JIMMY DURANTE, GOODNIGHT MRS.CALABASH

O cantor, pianista, comediante e ator James Francis Durante, mais conhecido como Jimmy Durante, nasceu no 10 de fevereiro de 1893, em Nova York e foi um dos mais populares artistas norte-americanos dos anos 20 até os anos 70.

Era famoso (também) por seu rariz avantajado, que lhe rendia muitas piadas, como nos filmes The Passionate Plumer e Speak Easily — ambos com Buster Keaton em 1923.

Em filmes musicais, fez par romântico com Alice Faye, em George White's Scandal - 1934 e Sally Irene and Mary em 1938. Atuou também com Shirley Temple (Little Miss Broadway, Bette Davis (The Man Who Came to Dinner)), Van JOhnson (Two Girls and a Sailor) June Allison e muitas outras.

CD Recomendado

A coletânea "As Time Goes By: The Best of Jimmy Durante" (Warner Archives)

Jimmy faleceu em janeiro de 1980.

Jimmy Durante and Frank Sinatra

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okJJwJEGxh8

Comedian, composer, actor, singer and songwriter ("Inka Dinka Doo") Jimmy Durante, was born on February 10, 1893 in New York City. He began his career as a Coney Island pianist, and organized a five-piece band in 1916.

He opened the Club Durant with Eddie Jackson and Lou Clayton, with whom he later formed a comedy trio for vaudeville and on television. He appeared in the Broadway musicals "Show Girl", "The New Yorkers", "Strike Me Pink", "Jumbo", "Red Hot and Blue", and "Stars in Your Eyes". By 1936, he had appeared at the Palladium in London.

Later he had his own radio and television shows, and was a featured headliner in night clubs. Biographer Gene Fowler wrote his biography, "Schnozzola". Joining ASCAP in 1941, he collaborated musically with Jackie Barnett and Ben Ryan, and his other popular song compositions include "I'm Jimmy That Well-Dressed Man", "I Know Darn Well I Can Do Without Broadway", "I Ups to Him and He Ups to Me", "Daddy Your Mamma Is Lonesome For You", "Umbriago", "Any State In the Forty-Eight", "Chidabee Chidabee Chidabee", and "I'm Jimmy's Girl".

Trade Mark
Rumpled hat, patter songs ("Inka Dinka Doo") and, of course, his huge proboscis.

Trivia

Interred at Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City, California, USA.

For years he signed off his radio and TV shows with "Goodnight Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are", but he would never divulge who she was. Some speculated it was a "code name" for a current or former lover, some doubted she ever existed. It was not until after his death in 1980 that it was revealed she was, indeed, a real person.

Reference - Jimmy Durante homepage