Parallel Careers
A Geezer’s Notebook, By Jim Foster
This morning I flew into a rage. Some ignorant yo-yo had the audacity to criticize Audrey Hepburn’s portrayal of Eliza Doolittle in the movie, My Fair Lady. I shall not print his name, not to save him from a savage beating from her countless fans, but because I lost it. I saw his comment on Facebook. Facebook is now, and ever shall be, a mystery to me. Once I leave a post it is gone, never to be seen again. The shame is by forgetting this yo-yo’s name I probably saved him from a major thumping by her irate fans and believe me that was not my intention.
What I didn’t know until I started digging into Audrey’s accomplishments, and there are many, was she didn’t do all her own singing in My Fair Lady, a lot of it, yes, but not all. She wanted to, and was disappointed when the powers that were wouldn’t let her. Jack Warner dubbed in the high stuff with someone else’s voice.
It was all about possible box office sales. The ideal person would have been Julie Andrews, she had been a hit on Broadway and would have been perfect for the role and she worked well with Rex Harrison, but Warner was afraid she wasn’t well-known in the movie world. He chose Audrey, a good choice it was too because she was wonderful, the picture was great and picked up all kinds of well-deserved Oscars. But the one for Best Actress that year went to, you guessed it, Julie Andrews for Mary Poppins. Was Warner wrong? Maybe not because both pictures were tremendously successful and made a hell of a lot of money.
But who got shafted? Marni Nixon. Who? Marni Nixon, it was Marni’s voice that was dubbed in for Audrey. I am sure she was well-paid and didn’t have to go on welfare. She sang ten songs in the movie and her name didn’t appear in the never-ending list of credits at the end, from the Gaffer who… I don’t know, gaffed I guess, the caterer, the flunky who really fetched Harrison’s slippers, and the guy who swept the floor in the men’s room, but no Marni.
I have no problem with her not getting the movie role, but I do about leaving her off the list of credits and it wasn’t the first time it happened to her. It was Marni’s voice in Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Gentleman Prefer Blondes, the King and I, An affair to Remember, West Side Story, Mary Poppins, Mulan, My Fair Lady and her name didn’t appear anywhere in any of them. Pretty shabby treatment, I’d say.
Now don’t feel too sorry for Marni, she had an amazing career. She starred on Broadway and several operas, won four Emmy Awards for Best Actress, made all kinds of television appearances, and was a guest soloist for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra among her other accomplishments.
Our musical careers were (I say ‘were’ since I no longer tread the boards as we say in show biz) almost a mirror image of each other’s.
The only difference was she got to sing. I was rarely given a solo and in almost every musical production of Mariposa Arts Theatre was relegated to the back row in the finale and several times asked to just mouth the words, that and not to pinch the ladies in the back row of the chorus.
In fairness to the directors I do not have what one would call a trained voice, although two of the notes in my three note range have been referred to as fairly pleasant as long as I keep the volume down. And my inability to remember lyrics can be a bit of a drawback when trying out for the lead in a musical. Some enchanted evening, you may meet a strangler didn’t go well.
As I recall I had just three solos in a career that spanned four decades and for two of them received a standing ovation. Well maybe not an ovation per se, but the fruits and vegetables thrown on the stage kept the local food banks supplied for months.
Amateur theater can be tough on the ego, when I played Elwood P Dowd in Harvey the audience waited down in the Green Room to meet the cast, they totally ignored me; they were waiting for the flippin’ rabbit.
(Image Supplied)
