Sons O' Guns is a musical in two acts with music by J. Fred Coots; lyrics co-authored by Arthur Swanstrom and Benny Davis; and a book co-written by Frederick A. Thompson and Jack Donahue. [1] Donahue also starred in the original production as the central character of Jimmy Canfield, an American playboy who is forced to enlist in the United States Army during World War I and has a series of comic adventures and a romance in France. [2]
The musical takes place in Rhode Island and in France during the years 1918-1919. The show opens in the United States where Canfield and his servant Hobson enjoy a privileged life of luxury and fun which is interrupted when they are enforced into enlisting into the United States Army during the first World War. who is with his master as a fellow enlisted serviceman. The pair have a series of misadventures all played for light hearted comic effect rather than serious drama on the Western Front in France; including being mistakenly accused of being German spies with Canfield being arrested. The musical also follows a central Romance between Canfield and the French girl Yvonne. All ends happily in the end. [2]
Sons O' Guns premiered on Broadway at the Imperial Theatre on November 26, 1929. A success, it ran there for a total of 295 performances; closing on August 9, 1930. [1] The production was co-produced by Swanstrom and Bobby Connolly; the latter of whom directed the show. Several Austrian-American creatives were on the production team for musical: including conductor Max Steiner as musical director, dancer Albertina Rasch as choreorapher, and artist Joseph Urban as scenic designer. [1] Charles LeMaire designed the costumes for the production. When lyricist and producer Arthur Swanstrom died in 1940, his obituary in Variety stated it was the most significant work in his career. [3]
The cast was led by Jack Donahue as Jimmy Canfield, William Frawley as Hobson, and Lili Damita as Yvonne. Others in the show included David Hutcheson as both Major Archibald and Ponsonby-Falcke, Milton Watson as Arthur Travers, Shirley Vernon as Mary Harper, Richard Temple as General Harper, Mary Horan as Bernice Pearce, Raoul De Tisne as Pierre, Robert Dohn as Parker, Alfred Bardelang as Oswald, Frances Markey as Colette, Gwendolyn Milne as Jeanette, and Marion Chambers as Joan. [1] The show is best remembered for its songs "Why?" and "Cross Your Fingers". [2]
The musical was adapted into the 1936 film Sons O' Guns . [4] [5]
Jean Schwartz was a Hungarian-born Jewish American composer and pianist. He is best known for his work writing the scores for more than 30 Broadway musicals, and for his creation of more than 1,000 popular songs with the lyricist William Jerome. Schwartz and Jerome also performed together on the vaudeville stage in the United States; sometimes in collaboration with Maude Nugent, Jerome's wife, and the Dolly Sisters. Schwartz was married to Jenny Dolly from 1913 to 1921.
Alfred Baldwin Sloane, often given as A. Baldwin Sloane, was the most prolific songwriter for Broadway musical comedies in the United States at the beginning of the 20th century. Despite his output and success during his lifetime, none of his music has had enduring popularity. Two of his most popular songs were "When You Ain't Got No Money You Needn't Come Around" and "Coming Through the Rye". His most successful hit tune was “Heaven Will Protect the Working Girl" which was first performed by Marie Dressler in the 1910 show Tillie's Nightmare.
Sons O' Guns is a 1936 American comedy film directed by Lloyd Bacon and written by Jerry Wald and Julius J. Epstein. It stars Joe E. Brown, and features Joan Blondell, with Beverly Roberts, Eric Blore, Craig Reynolds and Wini Shaw. It was released by Warner Bros. on May 30, 1936.
Louis Harrison was an actor, playwright, comedian, lyricist, librettist, and theatre director. As both a performer and playwright, he was mainly active within the genres of musical theatre and light opera.
The Billionaire is a musical in three acts with music by Gustave Kerker, and both book and lyrics by Harry B. Smith. The show was written with the backing of producers Klaw and Erlanger and was made specifically for the talents of Jerome Sykes who portrayed "The Billionaire", John Doe. The action of the musical begins in Nice, France during Carnival where the billionaire Sykes meets a young American girl, Pansy Good, studying to be an actress. Impressed with her talents, he buys her Doe's Theatre in New York City and establishes her as a star. Later, Doe attempts to ride a horse in a race at the Longchamp Racecourse in Paris, but is too fat to succeed. Pansy rides the horse instead and wins the race.
Happyland, Or, The King of Elysia is a comic opera in two acts with music by Reginald De Koven and a libretto by Frederic Ranken.
Frederic G. Ranken was an American librettist, lyricist, and playwright for light operas and musicals staged on Broadway from 1899 through 1907. His greatest success was the libretto for Reginald De Koven's 1905 comic opera Happyland. He also wrote libretti for composers Victor Herbert and Ludwig Engländer, and was a lyricist for composers Alfred Baldwin Sloane and Gustave Kerker among others. As a playwright he wrote the books for several musicals.
Coming Thro' The Rye is a "satiretta" or musical in two acts with both lyrics and book by George V. Hobart and music by A. Baldwin Sloane and J. Sebastian Hiller.
