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James "Jim" Dale, MBE (born 15 August 1935), is an English actor, voice artist, and singer-songwriter. He is best known in the United Kingdom for his many appearances in the Carry On series of films and in the US for narrating the Harry Potter audiobook series, for which he received two Grammy Awards, and the ABC series Pushing Daisies, as well as starring in Pete's Dragon. In the 1970s, Dale was a member of the National Theatre Company.[1]
Dale was born James Smith to William Henry and Miriam Jean (née Wells) Smith in Rothwell, Northamptonshire.[2] He was educated at the Kettering Grammar School. He trained as a dancer for six years before his debut as a stage comic in 1951, at the age of seventeen and a half.[3] He performed two years' national service in the Royal Air Force.[3][4]
As a Academy Award in 1966.[4] The song (performed by the Seekers) reached number 2 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart the following year, and sold over seven million records. He also wrote lyrics for the title song of the films Shalako, Joseph Andrews, Twinky (Lola in the United States) and A Winter's Tale.
At the age of twenty-two he became the first pop singer under the wing of hit records. Several of his songs entered the UK Singles Chart, including "Be My Girl" (1957, UK No.2), "Just Born (To Be Your Baby)" (1958, UK No.27), "Crazy Dream" (1958, UK No. 24) and "Sugartime" (1958, UK No. 25).[5]
In 1957, he was one of the presenters on BBC Television's Six-Five Special.[3] Dale also wrote and recorded the song "Dick-a-Dum-Dum (King's Road)", which became a hit for Des O'Connor in 1969.[6]
Dale's film debut was a tiny role as a trombone player[7] who thwarts orchestral conductor Kenneth Williams in the comedy Raising the Wind (1962). However, he is best known in Britain for his appearances in eleven Carry On films,[4] a long-running series of comedy farces, generally playing the hapless romantic lead. His Carry On career began as an expectant father in Carry On Cabby (1963), and was followed by Carry On Jack (1963), Carry On Spying (1964), Carry On Cleo (1964) and Carry On Cowboy (1965) - where he played a character called Marshall P Knutt. Then came Carry On Screaming! (1966),[3] Don't Lose Your Head (1966), Follow That Camel (1967), Carry On Doctor (1967) and Carry On Again Doctor (1969) and the 1992 Carry On Revival film Carry On Columbus. He was also offered roles in the Carry On films Carry On Camping (1969), Carry On Up The Khyber (1968) and Carry On Up The Jungle (1970) but turned them down. He played Dr. Terminus in Walt Disney's Pete's Dragon (1977).[8] He was the star of the Walt Disney comedy movie Hot Lead and Cold Feet (1978).[3]
At the age of eighteen Dale became one of the youngest professional comedians in Britain, touring all the variety music halls. On stage he appeared in both dramatic and musical roles. He has been nominated for five Tony Awards, winning one for Barnum (1980) for which the New York Times described him as "The Toast of Broadway",[9] also winning the second of four Drama Desk Awards.[10]
In 1970 Sir Laurence Olivier[9] invited Dale to join the National Theatre Company in London, then based at the Old Vic. At the Young Vic Theatre, he created the title role in Scapino (ca. 1970), which he co-adapted with Frank Dunlop,[11][12] and played Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew.[12]
His other UK credits include The Card (1973),[13] and The Wayward Way in London. He appeared in The Winter's Tale as Autolycus and A Midsummer Night's Dream as Bottom at the Edinburgh Festivals in 1966 and 1967 for Frank Dunlop's Pop Theatre.[14] He took over the part of Fagin in Cameron Mackintosh’s Oliver! at the London Palladium in September 1995.[15]
His Broadway performances include Scapino (1974) (Drama Desk Award, Outer Critics Award, Tony Award Nomination), Joe Egg (1985) (Outer Critics Award, Tony Award Nomination), Me And My Girl (1986) and Candide (1997) (Tony Award Nomination).[16] In 2006, Dale performed on Broadway (at Studio 54) in the Roundabout Theatre Company's production of The Threepenny Opera, as Mr. Peachum.[17] He received nominations for the Drama Desk Award, Outer Critics' Award, The Richard Seff Award and the Tony Award for this role.
