Songs About Actors

Guys, I'm still ill: my back absolutely hurts from these coughing fits, and I don't even have anyone for a decent back-rub, since my man's still in Paris. Sucks to be ill and alone, doesn't it?

So, I didn't have the stamina to present a proper post, but I did have the inspiration to present a playful post. You know that our main interests are music and films, so, I thought, why not put them together? Here are some of the most popular songs that refer to actors (on the title or inside the song).

Let's begin we the obvious ones, shall we? Kim Carnes' Bette Davis Eyes was one of the biggest hits of the 80s; it spent 9 weeks at the top of the charts in the US, and it also peaked at the top in France, Germany, Italy, Spain, South Africa, Norway, Switzerland, and Australia. It peaked at #2 in Canada and Austria, at #4 in Sweden, at # 5 in Ireland, and Belgium, and at #10 in the UK. The quirky lyrics, Kim Carnes special voice, and that slap-like percussion, all worked towards the song's success.

The other juggernaut doesn't include the star's name in the title, but rather in the lyrics. It's Candle In The Wind, one of Elton John's and Bernie Taupin's best songs. It's about Marilyn Monroe.

The song has a unique chart history; the original 1973 version was released as a single in the UK and peaked at #11. In the US it was the B-side to the #1 hit Bennie And The Jets. In 1986, a live version of the song was recorded in Sydney, Australia, and was released in 1987 on the album Live in Australia with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and as a single. In 1988, it reached #5 in the UK and #6 on the US Hot 100.

Then in 1997, after Princess Diana's tragic death, Elton, a personal friend, re-recorded the song with different lyrics, as a tribute to her, with the profits going to charity. The single peaked at #1 all over the world, and in 2007 the Guinness World Records stated that Candle in the Wind 1997 is the biggest-selling single "since records began", but that Bing Crosby's White Christmas has sold the most copies. The record of this version was produced by George Martin.

The best version is the first though, and this is the one we'll be listening to:

As an extra here's the live version from 1986:

Humphrey Bogart is very popular among song-writers: there are three songs about him that I want to present to you: one of my favorite songs of the 70s, Al Stewart Year Of The Cat, begins with:

On a morning from a Bogart movie

In a country where they turn back time

You go strolling through the crowd like Peter Lorre

Contemplating a crime

The song was a Top 10 hit in 1977 in the US, Canada, the Netherlands, Italy, and Belgium.

In 1982, Bertie Higgins had a US Top 10 hit with Key Largo. The song's lyrics plead with a lover to reconsider ending a romance the singer compares to that depicted by the stars of the 1948 film Key Largo, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. The glamorous couple is recalled in the lyric We had it all / Just like Bogie and Bacall / Starring in our own late late show / Sailin' away to Key Largo.

2HB is a song written by Bryan Ferry and first recorded by Roxy Music for their 1972 debut album, Roxy Music. The title is a dedication to the film star Humphrey Bogart (2HB = To Humphrey Bogart). In particular, the song references the Bogart classic Casablanca.

Elton John has written a song about yet another movie star: Roy Rogers, dedicated to the famous singing cowboy, is yet another outstanding track from Elton's masterpiece, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. Not surprisingly, there is another movie-related song in this album, I've Seen That Movie Too.

Clint Eastwood gained prominence as the silent cowboy "The Man With No Name" in Sergio Leone's amazing trilogy in the 60s. He starred in more successful Westerns, then cemented his reputation with the "Dirty Harry" movies, before giving us a number of great movies as a director. The Hollywood icon was given a tribute by the Gorillaz, a British virtual band created in 1998 by Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett. Clint Eastwood was their first single, released in 2001, a Top 10 hit all over Europe.

20 years earlier, another cowboy star was celebrated in a UK Top 10 hit. John Wayne Is Big Leggy (1982) was Haysi Fantayzee's debut single and most successful hit. The song was a combination of political satire and sexual humour wrapped in nursery rhyme style lyrics. The protagonist, John Wayne, is having sexual intercourse with a Native American female. When Wayne's bandolier restricts their intimacy, she suggests he removes it. He refuses and suggests he sodomises her instead:

So she says to him - Take off that thing, It's getting right between us.

Now listen honey I can't do that, not even for you my sweetness.

Now Big John, if that's a fact, then how'd you propose we do our act?

If that's the way it's gonna be, get the hell out of my tepee.

