Marion Sunshine (born Mary Tunstall Ijames, May 15, 1894 – January 25, 1963) was an American actress and songwriter. During her youth she worked in many films and Broadway musicals, as well as

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 ...

and

variety shows Variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is entertainment made up of a variety of acts including musical performances, sketch comedy, magic, acrobatics, juggling, and ventriloquism. It is normally introduced by a compèr ...

. In the 1930s she was involved in the so-called "

rhumba Rhumba, also known as ballroom rumba, is a genre of ballroom music and dance that appeared in the East Coast of the United States during the 1930s. It combined American big band music with Afro-Cuban rhythms, primarily the son cubano, but also co ...

craze" and translated the lyrics of many Latin music songs.

Life and career

Sunshine was born in

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border ...

on May 15, 1894. After moving to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

at a young age, she sang in

Broadway musical Broadway theatre,Although ''theater'' is generally the spelling for this common noun in the United States (see American and British English spelling differences), 130 of the 144 extant and extinct Broadway venues use (used) the spelling ''Th ...

s such as '' Going Up''. Between 1908 and 1916 she appeared on 26 films. In many of her performances she appeared with her sister Florence Tempest. Sunshine also worked as a

performer, and as a songwriter for Edward B. Marks. In 1922, while working in the

Ziegfeld Follies The ''Ziegfeld Follies'' was a series of elaborate theatrical revue productions on Broadway in New York City from 1907 to 1931, with renewals in 1934 and 1936. They became a radio program in 1932 and 1936 as ''The Ziegfeld Follies of the Air ...

, she became romantically involved with Cuban businessman Eusebio Azpiazú, known in the Latin music scene as Don Antobal. His brother Justo Ángel Azpiazú, better known as

Don Azpiazú Justo Ángel Azpiazú (Cienfuegos, 11 February 1893 – Havana, 20 January 1943), better known as Don Azpiazú, was a leading Cuban orchestral director in the 1920s and 1930s. His band introduced authentic Cuban dance music and Cuban musica ...

, was a prominent band leader in Havana. The 1930 rendition of "

The Peanut Vendor "El manisero", known in English as "The Peanut Vendor", is a Cuban son-pregón composed by Moisés Simons. Together with "Guantanamera", it is arguably the most famous piece of music created by a Cuban musician. "The Peanut Vendor" has been recorde ...

" recorded by his Havana Casino Orchestra featuring

Antonio Machín Antonio Abad Lugo Machín (11 February 1903, in Sagua la Grande, Cuba – 4 August 1977, in Madrid, Spain) was a Spanish-Cuban singer and musician. His version of '' El Manisero'', recorded in New York, 1930, with Don Azpiazú's orchestra, was the ...

on vocals became the first million-selling single in the history of Latin music. Sunshine translated the lyrics into English, as she would later do with other rhumba hits such as "Mango Mangüé". In December 1930 she married Don Antobal, and continued her involvement in the rhumba scene, which earned her the nickname "The

Rumba The term rumba may refer to a variety of unrelated music styles. Originally, "rumba" was used as a synonym for "party" in northern Cuba, and by the late 19th century it was used to denote the complex of secular music styles known as Cuban rumba ...

Lady". Besides, she wrote several jazz standards such as "When I Get Low, I Get High". Sunshine died in New York City on January 25, 1963, aged 68 years."Actress, Songwriter Marion Sunshine Dies"
''The Los Angeles Times'' (January 27, 1963): 31. via

Newspapers.com Ancestry.com LLC is an American genealogy company based in Lehi, Utah. The largest for-profit genealogy company in the world, it operates a network of genealogical, historical records, and related genetic genealogy websites. In November 2018, ...

Selected filmography

* ''

The Red Girl ''The Red Girl'' is a 1908 American black-and-white short silent Western film directed by D. W. Griffith for the American Mutoscope & Biograph Company. It stars Florence Lawrence and the cast includes Charles Inslee, George Gebhardt, D. W. Gr ...

'' (1908) * '' Mr. Jones at the Ball'' (1908) * '' Her Awakening'' (1911)

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Sunshine, Marion 1894 births 1963 deaths American film actresses American silent film actresses Vaudeville performers 20th-century American actresses Actresses from Louisville, Kentucky Songwriters from Kentucky Actresses from New York City