1. Rosemary Clooney was an American singer and actress.
30 Facts About Rosemary Clooney
1. 2.
Rosemary Clooney's father was of Irish and German descent, and her mother was of Irish ancestry.
3.
When Rosemary Clooney was 15, her mother and brother Nick moved to California.
4.
In 1945, the Rosemary Clooney sisters won a spot on Cincinnati's radio station WLW as singers.
5.
Rosemary Clooney recounted in her memoir that she despised the song, but pop singers in that era seldom had a choice in the material they performed and she risked being dropped from Columbia if she refused to record it.
6.
Rosemary Clooney recorded several duets with Marlene Dietrich and appeared in the early 1950s on Faye Emerson's Wonderful Town series on CBS.
7.
Rosemary Clooney did several guest appearances on the Arthur Godfrey radio show, when it was sponsored by Lipton Tea.
8.
Rosemary Clooney starred, in 1956, in a half-hour syndicated television musical-variety show, The Rosemary Clooney Show, which featured The Hi-Lo's singing group and Nelson Riddle's orchestra.
9.
In later years, Rosemary Clooney often appeared with Bing Crosby on television, such as in the 1957 special The Edsel Show, and the two friends made a concert tour of Ireland together.
10.
Rosemary Clooney left Columbia Records in 1958, doing a number of recordings for MGM Records and then some for Coral Records.
11.
In 1976, Rosemary Clooney recorded two albums for United Artists Records.
12.
At that time, Rosemary Clooney was one of the few singers of her generation who were still making regular recordings.
13.
In 1994, Rosemary Clooney guest-starred in the NBC television medical drama ER ; for her performance, she received a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series.
14.
On January 27,1996, Rosemary Clooney appeared on Garrison Keillor's Prairie Home Companion radio program.
15.
Rosemary Clooney was awarded Society of Singers Lifetime Achievement Award in 1998.
16.
Rosemary Clooney performed at the festival every year until her death.
17.
Rosemary Clooney received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2002.
18.
Rosemary Clooney was married twice to Puerto Rican movie star Jose Ferrer, 16 years her senior.
19.
Rosemary Clooney first married Ferrer on July 13,1953, in Durant, Oklahoma.
20.
Rosemary Clooney remarried Ferrer on November 22,1964, in Los Angeles.
21.
Rosemary Clooney joined the presidential campaign of close friend Robert F Kennedy, and heard the shots when he was assassinated on June 5,1968.
22.
Rosemary Clooney was hospitalized and remained in psychoanalytic therapy for eight years.
23.
Rosemary Clooney subsequently started a foundation in memory of and named for her sister.
24.
Rosemary Clooney chronicled her unhappy early life, her career as a singer, her marriage to Ferrer, her mental breakdown in 1968, and the diagnosis of bipolar disorder that seriously disrupted her career, concluding with her comeback as a singer and her happiness.
25.
Katherine Coker adapted the book for Jackie Cooper, who produced and directed the television movie, Rosie: the Rosemary Clooney Story starring Sondra Locke, Penelope Milford as Betty, and Tony Orlando as Jose Ferrer.
26.
In 1999, Rosemary Clooney published her second autobiography, Girl Singer: An Autobiography, describing her battles with addiction to prescription drugs for depression, and how she lost and then regained a fortune.
27.
Rosemary Clooney died in 2002 at age 74 at her Beverly Hills home from complications of cancer.
28.
Rosemary Clooney lived for many years in Beverly Hills, California, in the house formerly owned by George and Ira Gershwin at 1019 North Roxbury Drive.
29.
Rosemary Clooney maintained an apartment in the early 1960's at the Winslow Hotel on Madison Avenue.
30.
In 2003, Rosemary Clooney was inducted into the Kentucky Women Remembered exhibit and her portrait by Alison Lyne is on permanent display in the Kentucky State Capitol's rotunda.