Born On This Day- August 17th... Monty Woolley

Edgar Montillion Woolley was born on this day- August 17th, in 1888, in NYC. He was a professor & lecturer at Yale University & he became an actor rather late in life, appearing on Broadway in 1936.

Woolley was typecast as the sharp speaking, supercilious sophisticate. His most famous role is the cantankerous radio personality forced to stay immobile because of a broken leg in The Man Who Came to Dinner, which he performed on Broadway, on the road, & in the film version. The play is based a on the radio & press celebrity of the 1930s & 1940s, Alexander Woollcott, who was also gay.

In the early 1970s, I performed in The Man Who Came To Dinner, a near perfect piece of theatre comedy confection by George Kauffman & Moss Hart. I played the role of Banjo, a thinly disguised caricature of Harpo Marx. In a crazy coincidence, I would play Harpo Marx a year later in a rather good musical, ready to be revived I believe- Minnie's Boys.

Woolley was a teacher & trusted sidekick of Cole Porter while at Yale & throughout their lives. They enjoyed many amusing disreputable adventures together in NYC & on foreign travels.

He played himself, badly, in Warner Brother's misinformed, misrepresented, & miserable bio-pic about Cole Porter's life- Night & Day (1946), a fictionalised retelling of Porter's peculiar professional & personal life. In the film he is much older than Cary Grant's Cole Porter, but he was actually only 3 years older than his friend.which might give you a clue about the nature of some of their audacious assignations

Woolley starred in a CBS TV adaptation of The Man Who Came to Dinner in 1954, the year of my birth. Woolley appeared in the TV series- Best of Broadway.

After finishing his final film, Kismet (1955), he returned to radio. Woolley was nominated for an Oscar as Best Actor in 1943 for The Pied Piper & as Best Supporting Actor in 1945 for Since You Went Away. He won a Best Actor award from the National Board of Review in 1942 for his role in The Pied Piper.

I have it on good authority that Woolley had a passion for black men, as did Cole Porter. Bennett Cerf in his 1944 book Try & Stop Me, tells the tale of Woolley at a dinner party where he suddenly belched. A woman sitting nearby glared at him; he glared back & said: "& what did you expect, my good woman? Chimes?"  Woolley died in 1963. I could play his signature role- Sheridan Whiteside in the Man Who Came To Dinner, with my eyes wide shut.

Born On This Day- January 18th... Alexander Woollcott

I have had 40+ year obsession with the Algonquin Round Table Group. As always, I had over researched a stage role I was preparing. I had been cast in The Man Who Came To Dinner, a near perfect piece of theatre comedy confection by George Kauffman & Moss Hart. I played the role of Banjo, a thinly disguised caricature of Harpo Marx. In a crazy coincidence, I would play Harpo Marx a year later in a rather good musical, ready to be revived- Minnie’s Boys. The Man Who Came To Dinner is based on a real incident at writer & closeted gay- Moss Hart’s home involving the well-known radio & press celebrity of the 1930s & 1940s- Alexander Woollcott, who was gay.

Woollcott inspired at least 3 different characters in first-rate famous films with his articulate quips. He was a pillar of the Algonquin Round Table, a group of writers, actors & personalities who gathered regularly to match wits over a great deal of alcohol. He was a critic & commentator for The New Yorker (he devised the Shouts & Murmurs column still used today), & had his own CBS radio show.

He had famously intense & possessive relationships with many powerful, talented women, including lesbian actress Katherine Cornell & fellow Algonguin Round Table member Dorothy Parker.

Starting in 1929, his “This is Woollcott speaking” became his unmistakable catch phrase on the radio. Woollcott was the first on-air book reviewer, responsible for successes like James Hilton’s Lost Horizon, a power untapped until Oprah. He appeared in advertisements endorsing products & in movie trailers. He was a frequent White House guest, & had his favorite cocktail, the Brandy Alexander, named after him. He was loved & loathed, feared & fawned over.

Woollcott could be bitingly brutal & sourly sappy in his radio broadcasts. The 3 characters based on Woollcott were: Sheridan Whiteside, the sophisticated tyrant tethered to a wheelchair in The Man Who Came to Dinner; Waldo Leydecker, the writer & radio commentator who develops an obsession with his young protégé in Laura; & Addison Dewitt, the contemptuous critic, played by George Sanders, in All About Eve. The gay stereotype of an effeminate, snobby, cultured controller of young ladies isn’t around much in the 21st century.

He was so smart that he toured, rather successfully, in the very play with the wicked caricature of him.

My experience in The Man Who Came To Dinner was 40 years ago, but there in my bookshelf sits The Woollcott Reader & The Letters Of Alexander Woollcott.

Born On This Day- August 17th... Montey Woolley

Edgar Montillion Wooley was born on this day, in1888, in NYC. He was a professor & lecturer at Yale University & he became an actor rather late in life appearing on Broadway in 1936.

Woolley was typecast as the sharp speaking, supercilious sophisticate. His most famous role is the cantankerous radio personality forced to stay immobile because of a broken leg in The Man Who Came to Dinner, which he performed on Broadway, on the road, & in the film version. The play is based a on the radio & press celebrity of the 1930s & 1940s, Alexander Woollcott, who was also gay.

I performed in The Man Who Came To Dinner, a near perfect piece of theatre comedy confection by George Kauffman & Moss Hart. I played the role of Banjo, a thinly disguised caricature of Harpo Marx. In a crazy coincidence, I would play Harpo Marx a year later in a rather good musical, ready to be revived, I believe- Minnie's Boys.

Wooley was a teacher & trusted sidekick of Cole Porter while at Yale & throughout their lives. They enjoyed many amusing disreputable adventures together in NYC & on foreign travels.

He played himself, badly, in Warner Brother's misinformed, misrepresented, & miserable bio-pic about Cole Porter's life- Night & Day (1946), a fictionalised retelling of Porter's peculiar professional & personal life. In the film he is much older than Cary Grant's Cole Porter, but he was actually only 3 years older than his friend.which might give you a clue about the nature of some of their audacious assignations

He starred in a CBS TV adaptation of The Man Who Came to Dinner in 1954, the year of my birth. Woolley appeared in the TV series- Best of Broadway.

After finishing his final film, Kismet (1955), he returned to radio. Woolley was nominated for an Oscar as Best Actor in 1943 for The Pied Piper & as Best Supporting Actor in 1945 for Since You Went Away. He won a Best Actor award from the National Board of Review in 1942 for his role in The Pied Piper.

I have it on good authority that Woolley had a passion for Dark Meat, as did Cole Porter. Bennett Cerf in his 1944 book Try & Stop Me, tells the tale of Woolley at a dinner party where he suddenly belched. A woman sitting nearby glared at him; he glared back & said: "& what did you expect, my good woman? Chimes?"  Woolley died in 1963. I could play his signature role- Sheridan Whiteside in the Man Who Came To Dinner, with my eyes wide shut.