Was cole porter gay

What is This Thing Called Love?

A recent movie explores composer Cole Porter’s consummate musical gifts and his remarkable, unorthodox marriage

A stand of logs burns brightly in the fireplace, snowflakes flicker at the window, and servants attend the gentlemen and ladies gathered around a grand piano played by a youthful Cole Porter, on holiday break from Harvard law university. Carolers, joined by his female cousin, sing:

In the still of the blackout, While the society is in slumber, Oh, the times without number, Darling, when I state to you, "Do you love me as I adoration you? Are you my life-to-be, my dream come true?"

Porter gazes across the room at Linda Lee, the cousin's roommate who has come to observe Christmas on the Porter family farm in Peru, a humble town on the plains of northern Indiana. Porter and Lee possess only just met, but the intensity in their eyes suggests that the seeds of a profound passion acquire already taken root in their hearts.

Pure Hollywood. The 1946 movie Night and Day, starring Cary Grant as Porter, was a grand deception. After seeing the film, Porter pronounced with apparent satisfaction: "None of it's true."

To commence with, Porter, who left Harvard regulation s

At the time he sang second tenor in the Glee Club at Yale, Cole Porter (1891-1964) also appeared in stage roles and performed cabaret sets at private parties. It became his habit to step out of the chorus just before the choir’s last number to rest at the piano to accompany himself in a solo performance of songs and patter, much of the clever and cheeky material his own. Although he was listed just once in the program, the audience usually kept him there until he had gone through 10-12 encores. Reviewers called him the “highlight” of the concerts, “a clever imitator, tough singer and comedian”. Then, as later in life, Porter wrote both the words and melody to his songs.

After one year he dropped out of Harvard Regulation School, where he had resided with Dean Acheson, the future Secretary of State. His firm D-grades in all his law courses resulted in a transfer to the School of Song in 1914 for his second year at Harvard. For a time he studied music with Pietro Yon, who went on to become famous as organist at NYC’s St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

Porter, who was exclusively homosexual, met his future wife Linda at a 1918 wedding receptio

History

The work of songwriter Cole Porter (1891-1964) evokes an era of romantic glamor both on Broadway and in Hollywood in the 1930s and 1940s. He was the composer and lyricist for many staples of the American Songbook, including such classic songs as “Let’s Do It, Let’s Fall in Love” (1928; Porter’s first big hit), “Love for Sale” (1930), “Night and Day” (1932), “Easy to Love” (1934), “You’re the Tops” (1934), “Anything Goes” (1934), “I Receive a Kick Out of You” (1934), “Begin the Beguine” (1935), “I’ve Got You Under My Skin” (1936), “My Heart Belongs to Daddy” (1938), “Another Opening Another Show” (1948), and “I Love Paris” (1953).

Porter was born into a wealthy family in Peru, Indiana. He attended Yale where he wrote songs for student productions and football games, including the ever popular “Bingo” and “Eli Yale.” While at Yale he met his lifelong friend, actor and director Monty Woolley, best known for playing Sheridan Whiteside in the perform and movie The Man Who Came to Dinner. After college, Porter spent much of his time in Paris and Venice or traveling in Europe with a new set of wealthy, often titled, friends.

In 1918, he met the well-heel

Cole Porter: A Prolific Musical Career Launched in Greenwich Village

Cole Porter was a paradox; a musical genius who truly defined a time in musical history, he was at once a privileged sybarite and a bohemian provocateur all at the same hour. Porter also lived a contradictory lifestyle. He was gay, and yet he remained devoted to his wife until her death in 1954. It seems most fitting that Greenwich Village would be the launching pad for his prolific and genre-bending career.

Born on June 9, 1891 in Peru, Indiana, Cole Porter was the grandson of a wealthy speculator. He spent his in advance years learning to participate violin and piano, practicing composition, and writing a Gilbert and Sullivan-like operetta at the ripe age of 10. Educated at Yale and then at Harvard, his life certainly did not follow the typical path of an artist.

Porter wrote 300 songs while at Yale, including student songs such as the football fight songs “Bulldog” and “Bingo Eli Yale” (aka “Bingo, That’s The Lingo!”) that are still played at Yale today. During college, Porter became acquainted with Fresh York City’s vibrant nightlife, taking the train there for