Biography

Producer, director, composer, songwriter and composer; Earl Carroll was part Billy Rose, a little Busby Berkeley and part Mike Todd. He was a staff writer for a New York publishing company between 1912 and 1917, then served in the US Army Air Force during World War I. He produced and directed the Broadway musicals "Earl Carroll Vanities" (11 editions), "Earl Carroll Sketch Book" (two editions), "Murder at the Vanities" (for which he was co-librettist), and the infamous $350,000 flop, "Fioretta" (for which he was the librettist). He built two Earl Carroll Theatres in New York, in 1923 and 1931, and also the lavish Earl Carroll Restaurant in Hollywood in 1939. He produced films, and wrote he Broadway stage scores for "So Long, Letty", "Canary Cottage", "The Love Mill" (also librettist), and "Earl Carroll Vanities" in 1923 and 1924. He was a charter member of ASCAP in 1914, and composed the popular songs "Isle d'Amour", "So Long, Letty", "One Look at You", "Dreams of Long Ago", "Give Me All of You", "While We Dance", "Just The Way You Are", "I Never Knew" and "Dreaming".