 1938 (1937). MGM/UA, VHS, 1992.
Last of the Red Hot Mamas. Memoir Classics, CD, 1998.
Some of These Days. Pearl, CD, 1997.

LILY TOMLIN

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TOMLIN, LILY (Mary Jean Tomlin) (1939– ) Comic, Actress

Renowned for her inventive comic characters, Lily Tomlin was born Mary Jean Tomlin on September 1, 1939. Growing up in Detroit, Michigan, she often accompanied her alcoholic father to bars, where she amused patrons by imitating their neighbors. Tomlin briefiy attended Wayne State University as a premed student but quit after her performance in a campus play convinced her that she had a fiair for comedy. For several years, she performed on local television and in coffeehouses. To further her career, Tomlin moved to New York City in 1965. Engagements at such clubs as the Improv and Cafe Au Go Go led to a job performing on the nationally televised Garry Moore Show (1958–67). She left after three shows over arguments with the writing staff about the quality of her material.

In 1970, Tomlin returned to television as a regular on the comedy revue Laugh-In (1968–73). She became instantly famous for her monologues delivered in the voices of various characters. The most popular were Ernestine, a surly telephone operator, and Edith Ann, a five-and-a-half-year old who was wise beyond her years. She showcased these and other characters on several successful comedy albums, including This Is a Recording (1971), for which she won a Grammy Award. While working her 1972 album And That’s the Truth, she began writing with playwright Jane Wagner, who has remained a frequent collaborator. A proud feminist, Tomlin refused to perform jokes on Laugh-In that she deemed sexist or racist. She also made news by walking off The Dick Cavett Show, a television talk show, when a fellow guest, actor Chad Everett, described his wife as his possession. In a 1981 interview, she replied to the question of how feminism had affected her career with, “If it hadn’t been for the women’s movement, people would call it my hobby.” After Laugh-In, Tomlin appeared in a series of television specials that challenged network censors. The most notorious was a one-hour variety show for CBS written by Tomlin and comic Richard Pryor. The network wanted to cut a sketch titled “Juke and Opal,” in which Pryor portrayed a methadone addict. When Tomlin threatened to sue, CBS put the sketch at the end of the special and added an incongruous laugh track to detract viewers from the disturbing material. The special won an Emmy for its writing.

By the mid-1970s, Tomlin was also appearing in films. She made an auspicious debut in a dramatic role in Nashville (1975), in which she subtly portrayed the emotions of a mother of two deaf children drawn into a brief affair with a womanizing pop star. The performance won her a Oscar nomination for best supporting actress. After garnering good reviews in the modern-day noir The Late Show (1977), her film career almost ended with the critical and popular disaster Moment by Moment (1978), a romance costarring John Travolta and written by Wagner. Tomlin scored a much-needed hit two years later with the light office comedy 9 to 5 (1980), which also featured JANE FONDA and DOLLY PARTON. Most of her subsequent film work has been in supporting roles in fairly insubstantial comedies, including Big Business (1988), The Beverly Hillbillies (1993), and Disney’s The Kid (2000). Tomlin has found much more success as a stage performer. After winning a special Tony Award for her show Appearing Nitely (1977), Tomlin received the best reviews of her career for The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe (1986). This onewoman show, written and directed by Wagner, allowed Tomlin to create an array of unforgettable characters—from the bag lady Trudy to the miserable teen Agnes Angst to the caustic socialite Kate. Using virtually no props or scenery, she transformed from one to the next, employing just her voice and manner to indicate the character she had become. Tomlin and Wagner were hailed for daring to depict with affection characters who often bordered on the grotesque. Tomlin once explained, “I don’t necessarily admire them, but I do them all with love.”Winning a Tony for its original run, Tomlin revived Search on Broadway in November 2000. Reviewers marveled at the energy Tomlin, at 61, still brought to the demanding show. “It’s exhilarating,” Tomlin told USA Today, adding, “It’s such a joy to perform. . . . It’s fun to play, you know?”

Further Reading
Kaplan, James. “The Search for Lily Tomlin.” US Weekly. January 22, 2001, pp. 58–61.
Sorensen, Jeff. Lily Tomlin: Woman of a Thousand Faces. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989.
Wagner, Jane. Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe. New York: Harper & Row, 1986.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Nashville (1975). Paramount, DVD/VHS, 2000/1991.
9 to 5 (1980). Twentieth Century-Fox, VHS, 1995.
The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe (1992).
Wolfe Video, VHS, 1995.