The White Hen is a musical in two acts with music by composer Gustav Kerker, a book by Roderic C. Penfield, and lyrics co-authored by Penfield and Paul West. Set in Tyrol, Austria, the story takes place at an inn, 'The White Hen', owned by Hensie Blinder. The musical begins after Blinder returns from a trip to Vienna in which he engaged a matrimonial agency to help him find a wife. Upon his return to the inn, several women arrive in response to the advertisement placed by the agency and a comedy of errors ensues; including Blinder mistakenly believing he has committed the crime of bigamy.
Hip! Hip! Hooray! is a musical in two acts with music by Gus Edwards and both lyrics and book by Edgar Smith.
The Floor Walkers was a road musical that was created as a starring vehicle for the comedy duo of Hap Ward and Harry Vokes to feature their signature roles of the tramps Lord Percy Harden and Lord Harold Poorly ; characters the duo had previously portrayed in the earlier musicals A Run On the Bank (1895) and The Governors (1898). The Floor Walkers had no attributed author for its book or lyrics, but the music for the production was created by composer Herbert Dillea who also served as the musical's music director. The most well known song from the show was "Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder"; which was the only song to have an attributed lyricist, Arthur Gillespie. This song was for a time a popular standard and was recorded multiple times by singer Harry Macdonough and cornetist Jules Levy for records made for the Victor Talking Machine Company and Columbia Records from 1902 through 1905, and later was recorded by Wayne King in 1947.
John J. McNally was an American playwright, journalist, and drama critic. As a playwright he is best known for penning the books for many Broadway musicals staged between the years 1895–1909. Many of these were crafted for the Rogers Brothers, or were created in collaboration with the songwriting team of Jean Schwartz and William Jerome. He was a longtime drama critic and editor for various Boston newspapers.
John Donahue was an American dancer, comedian, and musical theatre actor who worked in vaudeville, films, and on Broadway.
Silvio Hein was an American composer, songwriter, conductor, and theatrical producer. He was a songwriter for Tin Pan Alley and composed the scores to fourteen Broadway musicals. His most successful stage work was the 1917 musical Flo-Flo which he created with the French librettist and playwright Fred de Gresac. His songs were also interpolated into musicals created by others, including The Little Duchess and Ziegfeld Follies. In addition to his work writing music, he also worked as both a conductor and producer on Broadway. In 1914 he was a founding member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers.
Owen Murphy was an American songwriter, film maker, and writer for radio, film, and theatre. He worked as a lyricist, composer, and playwright for Broadway musicals and as a songwriter for Tin Pan Alley in the 1920s and 1930s. As a film maker he was an early maker of industrial films. He also was a writer for comedian Joe Cook for both the stage and radio.
The King's Carnival is a musical burlesque in two acts with music by A. Baldwin Sloane and both book and lyrics by Sydney Rosenfeld. The musical also included one hit song by the songwriting team of Jean Schwartz and William Jerome, "When Mr. Shakespeare Comes to Town". The musical was a parody of several Broadway shows that dealt with royalty and courtly drama, including targeted spoofs of Paul Kester's When Knighthood Was in Flower, Clyde Fitch's The Climbers, Paul M. Potter's Under Two Flags, and Lorimer Stoddard's In the Palace of the King.
George W. Munroe was an American actor and comedian who specialized in female impersonation. He was actively performing in American theaters from the 1880s into the early 1920s. He performed in both Broadway shows and in vaudeville. He was best known for his comic portrayals of gossipy old Irish women.
Joseph Macauley, sometimes given as Joseph Macaulay, was an American actor and singer. A native of San Francisco, he originally trained as a lawyer at the University of California and also studied singing with Henry Bickford Pasmore. In his early acting career he performed with various theatre troupes in Northern California from 1913 to 1915 and was often seen in outdoor amphitheaters in public parks such as the Cushing Memorial Amphitheatre on Mount Tamalpais and the Forest Theater in Carmel. In 1916 he toured in John E. Kellerd's Shakespeare troupe, and then settled in New York City where he trained under George Arliss as a member of The Theatre Workshop in 1916–1917.
Arthur M. Swanstrom was an American lyricist, playwright, producer, and dancer. The son of politician J. Edward Swanstrom, he began his career as a ballroom dancer; primarily performing in that capacity in nightclubs and in vaudeville. He expanded into working as a lyricist; initially working in partnership with John Murray Anderson as the lyricist for the revue The Greenwich Village Follies from 1919 to 1921. He became active as a Tin Pan Alley songwriter; writing lyrics for popular songs. Some of his hit songs included "Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gives to Me" (1919), "The Argentines, The Portuguese, and the Greeks" (1920), "Broadway Blues" (1920), "Rain" (1927), and "Twenty-Four Hours A Day" (1935). Many of his songs were written in collaboration with Carey Morgan; although he worked with several other composers during his career. He was both producer and lyricist for the Broadway productions of Sons O' Guns (1929) and Princess Charming (1930), and authored both the lyrics and book to the Broadway musical Sea Legs (1937). Ill health and financial problems plagued Swanstrom in the last years of his life, and he died of a stroke in 1940 at the age of 52.