This second part of the story of Irving Berlin’s life picks up after WWI, and covers his family life, his rise to fame, and the controversies that were part of his career.
Research:
- Bergreen, Laurence. “Irving Berlin: This Is the Army.” Prologue. Summer 1996, Vol. 28, No. 2 https://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/1996/summer/irving-berlin-1
- Carlson, Olivia. “What’s White Christmas without Minstrelsy?” Music 345: Race, Identity, and Representation in American Music. Student Blogs and Library Exhibit Companion. https://pages.stolaf.edu/americanmusic/2021/10/25/whats-white-christmas-without-minstrelsy/
- CBS Sunday Morning. “American songsmith Irving Berlin.” Via YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DV9uq8z2k5E
- Greten, Paula Anne. “Irving Berlin.” American History. August 2006.
- Hamm, Charles. “Irving Berlin -- Songs from the Melting Pot: The Formative Years, 1907-1914.” Oxford University Press. Via New York Times. https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/first/h/hamm-berlin.html
- Hamm, Charles. “Alexander and His Band.” American Music , Spring, 1996, Vol. 14, No. 1 (Spring, 1996). Via JSTOR. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3052459
- Hyland, William G. “The Best Songwriter Of Them All.” Commentary. October 1990.
- "Irving Berlin." St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture Online, Gale, 2013. Gale In Context: U.S. History, link.gale.com/apps/doc/K2419200098/GPS?u=mlin_n_melpub&sid=bookmark-GPS&xid=be3b3028. Accessed 16 Nov. 2022.
- Jewish Lives. “Irving Berlin.” Podcast. Episode 4. 11/18/2019.
- Jewish Virtual Library. “Irving Berlin.” https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/irving-berlin
- Judaism Unbound. “Bonus Episode: Irving Berlin – Judah Cohen (American Jewish History #5).” Podcast. Episode 248, October 2 2019.
- Kaplan, James. “Irving Berlin: New York Genius.” Yale University Press. 2019.
- Kennedy Center. “This Land is Your Land: The story behind the song.” https://www.kennedy-center.org/education/resources-for-educators/classroom-resources/media-and-interactives/media/music/story-behind-the-song/the-story-behind-the-song/this-land-is-your-land/
- Magee, Jeffrey. "'Everybody Step': Irving Berlin, jazz, and Broadway in the 1920s." Journal of the American Musicological Society, vol. 59, no. 3, fall 2006, pp. 697+. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A157180372/GPS?u=mlin_n_melpub&sid=bookmark-GPS&xid=07c374cd. Accessed 16 Nov. 2022.
- Markel, Howard. “How Irving Berlin’s blue skies turned to blue days.” PBS NewsHour. 9/24/2021. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/how-irving-berlins-blue-skies-turned-to-blue-days
- Maslon, Laurence. “Overture.” (And following pages) The Irving Berlin Music Company. https://www.irvingberlin.com/overture
- Schiff, David. “For Everyman, By Everyman.” The Atlantic Monthly. March 1996.
- Spitzer, Nick. “The Story Of Woody Guthrie's 'This Land Is Your Land'.” NPR. 2/15/2012. https://www.npr.org/2000/07/03/1076186/this-land-is-your-land
- The Irving Berlin Music Company. “Irving Berlin.” https://static1.squarespace.com/static/57d1974abe6594a72075321b/t/5a5f673eec212d2269841cf4/1516201791369/Irving+Berlin+-+official+biography.pdf
- White, Timothy. “Irving Berlin Knew Pop Music’s Power.” Billboard. Vol. 111, Issue 21. 5/22/1999.
- Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp. v. Dieckhaus, 153 F.2d 893, 898 (8th Cir. 1946) https://casetext.com/case/twentieth-century-fox-film-corp-v-dieckhaus
- Bornstein, George. "Say it with music." TLS. Times Literary Supplement, no. 5698, 15 June 2012, p. 9. Gale Literature Resource Center, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A667239228/LitRC?u=mlin_oweb&sid=googleScholar&xid=7d90f5a8. Accessed 2 Dec. 2022.
