Individual Details
Richard Adler
(3 Aug 1921 - 21 Jun 2012)
UPPER EAST SIDE — The $22 million estate of "Damn Yankees" composer Richard Adler is in tax limbo because his son and fifth wife have both balked at paying his death dues, court records show.
The estate of the late Broadway great owes an estimated $1 million in state taxes and administrative costs, but his widow and only surviving son each want the other to cover the costs, according to a co-executor of the will.
"There seems to be no spirit of compromise that is likely to resolve these disputes quickly," the executor, Norman Solovay, said in his Feb. 14 petition asking the Manhattan Surrogate's Court to intervene and facilitate a resolution.
Solovay says Adler's widow, Susan Alison Ivory, won't generate cash to cover the tax problem by selling the $9 million Southampton pad left to her in the will. She instead wants Adler's son Andrew to sell his inheritance, a $3 million Upper East Side apartment, but he has vehemently refused, according to the petition.
The standstill stems from ill will over who got what in the will, Solovay says.
Adler, who also scored the Broadway hit "Pajama Game," died at 90 in 2012, but in the last five years of his life, he added three codicils to his will that drastically reduced Andrew's inheritance and gave more money to Ivory, 69, and her two kids from a previous marriage.
Andrew's lawyer, Eve Markowitz, has claimed that Richard Adler was seriously ill when he drafted the codicils and that Ivory "assumed total responsibility for his care," according to Solovay's petition.
"[The lawyer] has suggested that during this time [Adler] became totally dependent on Ms. Ivory and executed codicils at her direction," he said.
As a result of the will's additions, Andrew, a painter mentored by renowned abstract artist Willem de Kooning, was left his dad's Manhattan pad and little more.
Ivory, who is also a co-executor of the estate, says there was nothing fishy about the codicils. The adjustments were borne out of love, she said, pointing to her 21-year marriage with Adler — the longest he had with any of his wives.
Under the terms of the codicils and will, Ivory received the Southampton home and half of Adler's music rights, which bring in $300,000 to $500,000 a year, according to the petition.
Ivory's two children, who are from a previous marriage, also got pieces of the estate. Her daughter, Katherine, whom Adler adopted, was bequeathed $1 million and already owned a 6-percent stake in the composer's music rights. Ivory's son, Charles Shipman, inherited $300,000 and also had a 6-percent share of the music rights.
Through gifts during Adler's life and bequests in the will, Andrew's two children received trusts that each hold 18.5 percent ownership of the music rights.
Before his death, Adler anticipated his son and wife would squabble over his fortune and added a provision in the codicils that state Solovay, his longtime lawyer, should mediate and arbitrate any conflicts between them.
In his petition, Solovay says he is hesitant to mediate their dispute because he also supervises the trusts of Andrew's children and fears a conflict of interest.
Solovay has also asked the court for an accounting of how money from the music rights has been spent, noting that he learned shortly before Adler's death that Ivory and her children used the cash to fund "an extravagant lifestyle that they could not otherwise afford or sustain without it."
Solovay declined to comment about the petition. Andrew's lawyer was unavailable for comment because she was on vacation, her office said. Ivory could not be reached for comment.
A hearing over the tax dispute will take place in the next two weeks unless a settlement is reached, a source said.
Adler and his partner Jerry Ross wrote the music and lyrics to "Damn Yankees" and "Pajama Games" in the 1950s. Both won the Tony award for best musical.
Adler also produced John F. Kennedy's presidential birthday bash that featured Marilyn Monroe's breathy rendition of "Happy Birthday."
By James Fanelli, July 10, 2013 8:12am
Richard Adler, who has died aged 90, packed two hit Broadway shows, The Pajama Game and Damn Yankees, with several musical numbers that became songbook standards, including You Gotta Have Heart and Hey, There.
He also staged and produced the 1962 New York extravaganza in which Marilyn Monroe serenaded President John F Kennedy with a breathy rendition of Happy Birthday.
In 1954 Adler collaborated with Jerry Ross on the music and lyrics for The Pajama Game, a light comedy about management-worker relations at the Sleep-Tite pajama factory. The score featured one of their biggest hits, Hernando’s Hideaway, a torrid tango which enjoyed chart success both in the US and Britain.
