用户:Catherine Laurence/乔治·福尔比

1919年的福尔比

乔治·福尔比（英语：George Formby，1875年10月14日—1921年2月8日），本名杰姆斯·劳勒·布斯（James Lawler Booth），英国著名的喜剧演员、音乐剧歌手。他被誉为二十世纪初最伟大的音乐厅表演者之一。他的喜剧多以兰开夏郡的典型生活方式为蓝本，戏剧平易近人，很受英国大众的欢迎。由于他在表演中把自己患有的支气管炎导致的咳嗽转化成一种行为艺术，人们又称呼他“维根·南丁格尔”。 福尔比出生于英格兰西北部的工业区的一个贫苦的家庭。他年少时经常被母亲虐待。为了赚钱，他在街头卖唱。十几岁时，他曾加入一个声乐二人组。到了19世纪90年代，他开始发展自己的表演艺术，并在兰开夏郡的演出获得了一批粉丝。他还创造了一系列舞台角色， 包括“约翰·威利”。文化史学家杰弗里·理查兹评价福尔比手下这些角色的特点：“典型的笨头笨脑的兰开夏郡小伙子……妻管严，笨手笨脚，容易惹出事故，但还能混日子。”福尔比也有过一段成功的歌手生涯，而他在1916年，却从表演音乐剧转变为表演滑稽剧。

他的健康状况一直很差，1916年的一场舞台意外又使他肺部受伤，而且在接下来的几年里病情恶化，他的表演能力因此大幅度下降。1918年流感大流行中又因为流行性感冒和肺结核导致肺部收缩，进一步削弱了他的体质。1921年，因肺结核去世，享年45岁。 受福尔比的表演和他独特的服饰的启发，卓别林创造了流浪汉这一角色，并由此家喻户晓。福尔比的儿子在他的舞台表演初期也模仿了父亲所创造的人物角色，模仿大获成功之后，他也把他自己的名字改成乔治·福尔比。小福尔比于1937到1943年间为英国票房收入最高的男明星。

简介

早年生活

"Mine is not an isolated story of the stage. Which of the 'bhoys', I wonder, can say they never knew days of privation and distress? But which of them, I wonder, can tell a more pathetic story than I?"

Formby on his childhood

福尔比在1875年10月4日出生于兰开夏郡的阿什顿安德莱恩市。他是莎拉·简布斯的私生子也是她唯一的儿子。他的父亲弗朗西斯·劳勒是一个煤矿工人，没有出生证明。他的母亲是个贫困而又不识字的织布工。在福尔比出生后的六个月之后。他们才结婚。年龄都在19岁左右。莎拉是个妓女，她身材非常矮小，身高约为4英尺（1.2米）。她还是个酒鬼，为了能喝到酒，她经常在酒吧里面唱歌来换取酒。她多次因盗窃、卖淫、酒后闹事和打架斗殴而被判刑约140次。因为父母婚姻动荡，福尔比常被父母忽视、虐待，甚至还患上营养不良症。因为莎拉不是经常离家出走就是被当地警察局所拘留，福尔比经常被迫露宿街头。这导致他患上哮喘，可能在那时他就已患有支气管炎。他在晚年回忆录里提到：他的童年是人类一生中最悲惨的时期。

福尔比在八九岁时就接受了正规教育，但直到十几岁时才学会如何阅读。为了养家糊口，福尔比在街头为求得铜板而开始卖唱。1890年10月，父亲劳勒死于肺结核，享年33岁。在这之后，福尔比去了一家纺织厂工作,当了两年的纺织厂员工。同时他在酒吧、酒馆和一些晚餐歌舞厅唱歌来赚取更多的钱，之后又去了娱乐性非正式场所。大约在这个时候，他和另一个男孩组成了一个叫“格伦雷兄弟”（也被称作“格伦·雷兄弟”）的二人组合。这个组合所创造的价值足以吸引一名经纪人前来经营。后来，福尔比开始变声不能继续演唱，两人也各自单飞。

新的舞台

福尔比第二任妻子伊丽莎·安娜·福尔比（婚前姓霍伊，1879–1981)

