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Dorothy Fields

Dorothy Fields

Dorothy Fields was born in 1905 into a lively theatrical environment. Her father Lew Fields was an enterprising Broadway producer and at the turn of the century had been one-half of the famous vaudeville team of Weber and Fields. Her brother and co-librettist was Herbert Fields. In those days few women embarked upon the rough and tumble world of Tin Pan Alley or Broadway song writing. Her first show with Arthur Schwartz was 1939's Stars In Your Eyes. In the early 1940s she wrote the librettos with her brother for several Cole Porter musicals, Let's Face It for Danny Kaye, Something For The Boys for Ethel Merman, and Mexican Hayride for, yes, "Baby June" herself, June Havoc. Dorothy Fields' formative Hollywood years in the 1930s had her penning lyrics to the tunes of Jerome Kern (the score for Swing Time) and a string of standards with Jimmy McHugh ("I'm In The Mood For Love," "On The Sunny Side Of The Street," "Don't Blame Me" and "I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby.") But as a Broadway contributor, commentators consider A Tree Grows In Brooklyn (1951) as an example of her best lyric writing. Redhead in 1959 scooped up a handful of Tony Awards for her and her brother as well as for Bob Fosse and the star of the show, Gwen Verdon (Verdon's fourth medallion). In 1966, with composer Cy Coleman--and again with the Fosse-Verdon team--she enjoyed great success with Sweet Charity and in 1973 provided lyrics for Coleman's score for Seesaw. Dorothy Fields died a year later.

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