Diva Alert #19: Libby Holman

Written by Jackson Upperco

February 12, 2018

Welcome back to Diva Alert, Performer Stuff’s series on Great Dames from the Golden Age of Broadway. In these posts, we’re taking a look at some of the American Musical Theatre’s most legendary ladies, along with their seminal stage triumphs.

This dame could put over a torch song like nobody’s business. That’s because her life seemed to resemble one.

Born in Cincinnati to a wealthy Jewish family who soon lost everything thanks to her embezzling uncle, Libby Holman moved to New York and made her Broadway debut in 1925 at the age of 21.

A brooding chanteuse prone to torch songs, Holman rocketed to stardom by spoofing her image in the landmark 1929 musical revue The Little Show, which also starred Fred Allen and Clifton Webb. The trio reunited again the next year for Three’s A Crowd (1930).

Holman was a known bisexual who had relationships with women like DuPont heiress Louisa d’Andelot Carpenter and (younger) men like actor Montgomery Clift. She married Zachary “Smith” Reynolds, her first (of three) husbands, in 1931.

Their union was short-lived though; in 1932, Reynolds died of a gunshot wound — moments after his wife had revealed that she was pregnant. Officially ruled a suicide, Reynolds’ death caused a national scandal, with many believing either Holman or her alleged lover pulled the trigger.

Although she returned to Broadway twice more over the next few years — and again for a short-lived solo concert with which she later toured — Holman’s life remained dramatic. Her second marriage crumbled when her husband came home from war and committed suicide. Then she was professionally humiliated: fired from a new musical during its tryouts.

In 1950, after having adopted two children, Holman’s only natural son died while falling off a mountain; she never recovered from the loss. After marrying again in 1960, Holman took up political activism. Long a champion of Civil Rights (ever since her friendship with Josh White), she was devastated by the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Libby Holman extinguished her torch light in 1971 — an appropriately tragic end to a life that seemed to embody all those tragic women she played and sang about on the stage. Her life was a torch song — and nobody crooned it better.



DID YOU KNOW? Producer Vinton Freedley reportedly first offered the leading role in the Cole Porter musical that later became Anything Goes (1934) to Libby Holman. When she turned it down, that part went to a rising Broadway diva named Ethel Merman.

Holman Roles You Should Know

Various Roles in The Little Show (1929)



Known as the first intimate musical revue — in contrast to the spectacles offered by men like Ziegfeld, Carroll, and White — this score gave Libby Holman one of her signature numbers, Ralph Rainger and Howard Dietz’s uber torchy “Moanin’ Low.”

Various Roles in Three’s A Crowd (1930)



With the same three stars as The Little Show, this follow-up to that smash hit provided this month’s diva with several new songs for her repertoire, including “Body And Soul,” by Johnny Green, with Edward Heyman, Robert Sour, and Frank Eyton.

Maria in Revenge With Music (1934)



In her first stage role after Reynolds’ death, Holman played the wife of a man who believes the governor has seduced his new bride. The score’s main love duet — by Howard Dietz and Arthur Schwartz — was the aching “You And The Night And The Music.”

Mme. Baltin in You Never Know (1938)



This Cole Porter musical was an adaptation of an Austrian farce involving a baron, his valet, a madam, and her maid. It had a troubled production history — Holman feuded the whole time with co-star Lupe Valez — and closed early, despite its fine score.


Hungry for more theatre history? Check out our other stories below!

Jackson Upperco is a lover of retro television, forgotten Broadway musicals, and Pre-Code Hollywood. He boasts a Bachelors Degree in Film and Television from Boston University. You can keep up with all of his entertainment interests at jacksonupperco.com.
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