11,545 stories by "Trav S.D."
What a joy it is to discover the existence of characters like Ramblin' Tommy Scott (1913-2017) and what a boon, for he appears to have been one of the last purveyors of the old time medicine…
There's not a huge amount to say about the late Al Molinaro (1919-2015) other than he was funny and universally beloved. He may have had the most epic beak in show business history, beating …
Martha Sleeper (1910-1983) started out with the greatest possible advantages in show business. Her uncle was J.J. Murdock, who ran the Keith-Albee-Orpheum circuit (in other words, the boss o…
Chicago born Rita Oehmen (1917-1995) started out in a vaudeville act with her brother Edward called The Oehmen Twins. At age 20 she briefly performed as a solo, and rapidly got into films. S…
I have long mentally penalized character actor Donald MacBride (1893-1957) for being one of the most annoying parts of one of the worst Marx Brothers movies, Room Service (1938). He's that g…
I get the birthday for the late Michael Wilson (1952-1996), Coney Island USA's famous Illustrated Man, from this photo spread of his 1989 birthday party by John A. Moser. Wilson was one of t…
Today being the first day of Pride Week (here in New York anyway), we thought we'd use the occasion for a brief tribute to the historic situation comedy Love Sidney (1981-83). Love, Sidney w…
I was lured to the rim of this rabbit hole of a story initially by learning about the situation comedy Harry's Girls, a short-lived show that ran on NBC from 1963 through 1964. The premise o…
Today we celebrate the brilliant stage and screen impresario Mike Todd (Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen, 1909-1958). He's my new hero, I think. I look down the list of what he produced, and it hugely…
Tim Herbert (Herbert Timberg, 1914-1986) had a wonderful show biz pedigree. The son of vaudeville performer and sketch/songwriter Herman Timberg, he first teamed up with Pat Rooney Jr, perfo…
For all her present obscurity, Jocelyn Lee (Mary Alice Simpson, 1902-1980) appears to have been quite the handful. The Chicago chorus girl started out in regional productions of Broadway rev…
Dorothy Stickney (1896-1898) was primarily a creature of the stage, although she was also in some well known film and television projects. The daughter of a North Dakota doctor, she attended…
It seems madness to me that I only recently heard of the team of Phil Ford (1919-2005) and Mimi Hines (b. 1933). This duo was bursting at the seams with talent, mixing elements of Burns and …
Looking into one guy named Jack Arthur this morning has made me aware of another, so we treat of them both. Neither was the same as Johnny Arthur, who appeared in comedy shorts, btw! The Ame…
We salute one of the most appealing of all male Hollywood stars on his natal day: Errol Flynn (1909-1959). A number of Flynn's films are genuine classics. The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)…
Like many of my other posts on major American playwrights (most recently Tennessee Williams), this is adapted from my personal notebooks. I don't deal much with biography here. It's mostly c…
It was the early part of Gail Patrick's career that interested me initially. Patrick came to Hollywood to compete in that same "Panther" contest that Lona Andre had " the prize was getting t…
Augustus "Gus" Schilling (1908-1957) was a burlesque and Broadway comic who became a beloved Hollywood bit player and star of comedy shorts. A son of New York's German-American community, Sc…
Francis "Dink" Trout (1898-1950) was a fascinating jack of all trades: musician, radio personality, screen actor, voice-over artist. He started out as a trombonist and marimba player in Ben …
Louisville-born blues singer Sara Martin (Sara Dunn, 1884-1955) started out on the black vaudeville circuits sometime prior to 1915. Advertised as "The Colored Sophie Tucker" or "The Famous …
I was actually rooting for Ghost Light, John Stimpson's new Shakespearean horror comedy to strike a chord with me , because " why wouldn't I? Such a thing, well executed, would be pretty muc…
Ona Munson (Owena Wolcott, 1903-1955) started out in vaudeville, making her way from her native Portland, Oregon to Broadway, where she was in the chorus of George White's Scandals in 1919. …
Did you know the classic 1921 Tin Pan Alley song "Peggy O'Neil" was about a real person? She was a stage and screen star in both the U.S. and U.K., although dividing her time between both na…
I see many references to Philadelphia-born comedian Jimmy (or Jimmie) Callahan (1891-1957) in vaudeville starting round 1910, although it can be little tough to sort out: pro baseball player…
Just a brief acknowledgment of the existence of character actor William B. Davidson (1888-1947) today. The fact that Davidson was both a Columbia football star and a trained lawyer speaks to…
