Danny Kaye was sexy

Sexy?! Are you fucking nuts? He had a face like a boiled shrimp.

[quote]Danny Kaye was sexy.

Only to a clown.

He was charismatic but not conventionally handsome.

Leslie Howard ought to have fostered him as the sidekick who made him look studly.

Since Danny's first full-length feature film was released in 1944, one year after Leslie Howard's death, that would have been difficult.

OP is correct about the nose job--and Kaye's refusal to get one. The studio's compromise was to dye Kaye's hair strawberry-blond to make him more conventionally attractive. Kaye kept the hair color the rest of his adult life.

Not a nice man, that Danny Kaye.

The rumor was that he was so cheap that married his writer wife, Sylvia Fine, so he'd never have to pay for material. Allegedly, he'd repeat this to friends, and it got back to Sylvia.

They were together 47 years, at any rate. She must have known about Sir Laurence and other men.

Shirley MacLaine claims she had a fling with him, in her 2011 memoir "I'm Over That And Other Confessions."

He had an amateur interest in surgery?

Did he do some in his spare time?

Danny Kaye was my favorite, as a kid - I identified with him, he played the kind of milquetoast who was inwardly a hero. We even had a couple of his records. Also I thought he looked like me (he didn't, we just both had reddish blond hair). His TV show was great, too. I especially like The Court jester, Knock On Wood, On The Double, and White Christmas. My dad saw his stage show, I guess he was a fan too. And yeah I think he was very cute.

He did a lot to help UNICEF, also.

(Pic w/Grace Kelly on set of To Catch A Thief)

Shirley MacLaine also describes a fling with Robert Mitchum and referred to a “wall” she couldn’t get beyond with him. The “Wall” was Mitchum’s homosexuality. MacLaine knew how to pick ‘em.

I guess he looks OK for a lesbian.

I guess he looks OK for a lesbian.

I'm with OP and R10 - he wasn't conventionally handsome, but still hot. I would have bedded him back then given the chance

But not to everyone's tastes obviously

He clearly had an athletic body, and though he wasn't conventionally handsome, he was attractive. I'd have done him.

I wouldn't have wanted to work with him, though. He was very mean and a big diva. He starred as Noah in "Two by Two" on Broadway in 1970, but he was so jealous of the audience's attention he first had one of the best Richard Rodgers songs sung by another character removed because he insisted "No one gets a bigger laugh in a Danny Kaye show than Danny Kaye," and he also took to ad-libbing so much that Rodgers himself publicly complained. he was popularly understood to have taken himself out of Tony competition that year because of his bad behavior.

(I think Madeline Kahn also left the show because of his nasty behavior...)

Didn’t he poop on a table or something?

He's rather ugly and as pointed out, he was mean to everyone. So not sexy. Not at all.

He did, however, sing Cole Porter's songs better than anyone else. He could enunciate the hell out of lyrics.

I find Kaye absolutely insufferable as a performer, especially when performing the "special material" written for him by Sylvia Fine Kaye. And even as a child watching his TV variety show, he struck me as, to use a word I heard my parents use back then, "sissified." Here he is capering with Liza on his show in 1966.

This is a nice photo of him--shows him at his most attractive

He was the original choice for On the Twentieth Century but Madeline said "No way", r16...

If he could have reined himself in he would have been great as Oscar Jaffe. But he would have psychologically tortured Kahn, and also made everyone miserable with constant stupid ad libs.

Dear OP, you are foolish to drag out this old canard about the American and Sir Laurence.

Sir Laurence Olivier was fascinated by all parts of human characters and he had an affection for vaudeville (as shown in 'The Entertainer'.

He and the American spent a brief time rehearsing for their routine in a fundraising-show called "Night of 100 Stars" Gala in 1955.

He had a great chin and jawline. That's it. Nothing else remotely sexy about him. Plus some of his performances are cringeworthy, he was such a hambone.

His stuff from the 60s was cringeworthy with schmaltzy sentiment and I vaguely remember some propaganda TV show about the Israeli kibbutzes claiming they were perfect Socialism in action.

On the other hand, he and somebody —Godard Leberson, perhaps— did a record called 'Tubby The Tuba' which IMO was clever and instructional.

I think he's funny. And he was classy and sophisticated. Even when he was silly. He was a big favorite of Princess Margaret, they may have been lovers.

I think he had a very graceful body - lean, well-proportioned - and was a good dancer. He was also accomplished in other fields and seems to have been a cultured person. His version of "Balling the Jack" is charming. I think he had sex appeal. When he wasn't clowning, he looked elegant and elven rather than handsome. But he seems to have been more unpleasant than Lauren Bacall and Faye Dunaway put together.

