“If you recognize any of yours”: An oft-repeated anecdote, in Faith, Life in Comedy, 116; and elsewhere.
“I had a great staff”: Hope interview, Film Comment, May–June 1979.
“The Road pictures had the excitement”: Hope and Thomas, Road to Hollywood, 35.
“How fast was I going, Officer?”: Giddins, Bing Crosby, 580.
“That scene was like a piece of music”: Hope and Thomas, Road to Hollywood, 36.
By April, Paramount was already planning: Variety, April 10, 1940.
“Bing loved to hunt and fish”: Giddins, Bing Crosby, 561.
“Bing was a cold tomato”: Sherwood Schwartz, interview with author.
“What the hell are you doing that for”: Liberman, unpublished memoir.
“Bob wanted everything that Bing had”: Hal Kanter, interview with author.
“It was the only time I saw Bob”: Ibid.
On his first stop in Joliet . . . there were lines around the block: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 61–62.
With a guarantee of $12,500: Variety, May 15, 1940.
“Bob Hope is blazing Hot”: Variety, May 22, 1940.
“It was my first experience”: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 61–62.
“He had his job, and she had her job”: Tom Malatesta, interview with author.
“She longed for romance from this man”: Lahr, “C.E.O. of Comedy.”
When he saw that the boy had a ski nose: Hope, Have Tux, 289.
“I haven’t made a comedy”; “That’s all fine”: Ibid., 156–59.
“Its lightness and levity throughout”: Variety, June 12, 1940.
especially well with “the under-21 mob”: Variety, June 26, 1940.!
put the squeeze on Pepsodent: Variety, June 19, 1940.
“Everyone would write down”: Thompson, Portrait of a Superstar, 50.
“Who do you think you are—Harpo?”: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 64.
“I want to thank both political candidates”: Ibid., 65.
“The Democrats really put on”: Ibid., 67–68.
“We are getting many protests”: NBC memo, November 19, 1940, “Bob Hope and American Variety,” Library of Congress exhibit.
President Roosevelt . . . launched a massive war mobilization effort: Background on the home front in the years leading up to and during World War II is drawn largely from Doris Kearns Goodwin, No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II (Simon & Schuster, 1994).
“did Selznick bring them back?”: Accounts of the ceremony in Wiley and Bona, Inside Oscar, and Daily Variety, February 28, 1941.
he entertained at a reported 562 benefits: “Hope for Humanity,” Time, September 20, 1943.
Lamour . . . tried to keep up: Lamour, My Side of the Road, 98–99.
seventy-two of them had to be removed: Paramount publicity material, AMPAS archives.
“some of the most uninhibited”: “The Groaner,” Time, April 7, 1941.
plans for a third in the series: “Road to Moscow New Crosby–Bob Hope Trek,” Los Angeles Times, March 24, 1941.
“I thought David was going to knife me”: Hope, Have Tux, 148.
“Why should we drag the whole show”: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 73.
“I got goose pimples myself”: Ibid., 74–75.
“It was our job to talk to the men”: Schwartz, interview with author.
Even the term GI: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 76.
Pepsodent printed 4 million copies: Daily Variety, September 29, 1941.
“I was such a beautiful baby . . . I remember my first appearance . . . Fan mail is like bread and butter”: Bob Hope, They Got Me Covered (Bob Hope, 1941), 10, 32, 66.
“You can say it’s about a quarter of a million”: Time, July 7, 1941.
“It’s not very often that I get mad”: Bing Crosby, letter to the editor, Time, August 4, 1941.
Paramount’s No. 1 star and ranked fourth: Variety, December 31, 1941.
“Other top-line funnymen”: Wilkinson, “Hope Springs Eternal.”
“We were all too shocked”: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 80.
CHAPTER 6: WAR
Hollywood was a changed place after Pearl Harbor: Otto Friedrich, City of Nets: A Portrait of Hollywood in the 1940s (Harper & Row, 1986), 101–3.!
“to ensure completion of films”: Variety, December 17, 1941.
“Sacrifices will have to be made”: Daily Variety, December 8, 1941.
car chases were banned . . . as was the filming of battle scenes: Louella Parsons, syndicated column, January 17, 1942.
Hedy Lamarr and Lana Turner sold bonds: Friedrich, City of Nets, 105–9.
Jack Benny . . . found the raucous crowds too disruptive: “Radio, Vaudeville & Camps,” Time, April 13, 1942.
