Carolyn Leigh
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Carolyn Leigh (August 21, 1926 – November 19, 1983)<ref name="LarkinGE">Template:Cite book</ref> was an American lyricist for Broadway, film, and popular songs. She is best known as the writer with partner Cy Coleman of the pop standards "Witchcraft" and "The Best Is Yet to Come". With Johnny Richards, she wrote the million-seller "Young at Heart" for the 1954 film Young at Heart, starring Frank Sinatra.
Biography
Leigh was born to a Jewish family<ref name=TampaFed>Tampa Jewish Federation: "Jews in the News: Mike Nichols, Yael Grobglas and Dominic Fumusa" retrieved March 18, 2017 |"The musical was penned by five Jewish theater legends, all now deceased. Lyrics by: BETTY COMDEN, ADOLPH GREENE, and CAROLYN LEIGH — with music by: MARK CHARLAP and JULE STYNE."</ref> in the Bronx, New York, graduated from Hunter College High School, Queens College, and New York University.<ref name="LarkinGE"/>
Leigh worked as a copy writer for radio stations and advertising agencies.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Always writing stories and poems, in 1951, when urged to write songs by a musical publisher who gave her a contract, she wrote "I'm Waiting Just for You" with Henry Glover, and two years later, "Young at Heart."<ref name="NYTObit"/>
Leigh's lyrics for Broadway shows include Peter Pan, Wildcat, Little Me, and How Now, Dow Jones.<ref name="LarkinGE"/> The last was an original idea of Leigh's, though Max Shulman wrote the script. She provided lyrics for the scores to the films The Cardinal in 1963 and Father Goose in 1964. In 1969 she wrote the lyrics for the musical Gatsby, with the score by Lee Pockriss and book by Hugh Wheeler.<ref>The New York Times. A Musical Version of ‘Gatsby,' Four Decades Late by Rachel Lee Harris, September 29, 2011.</ref> She wrote the lyrics for two other unproduced musicals,Caesar's Wife, again with music by Pockriss, about Julius Caesar's third wife, Calpurnia, and Juliet, based on the Fellini movie Juliet of the Spirits, with music by Morton Gould.<ref>The New York Times, Unearthing Lost Gems in Career of Lyricist ‘Unsung Carolyn Leigh' Reveals Charm of a Gatsby Musical by Stephen Holden, April 8, 2014.</ref>
Leigh was working with Marvin Hamlisch on the musical Smile when she died on November 19, 1983, of a heart attack.<ref name="NYTObit">Carolyn Leigh, Lyricist for Peter Pan, Dies", The New York Times, November 21, 1983, p. D20</ref><ref name="LarkinGE"/> She was divorced from her first husband Julius Levine in 1959 and married David Cunningham Jr. the same year. <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Leigh was inducted posthumously into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1985.<ref name="NYTObit" />
Tony Award nominations
- Little Me (1963) - Tony Award for Best Original Score
- How Now, Dow Jones (1968) - Tony Award for Best Original Score<ref name="LarkinGE"/>
References
External links
- Bio on Songwriters Hall of Fame site
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- Carolyn Leigh papers, 1944-1985, held by the Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
- Carolyn Leigh scores, 1910-1982, held by the Music Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts