Richard Armstrong Whiting (November 12, 1891 – February 19, 1938)[1] was an American composer of popular songs, including the standards "Hooray for Hollywood", "Ain't We Got Fun?"

They broke up the duo and went their separate ways: Neilan to Hollywood, where he would go on to be a successful film director and actor, and Whiting to Detroit to try to jump-start a career as a professional songwriter.

To supplement his income at the time, Whiting worked with a local hotel's Hawaiian band, playing piano in light blackface, earning him an extra $10 a week.

[citation needed] Other hit songs written by Whiting during his time at Remick include "Where the Black-Eyed Susans Grow" (1917), "The Japanese Sandman" (1920), "Bimini Bay" (1921, lyrics by Egan and Gus Kahn), "Ain't We Got Fun?"

[2] During his career, Whiting collaborated with such songwriters as BG DeSylva, Johnny Mercer, Neil Moret, Leo Robin, Ralph Rainger, Gus Kahn, Oscar Hammerstein II, Haven Gillespie, Seymour Simons, Nacio Herb Brown, Harry Akst, Walter Donaldson, Ray Egan, and Sidney Clare, to produce a number of hits (listed below).

[2] In the film, Transatlantic Merry-Go-Round (1932), a song performed by The Boswell Sisters, titled "Rock and Roll", written by Richard A. Whiting and Sidney Clare, is sometimes credited as the first use of that term.

Tony Bennett recorded many of Whiting's songs, such as "My Ideal" on his album Here's to the Ladies, "True Blue Lou" and "She's Funny That Way."

In 2010, Enrique Iglesias used a segment of "On the Good Ship Lollipop" written by Whiting and Sidney Clare for Bright Eyes in his YouTube video for the song "Tonight (I'm Lovin' You)" In 2011, Diet Coke used Whiting's music to the song "Hooray for Hollywood" in their Oscar commercial which played nationwide in movie theaters.