Jule Styne

Biography

Jule Styne was born in England to Jewish Ukrainian parents, who brought him to the U.S. while he was still a child. This family settled in Chicago. When the young man Jule struck out on his own, he left Chicago first for New York (1935) and later for southern California (1937). Styne is remembered for composing for a string of Broadway and movie musicals, including Anchors Aweigh (1945), and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (in theatres as of 1949, and a Hollywood movie in 1953). Styne worked with lyricist Stephen Sondheim on Gypsy – a great theatrical success in 1956 and a movie in 1960. His last big Broadway hit – with the help this time of lyricist Robert Merrill, was Funny Girl (1964, a movie four years later). Styne also worked for television, composing songs for Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol, an animated adaptation of the classic Dickens story that was shown regularly on television in the U.S. from 1962 until the late 1980s.