BIG MAMA THORNTON

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THORNTON, BIG MAMA (Willie Mae Thornton) (1926–1984) Singer

One of the last great traditional blues singers, Willie Mae Thornton was born on December 11, 1926, in Montgomery, Alabama, where her father was a minister. As a child, she began singing in his church and taught herself to play the harmonica and drums. With the death of her mother, Willie Mae at 14 went to work. While scrubbing fioors in a saloon, she was drafted to fill in for the establishment’s regular singer, and a performing career was born. Thornton soon joined the Hot Harlem Revue, a traveling show that toured African-American communities in the Southeast. Because of her powerful voice, she was billed as “the new BESSIE SMITH.” Other blues greats that infiuenced her style included GERTRUDE “MA” RAINEY and Memphis Minnie. By 1948, Thornton was working clubs in Houston, Texas. She was signed to Peacock Records by owner Don Robey, who began helping her choose material and directing her onstage appearance. Thornton made her first record in 1951 and the next year she was recruited for the nationally known touring show led by Johnny Otis. With Otis, Thornton began playing venues in the North for the first time. Her full-throated style of country blues became one of the show’ s highlights. Six feet tall and nearly 300 pounds, Thornton earned the nickname “Big Mama” both for her imposing physical stature and her oversize personality.

In 1953, Thornton recorded her biggest hit, “Hound Dog.” The song was credited to songwriters Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller. According to Thornton, “[T]hey had this song written on the back of a brown paper bag. So I started to sing the words and put in some of my own.” Characteristic of Thornton’s work, the record features her growling and shouting sexually explicit lyrics about a no-good lover. Although it sold more than half a million copies in the urban African-American market, Thornton received a total of only $500 for her work. Even more galling, she saw absolutely no compensation when Elvis Presley’s 1959 cover of “Hound Dog” became a sensation, rocketing Presley to stardom.

Thornton’s success continued as Robey paired her with his other star, ballad singer Johnny Ace. They became a star attraction, called by some “the king and queen of the blues.” Their partnership ended at a Christmas dance in 1954, when Ace accidentally killed himself during a game of Russian roulette. In the wake of the tragedy, Thornton’s popularity began to wane. She stopped touring with Otis in 1955 and moved to San Francisco, California. Without a record contract, Thornton began playing small local clubs in the late 1950s. After several lean years, a renewed interest in the blues by early rock artists brought Thornton back into the public eye. Following her appearance at the Monterey Jazz Festival in 1964, Thornton became a regular at jazz and blues festivals and at the best clubs in the United States and Europe. Her recording career was revived as well with a string of albums, including Big Mama Thornton with the Chicago Blues Band (1967), on which her band included musicians Muddy Waters, James Cotton, and Otis Spann. In the late 1960s, Thornton also became known as an inspiration to rock singer JANIS JOPLIN, who imitated Thornton’s style and mannerisms on stage. One of Joplin’s signature songs was her cover of Thornton’s composition “Ball and Chain.” For the second time, Thornton saw one of her songs help a white artist rise to international fame.

Always a heavy drinker, Thornton began to suffer from cirrhosis of the liver in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Even though the illness shrunk her body to less than 100 pounds, she continued to perform despite her physical frailty. On July 25, 1984, Big Mama Thornton died of a heart attack in a Los Angeles boardinghouse. A week later, friends and fans came together at a benefit concert organized by the Southern California Blues Society to pay for her funeral expenses.

Further Reading
Gart, Galen, and Roy C. Ames. Duke/Peacock Records: An Illustrated History with Discography. Milford, NH: Big Nickel Publications, 1990.
Shaw, Arnold. Honkers and Shouters: The Golden Years of Rhythm and Blues. New York: Macmillan, 1978.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
The Complete Vanguard Recordings. Vanguard, CD, 2000.

