Jimmy Durante
Actor
Biography
Comedian, composer, actor, singer and songwriter ("Inka Dinka Doo") Jimmy Durante was educated in New York public schools. He began his career as a Coney Island pianist, and organized a five-piece band in 1916. He opened the Club Durant with Eddie Jackson and Lou Clayton, with whom he later formed a comedy trio for vaudeville and on television. He appeared in the Broadway musicals "Show Girl", "The New Yorkers", "Strike Me Pink", "Jumbo", "Red Hot and Blue", and "Stars in Your Eyes". By 1936, he had appeared at the Palladium in London. Later he had his own radio and television shows, and was a featured headliner in night clubs. Biographer Gene Fowler wrote his biography, "Schnozzola". Joining ASCAP in 1941, he collaborated musically with Jackie Barnett and Ben Ryan, and his other popular song compositions include "I'm Jimmy That Well-Dressed Man", "I Know Darn Well I Can Do Without Broadway", "I Ups to Him and He Ups to Me", "Daddy Your Mamma Is Lonesome For You", "Umbriago", "Any State In the Forty-Eight", "Chidabee Chidabee Chidabee", and "I'm Jimmy's Girl".
Filmography
Frosty the Snowman
as Narrator (voice) 1969
The Man Who Came to Dinner
as Banjo 1941
That's Entertainment!
as (archive footage) 1974
Pepe
as Jimmy Durante 1960
That's Entertainment, Part II
as (archive footage) 1976
That's Entertainment! III
as (archive footage) 1994
The Last Judgment
as The man with the large nose 1961
The Great Rupert
as Mr. Louie Amendola 1950
Speak Easily
as James 1932
Billy Rose's Jumbo
as Anthony ('Pop') Wonder 1962
It Happened in Brooklyn
as Nick Lombardi 1947
The Movie Orgy
as Self (archive footage) 1968
On an Island with You
as Buckley 1948
Little Miss Broadway
as Jimmy Clayton 1938
Hell Below
as Ptomaine' - Ships Cook 1933
Hollywood Party
as Jimmy Durante 1934