Chicago 50 - No. 25 - Funny Honey

Lauryn Johnson
5 days ago
2 min read

Gwen Verdon sings "Funny Honey" Photo by Martha Swope, 1975.

Fosse knew vaudeville. Though he wasn't born until 1927, when he came of age as a performer in his teens, the people he learned from were all vaudeville veterans, and he danced old vaudeville numbers himself.

Almost every song in the show is modeled on an actual vaudeville act or star. “Funny Honey” starts out being an homage to torch song queen Helen Morgan's song “Bill” from Show Boat, a song about an ordinary man, who's nothing special, but she loves him anyway. Roxie even sits atop a piano, like Helen Morgan often did.

In 1927, Morgan appeared as Julie LaVerne in the original cast of Show Boat, her best-known role. She sang "Bill" in two stage runs and two film productions of Show Boat over a span of 11 years. During the run of Show Boat, however, Morgan's stardom led to difficulties. Her prominence in the world of New York nightclubs (actually illegal speakeasies in the era of Prohibition) led to her fronting a club called Chez Morgan, at which she entertained. Only days after the opening of Show Boat, she was arrested at Chez Morgan for violation of liquor laws. Charges were dropped in 1928, and the club reopened as Helen Morgan's Summer Home, but she was arrested again on June 29 and this time indicted. A jury acquitted her at a trial held in April 1929.

Text from Inside CHICAGO Background and Analysis by Scott Miller and Wikipedia