Background
Billy Rose was born on September 6, 1899. Rose began life in poverty on New York City’s Lower East Side, where he was born on the kitchen table of the tenement where his family lived.
(In 1936 as Texas prepared to celebrate its centennial100...)
In 1936 as Texas prepared to celebrate its centennial100 years after the Battle of San JacintoDallas was chosen as the site of the official exhibition. Plans were under way for a modest Frontier Days Celebration in Fort Worthuntil Star-Telegram publisher and civic booster Amon G. Carter stepped in. Carter considered the naming of Dallas as the official site a gross miscarriage of justice and was determined to get even by mounting a show that would directly rival the official eventand pull tourist dollars into Fort Worth. To put his celebration together Carter hired flamboyant Broadway producer Billy Rose. The result was Fort Worth’s Frontier Centennial, an improbable conglomeration of agricultural exhibits, sideshow nudes, an old-time Wild West show, Rose’s musicalized circus Jumbo, and a parade of Broadway and vaudeville talent led by feature artiste, stripper Sally Rand. The centerpiece for this extravaganza was the dinner theater, Casa Mañana, with the world's largest revolving stage surrounded by a tank of water on which it seemed to float, over twenty fountains, and geysers of water that shot into the air at strategic intervals. The building featured over thirty Spanish-style arches, was 320 feet in length, and contained the world’s longest bar, a fact of which Rose was inordinately proud. But it was the revue on this magnificent stage that truly made theatrical history. On opening night, Paul Whiteman raised his baton and two bands swung into the fanfare. There were interpretations of the St. Louis World’s Fair, the Paris Exposition of 1925, and Chicago’s 1933 Century of Progress Exposition. Texas Sweetheart Number One” wore a $5,000 gold-mesh gown, and Sally Rand wore only a huge opaline balloon. On opening night when the orchestra played The Eyes of Texas,” the audience rose to its feet singing, whistling, and cheering. Texans,” wrote one critic, are not given to polite applause.” The Frontier Centennial and its sequel, the Frontier Fiesta, closed after only two brief seasons (1936 and 1937), the second season cut short by controversy and lawsuits. Rose left Fort Worth under a cloud, informed by city fathers that his services were no longer needed. Undaunted, he went on to become a multimillionaire with almost legendary status as a theatrical producer. But Fort Worth was never again the same after the Frontier Centennial . . . and memories of that festival linger today, even though the buildings were long ago razed. Today a permanent theater-in-the-round, appropriately named Casa Mañana, is located on the centennial grounds. Popular with Fort Worthians, it can only echo the splendor of the original. In 1936 as Texas prepared to celebrate its centennial100 years after the Battle of San JacintoDallas was chosen as the site of the official exhibition. Plans were under way for a modest Frontier Days Celebration in Fort Worthuntil Star-Telegram publisher and civic booster Amon G. Carter stepped in. Carter considered the naming of Dallas as the official site a gross miscarriage of justice and was determined to get even by mounting a show that would directly rival the official eventand pull tourist dollars into Fort Worth. To put his celebration together Carter hired flamboyant Broadway producer Billy Rose. The result was Fort Worth’s Frontier Centennial, an improbable conglomeration of agricultural exhibits, sideshow nudes, an old-time Wild West show, Rose’s musicalized circus Jumbo, and a parade of Broadway and vaudeville talent led by feature artiste, stripper Sally Rand. The centerpiece for this extravaganza was the dinner theater, Casa Mañana, with the world's largest revolving stage surrounded by a tank of water on which it seemed to float, over twenty fountains, and geysers of water that shot into the air at strategic intervals. The building featured over thirty Spanish-style arches, was 320 feet in length, and contained the world’s longest bar, a fact of which Rose was inordinately proud. But it was the revue on this magnificent stage that truly made theatrical history. On opening night, Paul Whiteman raised his baton and two bands swung into the fanfare. There were interpretations of the St. Louis World’s Fair, the Paris Exposition of 1925, and Chicago’s 1933 Century of Progress Exposition. Texas Sweetheart Number One” wore a $5,000 gold-mesh gown, and Sally Rand wore only a huge opaline balloon. On opening night when the orchestra played The Eyes of Texas,” the audience rose to its feet singing, whistling, and cheering. Texans,” wrote one critic, are not given to polite applause.” The Frontier Centennial and its sequel, the Frontier Fiesta, closed after only two brief seasons (1936 and 1937), the second season cut short by controversy and lawsuits. Rose left Fort Worth under a cloud, informed by city fathers that his services were no longer needed. Undaunted, he went on to become a multimillionaire with almost legendary status as a theatrical producer. But Fort Worth was never again the same after the Frontier Centennial . . . and memories of that festival linger today, even though the buildings were long ago razed. Today a permanent theater-in-the-round, appropriately named Casa Mañana, is located on the centennial grounds. Popular with Fort Worthians, it can only echo the splendor of the original.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0875652018/?tag=2022091-20
(The author claims that this is Broadway's biggest heel, o...)
