Beatrice Kay

Beatrice Kay, born Hannah Beatrice Kuper on April 21, 1907, in New York City, was an American singer, actress, and vaudevillian whose career spanned stage, film, radio, nightclubs, and television. She performed under the names Honey Kuper and Honey Day during portions of her career and died on November 8, 1986, in North Hollywood, California, at the age of 79, following a series of strokes.

Kay's performing life began at age six, when she appeared as "Little Lord Fauntleroy" in stock theater in Louisville, Kentucky. She went on to work across vaudeville and eventually became a headliner at Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe Nightclub in New York. Her nightclub appearances extended internationally and across the United States, with engagements at the Fairmont Hotel Venetian Room in San Francisco, the Moulin Rouge in Paris, Ciro's in Los Angeles, and the El Rancho Hotel in Las Vegas.

Her Broadway career ran from 1922 to 1937 and included four productions. She appeared in the play Secrets in 1922, the play Jarnegan in 1928, Provincetown Follies in 1935, and Tell Me Pretty Maiden in 1937.

On radio, Kay was a regular performer on Gaslight Gaieties and Gay Nineties Revue, and appeared on The Mercury Theatre on the Air, directed by Orson Welles. In 1946 she hosted her own program, The Beatrice Kay Show. Songs she helped bring to popular attention include "A Bird in a Gilded Cage," "The Band Played On," "Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay," "No! No! A Thousand Times No!!," and "Mention My Name In Sheboygan." She also recorded multiple phonograph albums throughout her career.

In film, Kay appeared in the 1945 motion picture Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe, which starred Betty Grable and Dick Haymes and was set in the nightclub where she had previously performed. She appeared alongside Cliff Robertson in the 1961 film Underworld U.S.A. and in the 1969 film A Time for Dying, which featured Victor Jory and Audie Murphy. Her final film role was a bit part in the 1974 production Ginger in the Morning, starring Susan Oliver, Sissy Spacek, and Monte Markham.

In television, Kay provided the voice of Sue in the ABC animated series Calvin and the Colonel from 1961 to 1962. Her television credits also included The Danny Thomas Show, Bonanza, The Rifleman, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, Ironside, Night Gallery, and Adam-12, among more than a dozen appearances overall.

In 1972, Kay toured with The Big Show Of 1936, a road production that co-starred Ben Blue, Jackie Coogan, the Ink Spots, Virginia O'Brien, Cass Daley, Ray Bolger, and the Wiere Brothers, and played venues including Madison Square Garden in New York. At some point during her later years she retired to operate a holiday resort dude ranch, but returned to performing after a fire destroyed her home. She subsequently headlined a month-long engagement opening Milt Larsen's Mayfair Music Hall in Santa Monica, California, appearing alongside Bernard Fox and Larry "Seymour" Vincent.