R16, didn't he actually slap one of his co-stars in that production? Or otherwise hit him, possibly onstage? I recall reading about it a few years ago. I think Actor's Equity got involved.

We're in solid Helen Lawson territory here.

He always seemed unwatchable--schmalty, mincing around, making faces, doing "funny" voices---ugh.

But on the other hand, R26, he and Princess Margaret may NOT have been lovers.

Watched him in White Christmas and he seemed funnier and more charming than Bing Crosby. He was easily the best part of that movie.

He's terrific in White Christmas and holds his own against Vera Ellen which is quite a feat. I was a big fan when I was a kid but my affection has cooled since he's turned out to be such a mean jerk.

When very young went to see him in Two by Two. Not a bad score but a terrible show. He turned it into the Danny Kaye show at the Palladium which was just as well. The audience ate it up. Today I would be disgusted. Back then I was charmed.

But never ever found him sexy. Was stunned that he had a relationship with Olivier. Since it came from Michael Korda when I was working in a book store before it became common knowledge I believe it.

I get him mixed up with Danny Thomas and Forest Tucker. Same era, same hamminess. Meh.

"He's rather ugly and as pointed out, he was mean to everyone. So not sexy. Not at all."

He wasn't ugly. He was attractive, but didn't have leading man looks, which didn't matter since he was a primarily a comedian. He wasn't "mean to everyone"; he did a lot of charity work and won awards for it. His style of performing was what was popular in his time; it may not be to everyone's taste these days but there's no denying he was a very talented, multi-faceted performer. In addition to being a actor, singer, dancer, comedian, musician, and philanthropist he was also an accomplished cook, golfer and pilot. He really was a amazing man.

R33 Why would you believe Korda?

His uncle was a Hungarian horse-trader, he married that Eurasian liar named Estelle Thompson and kept some crumpet named Christine Nordern on the side.

His uncle kept good company but the family's prime goals are fame and money.

R33, how did you meet Korda?

He looked good even in his 70s, which is quite rare for the time.

This is.... interesting. Notice Sir Larry's side-eye.

Did these other gentlemen interrupt something?

Danny, Sir Larry, Viv, and.... Steve Buscemi?

R44 You American ignoramus!

R43 That is no gentleman, that its Bobbie Helpmann!

R43, that photo made me think an affair between the two was not the joke it appeared to be.

That's a dancer's body.

R20’s pic reminds me of Roman Polanski. Did Polanski have some Ashkenazi genes?

Even as a child I found him to be insufferable.

He had a hot bod and BDF.

[quote] [R16], didn't he actually slap one of his co-stars in that production?

Actually, it wasn't a co-star, it was Dorothy Rodgers, the composer's wife. On one of the last night of rehearsals she made some sort of comment about wanting to get catering for the first night party but not wanting to serve Chinese food "because it smells like garbage," and he just slapped the shit out of her then and there. Apparently it was really something to see.

^ Theatre people are SO temperamental. They have tantrums over anything.

[quote]His version of "Balling the Jack" is charming.

Isn't it The Ball and the Jack?

I loathed his 'barber-shop' harmony singing quartet on his old TV show.

It was so twee and bad that I now wonder if it was intended as satire.

[quote]Isn't it The Ball and the Jack?

Not if you knew Jack.

Both Olivier and Kaye are wearing pinky rings in the photo at r43 - wonder if they gave them to each other?

Danny's pet name for Olivier was "Lally."

Some stories about Kaye's shenanigans during TWO BY TWO on Broadway.

What a piece of... work.

R52, no it is "Balling the Jack" - it's evidently a railroad term.

Jack NASTY!

He was a remarkable and sexy guy, but he was also an asshole. That's true of most famous comedians.

Tina Fey once said she had never met a comedian who was not at heart a very angry, unhappy person, and she included herself.

R45 , I had to look up that hideous face , But I was correct . Bobbie Helpmannn Was the child catcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang .

Bobbie Helpmann, like Danny Kaye, was a talented dancer. He was also, unlike Danny Kaye, a very nice guy.

Who did Bobbie do?

R63 If you look at the Wiki article at R45 you will see that Bobbie was an utterly ambitious uber-theatrical queen who trained as a dancer but was hampered by a caricature of a face.

He was able to insinuate himself into non-ballet roles with intimate friends Larry and Viv. He had a husband Michael Benthall.

Later on he assisted Margot and Rudolf.

He caused a minor scandal in the 60s with his remarks about nude ballet dancers.

