Biography
Born as Percival Davis on 5 January 1887 in Birmingham, West Midlands, England, Clifford Grey died on 25 September 1941 in Ipswich, Suffolk, England after a bomb blast during the early months of World War II. He began his career as a performer before supplying words for London and New York productions, most notably teaming with composer Nat D. Ayer on The Bing Boys Are Here. The revue, which opened at the Alhambra Theatre in April 1916, featured two of his lasting songs, “If You Were The Only Girl In The World” and “Another Little Drink Wouldn’t Do Us Any Harm.”
Over the following seasons Grey supplied lyrics for additional revues, among them Pell-Mell (Ayer), The Bing Girls Are There (Ayer, “Let The Great Big World Keep Turning”), The Other Bing Boys (Ayer), Hullo, America! (Herman Finck), The Bing Brothers On Broadway (Ayer, “First Love, Last Love, Best Love”), and Johnny Jones (Charles Cuvillièr). He also contributed to several musical plays: Theodore & Co. (Ivor Novello–Jerome Kern), Arlette (Jane Vieu–Guy Lefeuvre–Novello), Yes, Uncle! (Ayer), Who’s Hooper? (Howard Talbot–Novello), Kissing Time (Ivan Caryll–Willie Redstone), and A Night Out (Redstone).
Grey crossed the Atlantic in 1920 to resume work with Kern on Florenz Ziegfeld’s Sally. The lavish production starred Marilyn Miller, Leon Errol and Walter Catlett and completed 570 performances. Among the Kern–Grey numbers were “Sally,” “Wild Rose,” and “The Church ’Round The Corner,” the last with additional credit to P.G. Wodehouse. Although he remained in the United States through most of the decade, early-1920s West End credits included Phi-Phi (1922, Henri Christiné), The Smith Family (1922, Ayer), and The Rainbow (1923, George Gershwin). On Broadway he wrote lyrics—and occasionally libretti—for a succession of variable musical comedies and revues such as The Hotel Mouse (1922, Armand Vecsey–Caryll), Lady Butterfly (1923, Werner Janssen), Vogues Of 1924 (Herbert Stothart), Majorie (1924, Stothart–Sigmund Romberg–Stephen Jones), Artists And Models (1924, Romberg–J. Fred Coots), Annie Dear (1924, Romberg), Artists And Models (1925, Alfred Goodman–Coots–Maurice Rubens), June Days (1925, Coots), Gay Paree (1925, Goodman–Coots), Mayflowers (1925, Edward Kunneke), A Night In Paris (1926, Coots–Rubens), The Merry World (1926, Coots), The Co-Optimists (1928, Melville Gideon), The Madcap (1928, Rubens), Sunny Days (1928, Jean Schwartz), and Ups-A-Daisy (1928, Lewis E. Gensler).
Two projects stood out: Hit The Deck (1927, Vincent Youmans–Leo Robin), which ran 352 performances and introduced the rousing “Hallelujah!,” and The Three Musketeers (1928, Rudolph Friml–Wodehouse), a Ziegfeld staging that highlighted “Ma Belle” and “March Of The Musketeers.” Grey also supplied the English lyric for José Padilla’s “Valencia,” introduced by Hazel Dawn in the 1926 Shubert revue Great Temptations; the song later became a major hit for Paul Whiteman, Ben Selvin And The Revelers, and others.
With the arrival of sound films, Grey spent time in Hollywood, first collaborating with Victor Schertzinger on The Love Parade (1929) for Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald, which yielded “Dream Lover,” “Nobody’s Using It Now,” “Paris, Stay The Same,” “March Of The Grenadiers,” and “My Love Parade.” He next worked with Oscar Straus on The Smiling Lieutenant (1931), another Chevalier vehicle, producing “One More Hour Of Love,” “Jazz Up Your Lingerie,” “Toujours L’Amour In The Army,” and “Live For Today.” Additional screen assignments included Devil May Care (1929, Stothart, “Charming”) and In Gay Madrid (1930, Stothart, “Dark Night”) for Ramon Novarro, and The Rogue Song (1929, Stothart–Franz Lehár, “When I’m Looking At You,” “White Dove,” “The Rogue Song”) starring Lawrence Tibbett. Further work with Stothart produced The Floradora Girl (1930, UK title The Gay Nineties), featuring Marion Davies and the songs “Pass The Beer And Pretzels,” “Swingin’ Down The Lane,” and “My Kind Of Man.”
Thereafter, aside from contributing “I’m Glad I Waited” (Youmans–Harold Adamson) to the short-lived Broadway musical Smiles—where it was performed by Fred Astaire and Marilyn Miller—Grey returned permanently to England and frequently served as librettist or co-librettist. His first major success was Mr. Cinders, written with Greatrex Newman and Vivian Ellis; Binnie Hale introduced the memorable “Spread A Little Happiness,” later revived by artists including Sting, who reached the UK Top 20 with it in 1982 and saw it used in a television commercial. Another enduring number, “Got A Date With An Angel,” credited to Grey, Jack Waller, Sonny Miller and Joseph Tunbridge, was introduced by Bobby Howes in For The Love Of Mike (1931) and became popular in the United States through Skinnay Ennis with the Hal Kemp Orchestra.
During the 1930s Grey continued writing screenplays and songs for British films while contributing to West End productions such as Out Of The Bottle (1932, Oscar Levant–Ellis), The One Girl (1933, a revised Smiles with Youmans and Adamson), Command Performance (1933, Waller–Tunbridge), Mr. Whittington (1934, Waller–Tunbridge–Green, “Oceans Of Time”), Jack O’ Diamonds (1935, Noel Gay), Love Laughs! (1935, Gay), At The Silver Swan (1936, Edmond Samuels), Oh, You Letty (1937, Paul Sheron), and Bobby Get Your Gun (1938, Waller–Tunbridge). After the outbreak of war he joined ENSA, directing concert parties for the troops until his death.