19世纪90年代，福尔比开始活跃于舞台，并在兰开夏郡建立了庞大的粉丝后援团。他创造了很多角色，并结合这些角色的性格设计了相应的服饰，并谱写了一系列诙谐曲。截至1896年，他的任务簿就已经有了他收集购买版权诙谐曲、保护唱歌权利的记录。1897年之前人们称他为詹姆斯·布斯（J.H. Booth），后来他把艺名改为乔治·福尔比（George Formby）。尽管有谣言说，福尔比这个姓的来源是他看到一个铁路运输目的地叫做福尔比，于是以此作为新艺名中的姓。但是人们都认为这个故事可能是虚构的。福尔比这个姓的起源更有可能是由时任{{Link-en|菱形花纹剧院|Argyle Theatre}}经理丹尼斯·克拉克所提出的，而乔治这个名则是为了向乔治·罗比致敬。1897年，福尔比在伯肯希德第一次使用他的新艺名登台演出。

福尔比最早创建的角色名字为约翰·威利。戏剧教授巴兹·柯肖把这个角色描述为“舞台上的福尔比”。 文化历史学家杰弗里·里查德斯则将他描述为描述为“穿着宽松的长裤和紧身的夹克，带着一顶圆顶礼帽。说话慢吞吞，妻管严，易惹事故，但还能混日子”。他的服装包括：不合身的衣服、穿错脚的大靴子和各种帽子，他还经常带着拐杖。1908，他把一件衣服借给了卓别林，当他和弗莱德·卡尔诺的剧团一起巡回演出时，卓别林也把福尔比的快速旋转和鸭子步融入到他的表演中。

1897年，福尔比遇到了他人生中第一任妻子，20岁的音乐厅演员：玛莎·玛丽亚·索尔特（英语：Martha Maria Salter）。他们于八月份在玛莎的家乡哈利法克斯结婚。尽管1901年的人口普查表明索尔特仍和父母住在一起，但关于索尔特的事无人知晓。这场婚姻似乎并不成功，但根据福尔比的传记作家苏·斯玛特（英语：Sue Smart）和李察·博思威·霍华德（英语：Richard Bothway Howard）所写的传记来看，没有证据表明这对夫妇离过婚，也没有任何关于夫妻离婚的说法。

在1897或98年，福尔比与兰开夏郡的布莱克本的兰心大戏院（英语：Lyceum Theatre）签约，客串于魔术师沃尔福德·博迪的演出。很快他又开启了为期四十周的巡回演出，在巡演中福尔比每周能赚30先令。1898年在维恩剧院（英语：Wigan Empire）演出时（这场演出是巡演的一部分），福尔比遇见了伊丽莎·霍伊，这家剧院的一位收银员的女儿。 同年八月，福尔比和伊丽莎登记结婚。因为福尔比在两年前曾经和玛莎结过婚，所以这场婚姻是福尔比的第二次结婚。 他们结婚几个月后，伊丽莎成功说服福尔比皈依天主教，以此帮助福尔比克服她父母刚开始对他的不信任。 福尔比和伊丽莎育有十三个孩子，最后只有七个活了下来，其中四个是女儿，三个是男孩。历史文学家大卫·布雷评价福尔比时说道：“他具有惊人的，无法消耗完的性能力”, 并且他和其他的性伙伴有七个孩子， 但在福尔比的私生活中，伊丽莎变得越来越重要，在福尔比表演时她会帮他做好演出服并在身旁鼓励他。同时她还做针线活，午餐时到街上卖薯条，以此来维持生活。

在伦敦，人气日益增长

1902年，福尔比被泰德·格兰威尔（英语：Ted Granville）（景宁镇艾伯特皇家音乐厅的老板）邀请演出，这是福尔比第一次在伦敦演出，此时他出场费是每周3英镑; 格兰威尔随后成为福尔比在伦敦的经纪人。伊丽莎后来回忆说： 克里彭博士的妻子（后来被他杀害）看过福尔比的表演, 受到福尔比表演的深深感染，看完表演后联系格兰威尔，让他去利兹特地观看福尔比的下一场表演。据泰晤士报记载，这不久后，福尔比转到伦敦帕维里昂音乐厅演出，在这里他不久就大获成功，他也逐渐变成了“全镇的偶像”。乐厅中一个有声望的女演员兼歌手玛莉·劳埃曾经评价福尔比说道：“我只看两个人的表演，一个是福尔比，另一个是丹·雷诺。”福尔比的名声由此日益增加。劳埃把福尔比推荐给了蒂沃利音乐厅的老板，老板随后和福尔比签了十周的合同。 福尔比也给罗比留下了深刻的印象，因此在1905年他把福尔比推荐为纽卡斯特尔的哑剧首席表演者，福尔比在那一周能赚到35英镑。 1920年，他一周能赚325英镑。

