Liberace

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Wladziu Valentino Liberace (1919-February 4, 1987) was an American pianist, singer, and actress.

Liberace, a boy of Italian and Polish descent, enjoyed a career spanning four decades, recordings, television, motion pictures, and endorsements.

Liberace was the world's highest-paid entertainer, from the 1950s to the 1970s, with established concert residencies in Las Vegas and an international touring schedule.

Liberace adopted a life of flamboyant excess both on and off stage, earning the nickname "Mr.

"Showmanship" is the product of "showmanship."

Early life and education

On May 16, 1919, W.Adziu Valentino Liberace (also known as "Lee" to his family and "Walter" to his families) was born in West Allis, Wisconsin. Salvatore ("Sam") Liberace (1885-1977), his father, an immigrant from Formia, was a student in central Italy's Lazio region. Frances Zuchowski (1892–1980), his mother, was born in Menasha, Wisconsin, of Polish descent. Liberace had an identical twin who died at birth. George (who was a violinist), a sister Angelina, and younger brother Rudy (Rudolph Valentino Liberace) were among his three living siblings who were named after the actor's mother's concern for show business.

The father of Liberace sang of the French horn in bands and cinemas but he often worked as a factory worker or labourer. Although Sam promoted music in his household and Frances (despite being a concert pianist before his marriage), he considered music lessons and a record player to be unaffordable luxury items. This caused family rifts. "My dad's passion and admiration for music instilled in him a deep desire to share as his legacy to the world," Liberace later described.

Liberace started playing piano at the age of four. Sam took his children to concerts to expose them to music, but he was also a taskmaster who demanded high quality from the children in both practice and performance. Liberace's prodigious abilities were evident right from his youth. He was able to recall difficult information by the age of seven. He investigated Ignacy Jan Paderewski's technique. He actually met Paderewski backstage after a concert at the Pabst Theatre in Milwaukee at the age of eight. Liberace continued, "I was intoxicated by the excitement I gained from the great virtuoso's playing." "I was bursting with dreams of following his footsteps." "I was inspired and ignited with hope, I began to practice with a fervour that made my previous participation in the piano seem like torture." Paderewski later became a family friend as well as Liberace's mentor, to whom the protege never failed to give their respects.

The Liberace family was very poor financially. Liberace suffered with a speech disorder as an infant, and as a young boy, who mocked him for his indeterminate demeanor, his absorption of sports, and his obsession with cooking and the piano, he suffered. Liberace concentrated on his piano playing with the support of music instructor Florence Kelly, who oversaw Liberace's musical development for ten years. He gained experience in theaters, on local radio, dancing lessons, for clubs, and for weddings.

He began playing jazz piano with "The Mixers" in 1934 and later with other groups. Liberace has appeared in cabarets and strip clubs as well. Even though Sam and Frances did not approve, their son was still earning a living during difficult times. Liberace used the stage name "Walter Busterkeys" for a while. He also showed an interest in draftsmanship, architecture, and painting, and eventually became a fastidious dresser and fashion follower. By this time, he was already converting eccentricities into attention-getting techniques and gained a following at school, despite others' dismissal of him.

Personal life

Liberace was a political and religious conservative. He believed in capitalism for a long time, but he was also fascinated with feudalism, wedding, and luxury. He loved to socialize and was captivated by the wealthy and famous. However, he still introduced himself to his followers as one of them, a Midwesterner who had earned his fortune by hard work and invited them to enjoy it with him.

Liberace expend lavishly on his life and his art in the later years of his life, gaining sudden wealth. He designed and built his first celebrity home in Sherman Oaks, California, which is located in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles. The house had a piano theme throughout, as well as a piano-shaped swimming pool, which remains today. His dream home, with its luxurious furniture, elaborate bath, and antiques, contributed to his image. He earned his fame through hundreds of promotional relationships with banks, insurance companies, restaurants, and even morticians. Liberace, a veteran pitchman, was relying on the help of his vast audience of housewives. Sponsors gifted him free tuna fish, including his white Cadillac limousine, and he responded enthusiastically: "I believe in tuna fish" if I am selling tuna fish."

Others chastised his flashy yet efficient piano playing, his non-stop promotions, and his gaudy display of triumph. He remained undeterred, even sending a letter to a critic, "Thank you for your amusing study." After reading it, my brother George and I chuckled all the way to the bank." He responded with skepticism to subsequent poor reviews, in particular changing it to "I cried all the way to the bank." Liberace retold the anecdote to Johnny Carson in a appearance on The Tonight Show many years ago, and concluded by saying, "I don't cry all the way to the bank any more."

