Trivia

Burns was originally supposed to deliver the eulogy at the funeral of his best friend and fellow comedian, Jack Benny, but he was so overcome with emotion after trying to do so that he had to let someone else do it.

Burns was in very fragile health during the last days of the life and so could not attend his 100th birthday celebration in person as a result of this.

When Burns was interviewed around the time of the death of his wife, Gracie Allen, in the summer of 1964, he described her as being his "next breath".

Burns first discovered Ann-Margret and made her his opening act in Las Vegas, Nevada.

In the early 1940s at the peak of Burns and his wife Gracie Allen's popularity, he had a brief extramarital affair. He apologized to Gracie by giving her a new coffee table, and nothing more was said about it ever again; however, years later, when Gracie was serving coffee to a friend in their living room, he overheard her say, "You know, I wish George would have another affair. I really need a new coffee table.".

Along with Bob Hope and Señor Wences, Burns was one of three guest stars on The Muppet Show (1976) who lived to be 100 years old.

Burns and his wife, Gracie Allen, continued to play that they were single, even years after they were married; declining ratings prompted him to "update" the act on the air. He said later, "We were the only couple on radio who got married because we had to".

At the age of 13, Burns charged immigrants coming in by boat from Ellis Island $5.00 for dancing lessons, telling his clients that this was a necessary prerequisite for becoming a U.S. citizen.

Burns was awarded three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame: one for Live Theatre at 6672 Hollywood Blvd., one for Motion Pictures at 1639 Vine St. and one for Television at 6510 Hollywood Blvd.

Burns' first marriage was in name only. In the early 1920s he was doing a ballroom dancing act with Hannah Siegel, and they were offered a 36-week contract to go out on the road. When her father objected to her traveling with a young man outside the bonds of matrimony, he and Hannah got married so as not to turn down the offer. When they returned from their three-month engagement, they divorced.

Until his death in 1996 at the age of 100, Burns smoked as many as 10 cigars a day.

As a child, Burns attended P.S. 22 and left after the fourth grade due to economic reasons.

The two humpback whales in the film Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) were named George and Gracie after Burns and his wife, Gracie Allen.

In the beginning of their partnership, Gracie Allen played the straight character and Burns had the funny lines. When he realized that Gracie got more laughs than he did, he switched their roles.

Burns was pictured with his wife, Gracie Allen, on a 44¢ U.S. commemorative postage stamp that was issued on August 11, 2009 as part of the Early TV Memories issue honoring The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (1950).

Burns was best friends with fellow comedian Jack Benny, who also served as his best man at his wedding to Gracie Allen. Burns also loved playing practical jokes on Benny almost as much as he did watching Benny laugh when he realized that Burns had fooled him yet again, and then both fall down on the floor and pound it with his fists while still laughing.

Burns and his wife, Gracie Allen, adopted two children as infants: daughter Sandra Burns, born on July 28, 1934 and son Ronnie Burns, born on July 9, 1935.

He took the name "Burns" from the Burns Brothers Coal Company, whose trucks he had stolen lumps of coal from growing up in order to help heat the family home. "George" was a sobriquet that his brother Izzy occasionally used because he did not like his own name.

Although Gracie Allen was in love with another man when they first met, Burns carried a ring in his pocket until she finally agreed to marry him.

Burns was a regular on the "Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts". He was even a guest of honor on one of them in 1978.

In the film 18 Again! (1988) Burns' character celebrates his 81st birthday, although he himself was already 92 years old.

Burns' father, Eliezer "Louis" Birnbaum, was an Austrian Jewish immigrant and his mother, Hadassah "Dorah" Bluth, was a Polish Jewish immigrant.

Burns actually wore a hairpiece for most of his performing career; he appeared briefly without it in two of his films, The Sunshine Boys (1975) and Two of a Kind (1982).

"The Burns & Allen Show" (first on CBS Radio and then on NBC Radio from 1934 to 1950) was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 1994.

According to Phyllis Diller's autobiography, "Like a Lampshade in a Whorehouse", in the late 1960s Broadway producer David Merrick approached Burns with the idea of him playing Horace Vandergelder in "Hello, Dolly!" with his best friend, Jack Benny, in drag as Dolly Levi. The intention was to turn Broadway on its ear and revive flagging interest in the show, which had been running since 1964, originally with Carol Channing as Dolly Levi. This idea never came to fruition (Diller did, however, appear in the show for three months in 1970).

Burns was interred along with his wife, Gracie Allen, at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, CA in the Freedom Mausoleum at the Sanctuary of Heritage.

At the time of Burns' Academy Award win for Best Supporting Actor for The Sunshine Boys (1975) at the age of 80, he was the oldest winner of an Academy Award. This record was broken first by Jessica Tandy in 1990 and then later by Christopher Plummer in 2012 who also received an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, but at the age of 82.

Uncle of Lou Weiss, chairman emeritus of the William Morris Agency, who got his mail room start in the agency business with the help of "Uncle Nate".

During Oldsmobile's 90th anniversary in 1987, Burns appeared in two commercials for the automobile manufacturer.

Burns was a struggling vaudevillian in his early youth, often appearing as a trick roller skater and in ballroom dancing acts. Some of his acts were pretty terrible and work was hard to come by at that time, so he was forced to frequently change his stage name, appearing variously as Willy Delight, Captain Betts and Buddy Links, among others.

Burns is one of the few U.S. entertainers whose career in show business successfully spanned vaudeville, radio, film and television.

Brother of William Burns.

Biography in "Who's Who in Comedy" by Ronald L. Smith, pgs. 78-80. New York: Facts on File, 1992.

Biography in "American National Biography" Supplement 1, pgs. 82-84. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Interviewed in "The Great Comedians Talk About Comedy" (1968) by Larry Wilde.

From 1948 to 1953 Burns and his wife, Gracie Allen, were the celebrity spokespersons for Paper Mate Ballpoint Pens.

Burns replaced his best friend and fellow comedian, Jack Benny, in the film The Sunshine Boys (1975) after Benny's death, going on to win the Academy Award in that year for Best Supporting Actor for his efforts. This incident, which occurred when he was 80 years old, both brought him out of a brief retirement and revitalized his career, which lasted until shortly before his death in 1996 at the age of 100.

Mentioned in Daydreams (1981).