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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about TV and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the TV urban legends featured so far.

TV URBAN LEGEND: Tom Hanks sang the theme song to Bosom Buddies.

Bosom Buddies was a sitcom that lasted for two seasons from 1980-1982 that starred Tom Hanks and Peter Scolari as two friends who pretended to be women so that they could live in a cheap apartment that was in a building only for women.

The theme song for the show (although not for the DVD release or syndication, as I suppose they just didn’t want to pay for the song rights) was Billy Joel’s “My Life,” only not sung by Billy Joel (too expensive). The singer of the song is not credited in the closing credits of the series.

Years ago, a reader wrote in to ask me whether it was true that the mystery singer was, in fact, Tom Hanks. It is normal enough for the star of a show to also do the theme song. On the popular website, TV Tropes, they wrote the following on their Bosom Buddies page, “Tom Hanks sang the theme song and the rest of the cast provided backing vocals,” so this is not just something that an unnamed reader thought (sorry for losing your name, reader, feel free to write in and I’ll add your name in!).

So is it true?

No, it is not.

The theme song was sung by Atlanta session musician Gary Bennett.

Here is Bennett from 1978 doing a Steely Dan cover. He had a great voice…

I think the fact that Bennett is not exactly a household name, coupled with the credits not listing who the singer was and even Hanks singing a little of theme during an appearance on the sitcom 30 Rock led people to think that it was Hanks who sang the song.

But it wasn’t, so the legend is…

STATUS: False

Feel free (heck, I implore you!) to write in with your suggestions for future installments! My e-mail address is bcronin@legendsrevealed.com.