Danny Kaye - super talented guy. I'd say the Court Jester showed him off at his comedic best. "The chalice from the palace has the brew that is true". I don't think of him as being sexy on screen - on the other hand, I'll bet he was very good in bed (athletic body, probably not very inhibited). His physical comedy and timing has probably never been equaled by any other performer over such a long career. The backstage gossip about Two By Two, if true, greatly diminishes my respect for him. Certainly he would not be the first or last theatrical performer to demand first billing and lots of rights and privileges pertaining to the lead if he commonly did so. (I'm thinking of all the things that J-Lo is said to demand back stage). My father always claimed that he pulled some shenanigans in order not to be drafted into the military during WWII - however, he did a lot of USO shows during the war and afterwards, so I'm not sure about that.

He was NEVER cast as a romantic lead, and often appeared slightly scared by his romantic partners on screen (as he does in White Christmas), so I guess that either that means he might have been gay, bisexual, or he recognized that non-masculine stage persona as comedic gold for him. Definitely super philanthropic, he was so beloved by UNICEF that that org tapped him to accept the Nobel Peace Prize when it was awarded to it. I guess like many people, he probably has a mixed legacy - very good in some respects, horrible in others.

I read somewhere that he had a violent temper and beat his wife

"I read somewhere that he had a violent temper and beat his wife.'

You can't believe everything you read. I'm sure a lot of things about Danny Kaye's supposed "meanness" are exaggerated. And about his supposed affair with Olivier...well, that info came from Donald Spoto, and HE is certainly not the most credible. source in the world. Wikipedia says this about Spoto's claims:

Donald Spoto, the author of "Laurence Olivier (Harper Collins)", made an unsubstantiated claim that Kaye had a 10-year secret affair with Laurence Olivier.[98] Despite media rumour since that book's publication, no evidence has been published. The English journalist Terry Coleman, who spent four years studying Olivier's archive of letters and memorabilia, could not find evidence of such an affair between Kaye and Olivier. Coleman observed, "I did check it and talked to a number of people. In this mountain of material in the archives I could not find a hint of an affair with Danny Kaye."

[quote]"I read somewhere that he had a violent temper and beat his wife.'

"You heard he has a temper, he'll beat you every night. But only when he's sober, so you're all right."

He was known as the biggest fairy on 42nd Street when he was winning over Broadway in the early 40s -- he was not discreet in his sexuality. When he went to Hollywood he quickly wed lesbian writer Sylvia Fine in a lavender marriage and toned down his act to please his studio bosses. But his flamboyance never went away in his performances. Here's the happy couple in all their sexual heat.

[quote]The English journalist Terry Coleman, who spent four years studying Olivier's archive of letters and memorabilia, could not find evidence of such an affair between Kaye and Olivier. Coleman observed, "I did check it and talked to a number of people. In this mountain of material in the archives I could not find a hint of an affair with Danny Kaye."

Because for two working actors in the 1940s, there certainly would have been no need to be discreet about having a same-sex affair.

Actually, it's *ballin'*...

He did partner Vera-Ellen quite beautifully...

"Because for two working actors in the 1940s, there certainly would have been no need to be discreet about having a same-sex affair."

R69 said Kaye was "not discreet in his sexuality." So which is it? Was Danny Kaye a flamboyant fairy or heterosexual? Seems like it depends on who you believe.

[quote]He caused a minor scandal in the 60s with his remarks about nude ballet dancers.

Penises...Testicles...Fresh Bleached Anuses...and all FREE today?

The Netherlands Dance Theatre in 1972 was the first to feature a nude ballet. Bobbie Helpmann may have secretly loved the notion but he scandalised antipodean prudes by saying—

"The trouble with nude dancing is that not everything stops when the music stops"

Kaye was about as sexy as a soiled, wet socks but hey, there's someone or something for everyone!

R73, apparently he was indiscreet in youth and in the local world of Broadway. Youth lends itself to that. As he moved into the larger spotlight of Hollywood he became more discreet. Also they may have hidden it because Olivier wanted to do so strongly. There were two people in the relationship.

He wanted to be a big star so like Olivier he had to prove that he was crazy about beautiful women on screen like Vera Ellen and Virginia Mayo. Large audiences want their assumptions confirmed of the fantasies on screen. You don't want to know that that an actor who loves Zizi on screen really has a hankering for his young cobbler apprentice off. Well I may but mass audiences nicht.

A literal torch song...

[quote]He was NEVER cast as a romantic lead

I don't know how you define romantic lead. What about The Five Pennies (the film biography of jazz great Red Nichols)? He was the lead and he had a relationship with his girlfriend/wife (Barbara Bel Geddes). If you mean in a romantic film, no. Being a romantic lead is a skill but what he did was much harder and was unique.

That's sexy? He's repulsive looking.

Despite his dancer's body that mincing queen was never sexy.

