Tennis anyone? Tennis anybody? Anyone for tennis?

[Wilson Gray]

On Tue, Feb 14, 2012 at 6:29 PM, Garson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Tennis anyone? Tennis anybody? Anyone for tennis?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> The phrase "Tennis, anyone?" is associated with juvenile roles played
> by Humphrey Bogart. The phrase has been discussed a few times on the
> ADS list in previous years: 1999, 2000-2003, 2007.
>
> FYI: The QI website now has an analysis.
> http://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/02/14/tennis-anyone/
>
> The most interesting cite uncovered, I think, was an interview with
> Bogart in 1948 in which he mentioned the variant phrase "Tennis
> anybody?":
>
> Cite: Â 1948 September 16, Portsmouth Herald, Erskine Johnson: In
> Hollywood, Page 12, Portsmouth, New Hampshire. (NewspaperArchive)
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> Bogart laughed. "I used to play juveniles on Broadway and came
> bouncing into drawing rooms with a tennis racket under my arm and the
> line: "Tennis anybody?" It was a stage trick to get some of the
> characters off the set so the plot could continue. Now when they want
> some characters out of the way I come in with a gun and bump ‘em off."
> [End excerpt]
>
> Feedback welcome
> Garson
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

I have a very vague memory of a '40's(?) comedy(?) in which the plot
is continually disrupted by some dork in tennis whites and carrying a
racquet who keeps popping into scenes to ask, "Anyone for tennis?" I
couldn't understand why nobody took him up on it.

--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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