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This is an unofficial transcript meant for reference. Accuracy is not guaranteed.
Welcome this.
You missed in history glass, a production of I heart, radio
hello and welcome to the podcast I'm Tracy be well, then I'm holly fry. This is part two,
Episode on irving, berlin, which I did not intend to have as the two parties, but that's what happened if you start with this episode and you skip the first on you're gonna- be
thing more than three decades of his life, plus just the latter context about the music industry in the united states in the first half of the twentieth century. Also
berlin was really prolific, and so we cannot possibly mention every single song or even every single showed
he worked on. So if you have a favour it, but just doesn't come up. We're sorry.
not possible to do all of it. Also ever heads up, we are going to talk about the death of an infant in this episode in in more than just a passing reference to a baby who died in nineteen. Twenty four irving berlin met elena,
de he was thirty six and she was the twenty one year old daughter of finances clearance. Mackey clarence did not
proof of this relationship. In addition to the gap
Our ages, irving was jewish and the mackey were catholic when irving sought their blessing to propose. Ellen's mother gave it but her father arranged for ellen to take a prolonged trip in an effort to separate them.
Berlin was famous and the mac were rich, so all of this was kind of big news. With reporters focused on their seemingly star cross,
they should ship and clearances objection to it as our
it going on. Berlin wrote a musical for the marks brothers, that was the cocoanuts berlin.
the music in the lyrics, while george s kaufman wrote the book the show was set in a hotel in florida. During its nineteen twenties land boom groucho Marx played the role of the hotel proprietor with Zippo his
sustained. She go and harpo were con man trying to rob the place. There were also other characters, including another con man, although this show
really a lot more about the comedic sort of chaos that the marks brothers were known,
for more than for the actual plot
it's kind of any marks: brothers property right. This is a heavy, but really it's about poking each other in the eyes that
correct, the coconuts
for two years on broadway, followed by a tour and then a film. Although the marks brothers hated the film so much when they saw that they tried to buy it back and keep it from being released,
It was released over their objections and was generally
are reviewed and it was a big financial success.
on January fourth, nineteen, twenty six irving, berlin and Ellen mackey got married at city hall in new york. Ellen's family did not know. This was happening. The witnesses for the couple were earnings, long time, friend and colleague, max winslow and his wife. As well as earnings, publicity manager, when Ellen's father found out about this, he was furious. He caught her out of her inheritance
except for a trust that he could not legally touch ellen in her father did not speak to one another for the next three years.
arriving and Ellen's. First child was born on november twenty fifth nineteen, twenty six, they maimed her mary Ellen and
How to raise her and any other children they might have, was the first big fight of irving Alan's marriage, specifically they
argued about whether to raise the children, jewish or catholic. Ultimately, they decided on raising them is jewish but teaching them about catholicism,
they got a little older and then allowing them to decide for themselves how they wanted to live there.
Ps accounts of their home life describe incorporating elements from both traditions like having both a hanukkah menorah and a christmas tree around those holidays. Mary Ellen
I think, as the one he wrote a memoir later on and described all of the holidays as being very important in their household christmas, though, quickly became a sad holiday for the family,
giving and Ellen had a son, irving, berlin, junior and nineteen twenty eight, but he died at the age of only four weeks. He was found dead in his crib on christmas morning. The term sudden infant death syndrome was not coined until nineteen sixty nine, but it really describes what happens to irving junior. He died unexpectedly with no other explanation for what happened. The tragic loss of irving junior is what
finally led clarence Mackey to reconcile with his daughter, aside from their grief over the loss of their son, irving and Ellen struggled in some other ways as well. It's very
a clear that they loved each other deeply, but irving had trouble rating music with newborns m toddlers in the house in his nighttime hours did not line up with his family's me.