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福尔比的三个女儿英年早逝后，1904年，他的第一个儿子乔治·霍伊·布斯出生了。 Although the boy was born unable to see owing to an obstructive caul, he gained his sight during a violent coughing fit or sneeze when he was a few months old. Over the course of 1904 Formby purchased the singing rights to 57 songs, more than his normal annual number of between 10 and 20; the average cost of his songs was around a 坚尼.。 Two years later he made his first recordings, on 留声机圆筒, for the Louis Sterling Cylinder Company, and in 1907 he signed a recording contract with Zonophone. He was one of the few performers who had no difficulties recording clearly with the primitive equipment, and he performed in a relaxed fashion for an invisible audience. He would sing his song and then talk to the listener using a variant of his normal stage patter. Some of those songs, such as "Playing the Game out West" and "Since I Parted my Hair in the Middle" have been identified by Dave Russell, the social historian, as "clever depictions of a provincial innocent let lose （原文如此） in the capital".

1908年的一月～二月的大部分时间，福尔比出现在伦敦的各种音乐厅，每周他可以赚到30英镑。 在第二年，福尔比留在了伦敦的市中心继续他的表演, 他一晚连续在三个音乐厅进行表演，这时他每周可赚到45英镑。 One such venue was the Tivoli with Lloyd and Little Tich as the headline acts. 当伦敦没有表演任务时，福尔比会继续在省级的音乐厅进行巡回演出。1910年，福尔比再次出现在了蒂沃利音乐厅， 并复习The Times的剧本, 记者认为此举是： “为了重新成为歌手而复习如何唱歌。” 这一年以后，福尔比开始记录哪些歌曲将可能是他的著名歌曲, 这其中包含了"Standing at the Corner of the Street"到了1913年他的记录出售的歌曲版权足够他再签一个300英镑的合同。

1913年，福尔比的喜剧生涯开始走向高峰。在乔治五世和特克的玛丽之前，福尔比已经成为了诺斯利音乐厅皇家指挥部中的第七个人，其地位接近于利物浦。The Times 显示出：“福尔比式幽默获得了出乎意料的成功，表演结束后，他们对表演者福尔比本人赞不绝口。”但是福尔比本人对他的演出感到尴尬。他平时部分的表演通常都是由乐队指挥人来指挥的，这一次的演出也不例外：乐队们坐在晚会的后台，并乐队中的一些人认为福尔比并没有对他们尊重。 国王明白福尔比在和谁说话，但他依然给福尔比一个别针作为荣誉。该年十一月份，福尔比出现在了音乐厅皇家指挥部的年度表演现场上, 在法国女演员[莎拉·伯恩哈特]]组织的一场慈善演出时，福尔比再次出现。 他总共参加了两场演出： "Ten Little Nigger Boys All in a Row"的演出冰和其他演员一起演出。例如罗比，马可·谢雷登，西西莉·考特尼奇和乔治·格雷夫斯，紧跟着是短篇单人小表演。

File:George Formby with friends – April 1915.JPG

Formby Jr (right) while employed as a jockey, aged 10, in 1915

1914年3月，福尔比出现在了一部名为“No Fool Like an Old Fool”的电影中，这部电影是一部20多分钟的滑稽默剧; 这是他唯一出现在电影里面，且拍摄时他对人物和情节的了解少之又少。 当八月份时一战爆发后，福尔比曾试图参军。但却因为体检不过关而被拒绝申请，他并没有因此灰心丧气，而是积极参加征兵运动，在群众集会上发言, 特别是成为得比计划的声明者之一。

福尔比经常因他的儿子乔治看他的演出感到为难，因为他不希望儿子将来也和他从事喜剧演员，他曾经说过：“家里有一个傻瓜就够了。” 尽管如此，但他儿子依然想进军喜剧演员。虽然他费心尽力把儿子送出去当一名骑手。直到1915年的时候他才允许他儿子出现在舞台和银幕上，在伯特·霍尔丹指导的By the Shortest of Heads中他以一个稳健的男孩的形象出现在了银幕里，a thriller directed by Bert Haldane. 拍摄结束后，福尔比把他儿子送回爱尔兰来继续完成他儿子的赛马训练，还把当年为儿子买的五匹训练用的马匹送了过去。

病情恶化，死亡

福尔比在1916年六月的时候排演讽刺滑稽剧Razzle-Dazzle的时候意外受伤，他在皇家剧院彩排的时候意外从舞台上摔了下来。 他的肺部受损严重并被紧急送到盖伊医院进行肺出血抢救。 虽然他是这次演出的主角， 蛋挞在戏剧正式上演的时候并没有出现，这使得他受到了许多批评。and The Observer thought that "some of it seemed to have strayed in by mistake out of a second-rate provincial pantomime". Formby returned within a week and the reviews were more positive, with The Observer stating that it was "one of the successes of the season ... Razzle-Dazzle is now one of the liveliest revues in London, and the most spectacular". By August the production had transferred to the Empire Theatre, Leicester Square.

