Biography
Songwriter George Forrest earned lasting recognition for the enduring standards “Strangers in Paradise” and “Baubles, Bangles and Beads.” Working across seven decades with his primary partner Robert Wright—born Robert Craig Wright in 1914—the pair accumulated extensive credits for both Broadway and Hollywood productions. Born George Forrest Chichester Jr. in Brooklyn, NY, Forrest relocated with his family to Miami, FL, during the opening years of the 1920s. Despite limited formal instruction, he displayed early mastery of the piano. During adolescence he played behind vocalists in Miami nightclubs and performed with his high-school glee club, where he first encountered Wright, then serving as the club’s pianist. Still in their teens, the two embarked on a cabaret tour that reached Hollywood eight months later; there they auditioned successfully for MGM and secured a seven-year studio contract whose initial task was preparing the score for the Jeanette MacDonald–Nelson Eddy film Maytime. Across their 72-year partnership they produced more than two thousand songs, sixteen stage musicals—including 1944’s The Song of Norway, 1961’s Kean, and 1989’s Grand Hotel—fifty-eight motion-picture scores, and numerous cabaret revues. Their best-known numbers originated in the 1953 Tony Award–winning Broadway musical Kismet. Peggy Lee’s 1953 recording of “Baubles, Bangles and Beads” reached number 30 on the pop chart, the Kirby Stone Four’s 1958 doo-wop rendition climbed to number 25, and Frank Sinatra included the song on his Come Dance With Me! album. The 1955 MGM screen adaptation, directed by Vincente Minnelli and featuring Howard Keel, Vic Damone, Ann Blyth, and Sebastian Cabot, earned Oscar nominations for the songs “Always and Always,” “It’s a Blue World,” and “Pennies for Peppino.” Kismet later became a 1967 television presentation starring Jose Ferrer, Barbara Eden, Anna Maria Alberghetti, George Chakiris, and Hans Conried. The songwriting team received the ASCAP/Richard Rodgers Award for their sustained contributions to the American musical theater. George Forrest died in Miami on October 10, 1999, at the age of 84, while he and Robert Wright were still developing a new musical.