Credits Off-Broadway include Travels With My Aunt (1995)[18] (Drama Desk Award, Lucille Lortel Award, Outer Critics Award), Privates On Parade (1989),[19] Comedians (2003)[20] (Drama Desk Award nomination and a Lucille Lortel Award nomination) and Address Unknown (2004).[21]
Other stage work includes: The Taming of the Shrew as Petruchio with the Young Vic, London (1970) and the Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York (1974); The Music Man U.S. tour (1984),[2] and The Invisible Man at the Cleveland Play House (1998).[22] He played the part of Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol: The Musical at the Theater at Madison Square Garden, New York City, from November 28, 2003 to December 27.[3][23]
Dale starred as "Charlie Baxter" in a one-night only concert version of the musical, Busker Alley alongside Glenn Close on November 13, 2006. This was a benefit for the York Theatre Company, and was held at Hunter College in New York City.[24] He appears in a one-man show, Just Jim Dale, looking back over nearly sixty years in show business. The show opened on May 15, 2014 at the Roundabout Theatre Company Laura Pels Theatre.[25]
Source: The New York Times[26]
Dale opened every episode of the ABC drama Pushing Daisies (2009) as the unseen narrator.[9][31]
In the United States, Jim Dale is known as the "voice" of Harry Potter. He has recorded all seven books in the Harry Potter series as audiobooks,[32] and as a narrator he has won two Grammy Awards in 2008 and 2001, several Grammy nominations[33] and a record ten Audie Awards[3] including "Audio Book of the Year 2004," "Best Children's Narrator 2001/2005/2007/2008," "Best Children's Audio Book 2005," two Benjamin Franklin Awards from the Independent Book Publishers Association[9] (one of these was in 2001 for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban)[34] and 23 Audio File Earphone Awards.
He narrates the Harry Potter video games, and for many of the interactive "extras" on the Harry Potter DVD releases. He also holds a Guinness World Record for occupying the first six places in the Top Ten Audio Books of America and Canada 2005.[35] He previously held one for creating and recording 134 different character voices for one audiobook, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, but has since been supplanted by Roy Dotrice, who read 224 voices for A Game of Thrones.[36] Dale opened every episode of the ABC drama Pushing Daisies as the unseen narrator.[9][31]
In the early 1960s, Dale presented Children's Favourites on BBC Radio, for a year.
He narrated Peter and the Starcatchers (2004) audio book,[37] and its three sequels.
In 2003, Queen Elizabeth II honoured Dale with the MBE, as part of the Royal Birthday Honours List, for his work in promoting English literature for children.[38]
In December 2009, for their annual birthday celebration to Noël Coward, the eponymous Noël Coward Society invited Dale to be the guest celebrity to lay flowers in front of Coward's statue at New York City's Gershwin Theatre on Broadway, thus commemorating Coward's 110th birthday.
American gossip columnist Cindy Adams reported in the February 26, 2014 edition of The New York Post that Dale told her:
"Listen, I live here 34 years, been a US citizen 5 years, but age 9 I started in small-town British music halls touring 52 weeks a year. I've done shows all my life."[39]
Sources: allmusic.com;[3] Playbillvault;[10] Audio Publisher[40]
Roald Dahl, J. K. Rowling, Warner Bros., Andy Griffiths, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Bryan Fuller, Kristin Chenoweth, Barry Sonnenfeld, Fantasy, Lee Pace
William Shakespeare, Kiss Me, Kate, Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, 10 Things I Hate About You
Gerald Thomas, Peter Rogers, Norman Hudis, Kenneth Connor, Barbara Windsor
Laurence Olivier, William Shakespeare, Nicholas Hytner, Richard Eyre, Hamlet
Gerald Thomas, Julius Caesar, Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Kenneth Connor
Cy Coleman, Cameron Mackintosh, New York City, Mark Bramble, West End theatre
Gerald Thomas, Talbot Rothwell, Peter Rogers, Sid James, Kenneth Williams
Helen Reddy, Walt Disney Animation Studios, Don Bluth, Don Chaffey, Bambi
Doctor Who, Dad's Army, Kenneth Williams, That's Carry On!, Joan Sims