Eva Puck (November 25, 1892 – October 25, 1979) was an American entertainer, a
vaudeville
Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition ...
headliner who later found success performing in Broadway musical comedies and film.
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Early life
She was born in New York City, the middle of three children raised by Abraham and Lena (née Salmon) Puck. There is some question about the family surname being Puck or Salmon, both were used in early press articles. Little is known of her mother who came to America from Poland in 1874 or her English father who immigrated in 1882. They married in 1887. By 1899, Eva and her older brother Harry were performing in a vaudeville
Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition ...
song and dance
''Song and Dance'' is a musical comprising two acts, one told entirely in "Song" and one entirely in " Dance", tied together by a unifying love story.
The "Song" act is '' Tell Me on a Sunday'', with lyrics by Don Black and music by Andrew ...
act known as the Two Little Pucks.
On May 10, 1903, police raided the Trocadero Music Hall in Manhattan's Fort George district where the Puck children were performing as headliners and arrested their parents and the theater manager, Freeman Bernstein. They were charged with a violation of Section 289 of the Penal Code in unlawfully consenting to the employment, and in the employment, of minors in a theatrical exhibition. The investigators were concerned over the hours that Eva and her brother were keeping and also found the Trocadero an unsuitable environment for children with patrons smoking and consuming alcohol. The three were later brought to trial in the Court of Special Sessions, and found guilty. The judge, in passing sentence said, in part:
"We cannot resist the conviction that these parents have been living largely upon the earnings of these children, which amount from $125 to $150 per month. Now, this sort of business cannot be continued or permitted, and if these defendants come before this Court again the punishment will be more drastic."
Her father was fined $100, or thirty days jail time; and her mother $25, or fifteen days in the City Prison. Bernstein was fined $50.
For the next few years, the Two Little Pucks continued to perform at venues outside New York and later, as they entered their teens, toured as Eva and Harry Puck before disbanding sometime around 1918. Harry went on to be a successful choreographer, composer, songwriter
A songwriter is a musician who professionally composes musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music ...
and music publisher
A music publisher is a type of publisher that specializes in distributing music. Music publishers originally published sheet music. When copyright became legally protected, music publishers started to play a role in the management of the intellect ...
. He was a business partner of lyricist Bert Kalmar and wrote songs with him until Kalmar started his more famous songwriting partnership with composer Harry Ruby. Eva remained in vaudeville, soon teaming up with her future husband, song and dance comedian Sammy White (1894-1960).[The Papers of Will Rogers: From Vaudeville to Broadway](_blank)
/ref>[''The New York Times'', January 29, 1964](_blank)
/ref>
Their younger brother, Laurence "Larry" Puck, became a radio and television producer and general manager of Unicorn Productions Inc., a subsidiary of CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
. He later married Mabel Withee, a singer and dancer active on Broadway over the 1920s.
Career
Eva Puck became a member of the vaudeville comedy act Clayton and White that, after Lew Clayton's departure around 1920, became known as Puck and White. One of their popular vaudeville sketches ("Opera vs. Jazz") portrayed White as a scholarly music teacher and Eva as his inept student. The couple married in 1922.[The Fitchburg Sentinel May 20, 1932] and together appeared in Broadway
Broadway may refer to:
Theatre
* Broadway Theatre (disambiguation)
* Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S.
** Broadway (Manhattan), the street
**Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
shows such as the ''Greenwich Village Follies'' (1923), Rodgers and Hart
Rodgers and Hart were an American songwriting partnership between composer Richard Rodgers (1902–1979) and the lyricist Lorenz Hart (1895–1943). They worked together on 28 stage musicals and more than 500 songs from 1919 until Hart' ...
musical ''The Girl Friend
''The Girl Friend'' is a musical comedy with music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Lorenz Hart and book by Herbert Fields. This was the longest running show for the trio to that date.Secrest, Meryle. ''Somewhere for me:a biography of Richard Rodge ...
