After World War II, the career heights of composer Cole Porter seemed to be mostly behind him. However that all changed in 1948, when Porter scored one of his biggest smash successes, the award-winning musical Kiss Me Kate. This musical, with songs like “Too Darn Hot” and “So In Love,” kicked off a victory lap for the composer’s final years, which included musicals like Can-Can and films like High Society. On this episode, I’ll explore these late songs of Cole Porter, sung by Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Peggy Lee and more.
Rise And Fall in the 1930s and 40s
The 1930s, while most of America was struggling through the depression, were the heyday of songwriter Cole Porter. His wit and skill created a string of hits for both stage and screen during that decade, including The Gay Divorcee, Anything Goes, and Born To Dance , penning such enduring songs as “Night And Day,” “I Get A Kick Out Of You,” and “I’ve Got You Under My Skin.”
As the 1940s began, it seemed the successes would continue for Porter. But as the decade wore on, the once-king of Broadway and Hollywood seemed to be on the decline, his best work behind him. Shows like Seven Lively Arts and films like The Pirate were flops. An old injury that he sustained from falling off a horse in 1937 was still causing him constant pain. Time magazine said that Porter had become a “wallflower,” and that, quote “Another flop might finish him altogether.” Moreover the successful biopic about Porter’s life called Night And Day, starring Cary Grant as Cole Porter, seemed more like a retrospective about a once great composer.
However, all that changed in 1948 with one musical that put Cole Porter back on top, and sparked a late career Renaissance for the songwriter.
Kiss Me Kate
The idea for the new musical was presented to him by playwright Bella Spewack, and it was a combination of an adaptation of a Shakespeare play with a wacky backstage musical. It was all inspired by the real-life couple of actors Arthur Lunt and Lynn Fontaine, who had acrimonious fights offstage during a Broadway production of Shakespeare’s The Taming of The Shrew, but still managed to seem in love onstage. Porter was nervous about the high concept of the show, but Spewack insisted. After three months, they had a musical.
The result was the 1948 musical Kiss Me Kate, which despite having no big star attached, was a resounding success. Reviews at the time proclaimed that the old Cole Porter was back.
The musical was chockablock with now-famous standards, including “Too Darn Hot,” “Always True To You In My Fashion,” and “Why Can't You Behave?” But at the time, most critics agreed that the standout number was “So In Love,” the longing ballad from Act I. The song has been recorded by Peggy Lee, Frank Sinatra, and Ella Fitzgerald, with notable hit versions by Patti Page, Bing Crosby, and Dinah Shore shortly after Kiss Me Kate premiered.
The Tony Legacy
Kiss Me Kate will go down in Broadway history as a special first. In 1949, in a small reception at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, members of the American Theatre Wing were holding their third annual awards ceremony. This year, they decided to give out medallions for the first time, which they lovingly called “Tonys” after the American Theatre Wing’s founder Antoinette Perry.
It was also the first year that they introduced the category of Best Musical, and Kiss Me Kate was the recipient of that award, becoming the first in a line of Best Musical winners ranging from South Pacific and The Sound of Music to The Lion King and Hamilton. Porter also won the award for Best Score, further cementing his legacy.
About a decade later, singer Ella Fitzgerald and record producer Norman Granz set out on a project to celebrate the great theatre songs of the early 20th century, what we now call today “The Great American Songbook.” The first composer on their list to celebrate was Mr. Cole Porter. The 1956 album Ella Fitzgerald Sings The Cole Porter Songbook was the first album released on the newly minted Verve Record label, and Fitzgerald included four songs from Kiss Me Kate.
Out Of This World
Kiss Me Kate was just the inspiration Porter needed to jumpstart his career again. Over the next eight years, Porter, who at one point thought his career was over, became a hitmaker once again.
His follow up musical Out Of This World, based on an ancient Greek comedy, was campier than most other Porter musicals, and included songs like “Use Your Imagination” and “I Am Loved.” Unfortunately, though, it was not quite the hit he had hoped for. Part of the reason may be because its most enduring song, the song “From This Moment On,” was cut from the production. Porter believed in the song and added it to the film version of Kiss Me Kate a few years later. Sure enough, the song stuck, and has become a tried and true standard.
