- Born
- Died
- Birth nameOscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein
- Nickname
- Ockie
- Height1.91 m
- Oscar Hammerstein II was an American lyricist, librettist, theatrical producer, and musical theatre director from New York City. He won a total of 8 Tony Awards for his best known works, "South Pacific" (1949), "The King and I" (1951), and "The Sound of Music" (1959). He twice won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, for his songs "The Last Time I Saw Paris" (1940) and "It Might as Well Be Spring" (1945). Several of his songs became part of the standard repertoire for both singers and jazz musicians. During the 1940s and the 1950s, Hammerstein produced some of his best musicals in collaboration with the composer Richard Rodgers (1902-1979). They are credited with creating character-driven stories with dramatic moments, while American musicals were previously considered light-hearted entertainment.
In 1895, Hammerstein was born in New York City. His parents were the theatrical manager William Hammerstein (1875-1914) and his first wife Alice Nimmo (died in 1910). His father operated the Victoria Theatre in Times Square, considered for a while as the most successful theatre in New York City. Hammerstein's paternal ancestors were German Jews, while his maternal ancestors were British. Hammerstein's paternal grandfather was Oscar Hammerstein I (1846-1919), a theatrical impresario and composer who is credited with popularizing the opera genre in the United States.
In 1912, Hammerstein enrolled at Columbia University. He later studied at Columbia Law School. Following his father's death in 1914, Hammerstein participated in his first play: "On Your Way". It was performed in the Varsity Show (1894-), Columbia's regular arts presentation. During his university years, Hammerstein both wrote and performed for the Varsity Show.
In 1917, Hammerstein dropped out of law school to pursue a theatrical career. He found a mentor in the lyricist and librettist Otto Harbach (1873-1963). Harbach taught him that in musicals, the music, lyrics, and story should be closely connected. Hammerstein took this lesson to heart. Hammerstein wrote the book and the lyrics for the Broadway musical "Always You" (1920), the first musical of his career. In 1921, Hammerstein joined "The Lambs" (1874-), a New York City-based social club for theater professionals. It was named in honor of the English authors and salonists Charles Lamb (1775-1834) and Mary Lamb (1764-1847).
In 1927, Hammerstein had his first great success with the musical "Show Boat". It was an adaptation of a then-popular novel by Edna Ferber (1885-1968), and depicted life on a a Mississippi River show boat over a 40-years-period. It was considered revolutionary in musical storytelling in dealing with tragedy and serious issues, in a field previously dominated by light comedies and satirical operettas. The musical introduced the popular songs "Ol' Man River", "Make Believe", and "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man". Hammerstein had partnered with the composer Jerome Kern (1885-1945) for this musical. The duo continued to work together for decades.
In the early 1940s, Hammerstein was asked by Richard Rodgers to work with him in a musical adaptation of the play "Green Grow the Lilacs" (1930) by Lynn Riggs (1899-1954). Rodgers had previously attempted to work on the adaptation with Lorenz Hart (1895-1943), but they had a falling out over Hart's declining mental state and his self-admitted lack of inspiration. The adaptation turned into the hit musical "Oklahoma!" (1943), about a love triangle in Indian Territory. It ran for an unprecedented 2,212 performances, and has often been revived. The musical's success convinced Hammerstein and Rodgers that they should collaborate further in subsequent works.
Hammerstein and Rodgers became the dominant creative force of the American musical theatre from 1943 to 1959. Their subsequent collaborations were the musicals "Carousel" (1945), "Allegro" (1947), "South Pacific" (1949), "The King and I" (1951), "Me and Juliet" (1953), "Pipe Dream" (1955), "Flower Drum Song" (1958), and "The Sound of Music" (1959). Most of them were well-received, and they never had a single flop in all these years. The duo also worked together for the music of the film "State Fair" (1945), and for the music-themed television special "Cinderella" (1957). Their works often provided social criticism, and dealt with issues such as discrimination (in various forms) and domestic abuse.
In 1943, Hammerstein wrote the book and lyrics for the musical "Carmen Jones". It was an adaptation of the opera "Carmen" by Georges Bizet, but featured African-American characters and had an all-black cast. It was considered groundbreaking for its era. The musical eventually received its own film adaptation, serving as a vehicle for Dorothy Dandridge (1922-1965).
Hammerstein was an advocate for writers' rights within the theater industry. In 1956, he was elected as the new president of the Dramatists Guild of America, a professional organization whose main goal was to negotiate better contracts for playwrights. His term lasted until 1960, when he was replaced by Alan Jay Lerner (1918 - 1986).
