Rags Ragland

'Rags Ragland' (qv) was a boxer, then a burlesque comedian and then a Broadway performer before ending up in Hollywood to repeat his stage role as the boisterous sailor in _Panama Hattie (1942)_ (qv), in which 'Ann Sothern' (qv) played on film the part that had been played on Broadway by 'Ethel Merman' (qv). Ragland, typecast as a good-natured oaf with a knack for fracturing the English language, had as his sole movie employer Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, in some two dozen of whose lighter vehicles he appeared, in the company of such MGM luminaries as 'Red Skelton' (qv), 'Lucille Ball' (qv), 'Judy Garland' (qv) and 'Gene Kelly' (qv).::Bill Takacs <kinephile@aol.com>