The pair resumed their professional partnership on Damn Yankees, a 1950s take on the Faustian pact, in which a rabid baseball fan sells his soul to the Devil in exchange for a chance to lead his favourite team to American League glory. The show included the hit songs You Gotta Have Heart and Whatever Lola Wants, Lola Gets.
Both shows ran for more than 1,000 performances, both transferred to London, and both won Tony awards for best musical. Subsequently Adler, working alone, earned a further Tony nomination for the lyrics and music of the African-themed musical Kwamina (1961), a story of interracial love written for his second wife, the British actress and singer Sally Ann Howes. It ran for only 32 performances.
Richard Adler was born in New York on August 3 1921 and graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1943. He served in the Naval Reserve during the Second World War.
Largely self-trained, he composed several symphonic works, including Wilderness Suite, and The Lady Remembers, to celebrate the Statue of Liberty’s centennial. He also wrote two scores for the Chicago City Ballet: Eight by Adler in 1984 and Chicago.
His collaboration with Jerry Ross began in 1950, when the pair signed with the music publishing company owned by Frank Loesser. After writing Rags To Riches, a big hit for Tony Bennett in 1953, Adler and Ross wrote most of the numbers for a revue called John Murray Anderson’s Almanac, featuring Hermione Gingold, Billy De Wolfe and Harry Belafonte.
On Loesser’s recommendation, they were hired to write the score for The Pajama Game the following year. Perhaps the show’s most successful number was Hey, There, a US No 1 hit for Rosemary Clooney, and which reached No 4 in Britain in September 1955.
Within a matter of weeks, other versions by Sammy Davis Jr, Lita Roza and Johnnie Ray also made it into the British charts.
Sometimes Adler drew his ideas from unlikely sources. “I went to the bathroom one day, and when I got in there, I decided: 'I’m not leaving this room until I’ve written a song about something in the room,’” he recalled.
“There were certain things you can’t write about in a bathroom. Then, all of a sudden, the radiator started clanging and hissing.” The result was Steam Heat, the jazzy opening number to Act Two of The Pajama Game. In 1957 the show was successfully made into a film starring Doris Day.
Although Adler and Ross songs sold millions of records, their collaboration ended abruptly with Ross’s death, at 29, from lung disease in 1955.
Thereafter Adler confined his output mainly to orchestral works and advertising jingles and also embarked on a producing career. As well as the birthday celebration for President Kennedy at Madison Square Garden in 1962, he produced and staged a show for the White House press corps to mark the visit of the then British prime minister, Harold Macmillan, the same year.
Adler’s Broadway productions included a play, The Sin of Pat Muldoon, and the musical Rex. He was a member of the Songwriter’s Hall of Fame.
His autobiography, You Gotta Have Heart, appeared in 1990.
Richard Adler divorced his first wife, London-born Marion Hart, in 1958. His fifth wife, Susan Ivory, and three children survive him. A son predeceased him in 1984.
Richard Adler, born August 3 1921, died June 21 2012
5 spouses:
Mary St. George (198? - ?) (divorced)
Marion Hart Rogier (4 September 1951 - 3 January 1958) (divorced) (2 children)
Sally Ann Howes (3 January 1958 - 1966) (divorced)
Ritchey Banker (27 December 1968 - 1976)
Susan A. Ivory (26 May 1991 - 21 June 2012) (his death)
The estate of the late Broadway great owes an estimated $1 million in state taxes and administrative costs, but his widow and only surviving son each want the other to cover the costs, according to a co-executor of the will.
"There seems to be no spirit of compromise that is likely to resolve these disputes quickly," the executor, Norman Solovay, said in his Feb. 14 petition asking the Manhattan Surrogate's Court to intervene and facilitate a resolution.
Solovay says Adler's widow, Susan Alison Ivory, won't generate cash to cover the tax problem by selling the $9 million Southampton pad left to her in the will. She instead wants Adler's son Andrew to sell his inheritance, a $3 million Upper East Side apartment, but he has vehemently refused, according to the petition.
The standstill stems from ill will over who got what in the will, Solovay says.
