Cole Porter

Cole Albert Porter (June 9, 1891 – October 15, 1964) was an American composer and songwriter.

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His works include the musical comedies Kiss Me, Kate (1948) (based on Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew), Fifty Million Frenchmen and Anything Goes, as well as songs like "Night and Day", "I Get a Kick Out of You" and "I've Got You Under My Skin". He was noted for his sophisticated lyrics, clever rhymes, and complex forms. Irving Berlin used to refer to "Begin the Beguine" as "that long, long song."

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Porter was born in Peru, Indiana, into a wealthy Protestant family; his grandfather was a coal and timber speculator. His mother started Cole Porter in musical training at an early age, and Porter learned the violin at age 6, the piano at age 8, and he wrote his first operetta (with help from his mother) at age 10. Porter's grandfather wanted the boy to become a lawyer, and with that career in mind, Porter attended Worcester Academy and then Yale University beginning in 1909, (at Yale he became a member of the famous secret society, Scroll and Key) and Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity, and spent a year at Harvard Law School in 1913. After realizing that he wanted to concentrate on music, he transferred to Harvard's School of Music. Porter's first Broadway production, in 1916, See America First (book by Lawrason Riggs), was a flop, closing after two weeks.

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After his first Broadway failure, Cole banished himself to Paris, France. He loved to tell people back home that he had joined the French Foreign Legion, but in reality, he went to work for the Duryea Relief Fund. Cole had a closetful of various tailormade military uniforms that he wore when the mood suited him. He set up a luxury apartment in Paris. His Relief Fund duties left him plenty of time to lead a playboy lifestyle. In 1918, in Paris, he met Linda Lee Thomas (1883 – 1954), a rich Louisville, Kentucky-born divorc?e several years his senior; they were married in 1919. She was once dubbed the most beautiful woman in the world.

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His musicals and individual songs soon gained him popularity; many were written specifically with Fred Astaire and Ethel Merman in mind. A riding accident in 1937 crushed his legs and left him in chronic pain and largely crippled, but he continued to compose. (According to a biography by William McBrien, a probably apocryphal story from Porter himself has it that he composed the lyrics to part of "At Long Last Love" while lying in pain waiting to be rescued from the accident.) Cole underwent more than forty surgeries on his legs and was in constant pain for the rest of his life. During this period, the many operations led him to severe depression. Cole was one of the first people who experienced a new treatment for depression, electric shock therapy, which at that time was particularly barbaric.

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Porter was plainly and openly homosexual, which was not a concern for his almost a decade older wife, Linda. They both got what they wanted from each other. Linda was no longer interested in sex and was the glamorous wife of a world famous songwriter, who would never physically mistreat her; Cole had a beautiful woman on his arm when the situation warranted it. In those days, it was not uncommon for wealthy gay men to marry wealthy socialite women. Cole and Linda did separate in the early 1930s when Porter's sexuality became more and more open during their time living in Hollywood. He had an affair in 1925 with Ballets Russes star Boris Kochno and reportedly had a long relationship with his constant companion, Howard Sturges, a Boston socialite, as well as architect Ed Tauch (for whom Porter wrote "Easy to Love"), choreographer Nelson Barclift (who inspired "Night and Day"), director John Wilson (who later married international society beauty Princess Nathalie Paley), and longtime friend Ray Kelly, whose children still receive half of the childless Porter's royalty copyrights.

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A review of a recent Porter biography recounts that in his later years, the composer kept "breaking appliances so he could lure cute repairmen into his lair". When in Hollywood, Cole was also a regular guest at George Cukor's Sunday pool parties, which were completely devoid of women, but featured plenty of young men who were Hollywood hopefuls.

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Cole Porter died of kidney failure at the age of 73 in Santa Monica, California and is interred in Mount Hope Cemetery in his native Peru, Indiana.

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His life was made into Night and Day, a very sanitized (almost fantasy) 1946 Michael Curtiz film starring Cary Grant and Alexis Smith. His life was also chronicled, somewhat more realistically, in De-Lovely, a 2004 Irwin Winkler film starring Kevin Kline as Porter and Ashley Judd as Linda.

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June 9: June 9 is the 160th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (161st in leap years), with 205 days remaining....

1891: 1891 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar)....

October 15: October 15 is the 288th day of the year (289th in Leap years). There are 77 days remaining....

Cole Porter related Images and Photos (experimental)

Classic Musicals Collection: Cole Porter (DVD)	Gail Porter	Gary Cole	George Cole
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Tracy Porter Super Bowl XLIV	Nyree Dawn Porter	Old King Cole	Night Porter UK Movie Poster 1974