Sam Levene (born Scholem Lewin; August 28, 1905 – December 28, 1980) was an American Broadway, films, radio, and television actor and director. In a career spanning over five decades, he appeared in over 50 comedy and drama theatrical stage productions. He also acted in over 50 films across the United States and abroad.
Early life Levene was born Scholem Lewin in Shatsk in the Russian Empire (present-day Belarus) to a Jewish family,"New York, U.S. District Court Naturalization Records, 1824-1991", database with images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:WM2Z-NRZM : 8 March 2021), Samuel or Scholem Levine or Lewin, 1937. the youngest of five children by a dozen years.Bernard Carragher, "Confessions of a Pair of Hoofers", 1972 His family immigrated to the United States when he was two years old. He grew up on the Lower East Side of Manhattan on Avenue D and 8th Street and attended Public School 64. In 1923, Levene dropped out of Stuyvesant High School. Since he had been in the class of Broadway for over five decades, the illustrious dropout was given a special award, his Stuyvesant High School diploma, in a 1976 ceremony held at New York's Princeton Club.
Broadway On April 20, 1927, Levene made his Broadway stage debut earning 60 dollars a week with his first Actor's Equity contract. A five-line role, Levene acted as District Attorney William Thompson in the original Broadway melodrama Wall Street, a play that only ran for three weeks at the Hudson Theatre.
In 1980, Levene's last and thirty-ninth Broadway credit was his starring role as Daniel Horowitz in the 1980 comedy Horowitz and Mrs. Washington directed by Joshua Logan which closed after a run of only 10 previews and six performances at the John Golden Theatre. Although the Henry Denker comedy was panned, Levene's star power and comedic performance enabled a five-month tour of Horowitz and Mrs. Washington which went on Christmas hiatus on Saturday December 13, 1980, and turned out to be Levene's final stage performance in Canada, just two weeks prior to his death on December 28, 1980.
Levene's Broadway career began with five years of steady employment in nondescript roles in ten Broadway plays, including a series of flops. One titled Solitaire (1929), was a Broadway play about a Coney Island midget that only ran four performances at the now demolished Waldorf Theatre, partially financed with a $500 last-minute investment from Levene's older brother Joe.
Emanuel Azenberg and Eugene Wolsk worked with Levene twice in two Broadway productions and two national tours; the first time as company managers when Levene replaced Alan King in the starring role of Dr. Jack Kingsley in the original Broadway production of The Impossible Years (1966), which Levene performed 322 times on Broadway and later headlined and starred in the national tour. Six years later, Azenberrg and Wolsk were lead producers when Levene was cast as Al Lewis opposite Jack Albertson as Willie Clark to co-star in Neil Simon's The Sunshine Boys (1972); after performing the role of Al Lewis 466 times in the original Broadway production, Levene and Albertson headlined the subsequent national tour. In his December 21, 1972, review of the original Broadway production of The Sunshine Boys in The New York Times, theatre critic Clive Barnes wrote, "Jack Albertson as the heart-stricken comic never puts a line wrong. He is always pathetic but never enough to make you cry. Lovely. His acerbic partner, Sam Levene, is as tough as vintage chewing gum, and yet with a sort of credible lovability."
Theatrical career
Levene appeared in over 50 theatrical stage productions in the United States and abroad. A master of farce and comedy, Levene was equally effective in drama as well. Levene's Broadway credits include performances in 39 Broadway productions, 33 of which were performances Levene created in the original Broadway productions, and a 10-month USO tour.
Over his 54-year Broadway career, Levene performed in 39 Broadway productions at 29 different Broadway Theaters, and at some Theaters, several times. Levene performed over 1,600 times at the now demolished Playhouse Theater in four original Broadway productions, three of which Levene had starring roles after first appearing in Street Scene (1929), Three Men on a Horse (1935), Make a Million (1958) and The Impossible Years (1966). In a 1976 interview with Tom McMorrow for the New York Daily News.McMorrow, Tom (April 18, 1976). "Sacred Cows Slaughtered by Sam". The Sunday News. , page 3 Leisure.
Levene's Broadway credits include starring roles in three Broadway revivals, portraying businessmen Boss Mangan in George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House (1959) directed by Harold Clurman, recreating his original Broadway performance as Patsy, the racetrack gambler originated three decades earlier, in the acclaimed all-star Broadway revival of the smash hit farce Three Men on a Horse (1969) and performing the role of veteran theatre producer Oscar Wolfe in the all-star (1975–1976) Broadway revival of George S. Kaufman and Edna Ferber's The Royal Family (1975) directed by Ellis Rabb; the production was filmed for the series Great Performances on November 9, 1977.
Levene starred in two major UK productions; in 1953, he recreated his original Broadway performance as Nathan Detroit in the first UK production of Guys and Dolls which opened at The Coliseum a few days before the 1953 Coronation which had a run of 553 performances. In 1954, Sam Levene originated the role of Horace Vandergelder in the world premiere production of Thornton Wilder's The Matchmaker (1954), initially at the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland.
