Song:Be A Clown
Album:De-Lovely: Music From The Motion Picture
Though Kevin Kline is not known for film musicals, he started out in Broadway musicals and won three Tonys. He starred as Cole Porter in the 2004 film De-Lovely. He was born Oct. 24, 1947 in St. Louis. His father was an amateur opera singer and he owned The Record Bar. Kline's Inc. was the family owned department store chain. Kline studied music and theater at Indiana University. And he studied at Juilliard in New York on a drama scholarship. He toured with the City Center Acting Company. His first big Broadway appearance was in the 1978 musical On The Twentieth Century. He won a Tony for that. Then he won another Tony for the 1981 musical The Pirates of Penzance. And he also appeared in the 1983 film version. Kline's first film was the 1982 film Sophie's Choice. He continued to appear on stage. But he concentrated mostly on films after appearing in the Lawrence Kasdan films The Big Chill and Silverado. Kline won an Oscar for the 1987 film A Fish Called Wanda. Though Kline has occasionally returned to the stage, he is best known for his film career. Kline starred as Cole Porter in the 2004 film De-Lovely. It's a biopic of Porter and his marriage to Linda Lee Thomas played by Ashley Judd. The film was written by Jay Cocks and produced and directed by Irwin Winkler. Kline performs several songs in the film including Be A Clown. Peter Polycarpou plays Louis B. Mayer. Porter wrote Be A Clown for the 1948 film The Pirate performed by Gene Kelly. MGM stole the song for the 1950 film Singin' In The Rain. Producer Arthur Freed conceived Singin' In The Rain as a tribute to himself featuring songs he had written with Nacio Herb Brown. Director Stanley Donen told Freed they didn't have a solo number for Donald O'Connor and he wanted something similar to Be A Clown. Freed changed some of the lyrics and retitled Be A Clown as Make 'Em Laugh. And he credited the songwriting to himself and Brown. Donen has described it as 100% plagiarism. It is not known why Porter didn't sue Freed. Speculation is that he thought he owed Freed a favor for hiring him to write songs for MGM musicals like The Pirate and it wasn't worth jeopardizing that relationship over a minor song in his catalog. An odd thing in De-Lovely is there are several musical performances by contemporary artists like Sheryl Crow, Elvis Costello and others who aren't part of the film's story. It makes the film a little disjointed. It looks like this was done to serve the soundtrack album which is available as a digital download. Kline continues to appear in films and he won a third Tony for the 2017 revival of the comedy Present Laughter. Here's Kevin Kline with Peter Polycarpou and chorus performing Be A Clown in the 2004 film De-Lovely.
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