It's and also, while he considered himself to be pretty active. He quickly got a sense that becoming apparent at forty was a lot different from becoming apparent at twenty or even thirty would have been
the film the jazz singer, debuted in nineteen twenty seven, which marked the start of this shift in the film industry, from silent films to talkies and irving started doing more work for movies. That meant
he often needed to be in hollywood and he and Ellen had to figure out whether to move the family back and forth, or whether to keep the two
dron in new york, where, in the berlin's opinion, they had better schools and a stronger community. They made it work, though man over the years they had to more children when the Louise and nineteen thirty two and Elizabeth irving in nineteen thirty six.
Of course, this also means that their family was growing during the great depression, which was at its worst from nineteen twenty nine to nineteen thirty three, but it continued to have economic effects for years afterwards by starting his own publishing house and owning the rights to a lot of the music he'd written Berlin's income was protected in the long term, but in the short term he lost a lot of his savings and investments. Ellen's trust was not invested in the stock market and was mostly protected.
The family still had enough money to live on, but irving really hated the fact that they were having to rely almost entirely on his wife's money. Ellen's father
are also lost most of his fortune in the stock market collapse. The depression also affected all the industries that he was trying to work in
waters in berlin and Snyder went bankrupt and nineteen, twenty nine and ninety
Labour berlin wrote a score for a film called reaching for the moon, but in the face of spiralling financial costs and personality conflicts and the financial impact of the great depression. United artists made big changes to this movie. That included cutting out most of berlin's work. Berlin tended to take criticism and rejection. Pretty personally for his
career, and that was the case here, even though these cuts really do seem to have been more about money, maybe
a little more about personality conflict, not about the quality of the work that he had written. He became really depressed and he struggled to regain his confidence. Afterward, although times were tight, Berlin did have some success during the great depression in nineteen. Thirty
three, he wrote a review called as thousands cheer too
is better known. Songs were written, for this show easter parade am heat wave. There were also satirical sketches, based on real world figures, many of whom have been covered on our podcast, including
Amy, simple, Macpherson John, be rockefeller am Josephine baker act. Two of this show began with
anti lynching song called supper time sung by ethel waters, who also thank three other songs in the show. This was the first time
on broadway that a black performer was given equal billing with white co stars, and there were people who saw this as a problem. Both the content of the song supper time and the expectations that white performers treat waters as their equal. Three of her white co stars refused take a bow with her at the end of the show and
in berlin response to that was in that case there need be no bows at all. They did have bouncy, basically forced her colleagues to treat her as equal to them.
I would love it if she got the only one, but that's just made that also shore, with
this show
an enormous success running for four hundred performances at berlin's music box theatre, followed.
a tour and eastern parade was a big seller, a sheet music. This really
helped irving Berlin start to recover financially in the later years, the depression on may twenty eightth nineteen. Thirty
for irving. Berlin was on the cover of time magazine with the descriptor quote. Jerome kern was reminded of wagner, so
home kern was a composer and a song writer whose work included old man river and the way you look tonight and the music for the musical showboat kern had made this comment about irving berlin, reminding him of wagner a decade prior, but by nineteen thirty four, this had become a pretty jarring comparison. Wagner was deeply anti semitic and wagner had earned
local praise from Adolf hitler who, by this point, was ruling germany as a dictator. We are coming up on one of irving, berlin's, most famous songs,
eventually to world war two, and we will get to all of that. After a sponsor break.
and the night.
In thirty, a lot of irving berlin's work within built film, including the movie top hat with fred astaire and ginger rogers and nineteenth,
five. This is the start of a long friendship between irving and stare and in nineteen thirty six
was nominated for an oscar for best original song for the song cheek to check this oscar wound up going to lower
I have broadway from the movie. Gold diggers ends irving Berlin thought that was a pretty big insult in nineteen thirty, seven, the berlin family planned a vacation to alaska. This was a trip that involved a cruise. This trip was long enough that berlin needed to be able to keep working, so he planned to take his transposing piano with him. This presented a problem when it turned out than his transpose
piano would not fit on the ship. He was informed that any size grand piano would work as long as the legs were removed to get it on board. So he may do with that. Just by my story, just delightful lame.
