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Why Should I Worry 
​(My Lives) (2005) (recorded 1988)

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  Download "Why Should I Worry"

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Why should I worry?
Why should I care?
It's just bebopulation
And I got street savoir faire

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     Billy's one and only acting gig was to voice the Artful Dodger in the animated Disney movie Oliver and Company from 1988.   Billy was the perfect choice to play a streetwise punk with a heart of gold, who could also carry a tune.   The chair of Disney Studios, Jeffrey Katzenberg, said:  "When [director] George Scribner conceived of the character and when we said to him . . . anybody in the world - pick somebody who you think really gets across that New York street-smart, savoir-faire attitude that you want, he said, Billy Joel."  See article from McCall's magazine.  

       The movie's main song was "Why Should I Worry" written by the late Dan Hartman and Charlie Midnight.  Hartman and Midnight were a popular songwriting duo in the Eighties.   Hartman also later wrote and sang the hit "I Can Dream About You" from the movie Streets of Fire.  
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      Billy was eager to do the movie because of his young daughter, Alexa Ray Joel.  "Of course, I had just had a little girl. It's a great way to do something that my little girl could see that she could relate to right away." See McCall's article.   He said he also wanted to do Oliver & Company because it was a Disney movie. "I always thought the old Disney movies, the ones with the old-time animation, were magic," said Joel.

       I had read somewhere several years ago that Billy took his young daughter Alexa to see Oliver and Company without telling her that he was the voice of the Artful Dodger.  When she realized it was her father's voice, she did a double-take.  

     I took my young stepkids to the movie back in 1996 largely because Billy Joel was in it.  I think I enjoyed it more than them.   Animation has really come a long way since then.'
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     Here is a nice essay about Billy Joel and the movie from Erik Adams at AV Club.

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     Three years later, in 1991, Billy would also record the song "When You Wish Upon A Star" for the Disney album Simply Mad About The Mouse.

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Words and Music by Dan Hartman and Charlie Midnight

One minute I'm in Central Park
Then I'm down on Delancey Street
From the Bow'ry to St Marks
There's a syncopated beat

Whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo
I'm streetwise
I can improvise
Whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo
I'm streetsmart
I've got New York City heart

Why should I worry?
Why should I care?
I may not have a dime
But I got street savoir faire

Why should I worry?
Why should I care?
It's just bebopulation
And I got street savoir faire

The rhythm of the city
But once you get it down
Then you can own this town
You can wear the crown

Why should I worry?
Why should I care?
I may not have a dime
But I got street savoir faire

Why should I worry?
Why should I care?
It's just doo-bopulation
And I got street savoir faire

Everything goes
Everything fits
They love me at the Chelsea
They adore me at the Ritz

Why should I worry?
Why should I care?
And even when I cross that line
I got street savoir faire

Whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo
Whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo.... 

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Billy lent his acting and singing skills to the Disney movie Oliver & Company.

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Billy and Alexa Ray Joel.  Photo:  Mary Ellen Mark

Videos
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Clip from the movie Oliver & Company (1988) starring Billy Joel as the Artful Dodger.  Here he sings "Why Should I Worry."

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This is a short behind-the-scenes look at Billy in Oliver & Company.

More behind-the-scenes of Oliver & Company.

Comments
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