by Gary Giddins
Within weeks telegrams hastily went out for the club’s second meeting:
THE WESTWOOD HILLS MARCHING AND CHOWDER CLUB NORTH HOLLYWOOD BRANCH ASKS YOU TO ITS 2ND BREAKWAY MINSTREL SHOW TO BE PERPETRATED AT 10500 CAMARILLO NORTHHOLLYWOOD AT 7 PM JUNE 25TH. BRING YOUR OWN ACT AND COSTUME OR COME AND KNOCK YOURSELF OUT. CALL MISS ROSS AT NH 5645 WITH ACCEPTANCE OR ALIBI. SUPPER AT MIDNIGHT.
— DIXIE AND BING CROSBY 25
This show rounded up most of the same cast, along with Ken Murray, Wesley Ruggles, Jimmy Monaco, Andy Devine, Bill Frawley, Eddie Sutherland, Skeets Gallagher, and Fred MacMurray. Trotter led a five-piece band that included Tommy Dorsey and Spike Jones. Now titled The Breakaway Minstrel Show, the company performed in a huge tent erected on the Crosby tennis court, with an elaborate proscenium arch and a painted backdrop. 26 The showstopper came early, after an ensemble chorus of “Hello, Hello” and “The Little Ladies, God Bless ‘Em, in good ole ‘Swanee River.’” Lasses Mercer and Chitlins Crosby offered an “erudite analyseration of swing,” 27 based on the vaudeville classic “Mr. Gallagher and Mr. Shean.” Mercer wrote the lyric, an off-the-wall parody of jazz history; but what dazzled the audience was the smooth running wit of the neovaudevillians delivering it.
JM: Oh, Mr. Crosby [BC hums], Dear Dr. Crosby [BC scats]
Is it true that swing’s another name for jazz? [BC scats]
And the first place it was played
Was a New Orleans Parade
And the Southern Negro gave it all it has?
BC: Oh, Mr. Mercer, Mr. Mercer, Mr. Mercer,
Mr. Mercer, I believe that its foundation came from them
[JM: Are you positive?]
Yeesss. They just slowed the tempo down
And then they really went to town.
JM: Allegretto, Mr. Crosby?
BC: Alligators, Mr. M.
….
BC: Mr. Mercer, [JM: Yes?] Oh, Mr. Mercer, [JM: Hm-hmm?]
Well, I trust that I have made the matter clear.
[JM: It’s really too clear.]
So when someone plays a thing
You’re gonna understand it’s swing
And appreciate the rhythm that you hear.
JM: Oh, Mr. Crosby, [BC: Oh, hear me talking to ya]. No, Mr. Crosby
[BC scats]
I’m afraid that type of rhythm’s not for me.
I prefer my music played
A la Schubert serenade.
BC: Sort of ritardo, Mr. Mercer?
JM: Sort of Lombardo, Mr. C. 28
The number went over so well that Bing and Mercer recorded it six days later for Decca, producing a major hit (hailed by Time as “the summer’s most amusing ditty”), 29 an unflappable duet that remains a standard for rhythmic joshing on the boundary between vaudeville and jazz. They also recorded Hoagy Carmichael’s “Small Fry,” a more conventional reverie with southern minstrel badinage, which they performed with Fred MacMurray (“Fred plays the old dame”) in the tent show, re-creating a scene from the as-yet-unreleased Sing You Sinners. Other highlights found Bing, as Gene Krupa Krosby, joining with Kenny Goodman Murray and Lionel Hampton Burke on “Maggie Blues”; and as Cracklins Crosby, rendering the classic “Nobody” (“Lifted bodily from a Bert Williams record”), which he later sang successfully on radio; the broadcast performance was issued as a Decca recording.
Bing’s “private” shows, including impromptu productions at his golf and track meets, entranced much of Hollywood, adding to an allure that impressed his colleagues. In a town plagued by fear, he was seemingly fearless. His persona reflected an independence as admirable as it was rare. James Cagney had appeared as a guest on Kraft Music Hall early in 1937, but it was a year later, while listening to the show at his farm on Martha’s Vineyard, that he experienced something of an epiphany about Bing. “I knew at once that this was a most extraordinary fella. I actually started to write a piece about him, ‘The Miracle Known as Crosby,’ but after a page or two, I stopped. I realized he was just beginning, and would add up to even more than he was.” 30 Cagney was one of many KMH guests who marveled at his enigmatic grace.
