JULIE LONDON

It is the birthday today of one of my favorite singers, Julie London, who died, you will recall, seven years ago. In addition to being a wonderful stylist, with a nuanced, smokily crystalline, delicately whisky voice, London had beautiful bone structure. Alas, she was a terrible actress!

She was married to Jack Webb and jazz musician Bobby Troup. Julie had children with Webb, but it’s her long-running musical partnership with Bobby that we remember.

In daylight London wasn’t particularly striking; but it’s only in bad movies that we saw her in daylight. When we think of Julie, we think of her sultry presence in the underlit setting of an intimate club. There, she was one of the most beautiful women on earth—or, rather, somewhere apart from earth.

Cry me a river, Julie; cry me a river whenever you want.