Colours of Entertainment Trivia Quiz

Answer: Red

"Lady in Red" was released in 1986. It's rather common knowledge that men don't appear to remember the colours that are important to women. Colours such as "What are the colour of my eyes, darling?" or "What colour dress was I wearing when we met, my love?" To prove this is a fallacy (even though my husband frequently informed me I was wearing a pink frilly dress when we met, when I was actually wearing jeans and a white t-shirt) he wrote this song to mark the fact that his wife was wearing a red dress when they first met. Clever, clever man!

Answer: Gray

Released in 1968, this film stars Dean Jones and Diane Baker. The plot revolves around a man having to solve two problems. The first is to create a successful advertising campaign for a new product for his boss. The second is to try to get the money together to buy a horse for his daughter. The trouble arises when he decides to use the one idea to solve the two problems.

Answer: Black

"Black is the Colour of My True Love's Hair" is a folk song that rose to popularity in the United States. It was given popular rebirth there in 1915 in a recording made by one Lizzie Roberts. It originated however way back in time to Scotland as an old folk song from there, long before the advent of the technology enabling it to be recorded. It had a different melody there to the one that was made popular in America.

Joan Baez, born 1941, is an American folk singer and musician, who is usually associated with songs of social injustice. She revived this song and its popularity in 1962.

Answer: Orange

"The Love for Three Oranges" is a comic opera written in 1919 by Prokofiev. The story is that of a king who has a son who is sick with an imaginary illness brought about by reading too many sad poems. This, so the doctors gravely inform the king, can only be cured by laughter. All attempts to make the prince laugh do not work, until the wicked witch in the piece falls over, revealing her underwear. Well, it was 1919 after all. So enraged was she by the laughter this brought about, that she cursed the prince, saying he would only be cured by the love of three oranges, and until these were found, he would remain obsessed. Being a comedy, it ends up happily, complete with a beautiful princess emerging from one of the orangers. And they all lived happily ever after.

Sergei Prokofiev was a Russian composer who lived from 1891 to 1953.

Answer: Red

"The Man With One Red Shoe" is a comedy made in 1985. It stars Tom Hanks and Dabney Coleman. It tells the story of the deputy director of the CIA who plans to besmirch the reputation of its leader to force him into retirement. The director however learns of the plot and turns the tables on the deputy by letting him know, through devious means, that a man will be arriving at the airport to prove his innocence.

He sends two men there to pick up this man and tells them to select anyone at random amongst the crowd at the airport, and to make it obvious that he is the supposed contact, so that the deputy and his henchmen will be led on a wild goose chase after him. Tom Hanks is the victim.

He is forced to wear two different coloured shoes as a result of a prank by one of his friends. One is a subdued business shoe and the other is a red sneaker.

He is a concert violinist who has travelled all over the world during the course of his work. This includes performances in several communist countries.

The deputy of course thinks Hanks is a spy and that is his cover, and that his sheet music is actually coded secret messages. It's a very funny movie and well worth the watch.

Answer: White

"The White Cliffs of Dover"'s full title is "There'll Be Bluebirds Over The White Cliffs Of Dover". It was written in the Second World War years by Jewish American composer Walter Kent, to supposedly lift the spirits of all the service men and women who fought so desperately in the Battle of Britain.

This took place in the air over the famous English cliffs of Dover. The words and music are frightfully sad though. I would have been howling into my rationed bowl of porridge. It's a very beautiful old song however, constantly revived in memorial dinners by those wonderful old World War Two veterans, whose numbers now are sadly dwindling. I should point out though that bluebirds aren't actually found in England.

They're a little American bird.

Answer: Golden

"The Golden Cockerel" is a three act opera based on a poem by Alexander Pushkin who is considered to be Russia's finest poet. He in turn based his poem on several chapters of a book by American writer, Washington Irving. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908) was a Russian composer. The plot revolves around a magical golden cockerel who is created by a magician to protect a bumbling king of one nation who believes his country is about to be attacked by another nation. How very Russian.

It is initially a comedy and appears to end happily when the bumbling king falls in love with the conveniently single queen of the other nation. At their wedding however the king kills the magician, and the cockerel then kills the king out of revenge. The audience is subsequently informed during the epilogue by the still living magician that only he and the queen were real, and the rest is all illusion. Very odd. No doubt it has some great psychological significance. I however would have preferred that the wedding went ahead, and, at the wedding breakfast, the golden cockerel was on the menu.

Answer: Eighteen

American Singer Bobby Darin (1936-1973) made this song a hit in 1963. He wrote it for the mother of his future wife, the actress Sandra Dee (1942-2005) when they first met in 1960, to try to get into her mother's good graces. A movie based on Darin's life, "Beyond the Sea" (2004) has Darin saying that "You always make sure the mama dog likes you before you go near her puppy".

This ploy must have worked. Darin and Dee were married late that same year. Sadly the marriage broke up in 1967. Darin, who suffered recurring bouts of rheumatic fever as a child, died in 1973, following heart surgery brought on by this condition.

Answer: Purple

Starring Whoopi Goldberg, this 1985 drama tells the story of the struggle that African American women had in the early part of the twentieth century - through the eyes of the girl, Celie. It's both a disturbing but profoundly uplifting film, in spite of criticisms made over its many divergences from the book of the same name by Alice Walker.

Answer: Orange

This song was written back in 1938 and performed almost continually at various bluegrass events from that time, mostly as an instrumental piece. However, it wasn't until 1965 that Johnny Cash set it roaring to the top of the charts when he presented it with its lyrics in his album of the same name.

It was originally written to be accompanied by fiddles, but Cash replaced these with the excellent wah-wah sounds of the harmonica instead. It works beautifully when you listen to this great old recording.