Joe Cook (born Joseph Lopez; March 29, 1890 β May 15, 1959) was an American
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 ...
performer. A household name in the 1920s and 1930s, Cook was one of America's most popular entertainers, and he headlined at New York's famed
Palace Theatre. After appearing on
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 ...
he broke into radio.
Early life
Born Joseph Lopez in
Evansville, Indiana
Evansville is a city in, and the county seat of, Vanderburgh County, Indiana, United States. The population was 118,414 at the 2020 census, making it the state's third-most populous city after Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, the largest city in ...
, in 1890, he and his elder brother Leo were orphaned and adopted by a distant relative, Mrs. Anna Cook, at the age of three and six, respectively. He lived in the back of the grocery store of his adoptive parents at the corner of Fourth and Oak in Evansville.
Career
Cook joined a circus in 1906, which propelled him to
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 ...
,
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 ...
, and
Hollywood.
His brother Leo and he were billed as "Joe Cook and Brother" were they were in vaudeville together, from about 1909 to 1916.
Joe Cook's physical talents were remarkable. He was an incredible juggler, could walk a tightrope, ride a
unicycle,
mime
Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) is an Internet standard that extends the format of email messages to support text in character sets other than ASCII, as well as attachments of audio, video, images, and application programs. Message ...
, and perform many other circus skills with ease. With this, he combined an uncanny ability to tell nonsensical stories that made audiences roar with laughter. Added to this was his penchant for creating ridiculously complex inventions to perform absurdly simple or totally useless tasks. Mix in a little piano, violin, and
ukulele
The ukulele ( ; from haw, ukulele , approximately ), also called Uke, is a member of the lute family of instruments of Portuguese origin and popularized in Hawaii. It generally employs four nylon strings.
The tone and volume of the instrumen ...
playing and you had quite a show. The broad variety of Cook's act led to his nickname β "One Man Vaudeville". ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' critic Brooks Atkinson once wrote, "Next to Leonardo da Vinci, Joe Cook is the most versatile man known to recorded times." In 1930, noted columnist Walter Winchell wrote that "Joe Cook is certainly one of the musical theatre's three geniuses. I can't at the moment think of the other two."
Following a very successful fifteen years in vaudeville - three of them in
blackface, Cook - most often teamed with stooge/future restaurateur
Dave Chasen Dave may refer to:
Film, television, and theater
* ''Dave'' (film), a 1993 film starring Kevin Kline and Sigourney Weaver
* ''Dave'' (musical), a 2018 stage musical adaptation of the film
* Dave (TV channel), a digital television channel in the ...
- became a late 1920s/early 1930s Broadway musical comedy star. He appeared, most memorably, in such shows as ''Rain or Shine'', ''
Fine and Dandy'' - the first hit completely scored by a woman (
Kay Swift
Katharine Faulkner "Kay" Swift (April 19, 1897 β January 28, 1993) was an American composer of popular and classical music, the first woman to score a hit musical completely. Written in 1930, the Broadway musical '' Fine and Dandy'' includes s ...
), and ''Hold Your Horses''.
Corey Ford
Corey Ford (April 29, 1902 β July 27, 1969) was an American humorist, writer, outdoorsman, and screenwriter. He was friendly with several members of the Algonquin Round Table in New York City and occasionally lunched there.
Early years
Ford was ...
, the co-author of the last-named musical, wrote of Cook's Broadway debut: "When I first saw Joe Cook in 1923, he was co-starring in ''
Earl Carroll's Vanities
''The Earl Carroll Vanities'' was a Broadway revue that Earl Carroll presented in the 1920s and early 1930s. Carroll and his show were sometimes controversial.
Distinguishing qualities
In 1923, the ''Vanities'' joined the ranks of New Yorkβ ...
'' with
Peggy Hopkins Joyce
Peggy Hopkins Joyce (born Marguerite Upton; May 26, 1893 – June 12, 1957) was an American actress, artist's model, and dancer. In addition to her performing career, Joyce was known for her flamboyant life, with numerous engagements, four ...
, whom he used to refer to as 'that somewhat different virgin'. I sat on the balcony and marveled at the bland deadpan expression, the slightly curved mouth, the easy flow of nonsense patter as he walked a tightrope or juggled Indian clubs while explaining to the audience why he would not imitate four Hawaiians." Cook's "Four Hawaiians" routine was his most famous; Joe would explain that he was actually imitating only two Hawaiians. He "could imitate four Hawaiians but did not wish to do so because that would put all the performers who could only imitate two Hawaiians out of work". Cook would appear on stage with a ukulele in hand and begin:
"I will give an imitation of four Hawaiians. This is one
histles this is another
lays ukulele and this is the third
arks time with his foot I could imitate four Hawaiians just as easily, but I will tell you the reason why I don't do it. You see, I bought a horse for $50 and it turned out to be a running horse. I was offered $15,000 for him, and I took it. I built a house for the $15,000, and when it was finished, a neighbor offered me $100,000 for it. He said my house stood right where he wanted to dig a well. So I took the $100,000 to accommodate him. I invested $100,000 on peanuts, and that year, there was a peanut famine, so I sold the peanuts for $350,000. Now, why should a man with $350,000 bother to imitate four Hawaiians?"