Next up: Herman Goering was sexy!

He obviously had appeal to enough people to sustain a lengthy career.

Not because he was sexy, R83. Because he was talented, a good physical actor including dance skills, and "funny" by the standards of the day. Bathos or sentimentality was also in and he was happy to do that.

Just because you don't think he was sexy doesn't mean others didn't find him so, r84.

Kaye presented himself as a married hetero for publicity sake, and he always had a girlfriend/wife in movies but usually not a romance.

Is this tiresome thread over yet?

I don't think I would call him sexy, but he had a certain appeal. But why would he want to be "sexy", anyway? He just wasn't that type.

His nose was hideous, but very small amount of careful trimming would have made it look normal. I would never have a nose job because I am too old, got through life without ever worrying about my nose, and really don't care. However, Kaye could have opened the door for more romantic leads for himself it that schnoz had been tamed.

Or, you know, maybe it would have been the end of his career.

Sylvia Fine Kaye was the biggest cane face who ever faced a cane! Who the hell were they fooling.

Danny Kaye exhausts me like Robin Williams did. So frantic and often just awful.

AWFUL like that clip with Liza, ohmygawd! That number goes on forever!

The slapping story sounds like the one about Nicol Williamson (crazy), slapping a fellow actor during the curtain call for the Broadway musical "Rex." Years later he smacked a fellow actor with a broadsword during the play "I Hate Hamlet" claiming the actor had abandoned the fight choreography. Another loon.

Hey, shit happens in live theatre, guys.

That dance number at R72 is from White Christmas.

If you watch him as he’s dancing, he’s enjoying himself. He’s smiling the whole time and he’s completely out of character. He’s supposed to be a cowardly goofball but he’s dancing very gracefully and all out. If you didn’t know who he was, you’d think he was just a professional dancer dancing with a professional dance partner. The way he handles Vera Ellen is very careful. He seems to really like her. At this point in the movie, his character barely knows her. They just met. And he’s not aggressively romancing her character. Vera Ellen herself seems to be concentrating on her dance moves really intensely.

As soon as the dance number is over, he goes right back into his character. It’s interesting to watch his face as he dances, he’s really loving it. From watching that, I wonder if he would have preferred to be a dancer.

Here’s an article with some comments from Dena Kaye, Danny Kaye’s daughter. He was a gourmet cook, and liked cooking Chinese food among other nationalities, so maybe that’s why he was offended in R50’s story.

Dena thinks they were great parents, and dodged a question about his infidelities, so apparently she knew or knows now. The article suggests he may have had affairs with both men and women.

Fuck you, r82! I was FAR better looking than Danny Kaye!

R82 some of us like mincing queens, ya cant speak for us all. And with a dancers body like he had, irresistable

The scene at R72 really shows him at his best. He looks like he'd be excellent in bed.

That role in White Christmas was originally meant for Fred Astaire. He declined it, then it was recast for Donald O’Connor. He fell ill, then it was given to Kaye.

You can see Fred Astaire doing that dance at R72. I think Kaye did a wonderful job with it though. He brings a different style to it. Much less technical and more emotional.

About "White Christmas"...I really can't see Fred Astaire doing the "Sisters" number. I think he would have found it embarrassing. I don't think Donald O'Connor would have been that comfortable doing it, either. But Danny Kaye was perfect for it; he looks likes he's enjoying himself and is delightfully camping it up. He was so funny and adorable that Bing Crosby was visibly breaking up with laughter.

R99, I read further that they re-worked it a bit for Danny Kaye, so maybe they would have done it completely differently for Astaire. But I think Kaye was a good contrast to Crosby, who was very laid back and had some lines that made him sound kind of unlikable and nasty towards the Rosemary Clooney character. They made him sound very smug and judgy towards her in a couple of places. Like if she married him she would get treated like Crosby’s first wife.

Kaye, on the other hand, was a lot nicer and more deferential towards Vera Ellen’s character, while being funny and bringing energy to the role. Bing is practically in a coma. Some energy was needed to compensate for Bing.

And I think both Crosby and Astaire seemed lower energy as they got older. Crosby was 51 in this role. Donald O’Connor was playing broadly comedic humor at that time, very manic. He was 29 in 1954. Two years earlier he was in Singing in the Rain. That probably would been too much contrast to Bing. Coke vs opium.

This is Donald O’Connor two years before White Christmas. I think he would have made Bing seem older by contrast too.

The dancing was somewhat simplified for Danny Daye in "White Christmas" for him to keep up with Vera-Ellen, probably the screen's most versatile (could dance any style) and accomplished female dancer. When Donald O'Connor dropped out because of something he caught from Francis the Talking Mule, Kaye was cast. But you'll notice that for "Abraham" and I believe another more difficult dance, they used real dancer John Brascia, since Kaye couldn't keep up to Vera.

