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In the early 1930s, Raye was a band vocalist with the Paul Ash and Boris
Morros orchestras. She
made her first film appearance in 1934 in a band short titled A Nite
in the
Nite Club. In 1936, she was signed for comic roles by Paramount
Pictures, and made her first picture for Paramount. Her first
feature film
was Rhythm on
the Range with crooner Bing Crosby. Over
the next 26 years, she would
eventually appear with many of the leading comics of her day, including Joe E.
Brown, Bob Hope, W. C. Fields,
Abbott and
Costello, Charlie
Chaplin, and Jimmy
Durante. She joined the USO soon after the US
entered World War II.
Martha Raye was known for the size of her mouth, which appeared large
in
proportion to the rest of her face, thus earning her the nickname "The
Big
Mouth". She later referred to this in a series of commercials for
Polident
denture cleaner in the 1980s: "So take it from The Big Mouth: new
Polident Green
gets tough stains clean!" Her mouth would come to relegate her motion
picture
work to largely supporting comic parts, and was often made up in such a
way that
it appeared even larger than it already was. In the Warner Brothers cartoon
The Woods are Full of Cuckoos, she is caricatured as a jazzy
scat-singing
donkey named "Moutha Bray".
[ USO
During World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War, she
travelled
extensively to entertain the American troops, even though she had a
lifelong
fear of flying.
In October 1966, she went to Soc Trang, Vietnam,
to entertain the troops at the base which was
the home base of the 121st Aviation company, the Soc Trang Tigers, the
gunship
platoon, The Vikings and the 336th Aviation company. Shortly after her
arrival,
both units]were called out on a mission to extract supposed POWs from an
area
nearby. Raye decided to hold her troupe of entertainers there until the
mission
was completed so that all of the servicemen could watch her show.
During that time, a serviceman flying a "Huey Slick" helicopter
carrying
troops recalls that his ship received combat damage to the extent that
he had to
return to base at Soc Trang:
I was the pilot of that "slick" which had received major damage to
the
tail-rotor drive shaft from a lucky enemy rifle shot. The maintenance
team at
the staging area inspected and determined that a one-time flight back to
base
camp would be okay but grounded the aircraft after that. Upon arriving
back at
Soc Trang, I informed Martha (she came right up to us and asked how
things were
going) that we had a gunship down in the combat area and additional
efforts were
being made to extract the crew. I don't recall if we had received word
of the
death of the pilot at that time. Martha stated that she and her troupe
would
remain until everyone returned from the mission. As there were no
replacements,
the servicemen could not return to the mission. While the servicemen
waited,
Raye played poker with them and helped to keep everyone's spirits up. I
enjoyed
playing cards with Martha but regretted it somewhat. It appears that she
had
plenty of practice playing poker with GIs during her USO service in
multiple
wars. But I still love her for who she was and what she did. When the
mission
was completed, which had resulted in the loss of a helicopter, gunship
and a
Viking pilot, there was also an officer, the Major who was in command of
the
Vikings who had been wounded when the ship went down. He was flying
pilot
position but was not in control of the ship when the command pilot, a
Warrant
Officer, was shot. When he and the two remaining crewmen were returned
to Soc
Trang, Raye volunteered to assist the doctor in treating the wounded
flyer. When
all had been completed, Raye waited until everybody was available and
then put
on her show. Everyone involved appreciated her as an outstanding trouper
and a
caring person. During the Vietnam War, she was made an honorary Green
Beret
because she visited United States Army Special Forces in Vietnam without
fanfare, and she helped out when things got bad in Special Forces
A-Camps. As a
result, she came to be known affectionately by the Green Berets as
"Colonel
Maggie."[3]
TV career
Raye was an early television star when that medium was very young;
for a
while she had her own program, The Martha Raye Show (1954 - 1956)
in
which she was the lead and her awkward boyfriend was portrayed by
retired middleweight boxer Rocky Graziano.
The
writer and producer was future Phil
Silvers Show creator Nat
Hiken. Other stars who appeared on her show included Zsa Zsa
Gabor, Cesar Romero and Broadway dancer
Wayne
Lamb. She also appeared on
other TV shows in the 1950s, such as "What's My Line?". Following the
demise of
her TV variety show, the breakup of her fifth marriage, and a series of
other
personal and health problems, she attempted suicide with sleeping pills
on
August 14, 1956. Well wishers gave her a St. Christopher's
medal, a St.
Genesius medal and a Star of David.
After her recovery, she wore these
faithfully, although she was neither Catholic nor Jewish. At the end of
her TV
programs, she would also thank the nuns at The Sisters of St. Francis
Hospital
in Miami, Florida where she recovered. She would
always say, "Goodnight, Sisters" as a sign of appreciation and
gratitude. Later,
Raye served as the television spokesperson for Polident denture
cleanser,
principally during the 1970s and 1980s.
[edit] Later career
In 1970, she portrayed Boss Witch, the "Queen of all Witch-dom" in
the
feature film Pufnstuf for Sid and Marty
Krofft. This led to her being cast as villainess Benita Bizarre in The
Bugaloos (1970),
which the Kroffts produced the same year.
She often appeared as a guest on other programs, particularly ones
that often
had older performers as guest stars, such as ABC's
The Love BoatThe
Roy Rogers and Dale Evans
Show, also on ABC. She also appeared for two years as Mel
Sharples'
mother, Carrie, on the CBS sitcom Alice.
She made
guest appearances or did cameo roles in such
series as Murder, She
Wrote on CBS and The Andy Williams Show and McMillan &
Wife, both on NBC.