LOS ANGELES: Bob Hope, whose death at age 100 was announced on Monday, was the ultimate comedian, a master of timing who turned the one-liner into an art form and became a national institution.
Hope rose through show business ranks to become a close friend of a succession of presidents, including Kennedy, Nixon, Ford and Reagan and built up a personal fortune of at least $200 million.
His career — which included stints as an amateur boxer, minstrel in black face and dancer — spanned seven decades, in which he starred in five mediums: vaudeville, radio, stage, movies and television.
Virtually running his own joke factory by employing almost 100 writers, Hope was able to draw on a collection of hundreds of thousands of jokes. Hope never boasted it was talent that got him to where he was — as far as he was concerned, timing was everything.
“The only thing I have is timing — and lots and lots of experience,” he once said. “It’s not a great talent.”
With his trademark ski-slope nose, Hope was one of the first superstars and one of the 20th century’s greatest comedians. He also pioneered with Bing Crosby of one of Hollywood’s most enduring genres — the buddy movie. Crosby and Hope became one of the screen’s great couples in a succession of “Road” movies beginning with 1939’s “Road to Singapore.”
Former Hope writer Larry Gelbart once said Hope “was aware that when vaudeville died, television was the box they put it in. Once he made the V in TV stand for ‘variety.’ He breathed life into it.”
Biographers and others who followed Hope’s career have seen in him a driven man who craved the affection redolent in a laughing audience.
Even when a toddler in Cleveland, Ohio, Hope was a mimic. His aunt Polly used to reward him with cookies and, according to one biographer, counselled the tiny hope: “Always leave ‘em laughing”.
Hope even liked an audience when he was filming, and would invite large numbers of people to sets when making his “Road” movies.But the audiences he liked best were America’s fighting men and women. In World War II, Korea, Vietnam, right up to the 1991 Gulf war, Hope was there, always with his up-to-the-minute jokes and string of beautiful women. Hope’s hair thinned and his jowls and wrinkles were testament to his nonstop lifestyle, but he had a lift in his walk, thanks to the exercise he derived from being a fanatical golfer.
From 1941, when the United States entered World War II, Hope entertained in all theatres of operations. The “Bob Hope Christmas Show,” filmed while the comedian was entertaining servicemen, was usually the highest-rated TV special of the year during the Vietnam war.
Some saw Hope as a political right-winger. He once said he felt he had to openly take sides on major issues. But he also said he had wanted to campaign for President Franklin Roosevelt, a Democrat, but the head of the toothpaste firm sponsoring his radio show had told him: “Republicans clean their teeth as well, you know.”
He was a friend of presidents. Republican President Richard Nixon attended the weddings of two of Hope’s four adopted children and the comedian was a close friend of Republican Ronald Reagan, with whom he shared a Hollywood background.
Hope received 49 honorary degrees and more than 700 awards for humanitarian and professional efforts, including presidential medals of merit. In 1952 he received a Hollywood Oscar “for his contribution to the laughter of the world.”
But the devoted American was born Leslie Townes Hope in Eltham, Kent, England, the fifth of seven sons of a stonemason. His father moved his family to Cleveland, Ohio, when Hope was three to work on a church there.
After years of touring in stage acts, Hope became one of the stars of the Jerome Kern show “Roberta” in New York in 1933.
A friend took Hope to a nightclub where Dolores Reade was singing. She accepted his invitation to see his show, The following year they married.
Hope’s big break came in 1938 when he was given his own radio show, “The Bob Hope Show,” which ran for 15 years, and his first starring role in a film, “The Big Broadcast of 1938.” In that film, Hope sang what was to become his theme song, “Thanks for the Memory.”
He was showered with awards, including honours from Queen Elizabeth, the US Congress and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. According to the Guinness Book of Records, the 2,000 awards he won made Hope the most honoured entertainer in history.—Reuters/dpa