I read somewhere that Danny Kaye dated, or had an affair with, Gwen Verdon. She had appeared as a guest star on his tv show. Don't know where this would be between dating Bob Fosse, marrying Fosse, and being frustrated with Fosse's womanizing after marrying him. Lots of confirmations of Kaye's fairly long-term relationship with Olivier over the years.

Kaye was so unprofessional during "Two By Two" that he tried to get people to break character on stage. Nearly everyone but featured player Walter Willison who steadfastly refused and remained as professional as he could, apparently angering Kaye. Madeline Kahn wanted no part of Kaye for "On the 20th Century" after dealing with Kaye's antics.

When one of Noah's sons runs off in "Two by Two," Kaye improvised the following: "Keep running! Run all the way to 'No No, Nanette'!"

R101 There are NO confirmations of Kaye's three hour long relationship with Olivier except in the addled minds of wish fulfillment fools.

R100, young O'Connor was probably hawt under all those clothes. Certainly more than Kaye.

I had an intuitive dislike and embarrassment for him when watching as a gay child. I sort of "ugh, this is what we're like" feeling in my gut. Reading all these comments I see my intuitions were right. He was a vile human being.

[quote]There are NO confirmations of Kaye's three hour long relationship with Olivier except in the addled minds of wish fulfillment fools.

Speaking of fools . . .

R101, I read a story about Willison later playing Kaye’s role in Two by Two, when he was an older man many years later. He said after he played Kaye’s role himself, he understood better why Kaye changed various other roles to benefit the main role, it made more sense to him. But he said Kaye was an asshole to everybody in the cast when he was there.

R100, I don’t know why they wanted to cast O’Connor in Kaye’s role in White Christmas in the first place, he was too young and looked too young to be opposite Bing Crosby. Crosby would have looked 100 years old next to him.

Crosby in 1954: 51

O’Connor: 29

Kaye: 43

Vera Ellen: 33

Rosemary Clooney: 35

So, eight years between Kaye and Crosby, that’s not too bad. Twenty two years between O’Connor and Crosby is a big difference visually. O’Connor would have looked like Crosby’s son, not his pal he served with in WWII.

Donald O’Connor was about eighteen in 1944. It doesn’t seem very likely that a guy who was 41 in 1944 would be palling around with an eighteen year old private in the European Theatre. Even if you’re saying Bing was a few years younger, say he was 35, he’d be an officer. Not hanging around with a young kid. Audiences in 1954 would know it made no sense. They were all WWII veterans, and the movie mentions the military a lot, it’s made for veterans and their families.

The age gap between Kaye and Vera Ellen was ten years, but he looked younger. Between Crosby and Clooney it was sixteen years, but he was playing younger and she looked older. Vera Ellen was only about four years older than O’Connor, but she looked mature for her age and he looked a little young for her.

In 1953, Vera Ellen and Donald O’Connor were in a movie and did a dance scene together. She looks a little older than him, and his dance style is totally different, very bouncy and athletic, not smooth or romantic. I wonder if Vera Ellen liked him and suggested him because they were in the previous movie together, when Astaire was unavailable. Or maybe someone thought to pair them up because of their previous pairing.

R91, and that actor in I Hate Hamlet was Evan Handler, who played a Harry on Sex and the City.

R107 That dance you linked is from "Call Me Madam" and is actually on par with the best of the Astaire-Rodgers dances. O'Connor and Vera-Ellen also danced another great dance in that film "Something to Dance About". Both Astaire and Gene Kelly danced twice with Vera in their films and O'Connor would have danced with her again had he not gotten sick at the time of "White Christmas". O'Connor had been a star, mainly of B-pictures with his partner, who he considered as expert as Vera-Ellen, Peggy Ryan, then O'Connor served in WWII and came back to Universal and did A and B pictures before landing at MGM for "Singin' in the Rain" (where he, not Gene Kelly, won the Golden Globe). So I'm sure Vera-Ellen enjoyed dancing with O'Connor, as their chemistry is quite evident, the powers that be put them together,, as they were both superb dancers. Now if only Vera had the chance to dance with Gene Nelson, who was even more athletic and less narcissistic than Gene Kelly!

I mentioned I had seen Two by Two and I remember pretty much everyone on stage playing along with his tired stupid schtick. They must have hated him for having to humor him in front of an audience. But the absolute beyond horrible worst was Mostel in Fiddler at the Winter Garden. The most unprofessional performance I have seen in anything ever.

Well, R110? Don't leave us hanging!

