Career: 1960s and 1970s
Gore's first hit was followed by many others, including: "Judy's Turn to Cry" (US #5), the sequel to "It's My Party"; "She's a Fool" (US #5); the protofeminist million-selling "You Don't Own Me", which held at #2 for three weeks behind The Beatles' "I Want To Hold Your Hand"; "That's the Way Boys Are" (US #12); "Maybe I Know" (US #14/UK #20); "Look of Love" (US #27); and Grammy-nominated "Sunshine, Lollipops, and Rainbows" (US #13), from the 1965 movie Ski Party. Her record producer Quincy Jones, responsible for all her hits from 1963 to 1965, would later become one of the most famous producers in American music.
Gore was given first shot at recording "A Groovy Kind of Love", but Shelby Singleton, a producer for Smash Records, a Mercury subsidiary, recommended that she not record a song with the word "groovy" in it. The Mindbenders went on to record the song, and it went to #2 on the Billboard charts.
Gore performed on two consecutive episodes of the Batman TV series (January 19 and 25 1967), in which she guest-starred as Pussycat, one of Catwoman's minions. In the January 19 episode "That Darn Catwoman" she lip-synched to the Bob Crewe-produced "California Nights", and in the January 25 episode "Scat! Darn Catwoman" to "Maybe Now". "California Nights", which Gore recorded for her 1967 hit album of the same name, returned her to the upper reaches of the Hot 100. The Bob Crewe-produced single peaked at number 16 in March 1967 (with a then-sizeable 14 weeks on the chart) – her first top 40 hit since "My Town, My Guy and Me" in late 1965 and her first top 20 since "Sunshine, Lollipops, and Rainbows", which, like "California Nights", was co-written by Marvin Hamlisch and Howard Liebling.
Gore also performed the single "We Know We're in Love" ten months earlier on the final episode of The Donna Reed Show, which aired on March 19, 1966.
Gore composed songs for the soundtrack of the 1980 film Fame, for which she received an Academy Award nomination for "Out Here on My Own", written with her brother Michael.
Read more about this topic: Lesley Gore