Adler, who also scored the Broadway hit "Pajama Game," died at 90 in 2012, but in the last five years of his life, he added three codicils to his will that drastically reduced Andrew's inheritance and gave more money to Ivory, 69, and her two kids from a previous marriage.
Andrew's lawyer, Eve Markowitz, has claimed that Richard Adler was seriously ill when he drafted the codicils and that Ivory "assumed total responsibility for his care," according to Solovay's petition.
"[The lawyer] has suggested that during this time [Adler] became totally dependent on Ms. Ivory and executed codicils at her direction," he said.
As a result of the will's additions, Andrew, a painter mentored by renowned abstract artist Willem de Kooning, was left his dad's Manhattan pad and little more.
Ivory, who is also a co-executor of the estate, says there was nothing fishy about the codicils. The adjustments were borne out of love, she said, pointing to her 21-year marriage with Adler — the longest he had with any of his wives.
Under the terms of the codicils and will, Ivory received the Southampton home and half of Adler's music rights, which bring in $300,000 to $500,000 a year, according to the petition.
Ivory's two children, who are from a previous marriage, also got pieces of the estate. Her daughter, Katherine, whom Adler adopted, was bequeathed $1 million and already owned a 6-percent stake in the composer's music rights. Ivory's son, Charles Shipman, inherited $300,000 and also had a 6-percent share of the music rights.
Through gifts during Adler's life and bequests in the will, Andrew's two children received trusts that each hold 18.5 percent ownership of the music rights.
Before his death, Adler anticipated his son and wife would squabble over his fortune and added a provision in the codicils that state Solovay, his longtime lawyer, should mediate and arbitrate any conflicts between them.
In his petition, Solovay says he is hesitant to mediate their dispute because he also supervises the trusts of Andrew's children and fears a conflict of interest.
Solovay has also asked the court for an accounting of how money from the music rights has been spent, noting that he learned shortly before Adler's death that Ivory and her children used the cash to fund "an extravagant lifestyle that they could not otherwise afford or sustain without it."
Solovay declined to comment about the petition. Andrew's lawyer was unavailable for comment because she was on vacation, her office said. Ivory could not be reached for comment.
A hearing over the tax dispute will take place in the next two weeks unless a settlement is reached, a source said.
Adler and his partner Jerry Ross wrote the music and lyrics to "Damn Yankees" and "Pajama Games" in the 1950s. Both won the Tony award for best musical.
Adler also produced John F. Kennedy's presidential birthday bash that featured Marilyn Monroe's breathy rendition of "Happy Birthday."
By James Fanelli, July 10, 2013 8:12am
Richard Adler, who has died aged 90, packed two hit Broadway shows, The Pajama Game and Damn Yankees, with several musical numbers that became songbook standards, including You Gotta Have Heart and Hey, There.
He also staged and produced the 1962 New York extravaganza in which Marilyn Monroe serenaded President John F Kennedy with a breathy rendition of Happy Birthday.
In 1954 Adler collaborated with Jerry Ross on the music and lyrics for The Pajama Game, a light comedy about management-worker relations at the Sleep-Tite pajama factory. The score featured one of their biggest hits, Hernando’s Hideaway, a torrid tango which enjoyed chart success both in the US and Britain.
The pair resumed their professional partnership on Damn Yankees, a 1950s take on the Faustian pact, in which a rabid baseball fan sells his soul to the Devil in exchange for a chance to lead his favourite team to American League glory. The show included the hit songs You Gotta Have Heart and Whatever Lola Wants, Lola Gets.
Both shows ran for more than 1,000 performances, both transferred to London, and both won Tony awards for best musical. Subsequently Adler, working alone, earned a further Tony nomination for the lyrics and music of the African-themed musical Kwamina (1961), a story of interracial love written for his second wife, the British actress and singer Sally Ann Howes. It ran for only 32 performances.
Richard Adler was born in New York on August 3 1921 and graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1943. He served in the Naval Reserve during the Second World War.
Largely self-trained, he composed several symphonic works, including Wilderness Suite, and The Lady Remembers, to celebrate the Statue of Liberty’s centennial. He also wrote two scores for the Chicago City Ballet: Eight by Adler in 1984 and Chicago.
