Some context: George Michael Cohan (July 3, 1878 - November 5, 1942), known professionally as George M. Cohan, was an American entertainer, playwright, composer, lyricist, actor, singer, dancer and producer. Cohan began his career as a child, performing with his parents and sister in a vaudeville act known as "The Four Cohans." Beginning with Little Johnny Jones in 1904, he wrote, composed, produced, and appeared in more than three dozen Broadway musicals. Cohan published more than 300 songs during his lifetime, including the standards "Over There", "Give My Regards to Broadway", "The Yankee Doodle Boy" and "You're a Grand Old Flag".
Cohan began writing original skits (over 150 of them) and songs for the family act in both vaudeville and minstrel shows while in his teens. Soon he was writing professionally, selling his first songs to a national publisher in 1893. In 1901 he wrote, directed and produced his first Broadway musical, The Governor's Son, for The Four Cohans. His first big Broadway hit in 1904 was the show Little Johnny Jones, which introduced his tunes "Give My Regards to Broadway" and "The Yankee Doodle Boy." Cohan became one of the leading Tin Pan Alley songwriters, publishing upwards of 300 original songs noted for their catchy melodies and clever lyrics. His major hit songs included "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway," "Mary Is a Grand Old Name," "The Warmest Baby in the Bunch," "Life's a Funny Proposition After All," "I Want To Hear a Yankee Doodle Tune," "You Won't Do Any Business If You Haven't Got a Band," "The Small Town Gal," "I'm Mighty Glad I'm Living, That's All," "That Haunting Melody," "Always Leave Them Laughing When You Say Goodbye", and America's most popular World War I song "Over There", which was recorded by Enrico Caruso among others. The latter song reached such currency among troops and shipyard workers that a ship was named "Costigan" after Cohan's grandfather, Dennis Costigan. During the christening, "Over There" was played. From 1904 to 1920, Cohan created and produced over 50 musicals, plays and revues on Broadway together with his friend Sam H. Harris, including Give My Regards to Broadway and the successful Going Up in 1917, which became a smash hit in London the following year. His shows ran simultaneously in as many as five theatres. One of Cohan's most innovative plays was a dramatization of the mystery Seven Keys to Baldpate in 1913, which baffled some audiences and critics but became a hit. Cohan further adapted it as a film in 1917, and it was adapted for film six more times, as well as for TV and radio. He dropped out of acting for some years after his 1919 dispute with Actors' Equity Association. In 1925, he published his autobiography, Twenty Years on Broadway and the Years It Took To Get There.
What was it called
A: The Governor's Son,
Some context: Nilsson was born in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn in 1941. His paternal grandparents were Swedish circus performers and dancers, especially known for their "aerial ballet" (which is the title of one of Nilsson's albums). His maternal grandparents were the cornerstone of his young life. While his grandmother played piano, his grandfather Charlie supported the family in a tiny railroad apartment on Jefferson St in Brooklyn.
Nilsson is the subject of a 2006 documentary, Who Is Harry Nilsson (And Why Is Everybody Talkin' About Him)? produced by David Leaf and John Schienfeld. The film was screened in 2006 at the Seattle International Film Festival and the Santa Barbara International Film Festival. In August 2006, the film received its Los Angeles premiere when it was screened at the 7th Annual Mods & Rockers Film Festival followed by a panel discussion about Nilsson featuring the filmmakers and two friends of Nilsson, producer Richard Perry and attorney/executive producer Lee Blackman. The filmmakers re-edited the film with rare found footage of Nilsson, further interviews, and family photographs, and finally released it on September 17, 2010 at selected theaters in the United States. A DVD, including additional footage not in the theatrical release, was released on October 26, 2010. Nilsson's final album, tentatively titled Papa's Got a Brown New Robe (produced by Mark Hudson) was not released, though several demos from the album were available on promotional CDs and online. The musical Everyday Rapture features three songs by Nilsson and, similarly, the film A Good Year features "Gotta get up", "Jump into the fire" and "How can I be sure of you". On July 29, 2013, Sony Music released a definitive box-set of his RCA era albums called The RCA Albums Collection. Each of the albums in the 17-CD set had additional bonus tracks, along with 3 of the 17 discs that contained rarities and outtakes spanning his entire career. Additionally, several weeks later on August 13, Flash Harry was finally issued on CD also featuring additional material. Completing the two CD releases, the first book written about Nilsson was published covering his life story.
was he married?
A:
Some context: Hedy Lamarr (; born Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler, November 9, 1914 - January 19, 2000) was an Austrian-born American film actress and inventor. At the beginning of World War II, Lamarr and composer George Antheil developed a radio guidance system for Allied torpedoes, which used spread spectrum and frequency hopping technology to defeat the threat of jamming by the Axis powers. Although the US Navy did not adopt the technology until the 1960s, the principles of their work are arguably incorporated into Bluetooth technology, and are similar to methods used in legacy versions of CDMA and Wi-Fi.
On August 10, 1933, Lamarr married Mandl, an Austrian military arms merchant and munitions manufacturer who was reputedly the third-richest man in Austria. She was 18 years old and he was 33. In her autobiography Ecstasy and Me, she described Mandl as an extremely controlling husband who strongly objected to her simulated orgasm scene in Ecstasy and prevented her from pursuing her acting career. She claimed she was kept a virtual prisoner in their castle home, Schloss Schwarzenau. Mandl had close social and business ties to the fascist government of Italy, selling munitions to Mussolini, and although like Hedy, his own father was Jewish, had ties to the Nazi government of Germany, as well. Lamarr wrote that Mussolini and Hitler attended lavish parties at the Mandl home. Lamarr accompanied Mandl to business meetings, where he conferred with scientists and other professionals involved in military technology. These conferences were her introduction to the field of applied science and nurtured her latent talent in science. Lamarr's marriage to Mandl eventually became unbearable, and she decided to separate herself from both him and her country. In her autobiography, she wrote that she disguised herself as her maid and fled to Paris, but by other accounts, she persuaded Mandl to let her wear all of her jewelry for a dinner party, then disappeared afterward. She writes about her marriage: I knew very soon that I could never be an actress while I was his wife.... He was the absolute monarch in his marriage.... I was like a doll. I was like a thing, some object of art which had to be guarded--and imprisoned--having no mind, no life of its own.
how was her first marriage?
A:
she described Mandl as an extremely controlling husband who strongly objected to her simulated orgasm scene in Ecstasy