John Golden

John Lionel Golden
Eleanor Roosevelt and John Golden in New York City, June 14, 1943
Born	(1874-06-27)27 June 1874 New York City, New York, United States
Died	17 June 1955(1955-06-17) (aged 80) Bayside, New York, United States
Nationality	American
Occupation	Actor, songwriter, author and theatrical producer
Known for	Poor Butterfly

John Lionel Golden (June 27, 1874 – June 17, 1955) was an American actor, songwriter, author and theatrical producer. His best-known song is Poor Butterfly. He produced many Broadway shows, and four films.

John L. Golden was born in New York City on June 27, 1874. He grew up in Wauseon, Ohio, then returned to New York when he was fourteen. Golden briefly attended the law school at New York University. He joined a chemical manufacturing firm, where he worked for thirteen years.

Golden began a career as a lyricist. Golden composed the music for Miss Prinnt, a musical farce in which his friend Marie Dressler was the star, which opened in late 1900 in New York City. It was described by the critic Alan Dale as "a ghastly collection of decayed jokes, taphouse slang, meaningless music and direly trashy story..." He contributed lyrics to The Hoyden, a Charles Dillingham production that ran from October 19, 1907, to February 1, 1908. He wrote the music and lyrics for Florenz Ziegfeld's Over the River (1912). This otherwise mundane show, co-produced by Dillingham, was the first in which ballroom dancing appeared on the legitimate stage.Charles Dillingham hired Golden, now well known as a lyricist, to work on his Hip-Hip-Hooray. It opened at the Hippodrome on September 30, 1915, and ran for 425 performances. The show received excellent reviews. Between 1909 and 1921 R. H. Burnside staged many spectacular shows at the Hippodrome. Golden wrote the lyrics for four of these shows in a row.

While they were working for the Hippodrome shows in 1916, Golden and John Raymond Hubbell were asked to create a Japanese-style song. In Golden's autobiography Stagestruck (1930) he recalls creating Poor Butterfly with Hubbell in the summer of 1916. They went down to the elephant pens in the basement of the Hippodrome to find somewhere cool. Hubbell started to play the melody, and the lyrics quickly came to Golden, despite the presence and smell of the beasts. The song is about the central character in Madame Butterfly and was sung by Haru Onuki in The Big Show, which ran for 425 performances at the Hippodrome from August 13, 1916, to September 1917.Poor Butterfly became a smash hit.