While we hear the muse
go film. Alexander's ragtime band came out in nineteen thirty eight and it was named after Berlin's hit song from nineteen eleven that we talked about in part. One berlin wrote the script in collaboration with catherine scala at Lamar treaty and richard sherman and included several of his most popular songs. In this bell, Alexander is a bandleader who wants to make people think of ragtime as a moral, legitimate style of music and through his story the music gives edge
our own history of the musical styles of ragtime and jazz. This movie was pretty well reviewed, but this is also
movie, that was about the history of ragtime and jazz, which are to musical styles that were developed by black people but did not include any black people. I haven't seen this movie, but looking at cast
It's like, I don't know, I think not at all like, not even in like a background role. None yeah, I haven't seen it either. This film also faced allegations of plagiarism. Marie cooper dyke house filed suit against both berlin and twentieth century fox, alleging that the plot was the same as her unpublished, novel love girl. She had submitted this novel to agents and filmmakers in hollywood. The year before the movie was made. This legal case went on for years
with a judge ruling that the movies plot was the same as the book in nineteen forty four, but two years later, this was overturned because there was no evidence that berlin or any of the other screenwriters involved, had ever seen the novel and that none of them knew any.
if the literary agents that the book had been submitted to you
The earlier ruling had focused on similarities between the book in the movie. The ruling in the appeal noted some key differences quote. The book is weighed in part in the same period as the picture, but it is about the loves of the love girl and her several lovers, and there is no note of music in it. The pictures, real interest and value as to every scene and action in it are in the music. Its presentation requires an hour and three quarters and each minute
is filled with action attuned to the music to return to nineteen. Thirty, eight one of irving, berlin's, most famous songs, made its debut that armistice day. That year, that was november eleventh commemorating the armistice at the end of world war. One of course, by this point, parts of the world were at war. Again, intentions were
believing in others. The second sino japanese war had started in july of nineteen thirty seven and
germany had annexed austria in march of nineteen thirty, eight that September germany, ITALY, great britain and France had signed the munich agreement, forcing czechoslovakia to cede its predominantly german speaking border region to germany. This was done under threat of war with germany and,
Now the involvement of czechoslovakia in the face of all of this kate smith had asked irving berlin.
And for a new song for her armistice day performance, one that wound up taking place the day after the november pogrom, also known as kristallnacht, which took place over november, ninth and tenth of nineteen thirty. Eight we covered this programme on the pod.
less than twenty eighteen. The song that Berlin gave her was, god bless america, which had originally worked on to include and european YAP hank, but had not been satisfied with at that time.
One lyric that he changed as he was working on this for Kate smith was stand beside her and guide her through the night, with the light from above
through the night, was originally to the right meaning toward what was right, but he made the change out of concerns that people would interpret right as instead having a political meaning. This song was an immediate hit becoming one of kate smith's signatures.
Was it got huge amounts of radio play and its sheet music became a best seller. People called for god bless america to be me,
the national anthem and replace the star spangled banner that had been adopted just seven years prior, among other things, like many, a berlin saw
thanks, god bless. America was much easier to sing, but this song also faced and anti semitic xenophobic backlash as people question. How a jewish immigrant had the right to call on god to bless the united states. The coup clucks clam called for a boycott others disliked the song for different reasons, including folks, singer and songwriter. Woody Guthrie Guthrie found the songs of eager to uncritically patriotic and to optimize stake, especially given the state of the world and how many people were still financially really struggling in the wake of the great depression is also one of those songs that was just on the radio constantly, and now we have all had that's. I saw the radio cos
we just are so sick of it. Guthrie felt like it was impossible to get away from. God bless america. So in nineteen forty, he wrote a song of his own and that song was this. Land is your land which followed the same basic tune as two different carter: family songs? Those songs were when the world's on fire, which came out in nineteen thirty and little darling pal of mine, which came out in nineteen thirty. Five guthrie performed this song a lot, as did pete
figure who has come up on the show recently, one of the ironies about all of this is the batteries. Criticism of God bless. America included what he saw as it
uncritical elevation of the united states, but he wound up cutting out the most
go verses of this land. Is your land in most early recordings, an sheet music printings, one first, that
Usually cut was, as I went well.
king. I saw a there and on the sign, it said no trespassing, but on the other side it didn't say nothing. That side was made for you and me. Another was
in the squares of the city in the shadow of the steeple by their will?
