Most of you are probably not familiar with Me and My Girl, a musical first produced in London's West End in 1937 as a starring vehicle for Lupino Lane. Mr. Lane was a brilliant British comedian who was imported to America around 1919 — i.e., around the time Charlie Chaplin became the highest-paid performer in the world. Someone apparently thought the way to replicate Chaplin's success was to just get another agile guy from the U.K.
Equivalent popularity did not, of course, occur. Lane was a funny man and an incredible acrobat (at least as good as Keaton, many felt) and he made a lot of very amusing silent comedies which are largely forgotten. Some of them apparently no longer exist, which further limits his fame today. Still at the time, they brought him a limited stardom which petered out not long after sound came in…when moving funny became less important than talking funny. Actually, he was fine with dialogue and songs but not anything special in those capacities. Mr. Lane returned to England, thereafter working mostly on the stage. Me and My Girl was a spectacular hit and soon, everyone in the British Isles was singing and/or dancing to the musical's best song, "The Lambeth Walk." It was a great tune — one that almost always stops the show and leaves the audience cheering.
Me and My Girl ran for 1,646 performances in London. It would have run longer but when Hitler's forces began bombing London, several theaters were destroyed including one into which the show was planning to transfer. In fact, the show became a symbol of resistance against the Nazis, especially after a prominent Kraut denounced "The Lambeth Walk" as — and I quote — "Jewish mischief and animalistic hopping." That, of course, made the song all the more popular and many artists recorded it just to thumb their noses at Hitler.
It killed in subsequent, post-war revivals, here and in England, some of which featured a revised book by Stephen Fry. It's about as rousing and fun as any song that's ever been in any musical.
Here's the best version of the number I can post here, though you'll see several different ones on this site over the next week or so. If you think you got sick of seeing interpretations of "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" on this site, wait'll you see what I have in store for this one.
This video is from the 1987 Tony Awards telecast and it features Robert Lindsay, who won that year's Best Actor Tony, in the scene from a revival that was then playing on Broadway. If you look carefully, you may spot George S. Irving in the company. Mr. Irving has had one of the longest, most glorious careers on the stage…and at age 88, he's still trodding the boards. His voice would be instantly recognizable to fans of New York-based animated shows of the sixties like Underdog.
There will be more on "The Lambeth Walk" here tomorrow. And the next day and the next day and the next day…