Everything about Phil Silvers totally explained
Phil Silvers (
May 11,
1911 –
November 1,
1985) was an American entertainer and
comedy actor.
His best-known work is
The Phil Silvers Show, a 1950s
sitcom set on a
US Army post in which he played Sergeant Bilko; the show was also often referred to by this name. The show's chief writer,
Nat Hiken, was TV's first writer-producer, and Hiken helped set a high comic tone for the show through his inventive plots and snappy comedic
repartee for the characters.
Biography
Born
Philip Silversmith in
Brooklyn,
New York, Silvers was the youngest of eight children in a
Russian
Jewish family. His father was one of the workers on the early New York skyscrapers. Silvers started entertaining at age 11, when he'd sing in theaters when the projector broke down (a common occurrence in those days). Two years later, he left school to sing professionally, before appearing in vaudeville as a stooge.
Silvers then landed work in short films for the
Vitaphone studio, burlesque houses, and on
Broadway, where he made his debut in the short-lived show
Yokel Boy. The critics raved about Silvers, who was hailed as the bright spot in the mediocre play. He then wrote the revue
High Kickers, until he went to
Hollywood to star in films.
He made his film debut in
Hit Parade of 1941 (1940) (his previous appearance as a pitch man in
Strike Up the Band was cut). Over the next two decades, he appeared in character roles for
MGM,
Columbia, and
20th Century Fox, in such films as
Lady Be Good,
Coney Island,
Cover Girl, and
Summer Stock. When the studio system started collapsing, he returned to the stage.
Silvers wrote the lyrics for
Frank Sinatra's "
Nancy (With the Laughing Face)". Although, he wasn't a songwriter he wrote the lyrics on a whim while visiting Sinatra's home with composer
Jimmy Van Heusen. The song became a popular hit in
1944 and was a staple in Sinatra's live performances.
Silvers scored a major triumph in
Top Banana, a Broadway show of 1952. Silvers played Jerry Biffle, the egocentric, always-busy star of a major television show. (The character is said to have been based on
Milton Berle.) Silvers dominated the show and won a
Tony Award for his performance. He repeated the role in a 1954 film version that was originally released in 3-D.
Silvers became a household name in 1955 when he starred as Sergeant Ernest G. Bilko in
The Phil Silvers Show. The military comedy became a huge television hit, with the opportunistic Bilko fast-talking his way through one obstacle after another. Most episodes of the series were filmed in
New York. The series ceased production in 1959, not due to any decline but because of high production costs (the show had a huge ensemble cast; see the Wikipedia entry for
The Phil Silvers Show).
Throughout the 1960s he appeared internationally in films. such as
It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and
40 Pounds of Trouble. He was featured in
Marilyn Monroe's last film, the unfinished
Something's Got to Give. In 1967 he starred as a guest in one of the famed
British Carry On films,
Follow That Camel, a
Foreign Legion spoof in which he played a variation of the "Sergeant Bilko" character. Producer
Peter Rogers employed him to ensure the
Carry On films' success in
America. His salary was £30,000, the largest
Carry On salary ever, only later met by the appearance of
Elke Sommer in
Carry On Behind. Silvers's presence didn't ensure the film's success on either side of the Atlantic.
Silvers was offered the leading role of conniving Roman slave Pseudolus in the Broadway musical comedy
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. Silvers declined, and the role went instead to
Zero Mostel, who was so successful in the role that he repeated the role in the 1966 film version. By this time Silvers realized his error, and agreed to appear in the film as a secondary character, flesh merchant Marcus Lycus. When actor-producer
Larry Blyden mounted a Broadway revival of
Forum in 1972, he wanted Phil Silvers to play the lead, and this time Silvers agreed. The revival was a big hit.
Silvers also guested on
The Beverly Hillbillies, and various TV variety shows such as
The Carol Burnett Show,
Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, and
The Dean Martin Show. Perhaps Silvers' most memorable guest appearance was as curmudgeonly Hollywood producer Harold Hecuba in an episode (titled "
The Producer") of
Gilligan's Island (Silvers's production company Gladasya - named after his catchphrase "Gladdaseeya!" - financed the show).
