Donald O'Connor

Donald David Dixon Ronald O'Connor, born August 28, 1925, in Chicago, Illinois, was an American dancer, singer, and actor whose career spanned vaudeville, film, television, and Broadway. He died on September 27, 2003. O'Connor was born at St. Elizabeth Hospital, the 200th child delivered there, to Edward "Chuck" O'Connor, a circus strongman and acrobat of Irish descent, and Effie Irene O'Connor, a bareback rider. Both parents were working vaudevillians, and the family's constant touring made it difficult for either parent to recall the precise details of his birth. His father's family traced its roots to Ireland.

Tragedy struck early in O'Connor's childhood. When he was two years old, he and his seven-year-old sister Arlene were struck by a car outside a theater in Hartford, Connecticut; Arlene died from her injuries. Within weeks, his father suffered a fatal heart attack while performing on stage in Brockton, Massachusetts. These losses made his mother intensely protective of her youngest son. Effie did not permit O'Connor to cross the street unaccompanied until he was thirteen and kept him away from dangerous dance routines throughout his youth.

O'Connor joined a performing act with his mother and elder brother Jack, billed as the O'Connor Family, the Royal Family of Vaudeville. The act combined singing, dancing, comedy, and acting, and toured extensively across the country. When not on the road, the family stayed with O'Connor's Uncle Bill in Danville, Illinois, where O'Connor participated in the Danville High School dramatic club alongside Dick Van Dyke and Bobby Short, though he never attended school formally. He later reflected that his early dance training was self-taught and limited, consisting largely of two routines, and that he did not begin serious formal study of dance until he was fifteen.

O'Connor made his film debut in 1937 at age eleven in Melody for Two, appearing alongside his family act. That same year he appeared in Columbia's It Can't Last Forever. He subsequently signed with Paramount Studios, where he took on supporting roles in a series of films between 1938 and 1939, including Men with Wings, Sing You Sinners, Tom Sawyer Detective, Million Dollar Legs with Betty Grable, and Beau Geste, in which he played Gary Cooper's character as a boy. He also appeared at Warner Bros. in On Your Toes before returning to vaudeville for two years.

In 1941, O'Connor signed with Universal Pictures at $200 per week. The studio paired him with Gloria Jean and Peggy Ryan in a succession of low-budget musicals beginning with What's Cookin'? in 1942, which also featured the Andrews Sisters. Universal developed O'Connor and Ryan as a teenage duo modeled on Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland at MGM. He co-starred with Jean in four films, including Get Hep to Love and Mister Big, the latter of which prompted Universal to elevate the production from a B picture to an A picture with an additional $50,000 in budget. On his eighteenth birthday in August 1943, O'Connor was drafted into the United States Army. Before he reported for induction on February 6, 1944, Universal completed eight films featuring him, rushing four into production to meet the deadline.

Upon returning from military service, O'Connor found the studio reorganized as Universal-International under new management. The studio eventually cast him opposite Deanna Durbin in Something in the Wind in 1947 and kept him working in musical comedies through the late 1940s. In 1949, he took the lead role in Francis, directed by Arthur Lubin, in which his character befriends a talking mule. The film was a major commercial success and led to one Francis sequel per year through 1955, repeatedly interrupting his work in other genres.

O'Connor's most celebrated screen performance came in MGM's Singin' in the Rain in 1952, in which he performed the "Make 'Em Laugh" number. That routine earned him a Golden Globe Award. By the time of that film, MGM had shaped a more sympathetic sidekick persona for him that became his signature screen image, distinct from the wisecracking teenage characters he had played at Universal in the early 1940s. The athleticism of his dancing style was a defining characteristic of his work throughout his career. He also earned a Primetime Emmy Award from four nominations and received two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

O'Connor brought his career to the Broadway stage between 1981 and 1983, appearing in two musicals. He performed in Show Boat and in Bring Back Birdie, both of which marked his work in the New York theater during that period.