McIntyre and Heath

McIntyre and Heath, comedy team. James McIntyre (1857–1937) was born in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and Thomas Heath (1852–1938) in Philadelphia, the two teaming up in 1874 and touring the South where they soon learned to mimic both African Americans and stereotypical imitations of them. In their blackface comedy act, Heath, with a pillow‐stuffed belly, portrayed a shabbily genteel know‐it‐all who was always able to lure the thin, believing, whiny‐voiced McIntyre into preposterous enterprises. They appeared in several Broadway shows written especially for them, most notably in The Ham Tree (1905), but also in In Hayti (1909), The Show of Wonders (1916), and Hello, Alexander (1919). The team was the longest lived of any major two‐man act, though neither man spoke to the other, except in performance.