TWYLA THARP

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THARP, TWYLA (1942– ) Dancer, Choreographer

In the words of critic Arlene Croce, the innovative dancer and choreographer Twyla Tharp “swept away the ideological dividing line between ‘classical’ and ‘modern’ and ‘pop.’” The eldest of four children, Twyla was born in rural Portland, Illinois, on July 1, 1942. Her mother, an aspiring concert pianist, gave her daughter her unusual name because she thought it would look good on a marquee. When Twyla was eight, the Tharps moved to Rialto, California, where her father built and operated a drive-in theater. He also constructed the family home, which included a room equipped with a dance fioor and ballet barre. Blessed with perfect pitch, Twyla started taking piano lessons from her mother before she was two. She later added classes in social dance, ballet, violin, drums, and baton. By negotiating a highly demanding schedule of lessons, she developed an impressive self-discipline that characterized her adult career. After high school, Tharp entered Pomona College in California, intending to become a psychiatrist. Three semesters later, she transferred to New York City’s Barnard College with the new goal of becoming a dancer. While majoring in art history at Barnard, Tharp studied ballet at the American Ballet Theater (ABT) and modern dance with MARTHA GRAHAM, Merce Cunningham, and Erick Hawkins. While in college, she married fellow student Peter Young. This marriage and a second one to artist Bob Huot ended in divorce. Jesse, her son by Huot, was born in 1971.

Graduating in 1963, Tharp joined the Paul Taylor Company, but her ambition and independence moved her to quit in order to form her own troupe the next year. Initially an all-woman company, the troupe appeared primarily in nontheater spaces, such as gyms, museums, and parks. In keeping with the avant-garde currents of the day, Tharp’s dances tended toward minimalism in movement and in stage design. The pinnacle of her minimalist stage was Fugue (1970). The piece was performed without music, though its three dancers wore high-heeled boots equipped with microphones to create their own accompaniment. Critics saw a new warmth and wit in Tharp’s Eight Jelly Rolls (1971), during which her dancers wore backless tuxedos while moving to the music of early jazz great Jelly Roll Morton. Tharp also played with music in The Bix Pieces (1971). Though Tharp choreographed the work to Franz Joseph Haydn’s Opus 76, it was performed to the jazz of Bix Beiderbecke. Tharp’s breakthrough work, Deuce Coupe (1973), was also a hallmark in modern dance history. Commissioned by the Joffrey Ballet, it was performed to 14 songs by the Beach Boys in front of a set painted anew before each performance by teenage graffiti artists. The choreography—an eclectic mix of movements from ballet, Graham technique, popular dances, tap, and jazz—was performed by dancers from the Joffrey and from Tharp’s own company. One critic called it “a dialogue between American ballet and American Bandstand, which makes both seem more wonderful for the comparison.”

The enormous success of Deuce Coupe made Tharp modern dance’ s most popular choreographer to “cross over,” that is, to work in both classical and modern styles. She choreographed As Time Goes By (1973) for the Joffrey and then created five works for the ABT. There, she worked with dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov, with whom she developed a close professional and personal relationship. With him in mind, she choreographed Push Comes to Shove (1976), which dramatized the tensions between a ballet company and its star dancer. Other notable works by Tharp include Brahms-Handel (1984) for the New York City Ballet and Rules of the Game (1989) for the Paris Opera Ballet. Always fascinated by film since working at her parents’ drive-in, Tharp also welcomed movie and television projects. She choreographed dance sequences in three films directed by Milos FormanHair (1979), Ragtime (1980), and Amadeus (1984)—and created a dance number for Baryshnikov and tap dancer Gregory Hines in White Nights (1985). Tharp and her works have also been the subject of several television specials, most notably Making Television Dance (1977), Baryshnikov by Tharp (1985), and Twyla Tharp: Oppositions (1996). Tharp’s interest in narrative has also led her to work on creating evening-long theater pieces. In both When We Were Very Young (1980) and The Catherine Wheel (1981), she told the story of chaotic, dysfunctional families. In 1985, on Broadway, she created choreography for Singing in the Rain—a stage adaptation of the classic 1952 movie musical Singin’ in the Rain. The result was slammed by critics, though audience demand kept the show running for a year.

