Irving Caesar

Irving Caesar, born Isidor Keiser on July 4, 1895, in New York City, was an American lyricist, composer, and book writer whose work spanned Broadway musicals, revues, children's songs, and popular standards. He died on December 18, 1996, in New York at the age of 101. His wife at the time of his death was Cristina Ballesteros, and her daughter Danya Barazanji had assisted in his care since 1992.

Caesar was the son of Morris Keiser, a Romanian Jewish lawyer and socialist who also operated a bookstore. Caesar composed his first poem around 1901, an early creative impulse his family attributed to the literary atmosphere of his father's shop. His older brother Arthur Caesar went on to become a Hollywood screenwriter. The Caesar brothers grew up in Yorkville, a Manhattan neighborhood they shared with the Marx Brothers, whom Caesar knew during his childhood years. He received his formal education at Chappaqua Mountain Institute in Chappaqua, New York.

Over the course of his career, Caesar collaborated with a broad range of composers and songwriters, among them George Gershwin, Rudolf Friml, Sigmund Romberg, Victor Herbert, Ted Koehler, Ray Henderson, and Vincent Youmans. With Youmans, he wrote two of his most celebrated numbers, "I Want to Be Happy" and "Tea for Two," for the 1925 musical No, No, Nanette. "Tea for Two" became one of the most frequently recorded songs ever written. His lyric for "Swanee," composed with Gershwin, and his contributions to "Sometimes I'm Happy" and "Crazy Rhythm" further established him as a writer of enduring popular standards. In 1929 he adapted an Austrian song into "Just a Gigolo," which became a hit for Louis Prima in the 1950s and again for David Lee Roth in the 1980s. "Animal Crackers in My Soup," another of his compositions, was popularized by Shirley Temple in the 1935 film Curly Top.

In the late 1930s, Caesar partnered with composer Gerald Marks to produce a series of children's songs organized around themes of safety, health, and international friendship. The collections, titled "Sing a Song of Safety," "Sing a Song of Friendship," and "Songs of Health," drew on United Nations ideals of world peace, racial tolerance, and friendship. Caesar made hundreds of school appearances performing these songs. He also served on the board of directors of the performing-rights organization ASCAP from 1930 to 1946 and again from 1949 to 1966, and he was a founder of the Songwriters Guild of America. In 1972 he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Caesar's Broadway career began in 1919 when he contributed additional lyrics to La La Lucille. He served as co-lyricist on Kissing Time in 1920, an adaptation of an earlier version of that musical, and contributed to the revues Pins and Needles in 1922 and all three editions of The Greenwich Village Follies from 1922 through 1924, on which he also served as co-bookwriter for the 1922 edition. His musical Betty Lee, listed among his verified Broadway credits, arrived in 1924, followed by No, No, Nanette in 1925. That same year he appeared as featured lyricist on the Charlot Revue, contributing "Gigolette" and "A Cup of Coffee, a Sandwich and You." Additional credits from the mid-1920s include Yes, Yes, Yvette, Sweetheart Time, Ziegfeld's Revue "No Foolin'," and Betsy, for which he served as co-bookwriter.

Through the late 1920s and into the 1930s, Caesar continued to accumulate credits across a wide range of formats. He was lyricist on Talk About Girls and Here's Howe in 1927 and 1928 respectively, and contributed to the revue Americana of 1928. He served as co-composer and co-lyricist on both Polly and George White's Scandals of 1929. His work on Nina Rosa in 1930 and The Wonder Bar in 1931, for which he co-adapted the original German text as a play, demonstrated his range beyond the musical form. He contributed to George White's Scandals of 1931 as co-bookwriter and served as co-composer and lyricist on George White's Music Hall Varieties of 1932, a revue included among his verified database credits. Shady Lady, another verified credit, arrived in 1933, the same year he was lyricist on Melody. He wrote dialogue for the revue Continental Varieties in 1934 and provided the English-version lyrics for The White Horse Inn in 1936. His most comprehensive single credit came with My Dear Public in 1943, on which he served simultaneously as co-composer, co-lyricist, and co-bookwriter.

Following his primary career, Caesar contributed to several later productions. He was a featured lyricist on the dance revue The American Dance Machine in 1978 and a featured songwriter on the revue Up in One in 1979. In 1986 he provided the English-version lyrics for "Just a Gigolo" in Big Deal, and in 1994 his song "Tea for Two" was featured in the play Sally Marr...and her escorts.