File:George Formby snr, 1921.jpg

Formby, c. 1921

这次的事故导致了他的肺结核病更加严重，致使他出场的次数越来越少。在1917年的绍斯波特帕尔因为福尔比未能演出合同里所约定的戏剧表演而对他提起诉讼，因此福尔比的律师在法庭上对帕尔说说福尔比现在因为肺结核而处于生命垂危的状态，并且他为了能在短时间内完成工作牺牲了他在家庭里的休息时间。但这样福尔比还是败诉了。他的答辩因为他在这段时间里接受了别的合同而显得苍白无力。

1918年流感大流行后福尔比的身体持续恶化， during which he contracted the disease while appearing at the Manchester Hippodrome and was unable to work for a month. He was taken ill during the runs of pantomimes in both 1918 and 1919, was forced to rest for three months in 1919, and collapsed on stage during a performance in Newcastle upon Tyne in the 1920–21 pantomime season. Formby was advised by doctors to emigrate to South Africa for the benefit of his health, but he preferred to stay in Britain, with his wife and children, and continued to work. During his performances his wife would wait in the wings with ice for him to suck to stop internal bleeding, and an oxygen tent was present in the stage wings ready for emergencies.

In early 1921 Formby was appearing at the Newcastle Empire in Jack and Jill when he collapsed after a show. He returned to his home near Warrington, where he died of pulmonary tuberculosis on 8 February, at the age of 45. He was buried in a family plot in the Catholic section of Warrington Cemetery. He left over £25,000 in his will, listing Eliza as executrix. As their marriage had been bigamous, he described her as "my reputed wife Eliza Ann Booth, otherwise Eliza Ann Hoy".

The obituarist for The Manchester Guardian wrote that Formby was one of the "great drolls" of the music hall whose humour "always seemed to take its rise in a sympathetic perception of human vanities and weaknesses". The Dundee Courier considered him a great comedian, made all the greater by his continuing to perform through his illness, while the drama critic J. T. Grein, writing in The Illustrated London News, thought that Formby, "along with [Harry] Lauder, Robey and [Albert] Chevalier, formed the leading quartette （原文如此） of the profession".

Stage persona and technique

"His art seemed absolutely guileless and childish, in the vein of the Hatter's madness, but there was method in it—that wonderful form of humour which the Londoner appreciates, but cannot imitate. It was racial of the Lancastrian soil".

J. T. Grein, The Illustrated London News

Formby was the first comic to use a delayed entrance as a joke to make the audience laugh before he arrived: his orchestra played his entrance music, and then he failed to appear on stage. His act included songs, described by Smart and Bothway Howard as "characteristically simple, some with tunes derived from Methodist hymns, and with catchy choruses", and he would chat to the orchestra conductor and front rows, punctuating his stage patter—delivered in a deadpan style—with his cough. He used his health—particularly the coughing—as part of his act, and would say that he was "Coughin' well tonight!" He also created the phrase "It's not the cough that carries you off – it's the coffin they carries you off in!" One of Formby's nicknames, "The Wigan Nightingale" was coined because of the way he used his bronchial cough in his act.

The "John Willie" character, like much of Formby's act, used pathos as one of the comedic drivers, "but it was not contrived and was never mawkish", according to Alan Randall and Ray Seaton, two of Formby Jr's biographers. In his examination of British screen stars, Geoffrey Macnab agrees, and identifies that although Formby's jokes were about himself, "there was grit in the routines, a resolute denial of self-pity". The Times examined the performer's style of humour, and considered it "often crude, and always simple, but it was always true humour, and, what is more, it was invariably clean."

Much of Formby's humour was based in his north western roots, particularly Wigan, which he told people was where he was born, rather than Ashton. He would refer to taking his holidays at Wigan Pier, which was a small wooden platform on the Leeds and Liverpool Canal for loading coal, rather than a pleasure pier. The Manchester Guardian called him "Lancashire's accredited representative on the London variety stage ... clown-satirist of genius".

