Phil Silvers

Phil Silvers, born Philip Silver on May 11, 1911, in Brooklyn, New York, was an American comedic actor and entertainer whose professional career spanned nearly six decades. The youngest of eight children born to Russian Jewish immigrants Saul and Sarah Silver, he grew up in a household shaped by his father's work as a sheet metal worker on New York's early skyscrapers. Silvers began performing at age 11, singing in movie theaters to fill time when film projectors broke down, an arrangement that eventually earned him free admission in exchange for his services. By 13 he had joined the Gus Edwards Revue as a singer, and he subsequently built his early career through vaudeville and burlesque.

Before establishing himself on Broadway, Silvers appeared in short films for Vitaphone, including Ups and Downs in 1937, and made his feature film debut in Hit Parade of 1941 in 1940. Over the following two decades he worked as a character actor for Warner Bros., Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Columbia, and 20th Century Fox, appearing in films such as All Through the Night with Humphrey Bogart, Lady Be Good, Coney Island, Cover Girl alongside Gene Kelly and Rita Hayworth, and Summer Stock with Kelly and Judy Garland. During this period he also co-wrote the lyrics to the jazz standard "Nancy (with the Laughing Face)," composing the words while visiting Jimmy Van Heusen, originally as a birthday tribute to songwriter Johnny Burke's wife. When Sinatra's daughter's name was substituted at her birthday party, the singer was persuaded to record it himself, and the song became a popular hit in 1945. Near the end of World War II, Silvers joined Sinatra on several USO tours entertaining troops overseas.

Silvers made his Broadway debut in 1939 in Yokel Boy, a production critics found mediocre but in which Silvers himself was singled out for praise. The Broadway revue High Kickers in 1941 was developed from his own concept. His Broadway reputation grew substantially when he played con-man Harrison Floy in High Button Shoes in 1947, a performance that drew acclaim from critic Brooks Atkinson, who described him as possessing the speed and drollery of a honky-tonk buffoon. Silvers went on to star in Top Banana in 1952, playing Jerry Biffle, the egocentric star of a television program, a character widely understood to have been modeled on Milton Berle. The performance earned him his first Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical. He reprised the role in the 1954 film version, which was initially released in 3-D. He returned to Broadway in December 1960 in Do Re Mi, a production in which he and Nancy Walker were noted as two outstanding comic performers, and he received a Tony Award nomination for Best Actor in a Musical for that work.

When A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum was first mounted on Broadway, Silvers was offered the lead role of the scheming Roman slave Pseudolus but declined, and the part went to Zero Mostel, who was so successful that he repeated it in the 1966 film version. Silvers appeared in that film in the secondary role of flesh merchant Marcus Lycus. When actor-producer Larry Blyden mounted a Broadway revival of Forum in 1972, Silvers accepted the lead, and the production was a success. He became the first leading actor to win a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical in a revival, his second Tony in that category. His Broadway career thus extended from 1939 to 1972 and also included an appearance in How the Other Half Loves, among other productions.

Silvers became a household name in 1955 when he starred as Master Sergeant Ernest G. Bilko in You'll Never Get Rich, later retitled The Phil Silvers Show, a military comedy set on a U.S. Army post. The series was a television hit, and Silvers won two Primetime Emmy Awards for his work on it. CBS moved the show to Friday nights in 1958 and relocated its setting to Camp Fremont in California, and the series ended the following year. In the 1963–1964 season he starred in The New Phil Silvers Show on CBS, playing factory foreman Harry Grafton in a 30-episode run alongside co-stars including Stafford Repp, Herbie Faye, Buddy Lester, and Elena Verdugo.

Throughout the 1960s Silvers continued working in film, appearing in It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and 40 Pounds of Trouble, both in 1963, and in the unfinished Something's Got to Give in 1962 with Marilyn Monroe and Dean Martin. In 1967 he appeared in the British film Follow That Camel, playing Sergeant Nocker, a character resembling Bilko, in a role that producer Peter Rogers hoped would help the Carry On series find an American audience. Silvers received £30,000 for the role, the largest salary paid to any performer in the Carry On series up to that point. He also appeared as Hollywood producer Harold Hecuba in a 1966 episode of Gilligan's Island in which the castaways performed a musical version of Hamlet. His production company, Gladasya, named after his catchphrase, had financed that series.

In his later career Silvers made guest appearances on programs including The Beverly Hillbillies, The Carol Burnett Show, Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In, The Dean Martin Show, The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, and Happy Days, with his final screen credit coming on CHiPs in 1983. He also appeared on numerous talk and variety specials, including The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, The Merv Griffin Show, The Dick Cavett Show, and The Bob Hope Special. In 1980 he took part in The Friar's Club Tribute to Milton Berle alongside Don Rickles, Dick Shawn, Walter Matthau, Jack Lemmon, George Burns, Karl Malden, and Robert Culp.

Silvers was married twice, first to Jo-Carroll Dennison and then to Evelyn Patrick, with both marriages ending in divorce. He had five daughters, all by his second wife, Evelyn Patrick, who later married British musician Terry Dene. Phil Silvers died on November 1, 1985.