Spread a Little Happiness" is a song by the musical comedy composer Vivian Ellis and writer Clifford Grey from their 1929 West End musical '' Mr. Cinders''. In the original production it was sung by Binnie Hale as the character Jill Kemp;Gänzl and Lamb, pp. 131–132 a recording of her performance of the song was released by Columbia in 1929. In 1982, the song was sung in a revival of ''Mr Cinders'' at the

King's Head Theatre The King's Head Theatre, founded in 1970 by Dan Crawford, is an off-West End venue in London. The original venue was the oldest operating pub theatre in the UK. In 2024, the pub theatre, and the King's Head Theatre now operates from a purpose-b ...

, London and later at the

Fortune Theatre The Fortune Theatre is a 432-seat West End theatre in Russell Street, near Covent Garden, in the City of Westminster. From 1989 until 2023 the theatre hosted the long running play '' The Woman in Black''. History The site was acquired by aut ...

after the show was transferred there. In this revised version the song was sung by Jim Lancaster, the male lead, rather than by Jill. The song was used as the theme tune for a 2009 BBC Radio 4 comedy series of the same title, written by

John Godber John Harry Godber (born 18 May 1956) is an English playwright, known mainly for observational comedy, observational comedies. The ''Plays and Players Yearbook'' of 1993 rated him the third most performed playwright in the UK after William Shak ...

and Jane Thornton, set in a Yorkshire sandwich bar.

Sting version

In 1982, English musician Sting covered the song for the soundtrack of the film '' Brimstone and Treacle'', reaching number 16 in the UK.

Charts

Weekly charts

Other usage

Comic book A comic book, comic-magazine, or simply comic is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panel (comics), panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are often accompanied by descriptive prose and wri ...

series '' The Sandman'', published by the

DC Comics DC Comics (originally DC Comics, Inc., and also known simply as DC) is an American comic book publisher owned by DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery. DC is an initialism for "Detective Comics", an American comic book seri ...

imprint

Vertigo Vertigo is a condition in which a person has the sensation that they are moving, or that objects around them are moving, when they are not. Often it feels like a spinning or swaying movement. It may be associated with nausea, vomiting, perspira ...

, includes a piece of the song in issue #6 ''24 hours'' (1989), written by

Neil Gaiman Neil Richard MacKinnon Gaiman (; born Neil Richard Gaiman; 10 November 1960) is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, audio theatre, and screenplays. His works include the comic series ''The Sandman (comic book), The Sandma ...

and illustrated by Mike Dringenberg and Malcolm Jones III''The Sandman'' #6 (1989)

References

Sources

* * Songs from musicals 1929 songs {{musical-theat-stub