Astaire and Crosby were only four years apart in age. Astaire was born in 1899 and Crosby was born in 1903. They starred together in the original “Holiday Inn” movie in 1942. Astaire was about 43 and Crosby was about 39. They were about the same age and looked well together. They played a nightclub performing duo, a singer and a dancer.

White Christmas, the remake, was made in 1954. That movie was mostly about two guys that met in the Army years ago and became professional performing partners. The movie is set in the present day (1954), they’re veterans whose service is long past. So they’re older.

The war was over nine years ago at the time of the movie. Crosby and his partner have moved on with their lives after the war. They're well known, successful performers by the time of the movie.

O’Connor would have been eighteen in 1944. Berlin was captured in May 1945. So he would have been in the war, after boot camp, for less than a year as a private when the war ended, while Crosby, at his age, would have been an officer. Officers and privates didn’t mix. It’s not likely they would meet and become friends in the Army, with that big age gap. Their wartime friendship is a big part of the plot.

Astaire was 55 at the time and didn’t want to do it. He was too old for this part, really. The whole point of the movie was to have Crosby sing White Christmas, so they weren’t changing him no matter what. Kaye was about the right age to partner Crosby. The women couldn’t be too young either, because that would have aged Crosby. So they were in their thirties.

O’Connor was a bit young to be best friends with a fifty year old. He was 29. They probably just thought of casting him because he could dance and was a likable person. Kaye might have been a churl, but he was the right age for the part.

I can't even begin with Mostel I wouldn't know where to start. And I saw it 3 times!!! It was so bad an audience member wrote a letter to the Times to complain and they printed it! But Like Kaye Mostel could take a dump on stage and the audience would cheer. I still love Mostel on film.

He kinda looks like Jerry Lee Lewis

[quote]O’Connor was a bit young to be best friends with a fifty year old. He was 29.

And yet O'Connor partnered with Crosby just two years later in "Anything Goes," and the age differential was not an issue.

Is this tiresome thread over yet?

Dick Nixon was sexy!

Even with its wonderful Loesser score Hans Christian Anderson is a terrible movie.

Thinking about Danny Kaye helps with premature ejaculation.

[quote]Even with its wonderful Loesser score Hans Christian Anderson is a terrible movie.

It really is a wonderful score.

Thinking about Danny Kaye is a dick wilter but he could be a terrific performer. Though with an ego the size of Brazil.

R21 I'm not a NYer so I don't understand.

Madeline Kahn refused to have Danny Kaye in "On the Twentieth Century" in 1978 but she was replaced by Judy Kaye (who isn't related to Danny Kaye)?

What's not to understand, R122? Judy Kaye (no relation to Danny) was Madeline Kahn's standby in "On the Twentieth Century" and took over the role after Kahn left.

I seem to have been unlucky seeing shows right after Kahn left. However I did see her in Anyone Can Whistle at Carnegie which was a great night.

Madeline was a riot in "The Sisters Rosenszweig" too and won a Tony for her hilarious performance as Dr. Gorgeous.

[quote]dye Kaye's hair strawberry-blond to make him more conventionally attractive

The studio wanted him to get a nose job and dye his red hair to make him more "conventionally attractive," yes, which was code for "less visibly Jewish." They also asked him to change his surname of Kaminski for the same reason.

Whatever he was like in his personal life, Danny had terrific comic timing, a lovely voice and was a gifted dancer despite having grown up very poor and without access to any training. It shows if you have a trained eye, but he held his own with trained dancers and singers like Vera Ellen just fine.

And yes, he absolutely fucked Larry Olivier. They even had houses built next to each other and lived in those houses while vacationing with the likes of Noel Coward for over a decade - longer than most Hollywood marriages. Vivien Leigh reportedly hated his guts.

[quote] Vivien Leigh reportedly hated his guts.

I can't imagine why.

Kaye had already changed his name when he had been on Broadway in "Lady in the Dark" starring Gertrude Lawrence and in other show which he starred co-starring DL fave VIVIAN VANCE! in "Let's Face It".

Please, R126, your last paragraph has three assertions that cannot be credited or in any way validated with links to a reputable source.

Their affair was common knowledge in theatrical circles but they protect their own and word did not get out. So they were bisexuals. Is that what offends you?

I am offended, R130, by foolish adults who believe adolescent gossip created by a notorious Catholic whose profession is muck-raking.

He was a major asshole to many of his costars

He always struck me as a neuter.

TRIVIA : a sad thing about one of his movies is Kaye's controlling wife had one of his costars (Barbara Bates, who's also of course in ALL ABOUT EVE) cut out of THE INSPECTOR GENERL as much as possible. I don't know if she thought her husband liked the young actress, or what, but it was another blow and career setback to Bates, who eventually killed herself.

