Funny Girl is a musical with score by Jule Styne, lyrics by Bob Merrill, and book by Isobel Lennart, that first opened on Broadway in 1964. The semi-biographical plot is based on the life and career of comedian and Broadway star Fanny Brice, featuring her stormy relationship with entrepreneur and gambler Nicky Arnstein.
Eddie Cantor was an American comedian, actor, dancer, singer, songwriter, film producer, screenwriter and author. Familiar to Broadway, radio, movie, and early television audiences, this "Apostle of Pep" was regarded almost as a family member by millions because his top-rated radio shows revealed intimate stories and amusing anecdotes about his wife Ida and five daughters. Some of his hits include "Makin' Whoopee", "Ida ", "If You Knew Susie", "Ma! He's Making Eyes at Me", “Mandy”, "My Baby Just Cares for Me”, "Margie", and "How Ya Gonna Keep 'em Down on the Farm ?" He also wrote a few songs, including "Merrily We Roll Along", the Merrie Melodies Warner Bros. cartoon theme.
The Ziegfeld Follies were a series of elaborate theatrical revue productions on Broadway in New York City from 1907 to 1931, with renewals in 1934 and 1936. They became a radio program in 1932 and 1936 as The Ziegfeld Follies of the Air.
Fania Borach, known professionally as Fanny Brice or Fannie Brice, was an American comedienne, illustrated song model, singer, and theater and film actress who made many stage, radio, and film appearances. She is known as the creator and star of the top-rated radio comedy series The Baby Snooks Show.
Leon Errol was an Australian-American comedian and actor in the United States, popular in the first half of the 20th century for his appearances in vaudeville, on Broadway, and in films.
Lou Holtz was an American vaudevillian, comic actor, and theatrical producer.
John W. Steel was an American tenor. He was featured in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1919 and 1920 and Irving Berlin's Music Box Revues of 1922 and 1923.
Funny Girl is a 1968 American biographical musical comedy-drama film directed by William Wyler and written by Isobel Lennart, adapted from her book for the stage musical of the same title. It is loosely based on the life and career of Broadway and film star and comedienne Fanny Brice and her stormy relationship with entrepreneur and gambler Nicky Arnstein.
James Frederick Hanley was an American songwriter and author.
My Man is a 1928 black and white part-talkie American comedy-drama musical film directed by Archie Mayo starring Fanny Brice and featuring Guinn "Big Boy" Williams. It was Brice's feature film debut at the age of 37. She was a star in the Ziegfeld Follies before she started acting in motion pictures. At the time Warner Bros. made this film there were still some silent movies in production and being released. My Man used intertitles but included talking sequences, synchronized music, and sound effects using a Vitaphone sound-on-disc system. It was not until 1929 that talking movies would completely take over, but Warner Bros. had completely stopped making silent movies and switched to sound pictures by the end of that year, either part talking or full talking. Warner Bros. also started making movies in color as well as sound movies.
David Stamper was an American songwriter of the Tin Pan Alley and vaudeville eras, a contributor to twenty-one editions of the Ziegfeld Follies, writer for the Fox Film Corporation, and composer of more than one thousand songs, in spite of never learning to read or write traditional music notation. He may have written "Shine On Harvest Moon", a claim supported by vaudeville performer and writer Eddie Cantor. He was also a charter member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers or ASCAP.
Leo Edwards was a Broadway and Tin Pan Alley composer and pianist. He worked closely with Florenz Ziegfeld Jr., writing music for the Ziegfeld Follies for over a decade. He also wrote music for Paul Whiteman and collaborated with his two brothers, the composer Gus Edwards and music publisher and talent agent Ben Edwards, in addition to writing music for several New York music publishing firms.
Robert North was an American vaudeville performer who became a success as a stand-up comedian. Later he became a prolific motion picture producer.
Irvin Colloden Miller was an American actor, playwright, and vaudeville show writer and producer. He was responsible for successful theater shows including Broadway Rastus (1921), Liza (1922), Dinah (1923), which introduced the wildly popular black bottom dance, and Desires of 1927 starring Adelaide Hall. For thirty years he directed the popular review, Brown Skin Models, influenced by the Ziegfeld Follies but exclusively using black performers. "In the 1920s and 1930s, he was arguably the most well-established and successful producer of black musical comedy."
Herman Timberg was a vaudevillian, actor and songwriter, a writer of sketches and dialogue for vaudeville and musicals, "active in nearly every field of show business." He was the brother of composer Sammy Timberg and uncle of the journalist Robert Timberg.
"Second Hand Rose" is a 1921 popular song written by Grant Clarke and James F. Hanley for Fanny Brice.
Germaine Mitti, also known as Germaine Mitty, was a French dancer who appeared with the Ziegfeld Follies and in vaudeville revues of the 1920s.
Blanche L. Merrill was a songwriter specializing in tailoring her characterizations to specific performers. She is best known for the songs she wrote for Fanny Brice.
Patricia Bowman was an American ballerina, ballroom dancer, musical theatre actress, television personality, and dance teacher.
Seymour Furth was an American songwriter, composer, and librettist active from the late 1890s until his death in 1932. He wrote popular songs for Broadway musicals, vaudeville, tin pan alley, and minstrel shows; notably creating the opening musical number for the first Ziegfeld Follies in 1907. He most frequently worked as a composer with another collaborator serving as his lyricist, but sometimes he created both music and lyrics, and at other times just words with other composers. He composed piano works in popular styles of his day, including ragtime. His best known songs were comedic, including "Nothing Like That in Our Family" (1906) and "No Wedding Bells For Me" (1907).