In August 1960, Hammerstein died at his home, Highland Farm in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. It was a 19th-century farmhouse which had served as his residence since 1940. The cause of death was stomach cancer, and he had been struggling with the disease for a while. He was 65-years-old at the time of his death. To honor his passing, the lights of Times Square were turned off for one minute, and London's West End lights were dimmed. His remains were cremated and his ashes were buried at the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York. A memorial plaque for Hammerstein was placed at Southwark Cathedral in London.
Hammerstein was survived by his second wife Dorothy Hammerstein (1899-1987), a professional interior designer and decorator. They had been married since 1929. Hammerstein's son James Hammerstein (1931-1999) followed his father's footsteps as a theatre director and producer. Hammerstein's stepdaughter Susan Blanchard (1928-) worked as a lyricist and theatrical producer, though she is primarily known as a a socialite.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Dimos I
- SpousesDorothy Hammerstein(May 14, 1929 - August 23, 1960) (his death, 1 child)Myra Finn(August 22, 1917 - 1929) (divorced, 2 children)
- Children
- ParentsWilliam HammersteinAlice Vivian Nimmo
- RelativesReginald R. Hammerstein(Sibling)
- Often collaborated with Jerome Kern
- Often collaborated with Richard Rodgers
- So far the only man named Oscar ever to win an Oscar.
- Last song written before his death was "Edelweiss" from "The Sound of Music." It was written at the last minute to provide male lead 'Theodore Bikel' with a solo number, and Bikel has always thought it interesting that the last word that Hammerstein, who knew he was dying, wrote as a lyric was "forever." To this day, actor/folk singer Bikel invariably performs the song at his concerts, always to a warm reception.
- Stephen Sondheim said of him, "His work tended to make people think of him as an unsophisticated, platitudinous hick, when in fact he was a highly intelligent, strongly principled, and philosophical man.".
- Mentor to composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim. His Pennsylvania estate Highland Farms is now a popular bed and breakfast featuring various Hammerstein family memorabilia.
- He is credited, along with two of his collaborators - composers Jerome Kern and Richard Rodgers - with developing the "integrated musical", a kind of musical in which the songs furthered the plot and revealed character, rather than just serving as pleasant interruptions to the story. With Kern he wrote "Show Boat", and with Rodgers he wrote "Oklahoma!", "Carousel", "South Pacific", "The King and I", "Flower Drum Song", the TV musical "Cinderella", "The Sound of Music", and three other shows. They influenced musical theatre writers to the point that nearly every musical on Broadway after 1943 used song and dance to further and enhance the plots of the shows rather than distract the audience from the story lines.
- The definition of a producer: An idealist, a realist, a practical dreamer, a sophisticated gambler and a stage-struck child.
- [about writing "It Might As Well Be Spring" with Richard Rodgers] I wrote it all out first, and it took me several weeks. Then I gave it to him, and two hours later he called me up and said, "I've got it". I could have thrown a brick through the phone.
- Everyone speaks and writes words. Few can write music. It's creation is a mystery. There are mathematical principles to guide the construction, but no mere knowledge of these can produce the emotional eloquence some music attains. We are made sad or happy, romantic, thoughtful, disturbed or peaceful by someone else's singing heart. To me this is a most exciting and inexplicable phenomenon. I should hate to me a music critic with telling people what is good or bad in a musical composition or what are its component elements. One might as well try to explain to a group of children at the seaside the chemistry of salt water and sand, and the source of the sunlight or the breeze that romps with them along the shore.
- I am not a trained musician. As a librettist, I use music as a tool that a kind composer has given me, but I have no idea where he got it. I do have some idea of how music can affect an audience in a theatre, and only within this limited area, do I consider qualified to discuss the work of Richard Rodgers. He is essentially a composer for plays. He writes music to depict story and character and is, therefore, himself a dramatist. He is not an abstractionist in any sense and, as far as I can see, he has no interest in the mere creation of sound, however unusual or ingenious. He composes in order to make words fly higher or cut deeper than they would without the aid of his music. His melodies are clean and well-defined. His scores are carefully built, logically allied to the stories and characters they describe. No overgrown forests or weed-clogged meadows of music here, but neat rows of tenderly grown flowers on well-kept lawns.
- [on Lorenz Hart] He was always skipping and bouncing. In all the time I knew him, I never saw him walk slowly. I never saw his face in repose. I never heard him chuckle quietly. He laughed loudly and easily at other people's jokes, and at his own too. His large eyes danced and his head would wag. He was alert and dynamic.
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