Joe E. Brown

 Joe E. Brown (July 28, 1891 – July 6, 1973)

Brown is remembered for his amiable screen persona, comic timing, and enormous elastic-mouth smile. He was one of the most popular American comedians in the 1930s and 1940s, with successful films like A Midsummer Night's Dream, Earthworm Tractors, and Alibi Ike. In his later career Brown starred in Some Like It Hot (1959), as Osgood Fielding III, in which he utters the famous punchline, "Well, nobody's perfect." Brown was one of the few vaudeville comedians to appear in a Shakespeare film; he played Francis Flute in the Max Reinhardt/William Dieterle film version of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935) and was highly praised for his performance. He starred in Polo Joe (1936) with Carol Hughes and Richard "Skeets" Gallagher, and in Sons o' Guns. In 1933 and 1936, he became one of the top ten earners in films. He was sufficiently well known internationally by this point to be depicted in comic strips in the British comic Film Fun for twenty years from 1933. During WWII, he spent a great deal of time entertaining troops, spending many nights working and meeting servicemen at the Hollywood Canteen. After his son was killed in WWII, Brown traveled thousands of miles at his own expense to entertain American troops. He was the first to do so, traveling to both the Caribbean and Alaska before Bob Hope had, and before the USO was organized. Brown was one of only two civilians to be awarded the Bronze Star in WWII.

Brown was a sports enthusiast, both in film and personally. Some of his best films were the "baseball trilogy" which consisted of Fireman, Save My Child (1932), Elmer the Great (1933) and Alibi Ike (1935). He was also a television and radio broadcaster for the New York Yankees in 1953. His son, Joe L. Brown, inherited an interest in baseball, becoming the general manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates for more than twenty years. Brown also spent Ty Cobb's last days with him before he died, discussing his life. Brown began having heart problems in 1968, after suffering a severe heart attack, and underwent cardiac surgery. He died from arteriosclerosis on July 6, 1973, age 81. He is interred at Forest Lawn in Glendale, CA.