His collaboration with Jerry Ross began in 1950, when the pair signed with the music publishing company owned by Frank Loesser. After writing Rags To Riches, a big hit for Tony Bennett in 1953, Adler and Ross wrote most of the numbers for a revue called John Murray Anderson’s Almanac, featuring Hermione Gingold, Billy De Wolfe and Harry Belafonte.
On Loesser’s recommendation, they were hired to write the score for The Pajama Game the following year. Perhaps the show’s most successful number was Hey, There, a US No 1 hit for Rosemary Clooney, and which reached No 4 in Britain in September 1955.
Within a matter of weeks, other versions by Sammy Davis Jr, Lita Roza and Johnnie Ray also made it into the British charts.
Sometimes Adler drew his ideas from unlikely sources. “I went to the bathroom one day, and when I got in there, I decided: 'I’m not leaving this room until I’ve written a song about something in the room,’” he recalled.
“There were certain things you can’t write about in a bathroom. Then, all of a sudden, the radiator started clanging and hissing.” The result was Steam Heat, the jazzy opening number to Act Two of The Pajama Game. In 1957 the show was successfully made into a film starring Doris Day.
Although Adler and Ross songs sold millions of records, their collaboration ended abruptly with Ross’s death, at 29, from lung disease in 1955.
Thereafter Adler confined his output mainly to orchestral works and advertising jingles and also embarked on a producing career. As well as the birthday celebration for President Kennedy at Madison Square Garden in 1962, he produced and staged a show for the White House press corps to mark the visit of the then British prime minister, Harold Macmillan, the same year.
Adler’s Broadway productions included a play, The Sin of Pat Muldoon, and the musical Rex. He was a member of the Songwriter’s Hall of Fame.
His autobiography, You Gotta Have Heart, appeared in 1990.
Richard Adler divorced his first wife, London-born Marion Hart, in 1958. His fifth wife, Susan Ivory, and three children survive him. A son predeceased him in 1984.
Richard Adler, born August 3 1921, died June 21 2012
5 spouses:
Mary St. George (198? - ?) (divorced)
Marion Hart Rogier (4 September 1951 - 3 January 1958) (divorced) (2 children)
Sally Ann Howes (3 January 1958 - 1966) (divorced)
Ritchey Banker (27 December 1968 - 1976)
Susan A. Ivory (26 May 1991 - 21 June 2012) (his death)
Events
| Birth | 3 Aug 1921 | New York | |||
| Marriage | 26 May 1991 | Living |  | ||
| Death | 21 Jun 2012 | Southampton, Suffolk County, New York | | ||
| Obituary | 22 Jun 2012 | Sioux City, Woodbury County, Iowa | |  | |
| Obituary | 25 Jun 2012 | Arkansas | | |
Families
Notes
Marriage
Susan Ivory Wed To Richard AdlerPublished: May 27, 1991
Susan Alison Ivory, a freelance photographer and art historian in Chapel Hill, N.C., was married yesterday to Richard Adler, the composer, of New York and Southampton, L.I. Dr. Eugene Callender, the president of the Siddha Yoga Foundation in New York, officiated at the bridegroom's Southampton home.
Ms. Ivory, 46 years old, is keeping her name. A daughter of Janet B. Ivory of Ann Arbor, Mich., and the late Melvin Ivory, she graduated from the University of Michigan.
Mr. Adler, 69, and Jerry Ross wrote the music and lyrics for the Broadway musicals "The Pajama Game" and "Damn Yankees." He is the son of the late Dr. and Mrs. Clarence Adler of New York and is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Both Ms. Ivory and Mr. Adler were previously married and divorced.
Death
The curtain goes up this week on a courtroom drama pitting the longtime attorney of the late Broadway great Richard Adler against his high-living fifth wife — with big bucks at stake.The Tony-winning writer, composer and producer is famous for 1950s hits “Damn Yankees” and “Pajama Game” and for producing the 1962 fund-raiser that featured Marilyn Monroe singing “Happy Birthday, Mr. President.”
In the years before Adler died in 2012 at 90, his wife, Susan Ivory, 70, went on a spending spree, lawyer Norman Solovay, the executor of Adler’s $22 million estate, says in papers filed in Manhattan Surrogate’s Court. Ivory spent more in 2010 than her hubby’s music company took in, Solovay says.
