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Babes On Broadway
''Babes on Broadway'' is a 1941 American musical film starring Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland and directed by Busby Berkeley, with Vincente Minnelli directing Garland's big solo numbers. The film, which features Fay Bainter and Virginia Weidler, was the third in the "Backyard Musical" series about kids who put on their own show, following '' Babes in Arms'' (1939) and '' Strike Up the Band'' (1940). Songs in the film include "Babes on Broadway" by Burton Lane (music) and E.Y. "Yip" Harburg (lyrics), and " How About You?" by Lane with lyrics by Ralph Freed, the brother of producer Arthur Freed. The movie ends with a minstrel show performed by the main cast in blackface. Plot Tommy Williams (Mickey Rooney) is a talented performer with aspirations of making it on Broadway. He teams up with his friend Penny Morris (Judy Garland) to organize a charity show aimed at benefiting British children affected by World War II. Despite facing numerous obstacles, such as financial difficultie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Rose (illustrator)
William F. Rose (September 16, 1909– May 29, 1972) was an American illustrator and film poster artist active in the 1930s and 1940s. He is recognized as one of the most distinctive poster artists of the Classical Hollywood cinema, Classical Hollywood era, a time when most film posters featured painted illustrations rather than photography. Rose painted dozens of poster illustrations for RKO Pictures, RKO Radio Pictures and other studios. As one of the leading designers in RKO's art department, he helped to define the studio's bold visual aesthetic. Although he was prolific, only a fraction of his poster designs have been individually attributed to him. Most of his output remains unidentified. His artwork is prized by collectors, and original prints of his posters have fetched high prices at auction. One of his most iconic posters is the alternate "StyleB" design for ''Citizen Kane''(1941), which pitched the film as a more conventional romance than it actually was. The poster f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Virginia Weidler
Virginia Anna Adeleid Weidler (March 21, 1927 – July 1, 1968) was an American child actor, child actress, popular in Hollywood (film industry), Hollywood films during the 1930s and 1940s. Early life and career Weidler was born on March 21, 1927, in the Eagle Rock, Los Angeles, Eagle Rock area of Los Angeles, California, the youngest of six children born to German parents, Alfred Weidler, an architect, and Margaret Weidler (born Margarete Therese Louise Radon, 1890–1987), a former opera singer. She was the second Weidler child born in the United States after the family emigrated from Germany in 1923. She made her first film appearance in 1931. Her first credited role was as Europena in ''Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch (1934 film), Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch'' (1934), a role she won at age seven after having been seen in the play ''Autumn Crocus (play), Autumn Crocus''. Virginia made a big impression on audiences as the little girl who would "hold my breath 'til I am blac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James Gleason
James Austin Gleason (May 23, 1882 – April 12, 1959) was an American actor, playwright and screenwriter born in New York City. Gleason often portrayed "tough-talking, world-weary guys with a secret heart-of-gold." Early life Gleason was born in New York City, the son of Mina (née Crolius) and William L. Gleason. Coming from theatrical stock, as a schoolboy he made stage appearances while on holiday. He began earning his living at the age of thirteen, being a messenger boy, printer's devil, assistant in an electrical store and a lift boy. He enlisted in the United States Army at age 16 and served three years in the Philippines. Career On discharge, he began his stage career, later taking it up professionally. He played in London for two years and following his return to the United States, he began in films by writing dialogue for comedies. He wrote a number of plays, several of which were performed on Broadway. He also acted on Broadway, including in a couple of his o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Luis Alberni
Luis Alberni (October 4, 1886 – December 23, 1962) was a Spanish-born American character actor of stage and films. Early years Alberni was born in Barcelona, Spain, on October 4, 1886. He acted in stock theater for four years in Marseille before he went back to Barcelona, earned a BA degree, and studied law. Career Alberni was acting in Bordeaux when American humorist Wilson Mizner and playwright Paul Armstrong invited him to come to the United States, offering their help. In April 1912, he sailed to New York City as a steerage passenger aboard the S/S ''Nieuw Amsterdam''. In New York, Alberni acted on both stage and screen. His first motion picture performance was in the 1915 Jewish drama, '' Children of the Ghetto''. On the stage, he appeared in more than a dozen Broadway plays between 1915 and 1928, including ''39 East'', ''Dreams for Sale'' and the original production of ''What Price Glory?'' in 1924–1925. In the sound film era, he had notable roles as Jacopo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexander Woollcott
Alexander Humphreys Woollcott (January 19, 1887 – January 23, 1943) was an American drama critic for The New York Times and the New York Herald, critic and commentator for ''The New Yorker'' magazine, a member of the Algonquin Round Table, an occasional actor and playwright, and a prominent radio personality. Woollcott was the inspiration for two fictional characters. The first was Sheridan Whiteside, the caustic but charming main character in the play '' The Man Who Came to Dinner'' (1939) by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart,Oscar Levant, '' The Unimportance of Being Oscar'', Pocket Books 1969 (reprint of G.P. Putnam 1968), p. 81. . later made into a film in 1942. The second was the snobbish, vitriolic columnist Waldo Lydecker in the novel '' Laura'', later made into a film in 1944. Woollcott was convinced he was the inspiration for his friend Rex Stout's brilliant, eccentric detective Nero Wolfe, an idea that Stout denied. Early life and education Alexander Humphreys Woo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donald Meek
