{"id":12839,"date":"2013-02-27T12:46:26","date_gmt":"2013-02-27T17:46:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=12839"},"modified":"2013-02-27T12:47:44","modified_gmt":"2013-02-27T17:47:44","slug":"midweek-music-breakwhats-in-a-song-makin-whoopee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2013\/02\/midweek-music-breakwhats-in-a-song-makin-whoopee\/","title":{"rendered":"Midweek Music Break\/What’s in a Song: “Makin’ Whoopee”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"'Whoopee'<\/a><\/p>\n

[Sheet music from the original Broadway show. Note implication that
\n“whoopee” just refers to a cowgirl’s yell: yeah, <\/em>right.]<\/em><\/p>\n

O<\/span>ver the weekend, a couple of TV experiences converged to drive this song into my head:<\/p>\n

On Sunday, we watched the great Otto Preminger-directed film of 1959,\u00a0Anatomy of a Murder<\/em>. Jimmy Stewart plays a defense attorney for a confessed killer, an Army lieutenant played by Ben Gazzara. The killer was driven to it impulsively — so goes his defense — when he learned that his wife had been beaten and raped by the murder victim.<\/p>\n

At one point, the lieutenant’s wife (Lee Remick) takes the stand in his defense. Although the prosecution has argued strenuously (albeit ineffectively) to keep the rape out of the testimony, they can’t help trying to turn it to their advantage. Lead prosecutor George C. Scott, practically leering, compliments the wife on her cute little dog (who’s just made a courtroom appearance), and then attempts to paint her as a tart who dresses and acts in a way almost guaranteed to lure men from the straight-and-narrow path of chivalry and honor. He calls attention to her beautiful hair, her tight clothes, her drinking, her playing pinball, her occasional disregard for even common everyday decencies like wearing underwear—<\/p>\n

Jimmy Stewart leaps to his feet to object. Your Honor<\/em>, he demands rhetorically, is the assistant Attorney General from Lansing pitching woo, or is he going to cross-examine?<\/em><\/p>\n

The Missus and I snickered:\u00a0pitching woo<\/em>. <\/em>Like, huh?\u00a0woo<\/strong><\/em>???<\/em><\/p>\n

But in fact the synaptic groundwork had already been laid in my head. Earlier, I’d watched an episode of the late SyFy show,\u00a0Eureka<\/em>. In this episode, the beautiful-but-tough-as-nails deputy sheriff, named Jo Lupo, suddenly starts behaving out of character. In particular, she reveals a sudden (and heretofore unrevealed) interest in the nerdy assistant-to-geniuses named Fargo. During a karaoke session in the local cafe, as Fargo plays the piano, Jo — in a slinky gown — goes into a rendition of “Makin’ Whoopee”… crawling around on the piano, and concluding with a kiss.<\/p>\n

That scene in\u00a0Eureka<\/span>, red dress and all,\u00a0was so close to another — Michelle Pfeiffer on the piano, Jeff Bridges at the keyboard, in\u00a0The Fabulous Baker Boys<\/span> — that it had to be intentional.<\/p>\n

So I already had the song in my head. And then (as one does) I started to poke around on the Internets…<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

W<\/span>ritten by Gus Kahn and Walter Donaldson for the 1928 Broadway musical\u00a0Whoopee<\/em>, the song took its title and signature phrase from popular culture of the day. In his columns, Walter Winchell used it often as a coded way of saying what we might today call\u00a0fooling around<\/em>. (He claimed to have invented the phrase, but no one seems to know this for sure. I’ve seen etymological references which date back to the mid-19th century, but they all refer to the operative word in its exclamatory sense — like something, yes, which a rodeo cowgirl might cry out in excitement at the height of— wait, that came out wrong…)<\/p>\n

It seems to me that Walter Donaldson must have had fun writing the lyrics. Most of the rhymes seem so easy and unforced, so natural, without being facile — popping into the middle of lines as well as at the end. (In this way, it reminds me of “I’m Beginning to See the Light<\/a>.”)<\/p>\n

\"Eddie<\/a>With its innocent-but-not-too<\/em>-innocent message, the number was a natural fit for Eddie Cantor. The performer, generally a little too weirdly comic for my taste, managed to put the lyrics over with the barest hint of salaciousness in his delivery. The song and the show were popular enough that their Broadway run wrapped up early for the making of a film version in 1930.<\/p>\n

(Above right, Cantor in (a) a typically mugging publicity shot… and (b) as he appeared in the film while singing “Whoopee.”\u00a0Producer Sam Goldwyn added an exclamation point to the film’s one-word title — maybe hoping to pass it off as a cry of joy than as the, well, the subject<\/em> of the film.)<\/p>\n

At the outset, “Makin’ Whoopee” ostensibly functioned as a cautionary note from one guy to (probably) another guy. Most performers no longer sing the introductory verse, though:<\/p>\n

Ev’ry time I hear that march from Lohengrin<\/em><\/span>
\nI am always on the outside looking in.
\nMaybe that is why I see the funny side
\nWhen I see a fallen brother take a bride.
\nWeddings make a lot of people sad,
\nBut if you’re not the groom they’re not so bad.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Without those lines, the song is not only tighter and of course shorter; it also suddenly becomes suitable for unisex delivery. And when women sing it (see: Pfeiffer’s Susie Diamond, in\u00a0Baker Boys<\/em>; see: Deputy Lupo, in\u00a0Eureka<\/em>), the tune invariably turns into something of a tease.\u00a0Makin’ whoopee brings trouble<\/em>, they seem to say… and yet, goes the implication (with a wink and an upraised eyebrow and a slither along the piano lid):\u00a0Maybe there’s a possibility that you and someone nearby<\/em> (<\/em>me?) might, you know, hmm?<\/em><\/p>\n

I<\/span>f you’d like to see Eddie Cantor himself singing the song, in the 1930 film, of course the clip is on YouTube<\/a>. I think I’ll start off here, though, with a duet by Danny Thomas and\u00a0Doris Day, who co-starred as Gus Kahn and his wife Grace LeBoy Kahn\u00a0in 1951’s bio of the songwriter, I’ll See You in My Dreams<\/a><\/em>. It’s a classic early-’50s musical interpretation, sort of cutesy — cheery piping flutes and all — with not a hint of the dangling-bait twist which many later singers gave it.<\/p>\n