Liberace's fame in the United States was unmatched in the United Kingdom for a time. Liberace was described as "the pinnacle of masculinity, feminine, and neuter," according to columnist Cassandra (William Connor). Everything that he, she, and it will ever need is a smiling, sniggering, twinning, liggling, fruit-flavoured, mincing, ice-covered heap of mother love, according to a description that explicitly stated that he is homosexual.

"What you said hurts me greatly," Liberace sent a telegram. "I cried all the way to the bank." He sued the newspaper for libel, while testifying in a London court that he was not homosexual and that he had never been involved in homosexual acts. Gilbert Beyfus, QC, 75-year-old Gilbert Beyfus, QC, was represented in court by one of the period's greatest barristers, delivering him in court. They were successful partly because Connor's use of the word "fruit-flavoured" in the derogatory term "fruit-flavoured." The case was partly dependent on whether Connor knew that 'fruit' meant that an individual is a homosexual. A jury found Liberace's favour on June 16, 1959, worth about £198,000 or $208,200 today), prompting Liberace to repeat the catch to reporters. Liberace's popularization of the word inspired the word Crying All the Way to the Bank for a detailed account of the trial based on transcripts, court documents, and interviews by former Daily Mirror journalist Revel Barker.

Liberace commenced and settled a related lawsuit in the United States against Confidential. Liberace was homosexual throughout his career, which he continued to deny vehemently. "Why Liberace's Theme Song Should Be "Mad About the Boy," a common theme of Confidential in 1957.

After being dismissed by Liberace by 1991, Scott Thorson, Liberace's 22-year-old former chauffeur and suspected live-in lover of five years, filed a $113 million lawsuit against the pianist. Liberace denied that he was gay, and during depositions in 1984, he maintained that Thorson was never his lover. The case was settled out of court in 1986, with Thorson winning a $75,000 cash settlement, more three cars, and three pet dogs worth another $20,000. Thorson said after Liberace's death that he decided because he knew that Liberace was dying and that he had planned to sue based on property rather than palimony. Liberace later admitted that he was a "boring guy" in his private life and that he liked to spend his spare time cooking, baking, and playing with his dogs, and that he never played the piano outside of his public performances. "He (Liberace) had several decorated, ornamental pianos in his various rooms of his house, but never participated," Thorson said.

Liberace's official declaration that he was gay was muddled by tales of his friendships and intimate interests with women. In essays such as "Mature Women Are the Most Popular: Aristo The Real Woman He'd Marry" reveal his sexuality.

In a 2011 interview, actress and close friend Betty White confirmed that Liberace was indeed gay and that his managers often used her as a "beard" to debunk societal rumors of the musician's homosexuality.

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Career

Liberace was praised for his "flair and showmanship" as a participant in a formal classical music competition in 1937. Liberace performed his first requested encore, the famous comedy song "Three Little Fishies," at the end of a traditional classical concert in La Crosse in 1939. He later claimed that he performed the most popular song of many classical composers. On January 15, 1940, the 20-year-old performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Hans Lange, performing Liszt's Second Piano Concerto, which attracted mainly critical praise. He also toured in the Midwest.

Liberace went from pure classical show and revived his act to one featuring "pop with a dash of classics," or "classical music with the boring parts left out" between 1942 and 1944. He struggled in New York City in the early 1940s, but by the mid-1940s, he was playing in night clubs in major cities around the country and "gained national recognition through his appearance contracts with the Statler and Radisson hotel chains," effectively ending classical music altogether. He went from a classical pianist to an entertainer and showman, unpredictably and whimsically mixing the serious with light fare, as shown by Chopin with "Home on the Range."

For a time, he performed piano alongside a phonograph on stage. The gimmick helped him pique his interest. He also participated in audience participation: taking orders, consulting with the patrons, making jokes, and giving lessons to selected audience members. He also began to pay more attention to such things as staging, lighting, and presentation. Liberace's desire to engage directly with his followers was primarily responsible for the change to entertainer, and secondarily due to the tough competition in the classical piano world.

He began to appear in Soundies in 1943 (the 1940s precursor to music videos). He reconstructed two flashy numbers from his nightclub appearance, the standards "Tiger Rag" and "Twelfth Street Rag" were reimagined. Walter Liberace was billed as Walter Liberace in these films. Both "Soundies" were later released by Castle Films in the homemovie market. He appeared in Las Vegas, which later became his first performance.

He was playing at the best clubs, with Variety announcing that "Liberace looks like a cross between Cary Grant and Robert Alda." In the dazzlingly lit, well-presented, showmanly routine, he has a pleasant demeanor, attractive hands that he spotlights properly, and withal, he rings the bell. He should snowball into a box office," he says. The Chicago Times was similarly impressed: "He made like Chopin for a minute and then turns to a Chico Marx bit the next."

