| Pert Kelton |
|---|
Kelton in 1942. |
| Born | (1907-10-14)October 14, 1907
Great Falls, Montana, U.S. |
|---|
| Died | October 30, 1968(1968-10-30) (aged 61)
Ridgewood, New Jersey, U.S. |
|---|
| Years active | 1925-1968 |
|---|
| Spouse(s) | Ralph Bell (?–1968) 2 children |
|---|
| Children | Brian Bell
Stephen Bell |
|---|
Pert Kelton (October 14, 1907
[1] – October 30, 1968) was an American vaudeville, movie, radio and television actress.
[2] She was the first actress who played
Alice Kramden in
The Honeymooners with
Jackie Gleason and was a prominent
comedic supporting
film actress in the 1930s. She performed in a dozen Broadway productions between 1925 and 1968.
[3][4]
Films
Kelton was a young comedienne in A-list movies during the 1930s, often as the leading lady's wisecracking friend. She had a memorable turn in 1933 as dance hall singer "Trixie" in
The Bowery alongside
Wallace Beery,
George Raft,
Jackie Cooper and
Fay Wray. Directed by
Raoul Walsh, the film depicts
Steve Brodie, the first man to supposedly jump off the
Brooklyn Bridge and live to brag about it. Kelton sings to a rowdily appreciative crowd in an energetic dive, using a curious New York accent to good comedic effect, with Beery and Raft arguing over her attentions afterward.
As the witty young Minnie in
Gregory LaCava's pre-Code comedy
Bed of Roses (1933), she plays a bawdy prostitute (along with
Constance Bennett) fond of getting admiring men helplessly drunk before robbing them, at least until getting caught and tossed back into jail. Kelton has all the best lines, surprisingly wicked and amusing observations that would never be allowed in an American film after the Hollywood
Production Code was adopted. The movie remains realistic in terms of the interactions of the characters and features an early turn by
Joel McCrea as the
leading man, a small boat skipper who pulls Bennett from the river after she dives to escape capture. She played Mrs. Paroo in The Music Man.
Ironically, given her later
blacklisting, Kelton's last movie for years was called
Whispering Enemies (1939). Her next screen appearance was on television in
The Honeymooners and other sketches on the Gleason show. Kelton's abrupt departure due to the blacklist was explained away as a result of "heart problems".
Radio
During the 1940s, she was a familiar radio voice on such programs as
Easy Aces,
It's Always Albert,
The Stu Erwin Show and the 1941 soap opera
We Are Always Young. In 1949, she did the voices of five different characters on radio's
The Milton Berle Show. She was also a regular cast member of
The Henry Morgan Show. In the early 1950s, she played the tart maid in the
Monty Woolley vehicle,
The Magnificent Montague.
Television
Kelton was the original Alice Kramden in
The Honeymooners comedy sketches on the
DuMont Television Network's
Cavalcade of Stars. These sketches formed the eventual basis for the 1955 CBS sitcom
The Honeymooners.
Jackie Gleason starred as her husband Ralph Kramden, and
Art Carney as their upstairs neighbor Ed Norton.
Elaine Stritch played Trixie, the burlesque dancer wife of Norton, for one sketch before being replaced by
Joyce Randolph.
Kelton appeared in the original sketches, generally running about 10 to 20 minutes, shorter than the later one-season half-hour series and 1960s hour-long musical versions.
In the 1960s, Kelton was invited back to Gleason's CBS show to play Alice's mother in an episode of the hour-long musical version of
The Honeymooners (also known as
The Color Honeymooners), with
Sheila MacRae as a fetching young Alice. By this time, the original age discrepancies were reversed, with Ralph married to a much younger Alice than himself.
In 1963 Kelton appeared on
The Twilight Zone, playing the overbearing mother of
Robert Duvall in the episode "
Miniature."
In her last years, she was strongly identified with
Spic and Span because of her TV commercials for that product.
Broadway
Kelton made her Broadway debut at age 17 in
Jerome Kern's
Sunny. She played "Magnolia" and sang a song of the same name.
Years later, she was twice nominated for Tony Awards: in 1960, as Best Supporting or Featured Actress (Musical) for
Frank Loesser's
Greenwillow and as Best Supporting or Featured Actress (Dramatic) for
Spofford (1967–68). However, her most memorable Broadway appearance was as the impatient Mrs. Paroo (the mother of Marian Paroo) in
Meredith Willson's
The Music Man (1957), which she reprised in the
1962 film adaptation, the role for which she is probably best remembered.
Hotel
Pert Kelton was part owner of the Warner Kelton Hotel, built in the late 1920s, at 6326 Lexington Avenue, Los Angeles. The hotel catered to actors and musicians such as
Cary Grant,
Orry Kelly, and
Rodgers and Hart. It had a small outdoor theatre at its rear, along with a wishing well that may have inspired the song "There's a Small Hotel," from the musical "On Your Toes" (1936). It also housed a
speakeasy in the basement. A sign above the hotel entrance reads "Joyously Enter Here".
Death
On October 30, 1968, Kelton died of
heart disease at age 61.
See also
References
- ^ "The Story of Pert Kelton". Edward F. Kelton. 2002.
- ^ Obituary Variety, November 6, 1968, page 71.
- ^ Cullen, Frank; Florence Hackman; Donald McNeilly (206). Vaudeville, Old and New. New York: Routledge. pp. 629–630. ISBN 978-0-415-93853-2.
- ^ "Pert Kelton, Versatile Character Actress, Dead; Made Broadway Debut in '25 in the Musical 'Sunny' Played Gleason's TV Wife Also on Radio Show". New York Times. October 31, 1968.
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