A few weeks after the June Breakaway Minstrel Show, a young journalist named Marie Manovill wrote to several of Bing’s radio guests, asking them to discuss his good and bad points. Lotte Lehmann observed, “It is very difficult for me to say whether the charm of his personality or the charm of his songs is more appealing to me.” 31 The only correspondent who ventured any criticism was Rose Bampton. She began by remarking on Bing’s ability to work hard and yet “make everyone about him feel that he is taking life easily, which is quite unique. Especially, since his work is always done and done well.” 32 She pointed to the improvement in his singing as evidence of his labor and credited his “sincerity and absolute honesty” as additional reasons for his success. She continued:
If one were hunting for bad points, I think his only one would be that perhaps he is too self-effacing. I can recall the occasion of one broadcast which demanded that Bing learn an arrangement of the sextette of “Lucia.” Bing insisted that he didn’t read music, that he wasn’t a good musician, yet in spite of all this, inside of fifteen minutes he was singing as nonchalantly as any opera singer a most difficult arrangement which had been allotted to him.
By this little criticism I do not mean to say that one must be arrogant, but surely Bing should be cognizant a little more of his own quite unique ability and standing.
But then, perhaps that is just one of the reasons why every artist who is on his program comes away with a feeling of having made a very sincere new friend, and is just another Crosby fan for ever after. 33
Bampton had hit on something. Her “little criticism” was much echoed, privately and in the press, as Bing’s movies became increasingly routine; observers wondered why he seemed more energetic in pursuing golf and the ponies than in broadening his range as a performer. The public, of course, was satisfied. Bing was treasured in and out of the business. Hollywood had adopted him as its favorite crooner back when the Rhythm Boys played the Montmartre Cafe. The Marching and Chowder Club affirmed his likableness with insiders and amused the public when it learned of the get-togethers, initially through a charity-raising performance on Tommy Dorsey’s Raleigh-Kool Show. The MCC sponsored a quintet: violinist Jack Benny, clarinetist Ken Murray, cornetist Dick Powell, pianist Shirley Ross, and drummer Bing.
An eager Paramount publicist ran with the ball: the Marching and Chowder Club performed every month (no less) and “turned back the pages of time to the gay ‘90s” with “approximately 150 stars” (no less). Why stop there? The Floradora Sextette number alone, he marveled, would “cost $500,000 to put on the screen.” 34 Bing may have considered the ballyhoo a mistake, because Paramount quickly retreated with a bulletin that began on a more ominous note: “The screen colony’s ‘open door’ policy is a thing of the past.” 35 This release grieved for the film stars who were harassed by “chiseling hangers-on, blackmailers, souvenir hunters, and gate-crashing celebrity hunters”; they had no choice but to pare down parties and guest lists. “The West Side [sic] Marching and Chowder Club,” it noted, hired “special guards to keep out the uninvited.” 36 The Westwood revelers retired until 1940.
The mummers shows demonstrate Bing’s capacity for fun, penchant for masks, and love for the venerable traditions of show business. They also underscore a leadership capacity he exercised more readily in his private life than in his professional one. If Bing was an unbending force who went his own way in his own time, he did not consider himself or want to be considered the architect of his career.
Like the indifferent college student who was pushed to the brink of show business by high schoolers, like the singing star who adopted the vision of his record producer, and like the radio star who had to be cajoled into spontaneity, Bing continued to heed the advice of those he deemed savvier than himself. Disciplined, inscrutable, and innovative artist that he was, he pretended to leave the big decisions to others as long
as they suited his purposes. For example, at the time of the MCC shows, he accepted a ten-year contract, without options, to continue as Kraft Music Hall’s host. It was the longest commitment offered to anyone in radio history and would ultimately haunt NBC, when Bing made one of the biggest decisions of his life, to break free in 1946, and a judge ruled that a covenant of that length amounted to indentured servitude.
