Oscar Levant Biography

Fast Facts

• Studied music with Sigismund Stojowski and Arnold Schoenberg
• First traveled to Los Angeles in 1929 as part of a group of composers who worked on the first sound film scores and would compose for numerous films during his career
• Made his screen acting debut in the film "The Dance of Life" in 1939
• Quote: "There is a fine line between genius and insanity․ I have erased that line․"
• Quote: "I'd just like you all to know that I'm in the middle of a severe mental and emotional breakdown․ It's my fifth in two years․"
• Had a notably caustic, darkly humorous character and routinely poked fun at his own neuroses and insomnia, once joking that although he frequently smoked cigarettes and took sleeping pills, he never drank liquor because "it makes me feel good․"
• His controversial series "The Oscar Levant Show" had to be taken off the air because of his often inappropriate quips about celebrities, once commenting on Joe DiMaggio's divorce from Marilyn Monroe with "No man can excel at two national pastimes․"
• Was considered an expert on the works of George Gershwin and won significant praise for his recording of "Rhapsody in Blue․"
• Best known as a pianist, composer, and actor who played Adam Cook in "An American in Paris" and Sid Jeffers in "Humoresque․"
• Published three autobiographies: "The Unimportance of Being Oscar," "Memoirs of an Amnesiac," and "A Smattering of Ignorance․"