And then there’s the strange case of a Texas dance instructor who got caught impersonating Tommy Rall.
Tommy who?
Back in the 1950s, at the tail end of the era of big studio movie musicals, a handful of famous male dancers were making a splash on the movie screen: Gene Kelly, of course, and Donald O’Connor, Dan Dailey, Russ Tamblyn and a wispy-haired blond from Chicago named Bob Fosse, who would become a lot more famous as a Broadway choreographer.
There was also Tommy Rall – born December 27, 1929 in Kansas City, Missouri. He grew up in Seattle where his mother enrolled him in dance classes as a way of improving his vision; Tommy was born with a crossed eye, and a doctor suggested that dancing, which requires visual focus, might help correct the problem.
By 1948, Rall had made his musical-comedy debut in Los Angeles. He made his Broadway debut in Miss Liberty the following year. His greatest screen role came in 1953 in the film version of Cole Porter’s Kiss Me, Kate, which featured a dynamic dance sequence with Rall, Bob Fosse, Bobby Van, Carol Haney and Ann Miller. Rall was also a featured dancer in Seven Brides for Seven Brothers in 1954 and Funny Girl in 1968.
After Broadway roles became scarce, Rall worked in the trust department at a bank and became a professional portrait painter. The reticent Rall, who rarely gives interviews, has lived quietly in California for years.
It was a mystery novelist in Connecticut, Carole B. Shmurak, who outed the Tommy Rall impersonator in Texas. Shmurak, who writes the Susan Lombardi mystery series, had posted a mini-biography of Rall on the Internet Movie Data Base. Last fall, she received an e-mail from “a woman living outside of Houston who said her daughter was taking dancing lessons from a man who claimed he had danced in '50s movies under the name of Tommy Rall." The e-mail writer said she was growing suspicious of the man's claims.
Shmurak’s mystery-writer instincts kicked in. She wrote to the woman that Rall was living in California, not Texas, and was no longer dancing. She wondered if the dance teacher in Houston might be an impostor.
The woman who initially wrote to Shmurak wouldn’t give Carole the faux Rall’s “name.”
“She wouldn't give the name he was now using -- she said she didn't want to get him in trouble. But she did send me his photo and so-called credits,” Shmurak wrote. “The credits were wrong. He mentioned Seven Brides and Kiss Me, Kate but also Hello, Dolly and West Side Story.”
The real Tommy Rall hadn’t been in the latter two films. Shmurak wrote: “I was sure the man was a fraud, but I couldn't prove it -- and I was furious that this man was taking credit for Tommy Rall's work.”
Shmurak did eventually track down the Texas impostor – Houston dance instructor Ric Brame, who had been pretending to be the still-living Rall for three decades. After Shmurak outed the phony, Brame apologized to Rall. The real Rall declined to press charges. The phony Rall has, apparently, stopped adding the Rall credits to his biography.
The real Rall turns 78 years old this year. The fake Rall is still in Texas. – Charles Ferruzza
Showing 1-3 of 3
Here is the link to the Houston chronicle article on the impostor.
http://www.chron.com/disp/stor...
like
dislike
