Mae West's Pianist

"MAE WEST, author, loses her pianist," noted Variety on 8 September 1922.
• • Harry Richman - - an unknown talent in 1922 when Mae West gave him a break and hired the tall piano man with a pronounced lisp - - was performing on the big-time B.F. Keith vaudeville circuit with the Brooklyn bombshell. They were a good team. Wherever their act was booked, the pair got excellent reviews.
• • Ungrateful for the mega media exposure Mae had afforded him, Harry split with her and joined Texas Guinan's friend, singer Nora Bayes, in her act. However, as this clipping shows, Mae and Harry reunited and appeared together in April 1923 at the Colonial Theatre [Broadway and West 62nd Street].
• • Entertainer Harry Richman [10 August 1895 – 3 November 1972] was an actor, a singer, dancer, comedian, pianist, songwriter, bandleader, and cabaret performer. He was born Harold Reichman in Cincinnati, Ohio.

• • A flamboyant personality, Richman joined the George White's Scandals in the 1920s and appeared in the 1931 Ziegfeld Follies. In 1930, he made a splash in Hollywood with this crowd-pleaser: Puttin' on the Ritz. This film featured the Irving Berlin song of the same title, which gave Richman a phonograph record hit that year. His film career was hampered by his limited acting skills. [Writing about Puttin' on the Ritz, Leonard Maltin remarked: "A songwriter drinks and goes blind - - after seeing this you'll want to do the same".]
• • Maybe the silver screen was not his best medium. Richman remained a popular nightclub host and stage performer.
• • In 1966, his autobiography A Hell of a Life was published. In it he recounts his private and public relationship with Mae West.
• • Harry Richman married three times. All three marriages ended in divorce.
• • In November, it's time to remember Harry Richman. He died on November 3rd, 1972 in Hollywood, California at age 77.
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Mae West
• • Photo: Mae West's pianist • • Harry Richman • • 1926 • •
NYC
Mae West.