"Button Up Your Overcoat" is a popularsong. The music was written by Ray Henderson, the lyrics by B.G. DeSylva and Lew Brown. The song was published in 1928, and was first performed later that same year by vocalist Ruth Etting. However, the most famous rendition of this song was recorded early the following year by singer Helen Kane, who was at the peak of her popularity at the time. Kane's childlike voice and Bronx dialect eventually became the inspiration for the voice of cartoon character Betty Boop. From January 9, 1929 to December 21, 1929 Jack Haley and Zelma O'Neal sang "Button Up Your Overcoat" on Broadway in the musical Follow Thru. They reprised the song in the film version which opened on September 27, 1930 which was also one of the first movies in Technicolor.
Other recordings
Paul Whiteman
Fred Waring's Pennsylvanians
Johnny Mercer
The Hi-Lo's included the song on their album I Presume.
Nancy Sinatra, Covered that song for the 1966 album Sugar
1985 The Sure Thing - two characters sing "Button Up Your Overcoat" as part of a medley of show tunes during a road trip. The song also appears on the movie's soundtrack.
In 1969, the song was parodied in a television commercial for Contac cold capsules. In that commercial, a group of blonde chorus girls known as "The Cold Diggers of 1969" sing and dance to "Button Up Your Overcoat" in a Busby Berkeley- style production number. Father Mulcahy and Hawkeye sing "Button Up Your Overcoat" in episode 20, season 6 of M*A*S*H, "Mail Call Three". In 1997, the Kidsongs Kids and the Biggles sang "Button Up Your Overcoat" as part of the Kidsongs: I Can Do It! VHS/DVD. Helen Kane's 1929 cover of the song appears anachronistically in the 2013 video gameBioShock Infinite, set in 1912, and can be heard in the Downtown Emporia level. The song was added to the 1993 revision of the musical Good News.