“I find these audiences . . . like a tonic”: “Bob Hope Typical Soldier Entertainer,” Los Angeles Times, June 15, 1942.
“We are all soldiers now”: Daily Variety, January 20, 1942.
In Houston, the crowds packed the fairways: Unidentified Houston newspaper article, February 13, 1942, Hope archives.
“If anything it was Bob Hope’s Victory Caravan”: Daily Variety, May 1, 1942.
Hope came home physically exhausted: Daily Variety, June 23, 1942.
The war didn’t deter a record crowd: Wiley and Bona, Inside Oscar, 118–20.
Carroll . . . telephoned to thank Hope: Hope and Thomas, Road to Hollywood, 44.
some British military officers, who complained: Variety, April 15, 1942.
“Not only the funniest Bob Hope picture”: Richard Griffith, “My Favorite Blonde Shows Bob Hope at Comedy Peak,” Los Angeles Times, April 13, 1942.
It broke records . . . and outdrew Hope’s previous hits”: Variety, May 6, 1942.
one of Hope’s former movie stand-ins . . . suggested: Faith, Life in Comedy, 140.
The trip was almost scrubbed: Hope gives detailed accounts of the Alaska trip in I Never Left Home, 194–202; and Don’t Shoot, 90–93.
“It was a pretty scary night”: Bob Gates, interview with author.
“I wouldn’t trade this trip . . . Hollywood won’t see so much of Hope”: Variety, October 14, 1942.
“He was rejected every time”: Dorothy Kilgallen, undated newspaper column, Hope archives.
“The greatest good you can do”: Ed Sullivan, undated article in Photoplay, 1943.
No. 1 program in radio’s Hooper ratings: Variety, October 21, 1942.
The camel improvised the spit: Hope and Thomas, Road to Hollywood, 47–48.
“There were never less than three telephones”: Faith, Life in Comedy, 146.
Hope got a call from a Paramount wardrobe boy: Ibid., 146–47.
The evening began with privates Alan Ladd and Tyrone Power: Wiley and Bona, Inside Oscar, 128–29.
Hope even squeezed in some last-minute reshoots: Daily Variety, June 15, 1943.
“Take care of yourself”; “You know I will”: Faith, Life in Comedy, 147.!
“I couldn’t let this exciting world”: “How Mrs. Bob Hope Is Pitching on the Home Front,” Screenland, August 1943.
“there is no soap in the King’s bathroom”: Hope, I Never Left Home, 33.
“I was sorry I wasn’t able to tell him”: Ibid., 39–40.
“He finished out of the money”: Time correspondent files, August 1943, Time archives.
“We soon discovered you had to be pretty lousy”: Hope, I Never Left Home, 46.
In one ward Langford began to sing: Time correspondent files, August 1943.
The prime minister did a double take: Hope, I Never Left Home, 87.
“The most wonderful thing about England”: Faith, Life in Comedy, 149.
“When the time for recognition of service”: John Steinbeck, New York Herald Tribune, July 26, 1943.
an officer lent him: Hope, I Never Left Home, 99–100.
“Frances and I were standing”: Ibid.,
130.
“I was bouncing like a rubber ball”: Sidney Carroll, “Where There’s Life,” Esquire, January 1944.
“He is what the psychologists call”: Ibid.
“It not only gives you a feeling of security”: Hope, I Never Left Home, 157.
“A very wonderful guy”: Time correspondent files, August 1943.
“I want you to tell the people”: Stanley Hirshson, General Patton: A Soldier’s Life (Harper, 2003), 399–400.
“Bob came on the grandstand”: Letter quoted in Hope, I Never Left Home, 205–7.
“After you’ve listened to a raid . . . the most frightening experience”: Ibid., 162.
“I was in two different cities with them”: Ernie Pyle, New York World-Telegram, September 16, 1943.
“Don’t you know there’s a war on?”: Hope, I Never Left Home, 170.
“He flattered us”; “We’re too strong for ’em”: Ibid., 178–79.
“When we were lost over Alaska”: Ibid., 182.
“From the ranks of show business have sprung heroes”: “Hope for Humanity,” Time, September 20, 1943.
The two worked together through the fall: Faith, Life in Comedy, 156–57.
“I saw your sons and your husbands”: Hope, I Never Left Home, vii.
“A zany, staccato but often touching account”: Tom O’Reilly, New York Times Book Review, June 18, 1944.