Can-Can
By the time the 1950s began, Porter found himself in a depressive funk again. He checked himself into a hospital, and despite his success with Kiss Me Kate, was unsure whether he would ever compose another hit. However, he began to work on a new musical around this time that reignited the flames of his youth.
It was called Can-Can, and it was set in turn-of-the-century Paris, a place where Cole Porter lived in the 1920s. Some of his earliest successful musicals, like Fifty Million Frenchmen from 1929 and Paris in 1928, were set in “Gay Paree,” so Can-Can was a homecoming of sorts.
While the critics were lukewarm about the show, audiences loved it and the show ran for nearly 900 performances, nearly as many as Kiss Me Kate. One particular audience favorite was Porter’s ode to the city he once called home, one of his more simple and nostalgic songs “I Love Paris,” later sung by Ella Fitzgerald and Dean Martin.
Other memorable hits from the show included “I Am In Love,” “C’est Magnifique,” and “It’s All Right With Me.” Lena Horne was one of the first singers to turn “It’s All Right With Me” into a hit in 1955. Evidently though, Porter was not a big fan of her version. He intended the song to be sung slowly, like the way Frank Sinatra sang it in the 1960 film version of Can-Can. Singer Peggy Lee sang both “I Am In Love” and “C’est Magnifique” in an Afro-Cuban style on her 1960 album Latin A La Lee.
Silk Stockings and Les Girls
Cole Porter’s follow-up to Can-Can would be his last Broadway musical. It was called Silk Stockings, based on an old Greta Garbo film called Ninotchka, and it was a farce set in the Soviet Union, the U.S.’s new Cold War foe. Porter worked on the musical with George S. Kaufman and Abe Burrows, two stage veterans who just completed their successful production of Guys and Dolls. Silk Stockings was a moderate success on Broadway, enough that it was turned into a Hollywood film two years later starring Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse.
Despite its moderate success, the musical did not churn out as many hit songs for Porter as Kiss Me Kate or Can-Can did. The one song that did survive was “All of You,” sung by Fred Astaire in the film.
Despite his late career Renaissance, the mid 1950s were a tough time for Cole Porter. His mother passed away in 1952, and his wife and best friend Linda passed away in 1954. Even though theirs was an unconventional relationship—Cole was a closeted homosexual—the death of Linda still took a toll on his personal life. Nevertheless, the songwriter had a few more tricks up his sleeve, his final artistic contributions occurring only on film and television, rather than on the stage.
One of those films was the 1957 MGM musical Les Girls starring Gene Kelly and Mitzi Gaynor. It’s an interesting film, told three times from the perspective of the three leading ladies, Rashomon style. But it only produced one memorable song— “Ça, C'est L'amour,” made famous by Tony Bennett that year—and that song was really only memorable because it evoked the popular French style of Porter’s earlier success, Can-Can.
High Society
Cole Porter’s last official musical contribution was the music and lyrics to the CBS television special Aladdin in 1958. The special aired only once, and had only mild success as an LP—none of its songs are particularly well-remembered today. After that, Porter ran into more health problems, forcing him into retirement before passing away in 1964. But right before Aladdin, Porter had one more resounding success: the 1956 MGM film musical High Society.
High Society was a musical adaptation of the successful play and film The Philadelphia Story, which became a career changer for star Katherin Hepburn. In High Society, Grace Kelly plays Hepburn’s role, with Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra standing in for Cary Grant and James Stewart, respectively. And instead of being a yacht designer, like Cary Grant was in The Philadelphia Story film, Bing Crosby plays a jazz musician—naturally.
High Society also co-starred Louis Armstrong, performing with his band on screen. With a cast that included many of jazz’s iconic stars, the music was clearly the biggest draw of this film. The show included a few memorable songs, including “True Love” and “You’re Sensational,” plus two songs which later became part of Louis Armstrong's on-stage repertoire, “High Society Calypso” and “Now You Has Jazz.” Porter wrote “Now You Has Jazz” for Armstrong and Crosby to perform in the film. However, despite years of writing tunes adopted by the jazz world, the wordsmith Porter apparently struggled with executing the proper jazz lingo for the song.