Fish Gotta Swim Birds Gotta Fly Updated

Fish Gotta Swim Birds Gotta Fly

Vocal by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein Two, from the 1927 musical play Show Boat

"Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man" with music by Jerome Kern, and lyrics past Oscar Hammerstein Ii, is ane of the most famous songs from their classic 1927 musical play Show Gunkhole , adjusted from Edna Ferber's 1926 novel.

Context [ edit ]

The vocal, written in a dejection tempo, is sung in the bear witness by several characters, just is about closely associated with the graphic symbol Julie, the biracial leading lady of the showboat Cotton fiber Blossom. Information technology is Julie who is first heard singing the vocal – to Magnolia, the daughter of Cap'due north Andy Hawks and his wife Parthenia (Parthy), owners of the showboat. In the musical'south plot, the number is supposed to be a song familiar to African-Americans for years, and this provides one of the nearly dramatic moments in the show. When Queenie, the black cook, comments that it is strange that low-cal-skinned Julie knows the vocal because merely blackness people sing information technology, Julie becomes visibly uncomfortable. Later, nosotros learn that this is considering Julie is "passing" as white – she and her white hubby are guilty of miscegenation nether the state'due south law.

Immediately afterwards Julie sings the song through once, Queenie chimes in with her own lyrics to it, and she is joined by her husband Joe, the blackness stevedore on the boat. This is followed by Julie, Queenie, Magnolia, Joe, and the black chorus all performing a song-and-dance to the number.

Repeated during Bear witness Boat [ edit ]

The terminal refrain of the song is briefly reprised at the end of the outset human action by the ensemble, equally Magnolia and riverboat gambler Gaylord Ravenal enter a local church building to get married.

The song makes one last appearance in Act 2 of the evidence, when Magnolia uses it as an audition piece while trying to become a chore as a singer in the Trocadero nightclub after Ravenal has deserted her. From backstage, Julie, at present the featured star there after having been forced to leave the show boat by the local sheriff, hears Magnolia sing the song. Now an alcoholic as a result of having been abandoned by her own husband, Julie secretly quits her job so that the manager, in dire need of a vocaliser for New year'south Eve, will accept no choice but to hire Magnolia.

History of performances [ edit ]

"Can't Aid Lovin' Dat Man" was strongly associated with 1920s torch singer Helen Morgan, who played Julie in the original 1927 stage production of Bear witness Boat, besides equally the 1932 revival and the 1936 film version.^[i] ^[2] ^[three] While Morgan was alive, she "owned" the song equally much equally Judy Garland owned "Over the Rainbow" (from The Sorcerer of Oz ). Still, Morgan died prematurely in 1941. Her recordings are seldom played or reissued today and her films are infrequently seen. Finally, the 1936 film version of Show Gunkhole was taken completely out of circulation in 1942^[4] to make manner for MGM's 1951 remake, which featured Ava Gardner every bit Julie (with singing dubbed by Annette Warren). Therefore, mod audiences unfamiliar with the 1936 flick accept most probable never heard Helen Morgan's performance of the song, though various recordings of her singing it are available online.^[five] ^[6] ^[7]

The song was performed as a song and soft shoe trip the light fantastic by actress, singer and dancer Jessica Lange and actress and dancer Drew Barrymore, accompanied on piano past actor, singer and pianist Malcolm Gets, playing the roles of "Big Edie" Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter "Little Edie" Edith Bouvier Beale and piano accompanist George Gould Stiff, in HBO's 2009 dramatization Grayness Gardens ^[8] based on the 1975 documentary Grey Gardens .

Partial song lyrics [ edit ]

The lyrics are nether copyright, simply express portions tin can be repeated for critical analysis (encounter educational source for entire song). The words of the song emphasize an intense love, regardless of his money or achievement, as a force of nature likened to fish born to swim, or birds driven to wing. Within the play, the vocal is introduced equally mixed along with the dialog:

(JULIE sings...)

Fish got to swim, birds got to fly,

I gotta love one man till I die,

Tin can't help lovin' dat man of mine.

(MAGNOLIA recognizes the vocal):

That's it...

(QUEENIE, re-entering, stops in her tracks and appears puzzled.)

(JULIE continues singing...)

Tell me he's lazy, tell me he'southward tiresome,

Tell me I'1000 crazy (possibly I know)

Can't aid lovin' dat human being of mine.

(QUEENIE questions how would white people know the song):

How come up yous know dat song?

(...residual omitted due to copyright restrictions...)

Later verses complaining that when he goes away, she is sad until he returns.

Controversy [ edit ]

In its ain way, the song is nigh as controversial as the song "Ol' Homo River" (as well from Show Boat) because of some phrases, though its lyrics accept caused less of an uproar because the "offensive" portion is sung not by Julie just by Queenie, and is therefore not usually heard outside the evidence. In her section of the song, Queenie sings about Joe:

My human is shiftless,

An' expert for nothin', too.

He'due south my man just the same.

He's never 'circular hither

When there is piece of work to exercise,

He'due south never 'round hither when there's workin' to exercise.

This lyric was included in every production of Show Boat up until 1966, except for the 1951 picture show version, in which this section of the vocal was merely omitted. In the 1966 Lincoln Center product of the show, produced during the pinnacle of the Ceremonious Rights era, this role of the lyric was completely rewritten past an uncredited writer to avoid any controversy, and it has remained that style ever since – except in the at present-famous EMI 3-CD album set of Show Gunkhole, released in 1988. The revised lyric went:

My man's a dreamer,

He don't have much to say

He'south my homo just the same

Instead o' workin,

He sits and dreams all twenty-four hour period,

Instead o' workin', he'll be dreamin' all mean solar day.

The 1951 film version of Show Boat went even one pace further than the 1966 stage revival in "smoothing out" any "edginess" nearly the vocal, by omitting all reference to it as one sung for years past African-Americans, and thereby omitting the department in which Queenie remarks that it is strange for Julie to know the vocal. In the 1951 movie, the vocal is simply a dearest song Julie sings about her hubby Steve, not a folk tune. Lena Horne also sings information technology this way in Till the Clouds Roll Past.

See besides [ edit ]

Other songs from Bear witness Gunkhole : "Neb", "Ol' Man River"

Notes [ edit ]

^ "Show Boat (1936)". IMDb.com . Retrieved 16 December 2021.
^ "Helen Morgan". IMDb.com . Retrieved 16 December 2021.
^ "Testify Boat Original Broadway Cast 1932 | Broadway Globe". Broadwayworld.com . Retrieved 16 December 2021.
^ Warner's has recently reissued this version, remastered; initial product will exist manufactured DVDs, thereafter information technology volition become a fabricated-on-demand DVD-R.
^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2017-04-05. Retrieved 2017-03-02 . {{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy every bit title (link)
^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2017-04-06. Retrieved 2017-03-02 . {{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy equally title (link)
^ "Show Boat - 1936" . Retrieved 16 December 2021 – via YouTube.
^ "Grey Gardens". IMDb.com . Retrieved 20 May 2021.

Additional references [ edit ]

Kreuger, Miles Prove Boat: The Story of a Classic American Musical, Oxford, 1977.