When he performed in London, Formby would change his act, introducing himself as "Good evening, I'm Formby fra' Wigan ... I've not been in England long"; he slightly modified his stage persona, and he played "the naïve boy trying to fit in with the sophisticated south". Smart and Boothroyd consider that "the contrast between his northern accent and metropolitan bravado was humorous, and the more urbane and sophisticated his audience the more George exaggerated his provincial gormlessness".

Legacy

File:Unveiling memorial to George Formby Snr.png

The unveiling of Formby's memorial

福尔比逝世六周后，其子乔治首次以前者的形象出现在舞台上。一开始乔治使用霍伊（Hoy，乔治母亲的婚前姓），但不久后就改用福尔比。小福尔比最终成为1937至1943年间票房收入最高的英国男明星。

Chaplin, who derived some of his stage persona from Formby's, sailed in 1908 with Karno's troupe to the United States, where he developed the character of the Tramp, the image of which became universally familiar by 1915. George Orwell later used Formby's humorous concept of "Wigan Pier" in the title of his 1937 study of depression and unemployment in the area, The Road to Wigan Pier.

Formby left over 190 recordings, and after his death The Times commented, "There cannot be many people who have not heard at some time in their lives either the words or the refrain of 'John Willie – Come On', 'One of the Boys', 'I was Standing on the Corner of the Street', or 'Playing the Game in the West'", songs described by Fisher as "afizz with gaiety and champagne".

In October 1922 a large marble memorial was unveiled at the site of Formby's grave, in the presence of Formby Jr, Eliza and a large crowd. The memorial later became the resting place for both the younger Formby and Eliza. In June 2012 a blue plaque was unveiled at Hodgson Street, Ashton, Formby's birthplace.

参考文献

• Bret, David. George Formby: A Troubled Genius. London: Robson Books. 1999. ISBN 978-1-86105-239-1. 
• Fisher, John. George Formby. London: Woburn-Futura. 1975. ISBN 978-0-7130-0139-6. 
• Gildart, Keith. Images of England Through Popular Music: Class, Youth and Rock 'n' Roll, 1955–1976. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan. 2013. ISBN 978-1-137-38425-6. 
• Kershaw, Baz. Theatre Ecology: Environments and Performance Events. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2007. ISBN 978-0-521-87716-9. 
• Krishnamurthy, Aruna. The Working-class Intellectual in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-century Britain. Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. 2009. ISBN 978-0-7546-6504-5. 
• Macnab, Geoffrey. Searching for Stars: Stardom and Screen Acting in British Cinema. London: A&C Black. 2000. ISBN 978-1-4411-8425-2. 
• Quigley, Joseph. The Slogan – Sidelights on recruiting with Harry Lauder's Band. London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co. 1916. OCLC 35122379. 
• Randall, Alan; Seaton, Ray. George Formby. London: W. H. Allen. 1974. ISBN 978-0-491-01771-8. 
• Richards, Jeffrey. Imperialism and Music: Britain, 1876–1953. Manchester: Manchester University Press. 2001. ISBN 978-0-7190-6143-1. 
• Richards, Jeffrey. Formby, George (1904–1961). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press). 2004 [27 May 2014]. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/33205.  需要订阅或英国公共图书馆会员资格
• Richards, Jeffrey. The Age of the Dream Palace: Cinema and Society in 1930s Britain. London: I.B. Tauris. 2010. ISBN 978-1-84885-122-1. 
• Robinson, David. Chaplin: His Life and Art. London: Paladin. 1986. ISBN 978-0-586-08544-8. 
• Russell, Dave. Popular Music in England 1840–1914: A Social History. Manchester: Manchester University Press. 1997. ISBN 978-0-7190-5261-3. 
• Russell, Dave. Looking North: Northern England and the National Imagination. Manchester: Manchester University Press. 2004. ISBN 978-0-7190-5178-4. 
• Smart, Sue; Bothway Howard, Richard. It's Turned Out Nice Again!: The Authorized Biography of the Two George Formbys, Father and Son. Ely, Cambridgeshire: Melrose Books. 2011. ISBN 978-1-907732-59-1. 
• St. Pierre, Paul Matthew. Music Hall Mimesis in British Film, 1895–1960: On the Halls on the Screen. Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Press. 2009. ISBN 978-0-8386-4191-0. 

外部链接

• 互联网档案馆上的福尔比六首歌曲的录音
• 爱好者网页上的介绍
• 福尔比歌曲的歌词
• 福尔比歌曲列表

[[Category:1875年出生]] [[Category:1921年逝世]] [[Category:天主教皈依者]] [[Category:英格蘭天主教徒]] [[Category:英格蘭男歌手]]