Stung by the bad reception of Singing in the Rain, Tharp’s company lost some of its central members. This problem, combined with Tharp’s weariness with continual fund-raising, led her to disband the group in 1988. The same year, she joined Baryshnikov at the ABT, where she served as an artistic associate. When Baryshnikov left the company a year later, Tharp followed suit. Tharp has since toured frequently, putting ogether temporary troupes of talented young dancers. In addition to choreographing new works for the ABT, New York City Ballet, and the Boston Ballet, she wrote her autobiography, Push Comes to Shove (1992). For the new energy she brought to both classical ballet and modern dance, Tharp was awarded a MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant in 1992. In 1997, she was made an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Throughout the 1990s, Tharp was in demand as a freelance choreographer. Among the companies she created dances for were the Paris Opera Ballet, the Royal Ballet, the Martha Graham Dance Company, and the American Ballet Theater. She formed a new company, the Twyla Tharp Dance company, in 2000 and began developing a dance school in Brooklyn, New York. In 2001, Tharp explained that she now wants to work with only “great” dancers, defining greatness as “ambition, sweetness, personableness . . . I mean there’s something absolutely connected, a commitment that goes beyond sincerity. English does not supply the right descriptions for greatness—you just feel it.”

Further Reading
Rogosin, Elinor. The Dance Makers: Conversations with American Choreographers. New York: Walker, 1980.
Tharp, Twyla. Push Comes to Shove. New York: Bantam, 1992.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Baryshnikov Dances Sinatra & More . . . (1984). Kultur Video, VHS, 1991.
The Catherine Wheel (1982). Elektra/Asylum, VHS, 1992.
Hair (1979). MGM Home Entertainment, DVD/VHS, 1999/2000.

EVA TANGUAY

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TANGUAY, EVA (1878–1947) Singer, Actress

Nicknamed the “I Don’t Care Girl,” Eva Tanguay became the highest-paid player in vaudeville during the early 20th century. She was born on August 1, 1878, in Marbleton, Quebec, but six years later her family resettled in Holyoke, Massachusetts. Soon after, her father died, leaving the Tanguays impoverished. After winning an amateur contest, eightyear-old Eva joined the Redding-Stanton theater company and became her family’s breadwinner. She toured with the company for five years, then moved into adult roles in musical comedy. In 1901 Tanguay had her first major brush with celebrity when she had an impromptu fistfight with a chorus girl during a production of My Lady. The resulting publicity helped her land a star vehicle, The Chaperons, in which she sang “My Sambo.” Now a headliner, Tanguay fully established her stage persona in The Blond in Black. Exuberant and carefree, she won over audiences playing “the Sambo Girl.” She was such a sensation that the show’s producers soon renamed the show after her character.

Though now a leading star in theater, Tanguay moved into vaudeville in about 1906. Outrageous even offstage, her personality began to infiuence her stage performances more and more. She delighted in wearing scanty costumes, including one made entirely of dollar bills. Gyrating as she sang, she became famous for her rendition of “I Don’t Care,” a celebration of her lack of inhibition. The lyrics declared, “I don’t care/What people say or do,/My voice, it may sound funny/But it’s getting me the money,/So I don’t care.” In fact, her voice did sound shrill, and it earned her as much as $3,500 a week. Theater owners blanched at Tanguay’s risqué act, but her popularity was so great that they did little to censor her. Though described as “not beautiful, witty or graceful,” she pleased audiences primarily through her disinterest in propriety. In addition to giving them a vicarious thrill, her attitude was a refreshing challenge to outmoded Victorian ideals.

Tanguay had far less success in her personal life. She wed twice; one marriage ended in divorce, the other in annulment. By the 1920s, her health began to fail, eventually to the point that she could no longer perform. Although she earned an estimated $2 million during her career, extravagant spending and the 1929 stock market crash left her with nothing. Desperate for money, Tanguay attempted a comeback in the early 1930s, but soon cataracts left her blind. Stage star SOPHIE TUCKER paid for an operation to restore her sight, but then Tanguay was stricken with paralyzing arthritis. She was forced to retire to her small home in Los Angeles. When she died on January 11, 1947, she was in the process of working on her memoirs, Up and Down the Ladder. She had tried to interest Hollywood in her story, but did not live to see The I Don’t Care Girl, a 1952 musical starring Mitzi Gaynor as Tanguay.