The company, Lakshmi Puja, which brings in about a half- million bucks a year, owns the rights to Adler’s biggest hit songs, including “Hey, There,” “Hernando’s Hideaway” and “Whatever Lola Wants.”
“The money was still being used among other things for trips for Susan and her children and other extravagances,” according to Solovay..
The indulgences included a family jaunt to the Balkans for Ivory and her kids from a previous marriage while the 89-year-old Adler stayed at home, said a source close to the case.
Ivory also threw a 90th birthday party in Southampton for Adler and 75 of his friends even though the composer looked like a “statue” who could barely speak, Solovay said.
After Adler died, Solovay accused Ivory of trying to swipe funds from the composer’s two grandchildren, Demian Delshay Adler and Scarlett Cheyenne Adler. They’re the children of Adler’s only son Andrew and ownd 36.5 percent of Puja.
“She [Ivory] continued to refuse to recognize the grandchildren’s . . . trust interest in the music company and to misappropriate their funds in a way that now might well be described as theft,” Solovay charges.
Ivory, the sole employee of Puja, pays herself a $75,000 salary, the source said.
Solovay was originally the sole executor of Adler’s will.
Ivory allegedly manipulated her feeding-tube-aided husband into making multiple changes to his will in a codicil he signed in June 2011.
They added Ivory as a co-executor and also gave $1.3 million to her children while allegedly depriving the composer’s friends and favorite charitable organizations of their bequests.
The codicil did not change provisions dividing the vast bulk of his estate between Ivory and Andrew.
Ivory and her lawyer did not return calls for comment.
Obituary
Richard AdlerEvent TypeObituary
Event Date22 Jun 2012
Event PlaceIowa, United States
GenderMale
Age90
Relationship to DeceasedDeceased
Birth Date1921
BirthplaceNew York City, ,
Death Date22 Jun 2012
Death Dateabout 22 Jun 2012
Death PlaceSouthampton, , New York
NewspaperSioux City Journal
Spouse and Children
Susan A IvoryWifeFemale
Andrew AdlerSonMale
Katherine AdlerDaughterFemale
Charles ShipmanSonMale
Extended Family
Damien AdlerGrandsonMale
Scarlett AdlerGrandchildUnknown
Lola Jane ShipmanGrandchildUnknown
Others on Record
President John F KennedyNon RelativeUnknown
Marilyn MonroeNon RelativeFemale
Jerry RossNon RelativeMale
George AbbottNon RelativeMale
Richard BissellNon RelativeMale
Archie BlyerNon RelativeMale
Billy MayNon RelativeMale
Ella FitzgeraldNon RelativeFemale
Obituary
Richard AdlerEvent TypeObituary
Event Date25 Jun 2012
Event PlaceArkansas, United States
GenderMale
Age90
Relationship to DeceasedDeceased
Birth Year (Estimated)1922
Death Date25 Jun 2012
Death Dateabout 25 Jun 2012
Death PlaceSouthampton, , New York
NewspaperArkansas Democrat-Gazette: Northwest Edition
Spouse and Children
Susan A IvoryWifeFemale
Andrew AdlerSonMale
Katherine AdlerDaughterFemale
Charles ShipmanSonMale
Christopher AdlerSonMale
Others on Record
Jerry RossNon RelativeMale
Sally Ann HowesDivorced SpouseUnknown
Endnotes
1. "United States, GenealogyBank Obituaries, 1980-2014," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVP5-X5M1 : 16 July 2017), Richard Adler, Iowa, United States, 22 Jun 2012; from "Recent Newspaper Obituaries (1977 - Today)," database, GenealogyBank.com (http://www.genealogybank.com : 2014); citing Sioux City Journal, born-digital text..
2. "United States, GenealogyBank Obituaries, 1980-2014," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVPG-GDWL : 16 July 2017), Richard Adler, Arkansas, United States, 25 Jun 2012; from "Recent Newspaper Obituaries (1977 - Today)," database, GenealogyBank.com (http://www.genealogybank.com : 2014); citing Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: Northwest Edition, born-digital text..