Over the following seasons Grey supplied lyrics for additional revues, among them Pell-Mell (Ayer), The Bing Girls Are There (Ayer, “Let The Great Big World Keep Turning”), The Other Bing Boys (Ayer), Hullo, America! (Herman Finck), The Bing Brothers On Broadway (Ayer, “First Love, Last Love, Best Love”), and Johnny Jones (Charles Cuvillièr). He also contributed to several musical plays: Theodore & Co. (Ivor Novello–Jerome Kern), Arlette (Jane Vieu–Guy Lefeuvre–Novello), Yes, Uncle! (Ayer), Who’s Hooper? (Howard Talbot–Novello), Kissing Time (Ivan Caryll–Willie Redstone), and A Night Out (Redstone).
Grey crossed the Atlantic in 1920 to resume work with Kern on Florenz Ziegfeld’s Sally. The lavish production starred Marilyn Miller, Leon Errol and Walter Catlett and completed 570 performances. Among the Kern–Grey numbers were “Sally,” “Wild Rose,” and “The Church ’Round The Corner,” the last with additional credit to P.G. Wodehouse. Although he remained in the United States through most of the decade, early-1920s West End credits included Phi-Phi (1922, Henri Christiné), The Smith Family (1922, Ayer), and The Rainbow (1923, George Gershwin). On Broadway he wrote lyrics—and occasionally libretti—for a succession of variable musical comedies and revues such as The Hotel Mouse (1922, Armand Vecsey–Caryll), Lady Butterfly (1923, Werner Janssen), Vogues Of 1924 (Herbert Stothart), Majorie (1924, Stothart–Sigmund Romberg–Stephen Jones), Artists And Models (1924, Romberg–J. Fred Coots), Annie Dear (1924, Romberg), Artists And Models (1925, Alfred Goodman–Coots–Maurice Rubens), June Days (1925, Coots), Gay Paree (1925, Goodman–Coots), Mayflowers (1925, Edward Kunneke), A Night In Paris (1926, Coots–Rubens), The Merry World (1926, Coots), The Co-Optimists (1928, Melville Gideon), The Madcap (1928, Rubens), Sunny Days (1928, Jean Schwartz), and Ups-A-Daisy (1928, Lewis E. Gensler).
Two projects stood out: Hit The Deck (1927, Vincent Youmans–Leo Robin), which ran 352 performances and introduced the rousing “Hallelujah!,” and The Three Musketeers (1928, Rudolph Friml–Wodehouse), a Ziegfeld staging that highlighted “Ma Belle” and “March Of The Musketeers.” Grey also supplied the English lyric for José Padilla’s “Valencia,” introduced by Hazel Dawn in the 1926 Shubert revue Great Temptations; the song later became a major hit for Paul Whiteman, Ben Selvin And The Revelers, and others.
With the arrival of sound films, Grey spent time in Hollywood, first collaborating with Victor Schertzinger on The Love Parade (1929) for Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald, which yielded “Dream Lover,” “Nobody’s Using It Now,” “Paris, Stay The Same,” “March Of The Grenadiers,” and “My Love Parade.” He next worked with Oscar Straus on The Smiling Lieutenant (1931), another Chevalier vehicle, producing “One More Hour Of Love,” “Jazz Up Your Lingerie,” “Toujours L’Amour In The Army,” and “Live For Today.” Additional screen assignments included Devil May Care (1929, Stothart, “Charming”) and In Gay Madrid (1930, Stothart, “Dark Night”) for Ramon Novarro, and The Rogue Song (1929, Stothart–Franz Lehár, “When I’m Looking At You,” “White Dove,” “The Rogue Song”) starring Lawrence Tibbett. Further work with Stothart produced The Floradora Girl (1930, UK title The Gay Nineties), featuring Marion Davies and the songs “Pass The Beer And Pretzels,” “Swingin’ Down The Lane,” and “My Kind Of Man.”
Thereafter, aside from contributing “I’m Glad I Waited” (Youmans–Harold Adamson) to the short-lived Broadway musical Smiles—where it was performed by Fred Astaire and Marilyn Miller—Grey returned permanently to England and frequently served as librettist or co-librettist. His first major success was Mr. Cinders, written with Greatrex Newman and Vivian Ellis; Binnie Hale introduced the memorable “Spread A Little Happiness,” later revived by artists including Sting, who reached the UK Top 20 with it in 1982 and saw it used in a television commercial. Another enduring number, “Got A Date With An Angel,” credited to Grey, Jack Waller, Sonny Miller and Joseph Tunbridge, was introduced by Bobby Howes in For The Love Of Mike (1931) and became popular in the United States through Skinnay Ennis with the Hal Kemp Orchestra.
During the 1930s Grey continued writing screenplays and songs for British films while contributing to West End productions such as Out Of The Bottle (1932, Oscar Levant–Ellis), The One Girl (1933, a revised Smiles with Youmans and Adamson), Command Performance (1933, Waller–Tunbridge), Mr. Whittington (1934, Waller–Tunbridge–Green, “Oceans Of Time”), Jack O’ Diamonds (1935, Noel Gay), Love Laughs! (1935, Gay), At The Silver Swan (1936, Edmond Samuels), Oh, You Letty (1937, Paul Sheron), and Bobby Get Your Gun (1938, Waller–Tunbridge). After the outbreak of war he joined ENSA, directing concert parties for the troops until his death.