Never a fan of Hollywood, Cook made only two full-length movies and a handful of short subjects, which is a major reason he is not widely remembered today. In 1930, he starred in the film version of ''
Rain or Shine'', which was directed by a young
Frank Capra, and is still shown occasionally on television. It has recently been completely restored and will be permanently preserved by
Sony Pictures
Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Sony Pictures or SPE, and formerly known as Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc.) is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio Conglomerate (company), conglom ...
, the successor of
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...
. In 1935
Earle W. Hammons
Earle W. Hammons, known professionally as E. W. Hammons (December 2, 1882 – July 31, 1962), was an American film producer, . He produced more than 220 films between 1921 and 1938.
Biography
Born in Winona, Mississippi, in 1882, Hammons f ...
of
Educational Pictures
Educational Pictures, also known as Educational Film Exchanges, Inc. or Educational Films Corporation of America, was an American film production and film distribution company founded in 1916 by Earle (E. W.) Hammons (1882β1962). Educational pr ...
, needing a "name" comedian for that season's short-subject program, signed Joe Cook. Cook starred in five two-reel comedies (and wrote the scripts for three) at Educational's New York studio. Cook's only other feature film, ''
Arizona Mahoney
''Arizona Mahoney'' is a 1936 American Western film directed by James P. Hogan and written by Stuart Anthony and Robert Yost. The film stars Joe Cook, Robert Cummings, June Martel, Buster Crabbe, Marjorie Gateson and John Miljan. It is based ...
'', was filmed in 1936 and included a young Larry "Buster" Crabbe.
The 1930s also saw Cook's successful transition into the new medium of radio, as the host of two variety series and a frequent guest on many others.
Cook, from 1924 to 1941, made his residence at
Lake Hopatcong
Lake Hopatcong is the largest freshwater body in New Jersey, United States, about in area. Located from the Delaware River and from Manhattan, New York City, the lake forms part of the border between Sussex and Morris counties in the state's ...
, in
Hopatcong, New Jersey
Hopatcong ( ) is a borough in Sussex County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 United States census, the borough's population was 14,362, a decrease of 785 (β5.2%) from the 2010 census count of 15,147, which in turn reflected ...
, which was then a popular resort. His house was appropriately named "Sleepless Hollow" for the many parties he gave and celebrities he entertained. One visitor, his
librettist
A libretto (Italian for "booklet") is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major litu ...
Donald Ogden Stewart
Donald Ogden Stewart (November 30, 1894 β August 2, 1980) was an American writer and screenwriter best known for his sophisticated golden age comedies and melodramas such as '' The Philadelphia Story'' (based on the play by Philip Barry), '' T ...
, later recalled that "Joe lived on a mad gag-infested estate in
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...
which bewilderingly expressed his genius. On his three-hole golf course one drove off confidently into what looked like a fairway only to have one's ball rebound sharply over one's head from a huge rock that had been cunningly camouflaged. The last green was a golfer's paradise in that no matter where the ball landed it rolled obediently into the hole. Conditions inside the house were similarly deranged. The "butler" was one of the
contortionist
Contortion (sometimes contortionism) is a performance art in which performers called contortionists showcase their skills of extreme physical flexibility. Contortion acts often accompany acrobatics, circus acts, street performers and other li ...
s, acrobats, midgets, or other show-business people whom Joe had picked up his years in Vaudeville. Poor Mrs. Cook lived bravely in this cuckooland and struggled apologetically to bring some degree of common sense into the madhouse."
[Stewart, p. 183.] The Cookhouse still survives at Lake Hopatcong but is not open to the public.
Later life and death
Cook was diagnosed with
Parkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a long-term degenerative disorder of the central nervous system that mainly affects the motor system. The symptoms usually emerge slowly, and as the disease worsens, non-motor symptoms becom ...
in 1941. This forced his retirement from show business. He sold the lake house the same year and moved to a more modest residence in
New York State
New York, officially the State of New York, is a state in the Northeastern United States. It is often called New York State to distinguish it from its largest city, New York City. With a total area of , New York is the 27th-largest U.S. stat ...
, where he resided until his death in 1959. Had Cook stayed healthy until the advent of television, his playful and physical style of comedy might well have made him one of the new medium's biggest stars, as was the case with his contemporary,
Milton Berle.
References
Sources
*
*
*
Lake Hopatcong News
External links
*
*
Lake Hopatcong Historical Museum
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cook, Joe
1890 births
1959 deaths
Deaths from Parkinson's disease
Neurological disease deaths in New York (state)
Actors from Evansville, Indiana
People from Hopatcong, New Jersey
Vaudeville performers
Male actors from Indiana