If office, I see my people as they stood there. Hungary I stood there asking is this land made for you and me living,
does that were left meeting the ones that people became most familiar with
mostly the happier ones about endless skyways and golden valleys and diamond deserts and wheat fields waving not especially critical, also would Guthrie
the white man from Oklahoma writing a song about this land is my land, so sure godless america can come across as a glorification of american exceptionalism. That's a fair point. Would he gathered
but also this land? Is your land can really read like a tribute to settler colonialism,
but your return to irving berlin toward the end of the nineteenth thirty's. He bought a place in the cat skills that needed a lot of fixing
and he had a renovated, so the family could spend their summers there. In nineteen forty, he set up a trust to divert all of the royalties from god bless america to the girl scouts and the boys.
Out and nineteen. Forty irving berlin finished writing one of his biggest hits, and that was the song white christmas soon. He was also working on a movie to put it in that movie with holiday in when he talked to producers and executives about this movie in the works. He said he already had a big song for it, which needed to be included in the contract for the film the first public radio broadcasts of white christmas was, on christmas eve, nineteen, forty one on being crosbie weekly radio programme, and this was just weeks after the attack on pearl harbor hawaii white christmas can sound like our really wistful or even sad song, depending on how its per
armed and that's been interpreted as tracing back to the death of his infant son on christmas of nineteen, twenty eight, the movie holiday and came out in nineteen, forty, two starring being crosbie fred, astaire, marjorie, rebels, virginia dale,
Walter able, in addition to making sure white christmas, was included in plants for the
Berlin had also work to make sure being crosbie was cast in in nineteen forty three, the song white christmas. When the academy award for best original song,
this movie came out in august and Berlin had planned to start marketing the sheet music for white christmas closer to christmas, but it became an immediate best seller with six hundred thousand copies sold by november of that year holiday and also caused some controversy, one of its musical numbers of called abraham and in the context of the movie at the song. That's meant to be performed on Abraham lincoln birthday, and it is also a black face. Menstrual number Berlin was also criticized for some of this songs lyrics, specifically the use of one adjective that black audiences found offensive. I don't feel like we need to repeat with that. Additive was an issue about a more newspaper called the african american called berlin out on this and in research.
once he changed the lyric in future printings of the sheet music, saying quote: no song is important enough to offend a whole race. I should never have released it. Had I known the epithet was objectionable. This was not irving, berlin's last controversy about how he approached race in his work and we're going to talk more about that after we take a quick little sponsor break
The number december of nineteen forty one, the war department, asked irving berlin to work on a patriotic military musical along the same lines of european YAP hank during world war. One
Now would be performed to raise funds and also to raise the morale of the troops, and the results of that request was. This is the army. That is an effort that was simultaneously progressive and regressive in terms of race in terms of its progressive, this berlin insisted on casting black perform
as for this. So at a time when the, u S, army was racially segregated, the army would continue to be right,
billy segregated until president harry truman issued executive order, nine nine eight one in nineteen, forty eight. This was the
Lee racially integrated uniformed army units in the second world war, and that was me
as irving berlin had demanded at berlin. Also.
Assured theatres, where the show was being performed to integrate the same newspaper that had criticised his
goods and holiday. Inn published a piece titled, irving, berlin cracks theses, Jim crow law after he forced a washington dc theatre to admit a black woman who bought a ticket. However, he also had a huge argument with director, as
stone about the shows opener, which berlin envisioned as involving the entire cast of a hundred
tat man in black face stone, told him quote
No, the heritage of the menstrual show those days are gone. People don't do that anymore, but berlin continued to insist that this was how the show should start stone only got him to changes plans by pointing out the practical issue of getting a hundred and ten performers. Out of their black face, make up for the rest of the show, but Berlin still insisted on having different number with a smaller group of performers and black
face later on Berlin's conflict with stone, and others during this showed did not end there.