Further Reading
Martin, Linda, and Kerry Seagrave. Women in Comedy. Secaucus, N.J.: Citadel Press, 1986.
Sochen, June. From Mae to Madonna: Women Entertainers in Twentieth-Century America. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1999.

JESSICA ALICE TANDY

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TANDY, JESSICA ( Jessie Alice Tandy) (1909–1994) Actress

In a career that spanned seven decades, Jessica Tandy emerged as one of the greatest actresses on the 20th-century American stage. A native of London, she was born Jessie Alice Tandy on June 7, 1909. Her mother, a teacher, encouraged in Jessie a love of the arts. At a young age, she steeped herself in literature, developing a special fondness for Shakespeare. Her growing fascination with the theater led her to the Ben Greet Academy of Acting, where she studied from 1924 to 1927. At 18, Tandy made her London stage debut in The Manderson Girls (1927). A wide variety of roles followed, and by the 1930s, she was one of the leading young actresses in the English theater world. Her most notable triumphs included playing Ophelia in a 1934 production of Hamlet starring John Gielgud and Viola in a 1937 staging of Twelfth Night opposite Laurence Olivier and Alec Guinness. While working in London, she met and married fellow actor Jack Hawkins, with whom she had a daughter.

In late 1940, Tandy traveled to New York to appear on Broadway in Jupiter Laughs. Because of both the war in Europe and increasing tensions in her marriage, she decided to settle in the United States permanently. Tandy, however, soon became frustrated to learn that her success in London did little to win her parts on Broadway. She considered giving up acting, but her friend Hume Cronyn, who was also part of the Jupiter Laughs cast, persuaded her to stay with her first love. Tandy divorced Hawkins and married Cronyn in 1942. Deciding she might have better luck in film, Tandy and Cronyn moved to Hollywood. She signed a contract with Twentieth Century-Fox, but her movie roles did little to showcase her talent.

She was far better served by her part in a production of Portrait of a Madonna, a one-act play by Tennessee Williams directed in Los Angeles by Cronyn. Williams was so impressed by Tandy’s work that he insisted she be given the lead role in his new Broadway play, A Streetcar Named Desire (1947). Originating the role of fading southern beauty Blanche DuBois, Tandy at last achieved stardom in the United States. Although she won the Tony Award for best actress for her performance, she lost the role of Blanche in the movie adaptation to VIVIEN LEIGH. “I was disappointed and hurt,” Tandy later told the press, “but I wasn’t a film star. Vivien Leigh was.”Tandy parlayed her newfound fame into a long career on and off Broadway and in regional theater. She and Cronyn also became closely associated with Minneapolis’s Guthrie Theater, which was founded by a friend of Tandy’s from the London theater. Although Tandy often appeared in plays on her own, much of her finest work was in productions that also starred her husband. Tandy and Cronyn were particularly celebrated for their performances in Edward Albee’s A Delicate Balance (1966) and D. L. Coburn’ s The Gin Game (1977). For her work in The Gin Game and in Foxfire (1982), Tandy won her second and third Tony Awards.

Finding the rigors of theater acting difficult as she aged, Tandy stopped performing on stage in the mid-1980s. She then returned to acting in films, including the popular comedy Cocoon (1985) and the Academy Award–winning Driving Miss Daisy (1989). In Daisy, Tandy was cast as a wealthy southern woman who develops a longterm friendship with her African-American chauffeur. Her sensitive portrayal won her the best actress Oscar. To new fans unfamiliar with her stage work, Tandy became an “overnight sensation” that had been more than 50 years in the making. Tandy continued to appear in films, most notably Fried Green Tomatoes (1991) and Nobody’s Fool (1994), until her death from cancer on September 11, 1994.

Further Reading
Barranger, Milly S. Jessica Tandy: A Bio-Bibliography. New York: Greenwood Press, 1991.
Kalfatovic, Mary C. “Tandy, Jessica.” In American National Biography, edited by John Arthur Garraty and Mark C. Carnes, vol. 21, pp. 294–296. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Recommended Recorded and Videotaped Performances
Driving Miss Daisy (1989). Warner Home Video, DVD/VHS, 1997/2001.
Fried Green Tomatoes (1991). Universal, DVD/VHS, 2000.
Intimate Portrait: Jessica Tandy (1999). Unapix, VHS, 2000.