'' (1926), and Jerome Kern
Jerome David Kern (January 27, 1885 – November 11, 1945) was an American composer of musical theatre and popular music. One of the most important American theatre composers of the early 20th century, he wrote more than 700 songs, used in ove ...
's ''Show Boat
''Show Boat'' is a musical with music by Jerome Kern and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. It is based on Edna Ferber's best-selling 1926 novel of the same name. The musical follows the lives of the performers, stagehands and dock worke ...
'' (1927). Puck also appeared as Helen Cheston in the original Broadway run of the musical '' Irene'' from November 1919 to June 1921.
The two played in the original 1927 Broadway
Broadway may refer to:
Theatre
* Broadway Theatre (disambiguation)
* Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S.
** Broadway (Manhattan), the street
**Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
stage version of ''Show Boat''. In the musical, White played the role of comic dancer Frank Schultz, and Puck played the role of Ellie May Chipley, who eventually marries Frank. In 1932, the two reprised their roles in the first Broadway revival of the show. However, by the time Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures (legally Universal City Studios LLC, also known as Universal Studios, or simply Universal; common metonym: Uni, and formerly named Universal Film Manufacturing Company and Universal-International Pictures Inc.) is an Ameri ...
released the 1936 film version, the two had divorced, so the role of Ellie went to Queenie Smith
Queenie Smith (September 8, 1898 – August 5, 1978) was an American stage, television, and film actress.
Life and career
Smith was born in Texas. Her family moved from Texas to New York shortly before Smith began studying at the Metropol ...
, with White repeating his performance as Frank in the film.
Puck and White appeared in a short film made by Lee De Forest in his Phonofilm
Phonofilm is an optical sound-on-film system developed by inventors Lee de Forest and Theodore Case in the early 1920s.
Introduction
In 1919 and 1920, Lee De Forest, inventor of the audion tube, filed his first patents on a sound-on-film proce ...
sound-on-film
Sound-on-film is a class of sound film processes where the sound accompanying a picture is recorded on photographic film, usually, but not always, the same strip of film carrying the picture. Sound-on-film processes can either record an analog ...
process, which premiered at the Rivoli Theater in New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
on 15 April 1923. The film shows Puck and White performing their comic routine entitled "Opera vs. Jazz", and is preserved in the Maurice Zouary film collection at the Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...
.
In the mid-1930s, Eva Puck married Robert Groves (or Graves), a California merchant, and retired from the stage.
Family
She had a daughter, Lauretta (sometimes spelled Laurette) Puck, born in New York in 1912. Nothing is known about her father except that he was born in Hungary. She appeared in the short Leon Errol
Leon Errol (born Leonce Errol Sims, July 3, 1881 – October 12, 1951) was an Australian-American comedian and actor in the United States, popular in the first half of the 20th century for his appearances in vaudeville, on Broadway, and in film ...
film '' Should Wives Work?'' (1937) and had previously toured with the Arthur Ashley Players.
Lauretta later married William R. Golden, a Hollywood executive, and became a nationally known exhibitor and breeder of Irish Setter
The Irish Setter ( ga, sotar rua, literally "red setter") is a setter, a breed of gundog, and family dog. The term ''Irish Setter'' is commonly used to encompass the show-bred dog recognised by the American Kennel Club as well as the field-bred ...
s. A resident of Pacific Palisades, she died after an extended illness on July 17, 1972, predeceasing her mother by seven years.[Golden, Lauretta Puck - The Los Angeles Times, July 20, 1972 (obituary page)]
Death
Eva Puck died in 1979, aged 86, at the Granada Hills Community Hospital in Los Angeles County, California.
References
External links
*
*
''Eva Puck and Sammy White'' at SilentEra with photo of Puck and White performing their sketch "Opera vs. Jazz"
Book with information on Eva Puck
{{DEFAULTSORT:Puck, Eva
1892 births
1979 deaths
19th-century American actresses
20th-century American actresses
20th-century American singers
20th-century American women singers
American musical theatre actresses
American stage actresses
American film actresses
Vaudeville performers