"HOORAY FOR HOLLYWOOD" (1937)

On February 22, 2009, the 81st Academy Award Ceremony will be held at the Kodak Theater, built on the site where the Hollywood Hotel used to stand. That hotel was the setting for the Warner Brothers film Hollywood Hotel, which introduced "Hooray for Hollywood," the song that became the motion picture industry’s anthem and is a staple of every award ceremony soundtrack.

Richard Whiting composed the music and Johnny Mercer wrote the lyrics for "Hooray for Hollywood." Warner Brothers paired Whiting, who had extensive film score experience, with Mercer, a relative newcomer to Hollywood. Whiting served as a father figure and mentor for Mercer, helping him to negotiate the Hollywood studio system, and they worked together on five films. They were able to work side by side at the piano while composing, a working relationship that was unusual for Mercer. Usually he would take the composer’s melody and work on it by himself. Philip Furia and William Lasser, in their book America’s Songs, describe the importance of this close collaboration, "Such rapport between Mercer and Whiting was critical when the studio told them to write a march for Hollywood Hotel, which featured Benny Goodman’s band in parade. At first, Mercer matched Whiting’s tricky opening phrase with a dummy title, "Piece of ma-ter-i-al!" but then he struck upon another phrase for those percussive six notes: "Hooray for Hollywood."

Gene Lees, in his book A Portrait of Johnny, quotes Mercer himself about his reaction to Tinseltown, "Everybody was young and vital and interested in their work. Talented people from all walks of life and from every nation in the world, all there to get the gold at the end of the rainbow and the fame spilling off the silver screen – there for the taking, only needing a beautiful or funny face, a parlor trick, or a sexy body to catapult its owner to riches and notoriety." Lees then writes, "If Johnny was himself perennially starstruck – he wrote those observations when he was more than sixty years old – he was also skeptical of the sham and shabbiness of the movie industry, the unabashed mendacity of the great dream machine by the Pacific." Mercer had begun to enjoy some success in writing for Hollywood films, but he had had a difficult start and some hard feelings lingered that can be detected in the sardonic lyrics he wrote for "Hooray for Hollywood." Furia and Lasser comment on his motivation for writing the lyrics, "The song has become a show business anthem, but an anthem with its tongue planted firmly in its cheek. Drawing on his bitter experiences trying to establish himself in pictures, Mercer said, "Hollywood seemed to me like a big put-on and I just tried to make a little fun of it." The target of the lyric’s ironic bite is the hype that says "you’re terrific if you’re even good."

"Hollywood Hotel" debuted in New York City in January 1938, a few days before the Benny Goodman Orchestra’s landmark concert at Carnegie Hall. The New York Times movie critic, Frank Nugent, had this to say about the film: "Taking our courage by the scruff of the neck, we went to the Strand yesterday to see "Hollywood Hotel," a perspiringly energetic Warner musical with Dick Powell, Benny Goodman, Louella Parsons (who never looked lovelier) and other strange cinema co-workers. We left sure of one thing, our sanity not necessarily excepted: it is that, next to Mr. Goodman's swing band, the noisiest thing in the world is an audience of Goodman admirers. Since the maestro is going to give a recital at Carnegie Hall this Sunday, we feel the management should be informed and advised to take whatever cover is available." He went on to say, "For it is, if we can still trust our ears, about the loudest musical show on record, a thing of decibels and splashes—but for all that, a fairly good entertainment which probably deserves being called the best Warner musical in recent history." Reportedly, the rapturous reception of the film by his fans played a role in convincing Goodman to go ahead with the Carnegie Hall concert. By now, the film chiefly is remembered for introducing "Hooray for Hollywood;" however, the song’s enduring fame comes from its use in award ceremonies and newsreels.

"Hooray for Hollywood" was not intended to be a song for the ages. Mercer used contemporary cultural references in the lyrics, including Sally Rand’s fan dancing, Max Factor’s cosmetics, and the current slang of pan for face and roto for rotogravure – the term used for the separate photography section of newspapers. He had fun dropping then familiar names, like evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson, child star Shirley Temple and film heart throb Tyrone Power. The original lyrics included the line, "And any shop girl can be a top girl if she pleases the tired businessman" that was quickly exchanged for "And any barmaid can be a star maid if she dances with or without a fan." The song lyrics listed below, with the exception of the above change, are Mercer’s original lyrics. In Doris Day’s 1958 recording, she replaced "Where anyone at all from Shirley Temple to Aimee Semple" with the more contemporaneous "Where anyone at all from TV's Lassie to Monroe's chassis," and singers to this day continue to update and parody the lyrics.

Although Whiting and Mercer could make fun of Hollywood in song, it still was a harsh place in which to work and the Warner Brothers studio had a reputation for being the roughest. Whiting, a gentle and sensitive man who suffered from cardiac problems, found it especially difficult. In February of 1938, while he and Mercer were working on another film score, he had a cardiac arrest and died at the age of 46. The loss was devastating to Mercer. He said of Whiting, "He tried to steer me right. He...tried to initiate me into the studio mystique, which he had lived through so successfully at Fox and Paramount. That mystique consisted of smiling at the right people, staying away from certain starlets, playing politics, being at the right place at the right time to get the good assignments, and generally being aware of how to get along with your fellow workers, and especially the producers, the powers of the lot."

Mitzi Gaynor, an actress best known for her starring role in South Pacific, a frequent performer at Academy Award ceremonies, and a good friend of Johnny Mercer, has the last words on the song, taken from an article by Geoff Boucher, staff writer for the Los Angeles Times: "That song, it became the sound of Hollywood, or what people thought was Hollywood." She calls the song a "time capsule with a catchy tune," and with a sad voice she pines for the era it celebrated — even if "it made fun of it too."

"HOORAY FOR HOLLYWOOD"
(Johnny Mercer / Richard Whiting)

Hooray for Hollywood,
that screwy
ballyhooey
Hollywood,
where any office boy or young mechanic
can be a panic
with just a good looking pan, (pan = face)
and any barmaid can be a star maid
if she dances with or without a fan. (refers to fan dancer Sally Rand)

Hooray for Hollywood,
where you're terrific
if you're even good,
where anyone at all from Shirley Temple (child star of 1930s)
to Aimee Semple (Aimee Semple McPherson, evangelist)
is equally understood.
Go out and try your luck-
you might be Donald Duck.
Hooray for Hollywood!

Hooray for Hollywood,
that phoney
super-Coney
Hollywood,
they come from Chillicothes and Padukahs
with their bazookas
to get their names up in lights,
all armed with photos from local rotos (rotos = rotogravures)
with their hair in ribbon and legs in tights.

Hooray for Hollywood,
you may be homely in your neighbourhood,
but if you think that you can be an actor, see Mr. Factor, (cosmetic king Max Factor)
he'll make a monkey look good.
Within a half an hour
you'll look like Tyrone Power. (handsome action film star)
Hooray for Hollywood!

Hooray for Hollywood!