1. Alice Josephine Pons, known professionally as Lily Pons, was a French-American operatic lyric coloratura soprano and actress who had an active career from the late 1920s through the early 1970s.
30 Facts About Lily Pons
1. 2.
Lily Pons had a successful and lucrative career as a concert singer, which continued until her retirement from performance in 1973.
3.
Lily Pons made numerous appearances on radio and on television, performing on variety programs such as The Ed Sullivan Show, The Colgate Comedy Hour, and The Dave Garroway Show.
4.
Lily Pons made dozens of records, recording both classical and popular music.
5.
Lily Pons was awarded the Croix de Lorraine and the Legion d'honneur by the government of France.
6.
Lily Pons was adept at making herself into a marketable cultural icon.
7.
Lily Pons first studied piano at the Paris Conservatory, winning the first prize at the age of 15.
8.
Lily Pons later studied singing with Alice Zeppilli in New York.
9.
On October 15,1930, Lily Pons married her first husband, Mesritz, and spent the next several years as a housewife.
10.
Lily Pons successfully made her operatic debut in the title role of Leo Delibes' Lakme at Mulhouse in 1928 under Reynaldo Hahn's baton, and went on to sing several coloratura roles in French provincial opera houses.
11.
Lily Pons became a star and inherited most of Galli-Curci's important coloratura roles.
12.
Lily Pons became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1940.
13.
Lily Pons was a principal soprano at the Met for 30 years, appearing 300 times in 10 roles from 1931 until 1960.
14.
Lily Pons drew a record crowd of over 300,000 to Chicago's Grant Park Music Festival in 1939 for a free concert.
15.
In 1944, during World War II, Lily Pons cancelled her fall and winter season in New York and instead toured with the USO, entertaining troops with her singing.
16.
In places, the heat of the sun at the outdoor performances was so overbearing that Lily Pons, always wearing a strapless evening gown, held wet towels to her head between numbers.
17.
The last major new role Lily Pons performed was Violetta in La traviata, which she sang at the San Francisco Opera.
18.
Lily Pons made guest appearances at the Opera Garnier in Paris, Royal Opera House in London, La Monnaie in Brussels, Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, and the Chicago Opera.
19.
On February 11,1960, Lily Pons appeared on NBC's The Ford Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford.
20.
The program of the historic concert, which took place on Wednesday evening, May 31,1972, did not include any of the coloratura arias which Lily Pons sang in her prime, but did include ones more suited to her range at age 74.
21.
Lily Pons starred in three RKO films: I Dream Too Much with Henry Fonda, That Girl from Paris, and Hitting a New High.
22.
Lily Pons performed an aria in the 1947 film Carnegie Hall.
23.
Lily Pons died of pancreatic cancer in Dallas, Texas, at the age of 77.
24.
Lily Pons's remains were brought back to her birthplace to be interred in the Cimetiere du Grand Jas in Cannes.
25.
Lily Pons's only direct living relative, her nephew, John de Bry, is an archaeologist living in Florida.
26.
Lily Pons donated Ita, her pet ocelot, to the New York Zoological Gardens when it became too dangerous to remain in her apartment in The Ansonia on Manhattan's Upper West Side.
27.
Lily Pons had received the pet, which she believed was a baby jaguar, from a friend in Brazil.
28.
The pet and Lily Pons were very attached to each other, but it snarled at visitors and was deemed a hazard.
29.
In Stephen Frears's 2016 film Florence Foster Jenkins, Lily Pons is played by Aida Garifullina.
30.
Lily Pons starred in complete recordings of Die Fledermaus and Lucia di Lammermoor.