There was a lot of haggling over money with berlin's financial manager, sol born steam horrified at berlin's plans to donate all of his proceeds from the music sales. There was some unfortunate back and forth, but
in berlin, stone and others about whether there were too many jewish people in the cast, something that seems particularly jarring. Considering that berlin himself was jewish.
But there were several overlapping factors here. Berlin was concerned about increasing anti semitism in the. U s
A broad and about whether having a predominantly jewish cast would lead to rumors.
We're in the show to try to get out of combat duty. Why,
in particular, to our performance left berlin feeling like stone had intentionally insulted? Him
Finally, at the end of the show, Berlin would come out from the wings and stone would order the cast a face left where berlin withstanding, but when they performed in Washington dc president roosevelt was in a box to the right, so stone ordered them to face that way. That meant that the entire cast turned their backs to berlin in front of the president was very upset about this, but it also seems like if they had done the opposite. That would have involved a whole bunch of military men and uniform simultaneously turning their backs on the president, and that seems like it would have caused a different problem, like the only
right thing to do with the show would have been to realize that was going on and change the blocking totally differently ahead of time, and that's not what happened or either just say hey. We have to turn this.
Make it look like you're joining the cast to face. The president bear salute would have their yeah yeah.
this, is the army toured the? U s as well as in europe and north africa, and it was eventually made into a movie. Berlin- was with the turing cast whenever he could be at various points. He had to leave for both personal reasons and for other commitments. While they were in london he
Prime minister winston churchill, although there is an oft repeated story that this invitation was an error and that churchill thought he would be
meeting philosopher and historian. Isaiah, berlin, irving, berlin rejoined the tour for its final performance and nineteen. Forty five gave a final stage performance of oh, how I hate to get up in the morning and said that he hoped he'd never have to run
another war song. This the army raised more than six million
dollars for the army emergency relief fund. I saw some numbers that were even higher than that and in nineteen forty five president harry truman awarded bird
when the metal of merit for his efforts on it and nineteen. Forty four, the national conference of christians and Jews honoured berlin for quote advancing the aims of the conference to eliminate religious and racial conflict. I feel like the idea of racial conflict here, but
very. He seems to have been all over the place on this issue and generally much better at how he worked with individual performers than like broad issues like not doing black face anymore yeah. It seems, like some part of him, wanted to do the correct thing, but he just kept steppin in it like a problem
towards the end of the war. Berlin ended his business relationship with saw born steam. It wasn't just because of the conflict over berlin wanting to donate his royalties, but also because there were
king relationship had really been deteriorating for years, and berlin had evidence that born steen had been stealing from him. Berlin never discuss this publicly and he never pressed any charge. Is it
It was like he had clear evidence of wrong doing, but since born scenes actions, hadn't cause the business to fail or meaningfully harmed berlin. He had still become wealthy through songwriting. She just wanted this whole incident to be over with
quietly during and after world war. Two, there was a shift in the kind of shows that were popular on broadway moving from things like
Musical reviews and vaudeville shows that had at most a very thin suggestion of a plot kind of holding a bunch of songs to
two. Instead of more narrative form of musical storytelling, these kinds of narrative musicals definitely existed before the war, but they became,
a lot popular afterward, and this was especially true following the success of Oklahoma, which was the first musical written by the do of richard roger is an oscar hammerstein, a second berlin's first for
integrating for this kind of musical was Annie, get your gun in nineteen, forty six, which was about Amy oakley. This was something dorothy fields had been working on with rogers and hammerstein as producers. The plan was for fields to write the lyrics and for Jerome kern to write the music. With these spectacular, that's my interjection Ethel vermin in the lead role, but then kern unexpectedly died of a stroke.