Levene originated the "craps-shooter extraordinaire" Nathan Detroit in the American musical Guys and Dolls on the Great White Way in the original 1950 Broadway production directed by the inimitable George S. Kaufman. Levene has been synonymous with the role of Nathan Detroit for seven decades; Guys and Dolls book co-author Abe Burrows specifically crafted the role of Nathan Detroit around and for Levene who signed for the project long before Burrows ever wrote a single word of dialogue, a similar break Burrows said he had when he wrote Cactus Flower for Lauren Bacall. In Honest, Abe: Is There Really No Business Like Show Business?, Burrows recalled: "I had the sound of their voices in my head. I knew the rhythm of their speech and it helped make the dialogue sharper and more real." Burrows had the advantage of writing dialogue built around Sam Levene's New York Jewish cadences. The creative talent of Guys and Dolls agreed Levene was perfect for the role of Nathan Detroit (Damon Runyon had been one of Levene's fans). Frank Loesser agreed it was easier adjusting the music to Levene's limitations than substituting a better singer who couldn't act. Levene is the reason the lead role of Nathan Detroit has one major song, the duet "Sue Me".
Hundreds of productions of Guys and Dolls are staged annually and Sam Levene's comedic performance as Nathan Detroit still makes headlines, largely because it became the gold standard classic. Frank Rich, Chief Theatre Critic, The New York Times, like most critics, lauded the 1992 Guys and Dolls revival directed by Jerry Zaks stating: "this is an enchanting rebirth of the show that defines Broadway dazzle." However, regarding Nathan Lane's performance as Nathan Detroit, Frank Rich observed, "The supremely gifted actor Nathan Lane does not remotely echo the first Nathan Detroit, Sam Levene, for whose New York Jewish cadences the role was written. Mr. Lane is more like a young Jackie Gleason and usually funny in his own right, though expressions like 'all right, already' and 'so nu?' do not fall trippingly from his tongue." Los Angeles Times Critic Emeritus Sylvie Drake reviewed the 1993 Guys and Dolls touring production also directed by Zaks at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre had a similar observation, comparing David Garrison's portrayal of Nathan Detroit to Sam Levene's original 1950 Broadway performance, writing: "The wiry Garrison's Detroit physically harks back more to the 1950 original played by Sam Levene, than to Nathan Lane, who played the role on Broadway last year. But unlike Levene, Garrison doesn't come across down, dirty or gritty. Knowing this actor's talent, one finds his amiable New York gangster surprisingly bloodless and almost genteel."
Levene performed the role of Nathan Detroit in Guys and Dolls over 1,600 times, initially 41 times in the 1950 pre-Broadway Philadelphia tryout where each performance was different, two years performing his classic role in the original Broadway production, a week's stint at London's Bristol Hippodrome before co-starring with Vivian Blaine for a year in the first UK production, six months performing the role twice daily in a one and half hour version of the Broadway hit at the Royal Nevada's Theatre-in-the Desert, the first Las Vegas production and the 15th anniversary six week production, three weeks in Mineola, New York and three weeks in Paramus, New Jersey in 1965.
Levene reprised his performance as Nathan Detroit on the Decca's original cast recording of the Broadway musical Guys and Dolls according to Variety, original cast album sales totaled 250,000 as of September 1, 1954. Guys and Dolls composer and lyricist Frank Loesser specifically wrote "Sue Me" in one octave for Levene and structured the song so he and Vivian Blaine never sang their show-stopping duet number together; the son of a cantor, Levene was fluent in Yiddish: "Alright, already, I'm just a no-goodnick; alright, already, it's true, so nu? So sue me." Frank Loesser felt "Nathan Detroit should be played as a brassy Broadway tough guy who sang with more grits than gravy." Levene sang "Sue Me" with "such a wonderful Runyonesque flavor that his singing had been easy to forgive, in fact it had been quite charming in its ineptitude".
Alan Alda, son of Guys and Dolls co-star Robert Alda, recalls watching Levene perform Nathan Detroit while standing in the wings. In Never Have Your Dog Stuffed; And Other Things I've Learned, Alan Alda recalls, "Watching Sam Levene was thrilling. He could ride a moment as if a wild animal. New meanings occurred to him on the spot. Not only did he play the same lines differently every night, but the laughs rolled in from the audience in different places. How did he do it? This kind of spontaneity and this utter commitment to the moment became what I wanted to have. As good as my father was, what I was seeing as they played together a few feet away was the difference between burlesque and theatre, between performing and acting. I chose acting. I wanted to be Sam."
For three decades, Levene reprised his role as Patsy from Three Men on a Horse (1935) numerous times on stage, film, TV and radio; the first time when he made his motion picture debut in Three Men on a Horse (1936) directed and produced by Mervyn LeRoy; three times on radio, two USO tours playing 200 shows to 120,000 servicemen, the first legitimate U.S. theatrical production mounted overseas. Due to security, the USO cast was reduced from 12 to 7 without losing a minute of running dialogue. According to a May 26, 1945, Billboard interview, Levene said, "the G.I.s' gratefulness is absolutely embarrassing. They express it not only by applause but by meeting you personally and giving you objects which they have fought and bled for. They lose sight of the fact that they are the ones fighting the war."