Leo Singer

Leopold von Singer (born May 3, 1877 in Vienna ; † March 5, 1951 ) was an Austrian actor and showman.

Life

When his daughter Trudy fell ill with polio, Baron Leopold von Singer came into contact with a fairy tale garden in which small actors were employed. A special therapeutic stretching method was offered there. Around 1914 Leopold von Singer, who was also the owner of the Josefstädter Theater at times, founded his own troupe, "Singer's Midgets". In Vienna he was nicknamed "Zwergerl-Singer" for this. He preferably recruited short people of normal proportions who could not only sing and act, but were also able to dance and perform artistic performances. With this troupe, which at times comprised over a hundred members and was also accompanied by small and normal-sized elephants, including the Ziggy , giraffes and ponies named after Florence Ziegfeld , he toured Europe, South America, Asia and Australia before finally settling in the USA settled. In 1939 many of the "Singer's Midgets" starred in the film The Wizard of Oz .

Singer's Midgets

"Singer's Midgets" in the Wizard of Oz

For the most part, the "dwarfs" received much lower salaries than, for example, the dog Terry who played "Toto", and were not mentioned by name in the credits of the film. In addition, Leopold von Singer is said to have kept half of the money for himself - but he was still popular with his troops and was called "Papa" by the members.

In 1988 the film historian Steven Cox tried to reconstruct the fates of the 124 "Munchkins" who appeared in the film. He succeeded in interviewing 33 ex-actors who were still alive at the time and put together a book from the results, which was titled The Munchkins of Oz .

Web links

• Leo Singer in the Internet Movie Database (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Gusti Adler, But don't forget the Chinese nightingales , Langen-Mueller 1990, ISBN 978-3784418483 , p. 154
2. ↑ Poster advertising for "Singer's Midgets"
3. ↑ Note on Sam the Sudden by PG Wodehouse ( Memento of the original from February 26, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.