Now speckled hen just stop your squawkin', Big Bad Rooster's doin' the talking.

I know a trick we ought to try, turn right over - you'll know why.

Jeremy Healy of Haysi Fantayzee said:

"It was an allegory for treatment of which the white settlers used, but on the Native American Indians. However, I wrote it like John Wayne having anal sex with a squaw. I thought this was hilarious!"

Another controversial song was Bowie's Cracked Actor (1973). One of the Aladin Sane's hard rockers, the song is about an aging Hollywood star in an encounter with a (male) prostitute, the chorus including various allusions to sex and drugs. The rumour mill indicated that the song was about Rock Hudson, but we'll never really know, will we?

A romantic lead in the 40s and 50s, Gregory Peck got a fitting tribute with Brownsville Girl, a song written by Bob Dylan and playwright-actor Sam Shepard. Brownsville Girl is an 11 minute epic that appears on the Knocked Out Loaded album (1986). This is an alternate version, because, you know, Dylan and youtube are like oil and water...

The 80s gave us a number of songs about actors: Great Ska band the Madness gave us this song in 1984, a #11 UK hit. It was called Michael Caine:

Also in 1984, girl group Bananarama had a Top 3 UK hit with the fabulous Robert De Niro's Waiting:

One of the earliest such hits came from a pre-Wizard Of Oz Judy Garland, 14 at the time. It was called Dear Mr. Gable (1938):

Doris Day is name-checked in Wham's universal #1, Wake Me Up Before you Go-Go:

Ms. Day is also name-checked in the Beatles' Dig It (the best that I could find is this alternate version):

One of the stars in the 60s, Lee Remick, got her own tribute by an important Australian band called The Go-Betweens. It was their debut single, in 1978.

Grace Kelly was treated to a #1 UK hit by MIKA, in 2007:

Duck Sauce was a duo consisting of American DJ Armand Van Helden and Canadian DJ A-Trak. Their most popular track was Barbra Streisand, a Top 3 hit in most of Europe in 2010:

The international sex symbol in the 60s was French actress Brigitte Bardot. Brazilian Jorge Veiga wrote this samba in 1960 to honor her. It became an international hit:

As a bonus, here's a version by Italy's greatest Pop Icon: Mina (in 1984):

In 1994 Malcolm McLaren created the album Paris: a view of this immortal city through some of its most enduring icons. He dedicates Paris, Paris to one of the most glamorous such icons, Catherine Deneuve, who also joins in.

A Greek Icon, Melina Mercouri, actually sings about herself in Melina Melinaki (1972):

Another Greek Icon, Aliki Vougiouklaki, sings Aliki's Song, a song written especially for her:

Marlon Brando was the biggest male film actor of the 20th century. He was also a sex symbol. There's no way there wouldn't be a couple of songs in which he is mentioned. David Bowie mentioned Brando in his huge 1983 hit China Girl:

Neil Young mentioned Brando in one of his best songs, 1979's Pocahontas. Here he is, unplugged in 1993:

We can't mention Brando without mentioning the two other Hollywood rebels from the 50s. Mongomery Clift's tribute is R.E.M.'s Monty Got a Raw Deal from 1992:

... While James Dean got his own in Rock On, a 1973 Top 5 hit by David Essex:

We have already mentioned tributes to Barbra Streisand and Doris Day, who were/are famous both as singers and as actors. We will close with two more who fit this description: Frankie, a #1 UK hit by Sister Sledge in 1985 was about, who else, Frank Sinatra.

Elvis Presley may not immediately come to mind when we talk about movie stars. He did, however, star in more than 30 movies between 1956 and 1969, and most were commercial hits. Not surprisingly, there are a number of songs to chose from. We won't play the two direct tributes that were recorded after his death, I Remember Elvis Presley (The King Is Dead), a hit in the UK, or The King is Gone, a hit in the US, because, frankly, they're both forgettable. Walking in Memphis (1991) by Marc Cohn, however, is a classic:

Here's A Century of Elvis (1997) by the very good Scottish Indie band, Belle and Sebastian:

Here's Blue Moon Revisited (A Song For Elvis) by the Cowboy Junkies (1988):

... And here's Calling Elvis by the Dire Straits (1991):

Finally, most of the above - and more, are mentioned in this #1 hit, an express history lesson of the second half of the 20th century. Here's Billy Joel's We Didn't Start the Fire: