Martha Raye
Martha Raye (born Margy Reed), nicknamed The Big Mouth, was an American comic actress and singer who performed in movies, and later on television. She also acted in plays, including Broadway. She was honored in 1969 at the Academy Awards as the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award recipient for her volunteer efforts and services to the troops.
In the early 1930s, Raye was a band vocalist with the Paul Ash and Boris Morros orchestras. She made her first film appearance in 1934 in a band short titled A Nite in the Nite Club. In 1936, she was signed for comic roles by Paramount Pictures, and made her first picture for Paramount. Her first feature film was Rhythm on the Range with crooner Bing Crosby. She was a featured cast member in 39 episodes of Al Jolson's weekly CBS radio show, The Lifebuoy Program, also called Cafe Trocadero. In addition to comedy, Martha sang both solos and duets with Jolson. Over the next quarter century, she would appear with many of the leading comics of her day, including Joe E. Brown, Bob Hope, W. C. Fields, Abbott and Costello (in Keep 'Em Flying), Charlie Chaplin (in Monsieur Verdoux), and Jimmy Durante. She joined the USO in 1942, soon after the US entered World War II.
She was known for the size of her mouth, which was large in proportion to her face, earning her the nickname The Big Mouth. She later referred to this in a series of television commercials for Polident denture cleaner in the 1980s: "So take it from The Big Mouth: new Polident Green gets tough stains clean!" Her large mouth would relegate her motion picture work to supporting comic parts, and was often made up so it appeared even larger. In the Disney cartoon Mother Goose Goes Hollywood, she is caricatured while dancing alongside Joe E. Brown, another actor known for a big mouth. In the Warner Bros. cartoon The Woods Are Full Of Cuckoos (1937), she was caricatured as a jazzy scat-singing donkey named 'Moutha Bray'.
She often appeared as a guest on other programs, particularly those which often featured older performers as guest stars, such as ABC's The Love Boat, and also on variety programs, including the short-lived The Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Show. She appeared from the third to the ninth seasons as Carrie Sharples on Alice, making two or three appearances a season. She made guest appearances or did cameo roles in such series as Murder, She Wrote on CBS and The Andy Williams Show and McMillan & Wife, both on NBC. She appeared again as Agatha for the six-episode run of the retooled McMillan, taking over for Nancy Walker, who had left the series. Her last film appearance was as an incontinent airline passenger in the disaster film The Concorde ... Airport '79.
Later in her career, she made television commercials for Polident denture cleanser, principally during the 1970s and 1980s.
Known For | Acting |
---|---|
Most Rating | 8.267 |
Birthday | 1916-08-27 |
Place of Birth | Butte, Montana, USA |
Also Known As | The Big Mouth, The Female Bob Hope, Margaret Teresa Yvonne “Margy” Reed, Margaret Teresa Yvonne Reed, Margy Reed, |
1947
Monsieur Verdoux
7.8/398
The film is about an unemployed banker, Henri Verdoux, and his sociopathic methods of attaining income. While being both loyal and competent in his wo...
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Monsieur Verdoux
1962
Billy Rose's Jumbo
5.6/18
The daughter of a circus owner fights to save her father from a takeover spearheaded by the man she loves.
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Billy Rose's Jumbo
1938
The Big Broadcast of 1938
5.9/17
The Bellows family causes comic confusion on an ocean liner, with time out for radio-style musical acts.
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The Big Broadcast of 1938
1981
Pippin
7.6/9
A mysterious performance troupe led by a Leading Player tells the story of Pippin, a young prince on his search for meaning and significance. Taped at...
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Pippin
1944
Pin Up Girl
6.1/16
Glamorous Lorry Jones, the toast of a Missouri military canteen, has become "engaged" to almost every serviceman she's signed her pin-up photo for. No...
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Pin Up Girl
1941
Hellzapoppin'
7.1/91
Olsen and Johnson, a pair of stage comedians, try to turn their play into a movie and bring together a young couple in love, while breaking the fourth...
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Hellzapoppin'
1936
Rhythm on the Range
4/1
Cowboy Jeff Larabee returns from the east and meets Doris Halloway, a young girl, that he regards as a vagabond, till he learns that she's the owner o...
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Rhythm on the Range
1937
Double or Nothing
6.6/5
A philanthropist's will dictates that four people receive $5,000 apiece, with the stipulation that the first one who can double the amount -- without...
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Double or Nothing
1937
Waikiki Wedding
5.3/7
Tony Marvin is a laid back but incredibly successful promoter and fair-haired boy for J. P. Todhunter's pineapple company located in beautiful Hawaii....
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Waikiki Wedding
1944
Four Jills in a Jeep
5.7/3
Reenactments of actual USO experiences of its female stars entertaining troops overseas.
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Four Jills in a Jeep
2005
The Adventures of Errol Flynn
7.8/5
A documentary about the life of Errol Flynn, with recollections from friends and family.
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The Adventures of Errol Flynn
1939
Never Say Die
6.8/6
Bob Hope is being stalked by a predatory widow who is a widow of wealthy husbands many times over. Martha Raye is a Texan heiress who wants to marry h...
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Never Say Die
1938
College Swing
6.8/6
Gracie Alden tries to graduate from college to get an inheritance.
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College Swing
1970
No Substitute for Victory
4.3/3
John Wayne hosts this video which was produced during the Vietnam War when the Communist threat was at its height.
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No Substitute for Victory
1938
Give Me a Sailor
5.6/5
Jim and Walter are two brother sailors in the United States Navy. Walter tells Jim as soon as they get home he is going to ask his beautiful girlfrien...
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Give Me a Sailor
1941
Navy Blues
4/3
On a layover in Hawaii two conniving Navy seamen borrow money to lay down bets that their ship will win the upcoming gunnery practice trophy, having f...
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Navy Blues
1936
The Big Broadcast of 1937
5/3
The employees of a failing radio station must put on a huge ratings winner to have any chance of continued operation.
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The Big Broadcast of 1937
1938
Tropic Holiday
5/3
A screenwriter falls in love with a Mexican woman while searching for a story line south of the border.
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Tropic Holiday
1936
College Holiday
5.2/3
College students rally to save a struggling hotel from closing. Comedy.
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College Holiday
1979
The Concorde... Airport '79
4.8/172
Aviation disaster-prone Joe Patroni must contend with nuclear missiles, the French Air Force and the threat of the plane splitting in two over the Alp...
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The Concorde... Airport '79
1939
$1,000 a Touchdown
2/2
A couple inherits a college and to generate revenue offers a thousand dollars to players for each touchdown they score.
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$1,000 a Touchdown
1940
The Farmer's Daughter
5/3
Broadway producer Nickie North and press agent Scoop Trimble find an investor for their next show who insists that they cast his ex-girlfriend, Claric...
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The Farmer's Daughter
1979
Skinflint: A Country Christmas Carol
5.5/2
Charled Dicken's tale A Christmas Carol takes a contemporary jolt in this original musical set in modern-day Tennessee. Cyrus Flint is a mean old bank...
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Skinflint: A Country Christmas Carol
1937
Artists & Models
0/0
An ad man gets his model girlfriend to pose as a debutante for a new campaign.
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Artists & Models
1941
Keep 'Em Flying
6/17
When a barnstorming stunt pilot decides to join the air corps, his two goofball assistants decide to go with him. Since the two are Abbott & Costello,...
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Keep 'Em Flying
1940
The Boys from Syracuse
6.5/4
The action takes place in Ephesus in ancient Asia Minor, and the concerns The efforts of two boys from Syracuse, Anthipholus and his servant Dromio, t...
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The Boys from Syracuse
1970
Pufnstuf
6/22
Jimmy (Jack Wild) ventures to Living Island with his magical, talking flute, Freddy. Once there, he befriends many of the island's inhabitants, but th...
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Pufnstuf
1943
Show-Business at War
7/3
A multi-studio effort to show the newsreel audience the progress of the Hollywood war effort.
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Show-Business at War
1980
The Gossip Columnist
7.5/2
New Tinseltown gossip columnist Dina Moran helps faded movie star Georgia O'Hanlon dig up dirt on amoral characters.
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The Gossip Columnist
1936
Hideaway Girl
0/0
An unfortunate marriage and a bogus Count are the ingredients for this musical.
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Hideaway Girl
2014
And the Oscar Goes To...
7/48
The story of the gold-plated statuette that became the film industry's most coveted prize, AND THE OSCAR GOES TO... traces the history of the Academy...
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And the Oscar Goes To...
2014
Bing Crosby: Rediscovered
7/2
Bing Crosby was, without a doubt, the most popular and influential multi-media star of the first half of the twentieth century, pulling audiences in w...
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Bing Crosby: Rediscovered
1977
'Twas the Night Before Christmas
0/0
The story of the Cosgrove family on Christmas Eve in a New England town in the late 1890s.
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'Twas the Night Before Christmas
2019
Sid & Judy
7.6/12
Explore the dramatic career and personal struggles of the talented and tragically short-lived entertainer Judy Garland through rare concert footage, n...
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Sid & Judy
1937
Mountain Music
6.5/2
Mary Beamish, a folksy Ozark girl, yearns for the glitter of show business and for a man. She knows she is anything but gorgeous, but figures her enth...
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Mountain Music
1970
The Phynx
3.5/8
A rock band is invented by the government as a cover to find hostages in a remote castle in Albania held by communist enemies of the USA.
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The Phynx
1966
Clown Alley
0/0
An all-star cast joins Red Skelton in this lavish 60-minute salute to circus clowns.
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Clown Alley
1982
Showbiz Goes to War
10/1
While a few Hollywood celebrities such as James Stewart and Clark Gable saw combat during World War II, the majority used their talents to rally the A...
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Showbiz Goes to War
2003
Chaplin Today: 'Monsieur Verdoux'
5.3/5
A short documentary in the Chaplin Today series about Chaplin's "Monsieur Verdoux." Includes an interview with Claude Chabrol, whose 1963 film "Landru...
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