This was a personal and professional loss for many, including urban berlin, who was also up
at by the realisation that kern was only three years older than he was when he died of a team approached berlin about taking turns place, which you,
the willing to do only if he also took fields place as lyricist field seems too.
I felt like she had enough to do on the show without doing the lyrics that it doesn't seem like she felt she was being forced out in this change, but even after she had stepped aside, berlin still really had to be convinced to take the job he had some trepidation about joining the ssh, a show that he hadn't been part of from the start. By this point, a lot
his other shows were basically marketed with his name at the beginning, like irving, berlin's whatever he also just wasn't sure how,
oh, he would do at writing this kind of material as many creative ventures are. This seems to have been chaotic and stressful
but it was also another success. The show open in may of nineteen forty six in it ran from one thousand one hundred forty seven performances and it was later made into a
berlin would later say of rating for Ethel. Vermin quote. I love
what to write songs for Ethel. It's a little like addressed designer, getting an extra kick when he dreams of a gown for a beautiful woman with a purpose
figure. Irving. Berlin continued to do both creative and philanthropic work from there and nineteen forty
During the berlin airlift, irving berlin travelled to west berlin with past podcast, subject, bob hope to perform for the troops who are involved with that effort in
ten, forty nine, he wrote the music and lyrics for musical called miss liberty, which included setting Emma lazarus poem poem, the new colossus to music will lazarus and that poland also a past episode of the podcast. This musical was not a success, though it ran for three hundred and eight performances, but it was badly reviewed and a touring show lost money after this irving, berlin,
became increasingly depressed, his oldest daughter, gotta divorce, that year, something that was widely covered in the press and she blamed herself for her fathers mental illness feeling like it was because she had let him down
he started to recover. Some went when he started working on another show for Ethel vermin. This one called call me madame which open in nineteen fifty, but he continued to experience periods of depression and anxiety and at times he had to be hospitalized for treatment and nineteen. Fifty four president Dwight Eisenhower presented irving berlin with a congressional gold medal for god
america and other patriotic songs. He had written that same year, white christmas became a movie starring being crosbie danny k, rosemary clooney and bear it ellen white christmas is often described as a spiritual successor to holiday
and, although unlike holiday, and it does not include a black face number. It does, however, include a medley. That's sings by how much they love go and a minstrel shows you knew
you, you gotta, take the good with the bad when you look at classic films for sure and think critically about what they're saying in nineteen. Sixty two berlin wrote his last full length musical. That was mister president about a fictional us president's personal and political life
like miss liberty, it was not a success. Overall, it was poorly reviewed and a closed after a little more than two hundred performance is. I think they basically got through all of their advance. Ticket sales fails. Then that was the ends. This was not the new that irving berlin wanted to end his career on. He kept
to just write one more successful, musical or put together one last review with the music box theatre or right, one more hit song and nineteen sixty three
if he received a tony award for a quote, his distinguished contribution to the musical theatre for these many years, but this did not really lift his spirits. He increasingly felt obsolete and out of touch with changing musical tastes and probably social mores toward the end of his life. He said
quote. It was as if I owned a store and people no longer wanted to buy what I had to sell music changed to the beatles and other groups reached audiences. I couldn't it was time to close up shop and since he was in his seven these with a career that had started at the turn of the twentieth century, many of his long time, friends,
colleagues and collaborators had died. He also outlived all of his siblings, the last of whom died in nineteen. Seventy eight he had taken up painting and he spent more of his time on that, while becoming more reclusive and generally withdrawing from
life in nineteen. Seventy irving berlin was inducted into the songwriters hall of fame and nineteen seventy three he gave his last public performance. This was at the white house, singing god bless america for more than five hundred american Pierre Debbie's from the vietnam war after retiring
from writing and performing irving Berlin donated his transposing piano to the smithsonian, and he donated his road, where one military uniform to the museum of american jewish military history in nineteen. Seventy, seven, president,
gerald ford awarded irving berlin, the presidential metal of freedom, but he was not at the ceremony and no one represented him. There
same was true of two other honour ease, one of those with georgia, o keefe, and the other was alexander calder who was awarded the mental posture
sleep when irving Berlin turned a hundred on, may eleventh nineteen. Eighty eight, a tribute concert was held in his honour at carnegie hall, a though he did not personally attend. This concert was later heir to the television broadcast that
and to any awards. This concert had a star studded cast, including frank sinatra, rosemary clooney.