^ Wow

Mary Wikes was WAP

Barbara Bates, Anne Baxter

"I call myself Phoebe."

R129 are you fucking lost? This is a gossip site, not Wikipedia. Believe what you want or just look it up and draw your own conclusions.

It's been widely reported that Olivier had an affair not just with Danny Kaye, but with actor Henry Ainley.

Dear R139 it is only 'widely reported' by wishful-thinking fools.

Fifteen fan letters from Ainley to Olivier with NONE in return is NOT an 'affair'.

Danny Kaye was s̶e̶x̶y̶ sixty

R126, I read a similar story about Ronald Colman. He had a messy divorce from his first wife and didn’t want to marry again. So he bought the house next door to his gf, and had a hole cut in the brick wall in the back yard and a gate put in. So he would go back and forth to see his gf, actress Bonita Hume for years and they didn’t get married. And the paps were none the wiser.

Finally she got sick of it and told him she was taking a train out of town to get away from him. She took the slowest train she could find, and he was at the station down the line with a proposal. They got married and had a late in life daughter, Juliet, so it all worked out.

I don’t think he was the only guy that did that. Maybe Olivier and Kaye did something similar.

"a notorious Catholic". R131 IS posting from 1923!

R143 This silly queen is a professional Catholic. He trained to spread stories about virgin births, mystic miracles and men rising from the dead. And he's also a professional seeking out sensation and insisting 80% of people are homosexual.

The Sex Pistols manager, Malcolm McLaren, always claimed he was related to Danny Kaye.

"The Sex Pistols manager, Malcolm McLaren, always claimed he was related to Danny Kaye."

Why is that? Because they both had red hair? I suppose McLaren was making a weird joke.

McLaren is another professional liar.

^ McLaren is dead. Just like Danny Kaminsky is dead.

R146, I have no idea "why". Maybe because they were both Jewish and had red hair? They did have similar features. That TV series which explores celebrities backgrounds might have been helpful with this.

"McLaren was born on 22 January 1946 to Peter McLaren, a Scottish engineer, and Emily Isaacs in post-World War II North London. His father left when he was two and he and his brother Stuart were raised in Stoke Newington by his maternal grandmother, Rose Corre Isaacs, the formerly wealthy daughter of Portuguese Sephardic Jewish diamond dealers. He told Andrew Denton on Enough Rope that his grandmother always said to him, "To be bad is good... to be good is simply boring". In The Ghosts of Oxford Street he says Charles Clore (who bought Selfridges) became his mother's lover. When he was six, McLaren's mother married Martin Edwards, a rag trade entrepreneur; together they operated women's-wear business Eve Edwards with a factory in London's East End."

Danny could have been a distant relative, who really knows.

I seriously doubt Danny Kaye was a "distant relative" of Malcolm McLaren's McLaren, it would seem, was full of shit.

[r144] Is that you, Charles?

R144 is the Donald Spoto troll. Always the same stuff. Probably hack biographer William Mann.

^ they are both one-eyed, muck-raking hacks, but one is prettier

Writing a thesis R107?

Rosie Clooney was 25 in 1954, not 35.

R154 I appreciate R107s good analysis. People in show business need to learn from the mistakes of the earlier generation.

R140 Oliver was gay , for sure bi100 %

R157 The word "Gay" in your usage wasn't current in Olivier's lifetime and "100% bi" is a meaningless description.

R158

R158 In 2009, the Criterion Collection re-released on DVD "That Hamilton Woman", the 1941 classic starring Leigh and Olivier, and directed by Alexander Korda. Michael Korda - the director's nephew and son of the film's Art Director (Vincent) - gives a lively half-hour interview, which by itself is worth the cost of the disc. (I borrowed it from the library, and watched both the film and this interview twice.) Korda talks knowledgeably and openly about everything he saw while on the set as a boy of 7, as well as much that he came to learn in later years, working (among other things) for more than four decades as a senior editor at Simon and Schuster in New York. Born in 1933, his Wiki page in April of 2020 was reporting that he is, at the age of 86, still with us, thank God. While only briefly discussing a bit of the personal lives of the two lead actors, Korda did say: "And Olivier himself was at the time (i.e., 1940) reputed to be having an altogether inappropriate affair with the American comedian Danny Kaye." A bit of internet sleuthing turned up the following. Make of it what you will. "In 1950, when the Oliviers returned to Hollywood for Vivien to film her Oscar-winning role as Blanche du Bois in _A Streetcar Named Desire_, opposite Marlon Brando, David Niven walked into the garden of their Hollywood mansion and discovered Brando and Larry swimming naked in the pool. Said Niven: 'Larry was kissing Brando. Or maybe it was the other way around.'" Olivier's son Tarquin was furious at allegations that his father was gay or bi-sexual, and did his best to get all such mentions scrubbed from his father's official biography, written by Terry Coleman (2005). When that failed, he went to Olivier's last wife, Dame Joan Plowright, asking that she withdraw her permission for the book to be described as "authorized". She refused, remarking that "a man who had been at Eton and in the Guards might be expected to be a little more broad-minded.

I wonder who the freak is here who’s incensed by the fact that Lord Olivier was bisexual.

Is it his son Tarquin??

People on DL have said Korda and Niven were gossips that were not to be believed. I'm not quite sure what they would have gained by such salacious stories. To sell more books? I think they could have made up a lot better gossip. Like Henry Fonda and Jimmy Stuart making love when undergrads at Princeton while Joshua Logan furiously jacked off watching them.

[quote]I wonder who the freak is here who’s incensed by the fact that Lord Olivier was bisexual. Is it his son Tarquin??

Wasn't Tarquin Sheridan Bucket's roommate on "Keeping Up Appearances"?

Blah

Why would anybody think Olivier was having an affair with Danny Kaye? I should think that if he wanted a gay lover he would have picked some young, good looking twink.

^^ apparently Olivier was kind of passive, sexually. Vivien Leigh was definitely the aggressor in their relationship.

Danny Kaye was the aggressor in his affair with Olivier, too. So I think it was more a case of Olivier acquiescing rather than he was out prowling for the perfect male lover.

[quote]Why would anybody think Olivier was having an affair with Danny Kaye?

Um, because it happened? This isn't a thread about fan fiction of the 1940s.

"Danny Kaye was the aggressor in his affair with Olivier, too."

Sez who? If that information comes from the likes of Donald Spoto, William Mann or Scotty Bowers I wouldn't lend much credence to it.

"Um, because it happened?"

Again, sez who? Gossip mongers? Because that is indeed a juicy piece of gossip. Laurence Olivier and Danny Kaye sucking each other's cocks and plowing each other's assholes...WOOOOO! Salacious gossip sells and I imagine that's where this whole Olivier/Kaye affair comes from; an attempt to make money by selling a story about hot sex between two long deceased Hollywood stars.

IMHO, Kaye had a slight case of Gay Face.

Kill this thread, please.

Oh, Danny Kaye was always making silly faces. He was a COMEDIAN. That's what they did back then.

This is a gay gossip site, R169. It runs the gamut from classic Hollywood to Shawn Mendes. If that offends your sensibilities, perhaps you'd be happier elsewhere. It's not Wikipedia and doesn't require citations.

Danny Kaye was a sloppy power bottom.

#GetUsedToIt

Gossip doesn't "offend my sensibilities", R174. I do think believing unsubstantiated rumors by people who just want to make a buck is pretty stupid, though. You can't believe everything you read.

[quote]R176 You can't believe everything you read.

But you can believe a lot of what you read.

Danny PINTAURO was sexy.

I think some people are desperate to retail mindless gossip.

We don't need to invent fairy stories in order to feel validated for any imaginary inadequacy.

We already have Leonardo De Vinci and Michelangelo and Tchaikovsky and many other greats of world culture.

R179 is obviously too high-minded to be slumming on a gay gossip site.

R159 and R160 thank you, that is a hell of a lot of smoke for there not to be a fire! Interesting pieces that independently back what R126, R130 and others said. Good enough for me

R170 yeah Kaye definitely had gay face and not just slightly, that pic at R171 says it all. So fucking cute, dont blame Olivier for wanting a piece of that action at all, especially with the hot bod he had as well back then

ew

I can't bear watching Danny Kaye's old routines. So fucking twee.

The mincing face making is was always made him unwatchable to me.

The Spoto troll wants us to think he's elegant. He's probably a mouth breathing living in his mother's basement.

OP - Danny Kaye has a surprising amount of SWAGGER here

"Yeah Kaye definitely had gay face."

What made his face "gay?" He had a very semitic looking face. He made funny faces a lot (many of you seem to forget that he was a comedian); it that supposed to make him gay? Jesus, he was a performer who did silly things to be funny but I get the impression that his "mincing" and dancing and whatnot is somehow supposed to be proof he was gay. And that is truly ridiculous.

Yes, Danny Kaye was indeed gorgeous.

I cannot stand to watch that clip at R186 with the distorted aspect ratio. What possesses those retards to do that? Would they like it if people took every picture ever taken of them and stretched it so their fat, retarded faces were even fatter? How does that not look completely awful to everyone immediately?