Biography
Lyricist Bert Kalmar maintained a longstanding creative link to composer Harry Ruby, supplying material that reached the screen through comedy teams such as Wheeler & Woolsey and the Marx Brothers. Kalmar and Ruby collaborated on multiple Broadway productions that introduced notable performers, yet their most enduring achievements came as songwriters. Bert Kalmar traveled a circuitous route from New York's Lower East Side to Hollywood, marked by abrupt changes in direction.
Born in New York in 1884, Kalmar spent his early years only blocks from the birthplace of the slightly younger Harry Ruby. His interest in music developed gradually and surfaced only in his late twenties. At first he pursued magic. Leaving home as a youngster, Kalmar experimented with various livelihoods until he recognized an aptitude for sleight-of-hand; his quick reflexes and dexterity earned neighborhood renown for juggling, producing playing cards, or extracting rabbits from his sleeve. These abilities carried him onto the vaudeville circuit in the opening years of the twentieth century, though he soon encountered intense rivalry from other magicians and extended stretches without bookings.
Kalmar next considered a career as a comedian aimed at Hebrew-speaking New York audiences, then a sizable community. To prepare, he created Hebrew-language parodies of current popular songs. A satirical version of the George M. Cohan show "Wine, Women and Song" led him into stage comedy alongside Jessie Brown, later his wife and former spouse, under the billing Kalmar & Brown. Composer Ted Snyder encouraged Kalmar to shift from parodies to original songs; their joint effort "I Want to Be in the Land of Harmony" became a substantial success, drawing Kalmar into music publishing where he met Harry Ruby, a former movie-theater pianist working as a song plugger. Kalmar, Snyder, and Ruby later wrote "Who's Sorry Now," a composition that achieved popularity in the 1910s and 1920s and resurfaced as a hit for Connie Francis three decades afterward.
The Kalmar-Ruby partnership, launched in 1918, secured a contract with a major publisher. In subsequent years they produced songs recorded by Fanny Brice, Eddie Cantor, and Helen Kane, among them "Three Little Words," "This Heart of Mine," "I Gave You Up Before You Turned Me Down," "My Sunny Tennessee," "I Want to Be Loved By You," and "Oh, What a Pal Was Mary." Their ambitions soon extended beyond individual numbers; by the early 1920s they contributed sketches to Irving Berlin's Music Box Revues and Earl Carroll's Vanities. Their first full musical, Helen of Troy, N.Y., opened doors to work with the Marx Brothers on Animal Crackers, later adapted for film, and other successful stage productions. The number "Hooray for Captain Spaulding" from Animal Crackers served as Groucho Marx's signature piece for four decades and continued to generate royalties through his 1980s television program; ironically, the film version of Animal Crackers remained unavailable for years because of rights complications resolved only in the early 1970s. Their stage musical Top Speed also marked the production in which Ginger Rogers first garnered notable critical attention. By the close of the 1920s and the start of the 1930s, jazz artists including Henry "Red" Allen had begun performing Kalmar and Ruby songs, placing the team near the peak of their field.
The arrival of sound films and musicals drew Kalmar and Ruby to Hollywood in 1930, where RKO commissioned songs for Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey. Their material also appeared in the studio's 1930 Amos and Andy feature Check and Double Check. They supplied songs for Eddie Cantor in The Kid From Spain at Goldwyn and for Fanny Brice in Everybody Sing at MGM, yet their most frequently recalled screen contributions came in the Marx Brothers Paramount pictures Horse Feathers and Duck Soup, even though neither film enjoyed immediate success; in later decades both pictures, including the song "I'm Against It," attained classic status. The team continued writing for Hollywood into the mid-1940s, contributing to Wake Up and Dream at 20th Century Fox.
In 1947, shortly before Bert Kalmar's death, the pair contracted with MGM for a musical biography of their partnership. The resulting film, Three Little Words, appeared in 1950, with Fred Astaire portraying Kalmar and Red Skelton portraying Ruby. Renewed interest in the Marx Brothers during the 1960s revived attention to much of their Hollywood catalog, highlighted by the re-release of Animal Crackers in the following decade. Several of their songs remain familiar more than eighty years later, sustained by Connie Francis's multimillion-selling version of "Who's Sorry Now" and by the comedic numbers through Kalmar's wordplay and their ties to figures such as Groucho Marx and Helen Kane.
