“Danny Kaye Succumbs To TV’s Spell Tonight”
Syracuse Post Standard – Oct. 30, 1960
By: Margaret McManus
NEW YORK – Danny Kaye makes his first TV appearance as an entertainer on his own
hour-
Kaye’s wife, Sylvia Fine, is the producer of the show, the first time she has ever
accepted an official producer credit line for the creative work she does for her
husband. Norman Jewison is the director and Louis Armstrong is the only guest on
the essentially one-
The last time I talked with Danny Kaye, it was just before his only previous television
appearance, on Ed Murrow’s “See It Now,” which reported Kaye’s adventure abroad as
an ambassador for UNICEF. [Click Here to read her previous article. -
At that time, almost four years ago, Kaye was sitting on the sofa in the living room
of this suite at the Sherry-
He said it’s a lot of baloney about his being a stubborn hold out against television.
“It just never worked out before,” he said. “I never said I wasn’t ever going to
do any television. I only said I wasn’t in a hurry. I figured I’d be around awhile,
and television will be around even longer. There was no mystical decision about this.
When it came up before, I always had a movie or a show to do, and I didn’t want to
squeeze in television and do it half-
It could be that the price was right. Although Kaye will not say how much money he is getting bar show, he has signed an exclusive contract with General Motors to do one show a year for them, for three years. It is reliably reported that the sponsor has been most generous.
“I think I picked a nice little company to go with,” said Kaye. “We can grow together.”
He is an enigmatic man, tall, blond, blue-
The way things worked out, I took my seven-
He said to her. “That’s because I was only on television once before, but you should have seen me. On that show I was entertaining children all over the world.”
“I should have seen it,” said Mary, sagely, agreeably. “You must have been on too late for me, or maybe I was out.”
Because I had told her that Kaye was especially skillful at making faces for children, Mary whispered to me to ask him to make a face. I relayed the message.
“I’ll make a face for you, Mary,” said Kaye, “but only if you ask me yourself. You might as well learn early that if you want something, you have to ask for it yourself. Nobody else can ask for you.”
Kaye and his wife Miss Fine have a daughter, Dena, 13½, for whom they have one ambition.
“I don’t care what profession she chooses,” said Kaye, “as long as she grows up to be a whole human being. I’m in a wonderful mindset. It’s one I’m suited to. I’m in it because when I was a kid, it was the best means I had at my command to express myself. There is nothing in the world I’d rather do. I have no regrets.”
He leaned back on the sofa and half closed his eyes.
“If I get tired of my work, and I frequently do, I take off a few months and loaf. I come back with renewed interest and vigor and excitement. I have to enjoy what I’m doing or I don’t do it well. […unintelligible…] and I are very good friends. I do not find it necessary to be in constant motion nor to work twelve months of every year. I do not expend energy foolishly, but I can always summon whatever energy I need, when I need it.”
Kaye, who was born in Brooklyn, made his first Broadway success in “Lady in the Dark.” He then starred in such movies as “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” and “Hans Christian Andersen.”
After tonight’s television show, he plans to begin work on another movie, but he won’t do another television show until 1961.
Some of the lads who slave over a television show every week, or even once a month,
must have slightly savage feelings toward this man who makes his debut tonight as
a once-
How he has managed such an enviable arrangement would be difficult to explain. I’m sure it wasn’t easy. But then, who can explain the […unintelligible…] talents of Danny Kaye. As a performer and as a person, he is a […unintelligible…] unto himself. There is only the original […unintelligible…]