Biography
George Burns pursued two separate phases of work in entertainment, the second growing directly out of the first. Following the passing of Gracie Allen, his wife and stage partner of four decades, he resumed performing alone. Earlier still, before forming Burns & Allen, he had already navigated an uneven path through vaudeville, taking any role that kept him onstage. He once remarked, “Show business had a lot of appeal to me, you got to wear nice clothes, you got to travel, sometimes you got paid, and it didn’t require heavy lifting. You didn’t really need much talent to get started in vaudeville, and if there was one thing I had, it wasn’t much talent.” Among his many billed identities were Glide in Goldie, Fields, and Glide; Jose in Jose and Dolores; Eddie Delight; Jed Jackson in Jackson and Malone; Harris in Harris and Dunlop; Maurice Valentine in Maurice Valentine and His Trained Dog; Captain Betts in Captain Betts and His Trained Seal; and, at different moments, both Brown and Williams in Brown and Williams. Such constant reinvention might have discouraged others, yet Burns—born Nathan Birnbaum in 1896—observed that “The only things all of my acts had in common is that they weren’t very good. I only had one rule: I only worked with people who would work with me. It was tough, but I loved every minute of it. I was in show business and that was all I cared about. There was always another theater, or a new act, or a new name. I never cared what name I was working under, as long as I working. And why should I have felt bad about changing my name? Even my real name wasn’t my real name.” Nearly sixty years after harmonizing for coins on New York sidewalks with the Pee Wee Quartet, he again stood alone, now known simply as George Burns, the straight man who had supported one of the most celebrated comediennes of the era. Most performers would have found such a restart in their seventies daunting, yet Burns not only accepted the challenge but built a solo career longer than the four decades he had spent delivering lines to Gracie Allen.
Years of experience on both sides of success supplied him with unmatched theatrical insight. He had shaped Burns & Allen from behind the curtain, authoring their early routines and refining Gracie’s persona until the partnership ran with precision and consistency. He recognized what succeeded and what failed, directing his stable of writers to maintain a single, unwavering tone that only enhanced the public image of their characters. That same discipline sustained the team through two decades of headlining in vaudeville, film, and radio. When the act reached television in the early 1950s, Burns formed his own production company and began overseeing additional series. The first was The People’s Choice, a situation comedy featuring former child star Jackie Cooper alongside a talking basset hound; the same device later reached its peak in another Burns production, Mister Ed.
After Gracie announced her retirement in 1958, Burns returned to the airwaves at once, co-starring with Connie Stevens in the half-hour comedy Wendy and Me. He also resumed live performances, appearing with Stevens and Carol Channing while offering Ann-Margret her initial prominent showcase in his Las Vegas revue. He maintained a steady schedule of television specials, among them George Burns in Nashville?, George Burns’ Early, Early, Early Christmas Special, and the poignant A Love Letter to Jack Benny. Late-night programs, particularly The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, welcomed him regularly; audiences delighted in his store of show-business anecdotes and the old songs he would pointedly leave unfinished. His status as a living legend grew, yet he refused to rely solely on past triumphs. Instead he refreshed his material and adjusted his toupees to suit his age. Film work resumed as well, ranging from brief appearances in the widely panned Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band—making him perhaps the sole performer to share credits with both Al Jolson and Aerosmith—to portrayals of God in two successful features. He scored chart success with recordings such as “I Wish I Was Eighteen Again” and “It’s the Only Way to Go,” and filled theaters with one-man shows. His stage craft sharpened with each advancing year.
In his eighties he began committing his observations to print. Assisted by a collaborator, the man who had left school after fourth grade produced eight volumes, every one a best-seller, including the affectionate memoir Gracie: A Love Story. At seventy-nine he received the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Neil Simon’s The Sunshine Boys. A foundational figure in the development of modern entertainment, he had been present at the inception of recordings, motion pictures, radio, and television. He lived beyond one hundred, his professional life stretching across nearly the whole of the twentieth century. George Burns stands among the enduring giants of his field, and it is unlikely his equal will appear again.
Years of experience on both sides of success supplied him with unmatched theatrical insight. He had shaped Burns & Allen from behind the curtain, authoring their early routines and refining Gracie’s persona until the partnership ran with precision and consistency. He recognized what succeeded and what failed, directing his stable of writers to maintain a single, unwavering tone that only enhanced the public image of their characters. That same discipline sustained the team through two decades of headlining in vaudeville, film, and radio. When the act reached television in the early 1950s, Burns formed his own production company and began overseeing additional series. The first was The People’s Choice, a situation comedy featuring former child star Jackie Cooper alongside a talking basset hound; the same device later reached its peak in another Burns production, Mister Ed.
After Gracie announced her retirement in 1958, Burns returned to the airwaves at once, co-starring with Connie Stevens in the half-hour comedy Wendy and Me. He also resumed live performances, appearing with Stevens and Carol Channing while offering Ann-Margret her initial prominent showcase in his Las Vegas revue. He maintained a steady schedule of television specials, among them George Burns in Nashville?, George Burns’ Early, Early, Early Christmas Special, and the poignant A Love Letter to Jack Benny. Late-night programs, particularly The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, welcomed him regularly; audiences delighted in his store of show-business anecdotes and the old songs he would pointedly leave unfinished. His status as a living legend grew, yet he refused to rely solely on past triumphs. Instead he refreshed his material and adjusted his toupees to suit his age. Film work resumed as well, ranging from brief appearances in the widely panned Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band—making him perhaps the sole performer to share credits with both Al Jolson and Aerosmith—to portrayals of God in two successful features. He scored chart success with recordings such as “I Wish I Was Eighteen Again” and “It’s the Only Way to Go,” and filled theaters with one-man shows. His stage craft sharpened with each advancing year.
In his eighties he began committing his observations to print. Assisted by a collaborator, the man who had left school after fourth grade produced eight volumes, every one a best-seller, including the affectionate memoir Gracie: A Love Story. At seventy-nine he received the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Neil Simon’s The Sunshine Boys. A foundational figure in the development of modern entertainment, he had been present at the inception of recordings, motion pictures, radio, and television. He lived beyond one hundred, his professional life stretching across nearly the whole of the twentieth century. George Burns stands among the enduring giants of his field, and it is unlikely his equal will appear again.
Albums