Born in New York in 1884, Kalmar spent his early years only blocks from the birthplace of the slightly younger Harry Ruby. His interest in music developed gradually and surfaced only in his late twenties. At first he pursued magic. Leaving home as a youngster, Kalmar experimented with various livelihoods until he recognized an aptitude for sleight-of-hand; his quick reflexes and dexterity earned neighborhood renown for juggling, producing playing cards, or extracting rabbits from his sleeve. These abilities carried him onto the vaudeville circuit in the opening years of the twentieth century, though he soon encountered intense rivalry from other magicians and extended stretches without bookings.
Kalmar next considered a career as a comedian aimed at Hebrew-speaking New York audiences, then a sizable community. To prepare, he created Hebrew-language parodies of current popular songs. A satirical version of the George M. Cohan show "Wine, Women and Song" led him into stage comedy alongside Jessie Brown, later his wife and former spouse, under the billing Kalmar & Brown. Composer Ted Snyder encouraged Kalmar to shift from parodies to original songs; their joint effort "I Want to Be in the Land of Harmony" became a substantial success, drawing Kalmar into music publishing where he met Harry Ruby, a former movie-theater pianist working as a song plugger. Kalmar, Snyder, and Ruby later wrote "Who's Sorry Now," a composition that achieved popularity in the 1910s and 1920s and resurfaced as a hit for Connie Francis three decades afterward.
The Kalmar-Ruby partnership, launched in 1918, secured a contract with a major publisher. In subsequent years they produced songs recorded by Fanny Brice, Eddie Cantor, and Helen Kane, among them "Three Little Words," "This Heart of Mine," "I Gave You Up Before You Turned Me Down," "My Sunny Tennessee," "I Want to Be Loved By You," and "Oh, What a Pal Was Mary." Their ambitions soon extended beyond individual numbers; by the early 1920s they contributed sketches to Irving Berlin's Music Box Revues and Earl Carroll's Vanities. Their first full musical, Helen of Troy, N.Y., opened doors to work with the Marx Brothers on Animal Crackers, later adapted for film, and other successful stage productions. The number "Hooray for Captain Spaulding" from Animal Crackers served as Groucho Marx's signature piece for four decades and continued to generate royalties through his 1980s television program; ironically, the film version of Animal Crackers remained unavailable for years because of rights complications resolved only in the early 1970s. Their stage musical Top Speed also marked the production in which Ginger Rogers first garnered notable critical attention. By the close of the 1920s and the start of the 1930s, jazz artists including Henry "Red" Allen had begun performing Kalmar and Ruby songs, placing the team near the peak of their field.
The arrival of sound films and musicals drew Kalmar and Ruby to Hollywood in 1930, where RKO commissioned songs for Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey. Their material also appeared in the studio's 1930 Amos and Andy feature Check and Double Check. They supplied songs for Eddie Cantor in The Kid From Spain at Goldwyn and for Fanny Brice in Everybody Sing at MGM, yet their most frequently recalled screen contributions came in the Marx Brothers Paramount pictures Horse Feathers and Duck Soup, even though neither film enjoyed immediate success; in later decades both pictures, including the song "I'm Against It," attained classic status. The team continued writing for Hollywood into the mid-1940s, contributing to Wake Up and Dream at 20th Century Fox.
In 1947, shortly before Bert Kalmar's death, the pair contracted with MGM for a musical biography of their partnership. The resulting film, Three Little Words, appeared in 1950, with Fred Astaire portraying Kalmar and Red Skelton portraying Ruby. Renewed interest in the Marx Brothers during the 1960s revived attention to much of their Hollywood catalog, highlighted by the re-release of Animal Crackers in the following decade. Several of their songs remain familiar more than eighty years later, sustained by Connie Francis's multimillion-selling version of "Who's Sorry Now" and by the comedic numbers through Kalmar's wordplay and their ties to figures such as Groucho Marx and Helen Kane.