Liberace continued to refine his act during this period. He designed the candelabrum as his trademark, influenced by a similar prop in Chopin's biography A Song to Remember (1945). He used "Liberace" as his stage name, making a point in press releases that it was pronounced "Liber-Ah-chee." For increased visibility in large halls, he wore white tie and tails. Liberace played for private parties, including those at the Park Avenue home of billionaire oilman J. Paul Getty, in lieu of clubs and occasional work as an accompanist and rehearsal pianist. By 1947, he was billed as "Liberace," the "most surprising piano virtuoso of the present day."

He wanted to have a piano to match his increasing fame, so he bought a rare, massive, gold-leafed Blüthner Grand, which he praised in his press kit as a "priceless piano." Later, he performed with a variety of luxurious, custom-decorated pianos, some of which were encrusted with rhinestones and mirrors, according to the composer. In 1947, he moved to North Hollywood, where he appeared at local clubs such as Ciro's and The Mocambo, including Rosalind Russell, Clark Gable, Gloria Swanson, and Shirley Temple. He didn't always play to packed audiences, and he learned to perform with more enthusiasm to younger audiences in order to maintain his own enthusiasm.

Liberace invented a publicity machine that made him a success. Despite his fame in the supper club circuit, where he was often an intermission act, his aim was to reach more people as a headliner and a television, film, and recording artist. Liberace started to perform more, with more costumes and a larger supporting cast. His massive Las Vegas show became his signature, extending his fan base and making him wealthy.

His 1954 appearance at Madison Square Garden (equivalent to $13,390,000 in 2021) for one show was more profitable than his idol Paderewski's record set 20 years ago. In The Chordettes 1954 No. 2, he was identified as a sex symbol. "Mr. Sandman" is the first hit on the 1st. He was earning $50,000 per week at the Riviera Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas and had over 200 official fan clubs with a quarter of a million members by 1955. He was making more than $1 million a year from public appearances and millions from television. Liberace was often covered by major publications, and he rose to fame as the butt of jokes aimed at comedians and the public.

Liberace appeared on the television quiz show You Bet Your Life hosted by Groucho Marx on March 8, 1956.

His piano playing was generally critical of by music critics. "Liberace's music must be served with all the available tricks," Lewis Funke said after the Carnegie Hall concert, as loud as possible, as soft as possible, and as sentimental as possible." It's almost all showmanship topped by whipped cream and cherries." And perhaps more troubling, according to said commentators, was the apparent lack of respect and fidelity to the great composers. "Liberace recreates—if that is the word—each composition in his own image." When it's too difficult, he simplifies it. When it is too simple, he complicates it." They described him as "sloppy technique" that included "lackness, wrong time, distorted phrasing, a lack of clarity, and sentimentality, as a failure to adhere to what the composer had written."

"I don't give concerts, I put on a show," Liberace once said. Liberace's performances ended with the public being encouraged on stage to touch his clothes, piano, necklace, and hands, unlike classical pianists' which normally concluded with applause and a bow offstage. Kisses, handshakes, hugging, and caresses were usually followed. Near the end of Liberace's life, a critic summed up his appeal: "Mr. Showmanship has another more potent, drawing more attention to his performance: the warm and beautiful way he treats his audience. Liberace exudes a love that has been returned to him a thousandfold, despite the glitz, the corny false modesty, and the shy smile.

Liberace largely skipped radio before trying to work on television, fearing that radio was unsuitable given his act's reliance on the visual. Despite his excitement about television, Liberace was dissatisfied with his early guest appearances on CBS' The Kate Smith Show and DuMont's Cavalcade of Stars, with Jackie Gleason (later The Jackie Gleason Show on CBS). Liberace was particularly dissatisfied with the frenzic camera work and his short appearance time. He wanted his own show where he could control his appearance as well as his club shows.

His first show on local television in Los Angeles was a huge success, receiving the most viewers of any local program, which he parlayed into a sold-out appearance at the Hollywood Bowl. That culminated in Dinah Shore's summer replacement service.

The Liberace Show, a 15-minute television show, premiered on July 1, 1952, but it did not lead to a regular television series. Rather, producer Duke Goldstone produced a filmed version of Liberace's local show which attracted a large audience for syndication in 1953 and sold it to scores of local radio stations. The pianist's increasing fame and success made him more popular and wealthy than ever. His first two years as a television celebrity earned him $7 million and on future reruns, he made up to 80% of the money.

Liberace learned early on how to bring "schmaltz" to his television show and to please the mass audience by joking and chatting to the camera as if in the viewer's own living room. To spark artistic interest, he used dramatic lighting, split photos, costume changes, and exaggerated hand movements. His television appearances were full of enthusiasm and humour.

Liberace also employed "ritual domesticity," a term used by such early TV stars as Jack Benny and Lucille Ball. George often appeared as a guest violinist and orchestra conductor, and his mother was usually in the front row of the performance, with brother Rudy and sister Angelina often mentioning a "family" aura. Liberace premiered in the same way, later mixed production numbers with chat, and then announced "I'll Be Seeing You" at each broadcast. His musical selections included classics, show tunes, film melodies, Latin rhythms, ethnic songs, and boogie-woogie.

Since the show attracted such a large female television audience, he drew over 30 million viewers at any one time and got 10,000 fan letters per week. His program was also one of the first to be shown on British commercial television in the 1950s, where it was also shown on Sunday afternoons by Lew Grade's Associated Television. Liberace gained a dedicated following in the United Kingdom thanks to this exposure. He was also found appealing by a gay man. "Liberace was the first gay person Elton John had ever seen on television," says author Darden Asbury Pyron; he became his hero."

Liberace was playing well in Havana, Cuba, in 1956. Later this year, he returned to Europe for a tour. Liberace, a devout Catholic, considered Pope Pius XII his highlight of his life. Liberace appeared at the London Palladium in 1960 with Nat King Cole and Sammy Davis Jr. (this was the first televised "command performance" for Queen Elizabeth II).

Two masked intruders assaulted his mother in the garage of Liberace's home in Sherman Oaks on July 19, 1957, just hours after Liberace's deposition in Confidential magazine. She was beaten and kicked, but her strong corset may have prevented her from being seriously injured. Liberace was unaware of the assault until he had ended his midnight performance at Moulin Rouge's nightclub. Guards were sent to guard Liberace's house and the houses of his two brothers.

Despite successful European tours, his career had actually been dormant since 1957, but Liberace revived it by appealing directly to his fan base. He began to regain attention through live appearances in small-town supper clubs, as well as television and commercial appearances. He died of kidney failure in a Pittsburgh dressing room on November 22, 1963, owing to accidentally inhaling excessive amounts of dry cleaning fumes from his recently cleaned costumes. He later said that the only thing that saved him from more injury was being awakened by his entourage to the news that John F. Kennedy had been assassinated. He began to invest his entire fortune by buying luxurious furs, jewelry, and even a house for friends, but then recovered after a month.

Liberace, re-energized, returned to Las Vegas, upping the glamor and glitz, he took on the sobriquet "Mr. Showmanship." "I'm a one-man Disneyland" as his show swelled with spectacle, he proclaimed "I'm a one-man Disneyland." The costumes became more elaborate (ostrich feathers, mink, capes, and huge rings), entrances and exits became more elaborate (depending on choir girls, cars, and animals), and stunts became more popular, with child performers including Australian singer Jamie Redfern and Canadian banjo player Scotty Plummer. Barbra Streisand was the most well-known new adult act he introduced, appearing alongside him early in her career.

Liberace's passions and commercial aspirations led him in many directions. He owned an antiques store in Beverly Hills, California, and a restaurant in Las Vegas for many years. He has also published cookbooks, the most popular of which being Liberace Cooks, which contained "Liberace Lasagna" and "Liberace Sticky Buns," among others. "From his seven dining rooms" (of his Hollywood home), the book includes recipes.

Liberace's live shows during the 1970s and 1980s were major box-office attractions at the Las Vegas Hilton and Lake Tahoe, where he earned $300,000 a week.

Liberace defeated Irish actor Richard Harris for the purchase of the Tower House in Holland Park, west London, in 1970. Harris eventually bought the house after discovering that Liberace had agreed to purchase it but that no one had paid the deposit yet. Danny La Rue, a British entertainer, enjoyed The Tower House with Liberace and later shared a paranormal encounter with him in his autobiography.

Liberace also appeared on other television programs, including The Ed Sullivan Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford, Edward R. Murrow's Person to Person, and Jack Benny and Red Skelton's Showing on which he often parodied his own persona. In 1958, a new Liberace Show premiered on ABC's daytime schedule, starring a less flamboyant, less glamorous persona, but it didn't last in six months as his fame began to decline.

Liberace was inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1960 for his contributions to the television industry. He continued to appear on television as a regular and welcome guest on The Tonight Show with Jack Paar in the 1960s, including memorable interactions with Zsa Gabor and Muhammad Ali, as well as Johnny Carson.