leonard Bernstein Natalie call now carter, jerry or back madeline con willie nelson re charles and be arthur among many others,
Surely Maclean made a joke that they couldn't thing happy birthday, because that was the one song he didn't right before she sang there's no business like show business. That was another song from the musical anna get your gun and there's no business like show business also later became part of a movie musical.
I have the same name. A couple of months later, on July, twenty ninth nineteen, eighty eight irving, Berlin's wife, Ellen Mackey berlin died. They had been married for sixty two years. Irving had a stroke the day after christmas that year and he was not expected to survive, but he did recover. He died on September twenty second nineteen. Eighty nine at the age of a hundred
one over the course of his career. He had written more than nine hundred songs. I saw some totals that were much greater than that, and that seems a little low to me honestly. He also wrote the music and lyrics for nineteen musicals and scores for eighteen movies. According to the guinness book of world records, been crosbie is recording of white. Christmas is still the best selling album of all time. One quiet that comes up a lots and discussions of irving berlin's lie
and work is from Jerome kern, who wrote it in a letter to biographer alexander walcott in nineteen twenty seven. So this quote does not really reflect the complexities of his work that we have talked about this episode, but it does really show how people regarded him. In the early twentieth century, kern wrote quote irving. Berlin has no place in american music. He is american music as part of the same letter. He also said quote: he honestly absorbs the vibrations emanating from the people, manners and life of his time and in turn, gives these impressions back to the world, simplify
clarified glorified. I have a lot of feelings about irving. Berlin had a lot of farms, but I love I enjoy watching white christmas at christmas time, even though that movie has simultaneously aged beautifully,
and terribly like yeah, I tend to focus a lot on the clothes and I'm like yeah. I acknowledge that that part is there, but that is now what this movie is about. For me, yeah yeah, I knew we were going to have to talk a lot about blackface and these two episodes, but I did not really realize that there was going to be a part where he was stridently defending the use of blackface and the few people telling him like no seriously dude. We don't do this anymore, not cool so anyway, we'll talk some more about personal stuff and behind the scenes on friday.
have listener mail from jennifer
If a route, hey holly and tracy, I loved the podcast and have my phd in s. Why I m h sea and have assured to prove it. I just finished listening to the episode on charles true, which was great at the end of the pod cast talking about the american red cross ban on donated blood for men who have sex with men, triggered the memory for me that the canadian blood services recently in April lifted the ban on these men from donating. They have instituted protocols to have this blood closely tested for hiv and other blood borne illnesses. The great move forward for blood collection in canada and then there's linked to an article on this included with this email, is a picture of my house, panther batman being a diva having his picture taken. He is both handsome and very snugly. Thank you for all the entertainment you provide Jennifer so that that's correct. I did not know this, but the canadian blood services did just change their policy in April onest. Their policy has still gotten some
Some criticism like we were talking about in the behind the scenes on our charles drew episode. It is focused on behaviors. Instead of broadly banning all
like all men who have sex with man and all people who hate may have had sex with a man who has had sex with a man and instead looking at behaviors, people have criticised that some of these behaviors still could be discriminatory, so allow that's, definitely a change that seems to be generally favourable. It is still one that people have had criticisms of that.
you for letting us know about that. Jennifer. If you would like to send us a note about this or any other podcast, where history podcast, that I heart radio, dot com and we're all over social media missed in history and that's where you'll find our facebook, twitter, pinterest and instagram, and you can subscribe to
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Transcript generated on 2023-01-18.