Silvers was very ill in the last few years of his life, even though he continued work into the early 1980s in film and TV, including a cameo appearance on
Happy Days as the father of "Jenny Piccolo" (played by his real-life daughter
Cathy Silvers). This was a thrill for Silvers, who was by all accounts a devoted, if absent, father; his ex-wife, Evelyn Silvers, wrote that Phil secretly fought his fear of water in the backyard pool at night, so that he could swim with his four young girls. His daughters are Tracey, Nancey, Catherine, Candace, and Laury. Tracey and Nancey are both screenwriters, Catherine is an actress and stay at home mother, Candace is a life coach, and Laury is a college professor. Silvers has 13 grandchildren by four of his daughters. The
DVD release of
Gilligan's Island gave special thanks to his daughters.
A frail Silvers, interviewed before his death in 1985, revealed one of his secrets: "I’m an impatient comedian. And I feel the audience is as impatient as me." He died in his sleep of a
heart attack in 1985 at age 74.
In 2003,
The Phil Silvers Show was
voted Best Sitcom
in the BBC guide to television comedy. In a 2005 poll to find
The Comedian's Comedian, he was voted #42 on the list of the top 50 comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.
Dick Van Dyke, who made his TV debut on "Bilko", says he "was always fascinated with Phil's sense of timing. Incredible."
Silvers was as compulsive a gambler in real life as his legendary comic character Sgt. Bilko. He suffered from depression on and off over the years. His memoirs were titled 'The Laughs were on Me'.
When Silvers got to his more elderly years, he was rumored to watch his own movies and television shows over and over in the nursing home.
Silvers bears a resemblance to the exiled Tibetan leader the
Dalai Lama - in 1987 in Tibet, Chinese soldiers attempted to remove from an English tourist a T-shirt with an image of Silvers.
Animated tributes
Famed voice actor
Daws Butler employed an
impression of Silvers as the voice of the
Hanna-Barbera cartoon character
Hokey Wolf and also used the same voice in numerous cartoons for
Jay Ward. Furthermore, the premise of
The Phil Silvers Show was the basis for the Hanna-Barbera cartoon
Top Cat, for which
Arnold Stang moderately imitated Silvers' voice for the title character.
Stage credits
Filmography
Ups and Downs (1937) (short subject)
Here's Your Hat (1937) (short subject)
The Candid Kid (1938) (short subject)
Strike Up the Band (1940) (scenes deleted)
Hit Parade of 1941 (1940)
The Wild Man of Borneo (1941)
The Penalty (1941)
Tom, Dick and Harry (1941)
Ice-Capades (1941)
Lady Be Good (1941)
You're in the Army Now (1941)
All Through the Night (1942)
Roxie Hart (1942)
My Gal Sal (1942)
Footlight Serenade (1942)
Tales of Manhattan (1942) (scenes deleted)
Just Off Broadway (1942)
Coney Island (1943)
A Lady Takes a Chance (1943)
Four Jills in a Jeep (1944)
Cover Girl (1944)
Take It or Leave It (1944)
Something for the Boys (1944)
Diamond Horseshoe (1945)
Don Juan Quilligan (1945)
A Thousand and One Nights (1945)
If I'm Lucky (1946)
Summer Stock (1950)
Top Banana (1954)
Lucky Me (1954)
Something's Got to Give (1962) (unfinished)
40 Pounds of Trouble (1962)
It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963)
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1966)
A Guide for the Married Man (1967)
Carry On...Follow That Camel! (1967)
Buona Sera, Mrs. Campbell (1968)
The Boatniks (1970)
Hollywood Blue (1970) (documentary)
The Strongest Man in the World (1975)
Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood (1976)
The Chicken Chronicles (1977)
Hey, Abbott! (1978) (documentary)
The Cheap Detective (1978)
Racquet (1979)
The Happy Hooker Goes Hollywood (1980)
There Goes the Bride (1980)Further Information
Get more info on 'Phil Silvers'.
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