Oscar Hammerstein II Mathias by his first wife, and James Hammerstein by his second wife, with whom he also had a stepdaughter, Susan Blanchard. Hammerstein was one of the most important "book writers" in Broadway history – he made the story, not the songs or the stars, central to the musical and brought musical theater to full maturity as an art form. According to Stephen Sondheim, "What few people understand is that Oscar's big contribution to the theater was as a theoretician, as a Peter Brook, as an innovator. People don't understand how experimental "Show Boat" and "Oklahoma!" felt at the time they
Elaine Hammerstein opposite William Haines. With the latter film, the studio tried to promote Hammerstein and Haines as a couple, however, in real life, Haines was a gay man. Hammerstein wed James Walter Kays in Los Angeles, California, on June 10, 1926. Kays was a Los Angeles fire commissioner and had also served as finance director for the California Democratic Party. Upon her marriage, Hammerstein retired from acting. Her last film appearance is in the Columbia Pictures drama "Ladies of Leisure" (1926). In August 1948, while returning from a trip to the Mexican border town of Tijuana, the Kays and three friends