“I think I was suffering”: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 125.
drew an astonishing 40.9: NBC advertisement, Daily Variety, March 6, 1945.
“Have plane coming north tonight”: Hope, Have Tux, 248.
“In those days they were enormous”: Faith, Life in Comedy, 158–59.
“Some days I became almost as nonchalant”: Hope and Thomas, Road to Hollywood, 57.!
“The next day it was all patched up”: Lamour, My Side of the Road, 140.
“We had Barney along”: Bob Hope, “Now They Call Me Trader Corn,” syndicated newspaper column, November 12, 1944.
“Probably the biggest boost to our morale”: Eugene B. Sledge, With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa (Presidio Press, 1990), 34–35.
“When did you get here?”: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 144.
“You had to be careful”: Patty Thomas, interview with author.
“Bob would tell people”: Ibid.
“Hey, Dad, I think we’re in trouble”: Ibid.
Barney Dean, who was petrified . . . some American cigarettes . . . local dance hall in gratitude: Hope with Shavelson, Don’t Shoot, 144–45.
“He’s so used to seeing Bob going away”: “Bob Hope and Troupe Return from Pacific,” Los Angeles Times, September 3, 1944.
“I don’t see how we can let you do that”: Faith, Life in Comedy, 162.
“Just now I’ve been to Toronto”: “Bob Hope ‘Suspends’ Studio—That’s His Version, Anyway,” Hollywood Citizen-News, November 9, 1944.
“I’m not underrating the importance”: “Hope Suspends Studio, Studio Suspends Hope!,” Los Angeles Times, November 12, 1944.
“Some of the servicemen are boys”: “An Open Letter to a Radio Star,” Catholic Pilot, November 17, 1944.
“I think if we came out with some publicity”: NBC memo, “Bob Hope and American Variety,” Library of Congress exhibit.
“I think it is only fair to me”: Unidentified wire story, Hope archives.
“most consistently violates”: “Unchristian Hope?,” Time, December 11, 1944.
“Risqué stories—phooey”: Undated letter to Hope, Hope archives.
“as unfair a charge”: Ivan Spear, Boxoffice, December 30, 1944.
had to take off five days for an eye operation: Daily Variety, May 9, 1944. Neither Hope nor any of his biographers mention the episode.
“showed that you have been under a terrific strain”: Letter from Dr. Hugh Strathearn, January 12, 1945, Hope archives.
Hope’s contract gave him 50 percent: Letter of agreement to Hope from King Features Syndicate, April 21, 1944, Hope archives.
Hope returned to host the Academy Awards: Quotes and anecdotes from the ceremony from Daily Variety, March 16, 1945; and Wiley and Bona, Inside Oscar, 146–47.
Hope signed a new seven-year contract: Daily Variety, May 7, 1945.
“When a star of Hope’s stature”: Quoted in Faith, Life in Comedy, 169.
he spotted Maurice Chevalier in the audience: Hope tells the Chevalier anecdote and offers a defense of Chevalier’s wartime activities in Don’t Shoot, 155–56.!
“Everything was different”: Hope, “It’s Great to Be Home,” unidentified magazine article, December 9, 1945, Hope archives.
“Those boys in the stadium rose twenty-five feet”: Hope, It Says Here column, August 15, 1945.
Hope’s official itinerary had him continuing: Bob Hope Itinerary, 1941–1951, Hope archives. It lists stops for Hope in Germany, France, and Austria through at least August 31. Yet Daily Variety reported on August 22, “Bob Hope arrived in New York yesterday after completing his USO tour of Europe and expects to leave for the coast immediately.” According to Daily Variety, he arrived back in Los Angeles on August 30, the day his official itinerary has him appearing at Stadt Stadium in Munich.
“It was a pleasure to hear from you”: Letter to Hope, December 8, 1944, Hope archives.
CHAPTER 7: PEACE
“Why isn’t Hope doing”: Faith, Life in Comedy, 172.
still dominated by the same prewar stars: George Rosen, “This Is Where They Came In,” Variety, December 19, 1945.
Hope said it would never get past: Hope and Thomas, Road to Hollywood, 59.
the largest contract for radio talent: Daily Variety reported the figures, January 17, 1945. Luckman, in Twice in a Lifetime (177), says the amount “to the best of our knowledge” was the largest ever to that point.
projected to reach $1.25 million: “Hope Springs Financial,” Newsweek, May 6, 1946.
