Background
Ben Blue was born Benjamin Bernstein on September 12, 1901, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, the son of David A. Bernstein and Sadie Goldberg. Blue and his father, an art dealer, moved to Baltimore in 1911 after his parents' divorce.
Ben Blue was born Benjamin Bernstein on September 12, 1901, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, the son of David A. Bernstein and Sadie Goldberg. Blue and his father, an art dealer, moved to Baltimore in 1911 after his parents' divorce.
Ben Blue began his career as an entertainer, dancing for coins in the streets. In 1914, at age thirteen, Blue dropped out of school to make his own living as a window dresser in a haberdashery in Baltimore. The store window became a stage for Ben Blue. As he did his work he would dance and make faces for passersby, often gathering large crowds that would wildly applaud his antics. Later that year Blue landed a job imitating Charlie Chaplin outside Baltimore movie houses to promote Chaplin films. In 1916, Blue determined that his future was on the stage, and he gave up his last dollar to buy a train ticket to New York. For seven months he struggled as a window dresser at the huge Macy's store on Herald Square until he landed a job on Broadway in the chorus of George M. Cohan's Married. The show lasted one year, after which Blue endured a long period off the stage. His big break came in 1917 when he landed another chorus job in Cohan's Irene. Blue was also named as an understudy, and when the show's regular comedian became ill, Blue stepped in. The New York Post reported his three performances to be "a riot. " Blue did not immediately parlay his brief Broadway success into stardom.
At age nineteen, Blue and some partners opened a string of dancing schools in Minnesota, but the business failed within three years. Blue then set out for Hollywood, where he honed his pantomime skills in nightclubs and cafés, devising the routines - notably "The Skating Dance, " and "The Dying Swan, " which was first performed in Oakland - that would take him back to New York as well as to London, Paris, Budapest, and other European dance capitals. These routines gave Ben Blue name recognition. He now had opportunities in other areas of show business including shorts and two-reel comedy films. Additionally, he made radio appearances and became a headline act on the vaudeville circuit. Shorts and two-reelers led to feature films in 1936. Blue worked steadily through 1948, first with Paramount, then with MGM. Among his films were College Holiday (1936), High, Wide and Handsome (1937), The Big Broadcast of 1938 (1938), College Swing (1938), Paris Honeymoon (1939), Panama Hattie (1942), and My Wild Irish Rose (1947).
Meanwhile, Blue continued to take his act on the road. In New York he was a regular in George White's Scandals in the late 1930's and early 1940's. He also performed in other American cities and toured with the USO during World War II. By the early 1950's, with vaudeville dead, Blue turned to television to practice his craft. His visual comedy was a perfect fit for TV's early years. Dancing, miming, and making faces, Blue often portrayed the poor soul trying to make good in a cruel world. Blue was a regular on "The Frank Sinatra Show" from 1949 to 1951. In 1954 he hosted alternate weeks of NBC's "Saturday Night Revue. " Blue also made numerous guest appearances on "The Jack Benny Show, " "The Ed Sullivan Show, " "The Colgate Comedy Hour, " "The Ed Wynn Show, " "All Star Review, " and "The Milton Berle Show. " From 1967 to 1968 he played a farm handyman on the situation comedy show Accidental Family.
In 1963, after a fifteen-year hiatus from the movies, Blue returned to the big screen in the star-studded comedy It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, playing an old, broken-down World War I flying ace with a plane of the same description. Three years later, in the successful comedy film The Russians Are Coming, Blue played a classic routine of trying and failing to catch a horse. Three more films, A Guide for the Married Man (1967), The Busy Body (1967), and Where Were You When the Lights Went Out? (1968), wound up Blue's film career.
In addition to his dancing schools of the early 1920's, Blue owned a Santa Monica supper club during the 1950's, where he often performed. He also owned clubs in London and Paris, and was the proprietor of Slapsie Maxies, one of Hollywood's most popular restaurants. In 1969 Blue was indicted on six counts of tax evasion, but was required to pay only a $1, 000 fine. Most of Blue's remaining years were spent in retirement in Westlake Village, a suburb of Los Angeles, where he died.
Ben Blue married one of his dance instructors, Mary, in 1922. In 1937, Mary Blue sued for divorce, claiming that her husband spent large sums on gambling and escorted other women to social functions; she was given custody of their only child. In 1940, Blue married Axie Dunlap, a player with him in George White's Scandals. They had two children.