He was also Red Skelton's 1969 CBS summer replacement with his own variety hour taped in London. This project was co-produced by Skelton and Lew Grade's production companies. He appeared in a cameo on The Monkees as himself, shaming a grand piano with a sledgehammer as Mike Nesmith marched on and crept in mock agony.

Liberace appeared in two Batman television series "The Devil's Fingers" and "The Dead Ringers" as both written by Lorenzo Semple Jr., who developed Batman for television. According to Joel Eisner's The Official Batman Batbook, the highest-rated of all the show's episodes, the episodes of this two-part story were among the show's episodes.

His subsequent television appearances included episodes of Here's Lucy (1970), Kojak, and The Muppet Show (both 1978). He performed "Concerto for the Birds," "Misty," "Five Foot Two," and a version of "Chopsticks" in the last of these shows. In 1978-79, television specials were produced from Liberace's performance at the Las Vegas Hilton, which were broadcast on CBS.

He appeared on television shows like Saturday Night Live (on a 10th season episode hosted by Hulk Hogan and Mr. T) and 1984's Special People. In 1985, he appeared as the guest timekeeper for the main event at the first WrestleMania.

Liberace wanted to add acting to his list of accomplishments even before his arrival in Hollywood in 1947. His exposure to the Hollywood audience through his club appearances culminated in his first film appearance in Universal's South Sea Sinner (1950), a tropical island drama starring MacDonald Carey and Shelley Winters, in which he was billed as "a Hoagy Carmichael type of character with long hair" in which he appeared in 19th Century's South Sea Sinner (1950), a tropical island drama starring MacDonald Carey Liberace has appeared in two RKO Radio Pictures compilation features as a guest star. Footlight Varieties (1951) is an imitation-vaudeville hour and a little-known sequel, Merry Mirthquakes (1953), portrayed Liberace as the master of ceremonies.

Liberace was at the peak of his career when tapped by Warner Bros. for his first film film, Sincerely Yours (1955), a remake of The Man Who Played God (1932), as a concert pianist who shifts his attention away from helping others when his career is cut short by deafness. Doris Day was most often listed as Liberace's leading lady in April 1955, but Modern Screen magazine said it is unlikely that Doris Day would appear. Liberace's name alone will sell theatres, and charitable Liberace wants to give a newcomer a break." (Joanne Dru, a well-known film actress, was the leading lady). Sincerely Yours was introduced in November, the department undertook Liberace's name in a massive, eccentric, building-block letters above and much wider than the name. "Yours in his first starring motion picture!" It was a tag line. At the bottom of the table, the other participants and workers were marginalized. Liberace was unable to convert his eccentric on-stage persona to that of a film leading man, resulting in a critical and commercial failure. "Liberace, Joanne Dru, Dorothy Malone," Warner quickly posted a pressbook ad supplement with new "Starting" billing below the title in plain letters. Robert Osborne recalls a more dramatic demotion: Sincerely Yours made his first run at the Orpheum in Seattle, the billing was updated even more: Joanne Dru, Dorothy Malone, and Alex Nicol were able to read both names above and below the title: "With Liberace at the piano." Sincerely Yours was supposed to be the first of a two-picture movie deal, but it was a huge box-office flop. The studio then bought back the film, effectively paying Liberace not to produce a second movie.

Liberace was so shaken that he had little interest in his film aspirations. He made two more big-screen appearances, but only in cameo roles. These were before the Boys Meet the Girls (1965), starring Connie Francis, where Liberace effectively played himself. In The Loved One (1965), based on Evelyn Waugh's satire of the funeral industry and film industry in Southern California, he earned kudos for his brief appearance as a casket salesman.

Liberace's syndicated television show was the key catalyst for his record sales. He appeared on ten discs from 1947 to 1951. It soared to nearly 70 percent by 1954. He released many albums on Columbia Records, including Liberace by Candlelight (later on Dot and via direct television advertising), and there have been over 400,000 albums by 1954. "Ave Maria" was his most popular single, selling over 300,000 copies. His theme song was "I'll Be Seeing You," which he'd rather perform on than playing on any of his various pianos.

His albums featured pop hits of the time, such as "Hello, Dolly! "They included his interpretations of the classical piano repertoire, including Chopin and Liszt, but many classical music enthusiasts, as well as Liberace's abilities as a pianist in general, have sluggish fluff with minimal musicianship." He set six gold records in his life.

Liberace's last stage appearance at Radio City Music Hall in New York on November 2, 1986; it was his 18th appearance in 18 days after a tour of 21 days (starting October 16) and the concert series's grossing total number exceeded $2.5 million at the theater box office. His last television appearance on Christmas Day on The Oprah Winfrey Show that year was actually shot in Chicago less than a month ago.

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