James Cagney was in 1899 in the lower east side of Manhattan, he was the second of seven kids born into a poor family. He was a sickly child which he later attributed to being brought up in a poor family. He went out to graduate high school and started to attend Columbia where he was study Art. He dropped out after one semester to return home because his father had died from the 1918 flu pandemic. He held many different jobs in his early life to help support his family. While he was working for the New York Public Library he met Florence James, who helped him into an acting career. After being introduced to acting, he started tap dancing as a boy and was nicknamed "Cellar-Door Cagney” because he was famous for dancing on slanted cellar doors in the neighborhood. His early days of acting started out as a scenery boy for a Chinese pantomime at Lenox Hill Neighborhood House, which was one of the first places like this in the nation. His brother Harry performed there and Florence James directed these shows. He worked behind the scenes never wanting to be in…show more content… After that successful show he went on to do Grand Street Follies of 1929 and then Maggie the Magnificent, which critics didn’t like but all loved Cagney’s performance in the show. During Maggie he met Joan Blondell, the two did a new play a few months later called Penny Arcade, the play wasn’t as big as a hit as the two acting in it where. Al Jolson seeing the hidden potential of this play bought the rights then sold it to Warner Bros Studios with the stipulation that they cast Cagney and Blondell in the film, which Warner Bros did. Cagney was a hit and Warner Bros immediately gave him a seven year contract. He filmed a slew of films right away including Sinner’s Holiday, Public Enemy, Lady Killer, and G