Thomas Donald Meek (14 July 1878 – 18 November 1946) was a Scottish-American actor. He first performed publicly at the age of eight and began appearing on Broadway in 1903. Meek appeared in the films '' You Can't Take It with You'' (1938) and ''Stagecoach'' (1939). He posthumously received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1960. Early years Meek was born in Glasgow to Matthew and Annie Meek. In the 1890s, the Meek family emigrated to Canada and then to the United States. By 1900, they were living in Philadelphia, where Meek was employed as a dry goods salesman, according to the United States census of that year. Career Meek's Broadway credits include ''The Minister's Daughters'' (1903), ''Going Up'' (1917), ''Nothing But Love'' (1919), ''The Hottentot'' (1920), ''Little Old New York'' (1920), ''Six-Cylinder Love'' (1921), ''Tweedles'' (1923), ''The Potters'' (1923), ''Easy Terms'' (1925), ''Fool's Bells'' (1925), ''Love 'em and Leave 'em'' (1926), ''The Shelf'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard Quine
Richard Quine (November 12, 1920June 10, 1989) was an American director, actor, and singer. He began acting as a child in radio, vaudeville, and stage productions before being signed to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in his early twenties. When his acting career began to wane after World War II, Quine began working as a film director. He later moved into producing and directing television. Quine's films as director include '' Bell, Book and Candle'' (1958), '' The World of Suzie Wong'' (1960), '' Paris When It Sizzles'' (1964), '' How to Murder Your Wife'' (1965), and ''The Prisoner of Zenda'' (1979). Career Child actor Born in Detroit, Quine's father was an actor. Quine's family moved to Los Angeles when he was six years old. As a child, he began working as a radio actor and became a minor radio star. He then appeared in vaudeville before moving on to stage roles. Quine made his film debut in the drama ''Cavalcade'' (1933). He could also be seen in '' The World Changes'' (1933) (alongsid ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ray McDonald (actor)
Ray McDonald (June 27, 1920 – February 20, 1959) was a tap dancer who started his career as a vaudeville act with his older sister Grace McDonald, before being cast in a hit Broadway show, and then in films. He had a starring role in the films '' Down in San Diego'' and '' Born to Sing'', some leading roles in other films, as well as lesser roles including in uncredited dance sequences. McDonald's Broadway credits include ''Park Avenue'' (1946), ''Winged Victory'' (1943), ''Crazy With the Heat'' (1941), and ''Babes in Arms'' (1937). Personal life McDonald was born in New York City. His sister Grace was two years older. She was contracted to Universal while he signed with MGM. He was married to actress Elisabeth Fraser from 1944 until 1952 and then actress Peggy Ryan Margaret O'Rene Ryan (August 28, 1924 – October 30, 2004) was an American dancer and actress, best known for starring in a series of movie musicals at Universal Pictures with Donald O'Connor and Gloria ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New York City
New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive with a respective county. The city is the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the United States by both population and urban area. New York is a global center of finance and commerce, culture, technology, entertainment and media, academics, and scientific output, the arts and fashion, and, as home to the headquarters of the United Nations, international diplomacy. With an estimated population in 2024 of 8,478,072 distributed over , the city is the most densely populated major city in the United States. New York City has more than double the population of Los Angeles, the nation's second-most populous city. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the world's countries participated, with many nations mobilising all resources in pursuit of total war. Tanks in World War II, Tanks and Air warfare of World War II, aircraft played major roles, enabling the strategic bombing of cities and delivery of the Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, first and only nuclear weapons ever used in war. World War II is the List of wars by death toll, deadliest conflict in history, causing World War II casualties, the death of 70 to 85 million people, more than half of whom were civilians. Millions died in genocides, including the Holocaust, and by massacres, starvation, and disease. After the Allied victory, Allied-occupied Germany, Germany, Allied-occupied Austria, Austria, Occupation of Japan, Japan, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blackface
Blackface is the practice of performers using burned cork, shoe polish, or theatrical makeup to portray a caricature of black people on stage or in entertainment. Scholarship on the origins or definition of blackface vary with some taking a global perspective that includes European culture and Western colonialism. Blackface became a global phenomenon as an outgrowth of theatrical practices of racial misrepresentation, racial impersonation popular throughout Britain and its colonial empire, where it was integral to the development of imperial racial politics. Scholars with this wider view may date the practice of blackface to as early as Medieval Europe's mystery plays when bitumen and coal were used to darken the skin of white performers portraying demons, devils, and damned souls. Still others date the practice to English Renaissance theatre, English Renaissance theater, in works such as William Shakespeare's ''Othello''. However, some scholars see blackface as a specific pract ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Minstrel Show
The minstrel show, also called minstrelsy, was an American form of theater developed in the early 19th century. The shows were performed by mostly white actors wearing blackface makeup for the purpose of portraying racial stereotypes of African Americans. There were very few African-American performers and black-only minstrel groups that also formed and toured. Minstrel shows stereotyped blacks as dimwitted, lazy, buffoonish, cowardly, superstitious, and happy-go-lucky.The Coon Character , Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia, Ferris State University. Retrieved 29 January 2016.John Kenrick , musicals101.com. 1996, revised 2003. Retrieved 9 November 2011. A recurring character was Jim Crow, an exaggerated portray ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
