Jewish Stereo Types

"Shakin' the Blues Away" by Irving Berlin: Videos posted by The Marriott Theatre And hey, do not skip the rope skipping! Video posted by Great Performances/PBS That interrupted number was from the 2018 revival of Holiday Inn , but it was originally written for The Ziegfeld Follies of 1927 , was used again in 1948 in Easter Parade as a number by Ann Miller, and was used yet again in 1955's Love Me or Leave Me , in which it was sung by Doris Day, playing the role of Ruth Etting, the original 1927 singer. I guess it's a really good tune for a dance number? But, hey, no complaints here, I always do love a good tap number! *** If it weren't for the fact that we've got a holiday (Shavuot) starting in a few hours, I'd try to come up with some new factoid about Irving Berlin, but since we do, I shall just put in some links to what I've already said about Irving Berlin: For those who are celebrating Easter... It's been a little minute....

I really should have thought of this one before: Video posted by Sophia BP I mean, it was good enough for Lin-Manuel Miranda, right? Video posted by usnavi (Is this what happens at every Tony winner's wedding? Because this has not happened at any wedding I've been at. I feel like this should happen at more weddings.) *** I cannot help but feel that it is a trifle unnecessary to say that Jerry Bock (the composer) and Sheldon Harnick (the lyricist) of Fiddler on the Roof were Jewish. (As were the book writer, Joseph Stein ; the producer of the original Broadway production, Hal Prince ; and the director/choreographer of that same production, Jerome Robbins . So much for Mel Brooks and his "phalanx of Jews" !). Both Bock and Harnick wrote with others, but together they wrote the songs for at least eight Broadway musicals, including Fiorello! , the under appreciated She Loves Me , and The Rothschilds , and along the way picked up three Tonys. L'Chaim! *...

I don't suppose you can really call it a dance, can you--more a routine. But who cares? Video posted by ozabbavo77 Talk about classic comedy! And if you want to brave a Russian site, you can see Joseph Gordon-Levitt interpret/recreate the number on SNL , which while considerably less frenetic is at least as impressive an accomplishment considering that he made it all the way through on live TV--and then did the rest of the show--while when Donald O'Connor performed that tour de force of physical comedy he was so bruised and battered he had to retreat to bed for several days after filming the number. Ouch! Of course, there is a teensy little problem with the song itself. Arthur Freed was a producer at MGM, responsible for many of the best musicals to come out of Hollywood, but before that he was a lyricist, and together with composer Nacio Herb Brown had written a nice catalog of songs that he thought could be put to good use in a movie. Being an excellent producer, his wh...

Guilt doesn't seem like a promising direction. Let's try something else entirely: Video posted by omarov No, no, NO, they can't stop there! You can't have Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers not dance! (Go ahead, go full screen for it, you know you want to.) Video posted by UberDurable That was "Pick Yourself Up," music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Dorothy Fields, and it was written for the 1936 movie these clips came from, Swing Time . It's been covered and recovered , and was (almost) quoted by Barack Obama in his first Inaugural Address . *** We've run across Dorothy Fields before , but I hadn't mentioned that her father, Lew Fields (born Moses Schoenfeld), started out in theater as half of Weber and Fields --one of the most popular comedy teams in vaudeville--and then became a successful theater producer . Despite this show business background, Dorothy did anything but coast--even though a female lyricist and librettist was a rarity in her...

After all, we've already tried giving orders and offering sweet reason, so... Video posted by renatorw1165 "I Want to Be Happy" is from the Broadway musical No, No, Nanette , but wasn't in the original score. The show was unsuccessful in its out-of-town tryouts, so the producer asked Vincent Youmans (the original composer) and Irving Caesar (not the original lyricist) to come up with some new songs . The ones they came up with were "Tea for Two" and "I Want to Be Happy," and they turned out to be the big popular hits from the show, and both have been covered a LOT. *** Vincent Youmans, who died young , was not Jewish , but the legendary Isidor Keiser (aka Irving Caesar) was . He wrote the lyrics for over 700 songs, including "Tea for Two" (yes, that one ), "Swanee" (with George Gershwin), and the English lyrics to "Just a Gigolo," not to mention the songs for over 30 Broadway shows and revues. Not enough? He wa...

Even if it's not the best of all possible worlds, surely it's enough that it's the best of times! Video posted by BroadwayJLM (Which actually is not so far away from carpe diem, but still.) *** I've written a little about Jerry Herman, the composer and lyricist of La Cage Aux Folles (and Hello, Dolly! and Mame ) and his Jewish-summer-camp childhood before . Of course, those were not his only Broadway shows--he scored a dozen of them, plus five Off Broadway revues--but with those three he became the first composer-lyricist to have three musicals run more than 1500 consecutive performances on Broadway --the best of times, indeed! * * * * * And another happy-making thing from my sister (thank you, Sarah!): Live cams from the Bronx Zoo ! There are sea lion feedings at 11:00am and 3:00pm EDT; lemurs starting at 10:00am EDT; and aquatic bird feedings at 12:30pm and 3:30pm EDT--and if you keep scrolling down, there are some feeds from the New York Aquarium , too...

Video posted by arnau884 Of course, this "Best of All Possible Worlds" is from Leonard Bernstein's operetta based on Voltaire's satire Candide , and thus it is extremely tongue-in-cheek. You could even call it a bit mean-spirited, because, being a satire of Leibniz's optimism it is extremely broad and the philosophy it is satirizing is more subtle. (...But it is not entirely an unfair critique, either!) *** A positive raft of lyricists ultimately worked on Candide , but I believe that John Latouche wrote the lyrics for this iteration of "The Best of All Possible Worlds [The Lesson Song]," and although he apparently never mentioned it, Latouche was indeed Jewish, since both his maternal grandparents were . He died young (at age 41), but before that wrote the lyrics for some very well-known songs, such as "Taking a Chance on Love," and a number of musicals, plays, and even an opera. Of course, Leonard Bernstein was famously Jewish . And...