Hope would typically arrive in town: Time correspondent files, July 1946.
“I can’t even remember what city”: St. Louis Globe-Democrat, June 25, 1946.
grossing $500,000 in ticket sales: Variety, July 10, 1946.
He split his show-business endeavors: “Hope, Inc.,” Time, November 18, 1946.
“Wherever he goes, the whole board of directors”: Douglas Welch, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, quoted in Faith, Life in Comedy, 179.
“We made him remove the wig”: Time correspondent files, November 1946.
he would always take a drive and walk the property: Payson Wolfe, Hope attorney, tape-recorded interview with Richard Behar, 1983.
“If they would give me one spot”; “Mr. Hearst is very pleased”: Letters between Hope and Ward Greene, 1946, Hope archives.
“I used to climb over the fence”: “Hope Sets New High in Gate Crashing,” Los Angeles Times, June 23, 1946.
“We didn’t really do the Hollywood”: Linda Hope, interview with author.!
“She wasn’t easy”: Ibid.
“Dolores had a voice”: Rory Burke, interview with author.
“She was a mother of the period”: Robert Colonna, interview with author.
“My mother would say . . . sit up straight”: Linda Hope, interview with author.
“Mother was a pistol”: Tom Malatesta, interview with author.
“I’ve worn out four agents”: Jim Hope letter, May 15, 1946, Hope archives.
Marie . . . claimed she had been underpaid: Daily Variety, June 15, 1942.
Bob turned down the paper’s request . . . “It was a silly thing”: Faith, Life in Comedy, 180–81.
Producer Paul Jones didn’t like . . . the studio brought in Frank Tashlin: Hope and Thomas, Road to Hollywood, 60–61.
“He was a wonderful comic actor”: Woody Allen, interview with author.
he never worked for a major director: Tashlin probably came the closest, and Raoul Walsh (years before his great films) directed College Swing. But no Howard Hawks or Leo McCarey or Billy
Wilder. Even Jack Benny did a film for Lubitsch.
“Monsieur Beaucaire, as now enacted”: Bosley Crowther, New York Times, September 5, 1946.
“That rumbling yesterday”: John L. Scott, Los Angeles Times, August 23, 1946.
“He used to say that he carried two watches”: Lamour, My Side of the Road, 152.
$72,000 under budget: Paramount production records, AMPAS library.
“The best picture Monsieur Robin”: Louella Parsons, undated newspaper column, Hope archives.
returning to Broadway: Daily Variety, March 11, 1947.
making a trip to Europe and North Africa: Daily Variety, January 6, 1947.
stayed at the palatial estate: Faith, Life in Comedy, 187.
Hope got so sunburned: Daily Variety, July 24, 1947, Time correspondent files, July 1947.
Jimmie Fidler . . . gave Hope an early warning: Letter from Fidler, November 29, 1946, Hope archives.
Hope was branded the most tasteless comedian: “The RAP,” Time, November 17, 1947.
an innuendo-laden free-for-all: Arthur Marx quotes extensively from it in Secret Life of Bob Hope, 224–27.
The network bleeped out Hope’s line: Daily Variety, April 23, 1947.
Hope told Sinatra . . . The line got bleeped: Variety, May 14, 1947.
“You could enjoy it”: Jack Gould, New York Times, September 29, 1946.
“ ‘sad saga of sameness’ ”: Variety, September 24, 1947.
“I can tell the seasons”: “Irium-Plated Alger,” Time, April 10, 1944.!
The travel issue came to a head: Daily Variety, November 6, 1947.
had to miss the first week’s broadcast: Daily Variety, November 11, 1947.
Fred Williams . . . keeled over drunk: Hope, Have Tux, 217.
Queen Elizabeth reportedly “laughed so hard”: Daily Variety, November 28, 1947.
“Look at him”: Hope recounts the dialogue in Have Tux, 224.
“The most important thing for us in America”: Faith, Life in Comedy, 192.
“The only sad thing about coming to Claremore”: Ibid., 188.
Paramount had initially vowed: Hedda Hopper, Los Angeles Times, October 5, 1946.
“Bing and I hardly left the set”: Hope and Thomas, Road to Hollywood, 63.
“They could have considered a four-way split”: Lamour, My Side of the Road, 160.
“Crosby’s attitude toward Dorothy Lamour”: Liberman, unpublished memoir.
Hope: Entertainer of the Century Page 57