The author claims that this is Broadway's biggest heel, obsessed with big money and big women. Brutally candid. This is the story of Rose the man, not the legend. This book includes his 5 marriages, the split with Fanny Brice, who called Rose "the most evil man I ever knew" and the "War of Roses" divorce battle with Eleanor Holm.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0006BRM9A/?tag=2022091-20
impresario producer songwriter
Billy Rose was born on September 6, 1899. Rose began life in poverty on New York City’s Lower East Side, where he was born on the kitchen table of the tenement where his family lived.
He attended Public School 44, where he was the 50-yard dash champion. While in high school, Billy studied shorthand under John Robert Gregg, the inventor of the Gregg System for shorthand notation. He won a dictation contest using Gregg notation, taking over 150 words per minute, and writing forward or backward with either hand.
Rose began his career as a shorthand stenographer, and won many shorthand contests. Once, before a competition he broke his thumb while skating in Central Park, making it impossible for him to hold a pen. Determined to compete, he stuck his pen through a potato, held the potato in his injured hand, and won first prize. His excellence in shorthand won him a job with Bernard Baruch, who headed the War Industries Board during World War I. Baruch later advised Rose on many of his investments.
After the war Rose traveled through the United States and on his return to New York heard that songwriters earned large amounts of money. Rose determined to become a songwriter, and after spending nine hours a day for three months studying the lyrics of hit songs of the previous thirty years, he believed he had come up with a formula for writing successful songs. He proved himself right when he wrote “Ain't Nature Grand” in 1920, earning five thousand dollars. At age twenty- four he earned over 100,000 dollars writing more songs. All told, he authored nearly four hundred songs, fifty of which were hits (including “It’s Only a Paper Moon” and “Me and My Shadow”).
In 1924 during the Prohibition era, he began his second career as a nightclub owner. With a combination of bootleg liquor and the patronage of gangsters and society people, his Back Stage Club earned him a small fortune. His second nightclub, the Fifth Avenue Club, catered only to the very rich and was a failure. In his subsequent nightclub venture, he decided to appeal to the middle-classes. For a price of $2.50 a couple was entitled to dinner and a show at the Casino de Paree. Rose went on to open Billy Rose’s Music Hall and the Diamond Horseshoe.
During the 1930s and 1940s, Rose produced shows, his most spectacular production being Jumbo, a combination circus and musical show. Jumbo won critical acclaim, but was a financial failure. Carmen Jones, an all-black production of the opera Carmen, was more successful, running for three seasons on Broadway and becoming a movie.
It was the Aquacade at the 1939-1940 World Fair in New York that earned Rose his first million. The Aquacade was a combination water-show and musical and was the most popular attraction at the Fair, often grossing over 8100,000 a week.
After World War II, Rose began writing a syndicated column that appeared in over one hundred newspapers nationwide. He began investing in real estate and art, had a “trading room” in his home, complete with ticker, telephones, and files on his investments. Rose continued investing in entertainment, purchasing the Ziegfeld Theater, which he renamed The Billy Rose Theater, and the National Theater.
In 1965 Rose donated his sculpture collection, worth over one million dollars, to Israel. He built the Billy Rose Art Gardens in Jerusalem and placed in it over one hundred pieces, including Henry Moore’s Reclining Figure and Rodin’s Adam. Rose said he decided to donate the sculptures to Israel because “it is hungrier for culture than any other country in the world.” On a visit to Jerusalem, he told Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion to melt down the sculptures for bullets in case of war. The first of his five wives was Fanny Brice (the story of their marriage was dramatized in the movie Funny Lady).
(Texas attorney Billy Bob Holland must confront the past i...)
(In 1936 as Texas prepared to celebrate its centennial100...)
(The author claims that this is Broadway's biggest heel, o...)
He was married 5 times: Fanny Brice (1929-1938), Eleanor Holm (1939-1954), Joyce Mathews (1956-1959, 1961-1963), Doris Warner Vidor (1964-1966).