Cole Albert Porter (June 9, 1891 – October 15, 1964) was an American composer and songwriter. Born to a wealthy family in Indiana, he defied the wishes of his domineering grandfather and took up music as a profession. Classically trained, he was drawn towards musical theatre. After a slow start, he began to achieve success in the 1920s, and by the 1930s he was one of the major songwriters for the Broadway musical stage. Unlike many successful Broadway composers, Porter wrote the lyrics, as well as the music, for his songs.
After a serious horseback riding accident in 1937, Porter was left disabled and in constant pain, but he continued to work. His shows of the early 1940s did not contain the lasting hits of his best work of the 1920s and '30s, but in 1948 he made a triumphant comeback with his most successful musical, Kiss Me, Kate. It won the first Tony Award for Best Musical.
Porter's other musicals include Fifty Million Frenchmen, DuBarry Was a Lady, Anything Goes, Can-Can and Silk Stockings. His numerous hit songs include "Night and Day", "Begin the Beguine", "I Get a Kick Out of You", "Well, Did You Evah!", "I've Got You Under My Skin", "My Heart Belongs to Daddy" and "You're the Top". He also composed scores for films from the 1930s to the 1950s, including Born to Dance (1936), which featured the song "You'd Be So Easy to Love"; Rosalie (1937), which featured "In the Still of the Night"; High Society (1956), which included "True Love"; and Les Girls (1957).
"Ace in the Hole" is a popular song composed by Cole Porter. The song was written expressly for Porter's musical Let's Face It! which debuted at New York City's Imperial Theatre on 29 October 1941. In the original production, "Ace in the Hole" was performed by Mary Jane Walsh (as Winnie Potter) and Nanette Fabray (as Jean Blanchard). The song was one of the hits of the show throughout its 547 performances on Broadway and its 1943 movie adaptation.
The song was copyrighted in 1941 by the music publisher Chappell & Co. which transferred the renewed copyright to John F. Wharton, Trustee of the Cole Porter Musical & Literary Property Trusts.
Ace in the Hole may refer to:
"Ace in the Hole" the title of a song written by Dennis Adkins, and recorded by American country music artist George Strait. George's touring band is called "The Ace in the Hole Band." It was released in July 1989 as the third single from his album Beyond the Blue Neon. It became his 18th #1 single as well as his 11th in a row.
The song is about life and how you have to keep a few tricks up your sleeve in order to get ahead. Every one is fighting to succeed and have a good life and in order to beat out the competition you have to have some good people around you.
"Ace in the Hole" reached number 1 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart and on the Canadian RPM Country Tracks chart.
Ace in the Hole (aka The Big Carnival) is a 1951 American film noir starring Kirk Douglas as a cynical, disgraced reporter who stops at nothing to try to regain a job on a major newspaper.
It marked a series of firsts for auteur Billy Wilder: it was the first time he was involved in a project as a writer, producer, and director; his first film following his breakup with long-time writing partner Charles Brackett, with whom he had collaborated on The Lost Weekend and Sunset Boulevard, among others; and his first film to be a critical and commercial failure.
The story is a biting examination of the seedy relationship between the press, the news it reports and the manner in which it reports it. Without consulting Wilder, Paramount Pictures executive Y. Frank Freeman changed the title to The Big Carnival just prior to its release. Early television broadcasts retained that title, but when aired by Turner Classic Movies—and when released on DVD by The Criterion Collection in July 2007—it reverted to Ace in the Hole.