Playtime was another story: he called the shots. As Phil Harris recalled, “I knew him well enough to wait for him to call me.” 37 In the late 1930s most of the calls he made were focused on making the Del Mar racetrack a going concern. Toward that end, the money Bing put up — essential though it was — probably counted for less than his investment in energy and commitment. He coasted through the filming of Double or Nothing as if it were merely a venture to fill spare time. “When not actually working in a scene or learning a song,” a reporter noted, “he was on the telephone talking to functionaries at the track or at his stable, or he was out on the Paramount campus rounding up other stars to be Del Mar ‘guest stewards.’” 38 On the set he convinced costars to appear on opening day for the next meet. At the track he collected tickets, signed autographs, entertained, and announced races.
He was no less engaged in the stables. Charlie Whittingham, who trained for him in later years, met him in the early days at Del Mar. “He’d be out every morning, and I got to know him quite well. Very nice to be around, a regular guy, you know. Liked the horses and got to know them, because Binglin had quite a good stable. They kidded him about his nags, but he had decent horses. A lot of times, from the races we’d go over to Bing’s and have a cocktail, sit around and talk. They had a softball team at Rancho Sante Fe, and he played on it. Pretty good athlete.” 39
Though he never trained horses for Bing, Noble Threewitt admired the way he handled himself on the grounds: “Lots of owners hate to waste their time talking to you. But Bing would visit with anybody. He was just an all-around good guy. The opening day at Del Mar with him and Pat O’Brien — that was a great, great opening day.” 40
Yet in the year that followed that fabled afternoon, Del Mar stumbled badly, failing to attract capacity crowds or a serious following. John O’Melveny had argued against the whole plan, but Bing had uncharacteristically ignored his attorney’s advice and invested $45,000 for 35 percent of the stock. For a year and a half, Del Mar lost money. Everything changed with the legendary meet of August 1938, which was heralded by the most famous track ditty ever composed. Midge Polesie came up with the catchphrase “Where the Turf Meets the Surf,” inspiring a sixteen-bar anthem — and a longer but rarely heard verse — by Monaco, Burke, and Bing, played over the loudspeakers before and after every set of races for seven decades and counting. Bing, Pat O’Brien, and Oliver Hardy plugged it on three NBC shows the week before the 1938 meet.
No effort was spared to attract the Hollywood community on August 5, which was declared Motion Picture Day. Each contest was titled like the entrées on a Sunset Boulevard menu: The Actors, The Exhibitors, The Producers, The Directors, The Cameramen, The Screen Writers, and The Stars. A Motion Picture Handicap offered a $3,000 purse for three-year-olds owned by people in the business. The horses raced by Robert Riskin, Clark Gable, and Joe E. Brown won, placed, and showed; Bing’s entry, Rocco, came in last. But nothing could dampen his spirits that day. He announced the race and then signed hundreds of autographs. After the last race a screen was erected on the track for the premiere of Bing’s new picture, Sing You Sinners, a racetrack story in which his own horses participated. This in itself was an event, “Hollywood’s most novel preview,” a reporter called it. 41 Drive-ins were practically unheard-of (the first one, erected in New Jersey in 1933, had few imitators until the late 1940s). The audience at Del Mar marveled at the sight of planes overhead and the sound of train whistles in the distance as they watched the movie. Bing was not around for the alfresco screening, however; he was rehearsing the script for the radio broadcast to follow. It began with Del Mar’s theme song and proceeded with several stars lavishing praise on the picture and players, except for Bing, who in mock desperation asked Pat O’Brien, “How did you like my work in the picture, Pat?” The predictable reply: “Oh, were you in the picture, too?”
The press, including 375 writers and photographers who were delivered to the gates on a special train, focused on Motion Picture Day (Friday) and failed to report on Saturday evening’s entertainment, which proved more consequential. Bob Hope had relocated to Los Angeles the previous year to appear in Paramount’s The Big Broadcast of 1938. Having renewed their friendship on the links and at the studio, Bing asked Hope to join him onstage to re-create the routines they improvised at the Capitol Theater six years earlier. The crowd loved them, as did William LeBaron, an officer on the Del Mar board and Paramount’s chief of production. The buzz that evening was, why doesn’t somebody put these guys into a picture?
The incident that ensured Del Mar’s survival took place the following Friday. Bing and Lin Howard had purchased the 6,000-acre La Portena ranch in Argentina and shipped several horses back to the United States, a slow, arduous journey by sea and rail. When the horses finally arrived, the six-year-old Ligaroti was promising but unsteady, and for a while Bing and Lin considered selling him — he was offered to Louis B. Mayer for $75,000. They were glad Meyer declined when, in March 1938, Ligaroti won a $5,000 handicap at Bay Meadows, San Mateo, by three lengths, completing the mile course in 1:40. Another of their Argentine horses, Sabuesa, also won that day. In July Ligaroti won the $5,000 Aloma Handicap at Hollywood Park. Unbilled, he also got to win the big race at the climax of Sing You Sinners. Word got around that Bing and Howard were claiming Ligaroti might be the best distance runner in the country, a boast that Del Mar’s general manager, William Quigley, duly conveyed to Lin’s father, who owned the famous Seabiscuit.
Charles Howard had made a fortune in Buick dealerships. Seabiscuit added to it, winning more than a third of his starts over a four-year period; in 1937 he was voted the nation’s number one handicap horse. Howard could not resist Quigley’s challenge, and a match race was staged with a $25,000 purse, no public wagering, though spectators could bet among themselves. Bing and Lin placed side bets with Howard (who grandly offered three-to-one odds) and Seabiscuit’s backers. The distance was set at a mile and an eighth, with George (The Iceman) Woolf riding Seabiscuit and Noel (Spec) Richardson riding Ligaroti. A crowd of 22,000 overflowed the stands — larger by a third than the previous record crowd. The match was broadcast by Bing and O’Brien from a microphone on the grandstand roof, beneath which a cheering section wore Ligaroti sweaters and waved Ligaroti pennants, chanting, “You can try and try and try, but you can’t beat Ligaroti!”
The race, euphemized by one sportswriter as “torrid,” 42 was remembered by the man who announced it, Oscar Otis, as the most violent he had ever seen. Seabiscuit broke out first, but at no time did either horse lead by more than half a length. The crowd went crazy, and so did the jockeys, flailing each other and the horses with whips, grabbing at each other’s saddles and reins. Seabiscuit won by a nose in 1:49, setting a new track record by four seconds. Spec Richardson immediately filed a protest against Woolf, who in turn claimed Richardson began the melee by grabbing his whip hand. Track stewards launched an inquiry, observing that Seabiscuit had taken severe punishment, showing welts on his neck and flank and breathing heavily, while Ligaroti, as one might expect of a Crosby horse, “appeared cool and relatively little exerted.” 43 Both jockeys were suspended for the meet, with a recommendation that the California Horse Racing Board suspend them for the year. But as there was no pari-mutuel betting, the punishments could not be enforced. Dixie presented the prize money to Howard in the winner’s circle. Bing graciously remarked to reporters, “It’s no disgrace to be beaten by the world champion.” Nationwide coverage put Del Mar on the map.
Paramount provided a punch line for all the fuss in the form of a press release with Bing’s byline, in which he co
mplains that he was “on the set one day” and had to endure a barrage of jokes about his horses. “Oh well, let the clowns laugh,” he muses, “[my horses] will be winning races some day.” 44 No horses or races are mentioned in the release, but Paramount’s newest contract player makes an appearance. Bing laments that while driving to Lakeside, Bob Hope pointed to a decrepit nag and said, “It looks like one of your horses. It’s stopped.” 45 If the flacks were bent on reducing Bing to a routine of frazzled jokes, the front office seemed equally fixed on a standard recipe for film scripts. Small wonder he found more enchantment in the stables and more excitement at a tee.
23
A POCKETFUL OF DREAMS
I remember somebody once said that Bing would have made a great Hamlet. I don’t know what Bing had to say about that. Oh, my gosh, he would have been scared to death taking on Hamlet. But there was a feeling from people that there was something much deeper about Bing.
— Anthony Quinn (1989) 1
The New York Sun polled several personalities in 1938 for lists of their ten favorite films. Bing’s roster is individual, knowing, and surprisingly impolitic given his own predictable roles in the most capital-oriented (“After all,” says Sammy Glick, “our pictures are shipped out in cans. We’re in the canning business”) of the arts. 2