Question about Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady.- Page 2

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 12:06am

I don't think anyone believes Josh Logan was an expert on "sexy" in women. LOL.

Good point, Michael. Even if the prejudice against Broadway divas wasn't a factor, it is still true that Julie Andrews had never made a movie at that point. (She had done TV, of course, but it was the era of tiny screens and B&W TV, which wasn't much of a screen test for Cinerama.)

I rewatched MARY POPPINS recently and was surprised to discover that while Julie Andrews is absolutely incandescent in it, she actually has minimal involvement in the action. As the new movie suggests, the story is really about Mr. Banks, of course, and Dick Van Dyke (in dual roles) has more to do with that than Andrews.

Perhaps as a novice in her first feature film, Andrews seemed a safer bet for POPPINS than for MFL--for any number of reasons.

I do recall, however, the sense among the public that Andrews had somehow been "robbed" of her due by the big, bad corporate tycoon. I doubt that had anything to do with Oscar nominations (they are made by professionals, after all), but it didn't hurt Andrews' popularity, particularly after her triumph for Disney.

[Michael Bennett]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 12:11am

I have no doubt that the sentiment at the time was that Julie was 'dumped' for Audrey -- and I am sure you are correct in that the studios weren't counting on the public affection the public had come to develop for Julie through her television appearances and through the MY FAIR LADY cast recording which was one of the biggest selling records of the 1950s. But for all we know Disney also helped fuel that sentiment to build positive publicity for MARY POPPINS.

But of course from her biography, Andrews talks about MY FAIR LADY on stage as follows:

"I got the feeling from Rex's cold and ungenerous attitude that I wasn't making inroads with him," she writes, "and that he was, quite rightly, making a stink about this silly little English girl who couldn't manage the role."

Harrison told the management: "If you don't get rid of that c***, you won't have a show." And the designer Cecil Beaton, who called her a "silly bitch", told her: "You are the most hopelessly unphotogenic person I have ever met."

There is another rumor that Julie Andrews actually had some cosmetic surgery before making MARY POPPINS which helped 'correct' her cinematic appearance, but of course she has never confirmed this. Could be all part of the mythology.

But in any case, it's not hard to see how Jack Warner came to the decision he did when it was time to cast the movie of MY FAIR LADY.



Updated On: 12/15/13 at 12:11 AM

Posted: 12/15/13 at 12:47am

Hopelessly unphotogenic? What a rude thing to say to a young actress! She certainly proved him wrong.

She looks the same to me.

[degrassifan]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 2:12am

Oh goodness. That's all so awful. At the end of the day, she won the Golden Globe consecutively in 1965 and 1966, and got an Oscar nomination twice in a row, so I guess she showed them? Plus, didn't R&H write Cinderella with her in mind? Julie must not have been that bad if she got a Tony nomination and Lerner and Loewe did cast her again for Camelot. I do wonder what Walt Disney saw in her performance as Guinevere that made him cast her for Mary Poppins though.

And yes to the poster who said Andrews did not do much in Mary Poppins, which is why I feel like Maria was more of the Oscar winning role to me.

I've read that Audrey and Julie became great friends, and Audrey had confided to her saying something like, "Julie, that role was definitely yours, but I didn't have the guts to turn in down."

[SomeDude]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 6:24am

Some interesting Trivia:

"Rex Harrison wanted Julie Andrews for the role of Eliza, since they had played together in the Broadway version. He was concerned that Audrey Hepburn, whose mother was a Dutch baroness, would not be able to play a "guttersnipe" effectively. However, after finishing the film, Harrison had the highest regard for Hepburn's performance, and later referred to her as his favorite leading lady of them all. (It should also be mentioned that Harrison was appalled by Andrews during initial rehearsals for the original Broadway production of "My Fair Lady". Andrews was having a lot of trouble with the characterisation of Eliza Doolittle, and the Cockney accent. So much so, that Harrison was once quoted as saying: 'If that girl is here on Monday giving the same goddamn performance, I am out of this show!')"

and

"Audrey Hepburn later admitted she would never have accepted the role of Eliza Dolittle if she had known that producer Jack L. Warner intended to have nearly all of her singing dubbed. After making "My Fair Lady", Audrey Hepburn resolved not to appear in another film musical unless she could do the singing on her own." Updated On: 12/15/13 at 06:24 AM

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 6:59am

Both Hepburn and Andrews were criticized at the time for not "getting" the "Cockney flower girl" side of Eliza. They knew how to play a lady, but both seemed to be not quite comfortable (as you say) with the commoner. It was phony and put-on, and it showed ... at least to critics. Neither actress won awards for playing the role.

For that reason, I also maintain that Eliza is a very difficult role to pull off convincingly. You either have someone who can't quite get the "lady" or can't quite get the "flower girl." They end up looking awkward at one stage or the other.

I think it's more this case than Hepburn being uncomfortable singing in a musical. She had already sung, using her own voice, in Funny Face with Fred Astaire.

EDIT: (removed the inaccurate info about Deborah Kerr and Marni in An Affair to Remember to avoid confusion)

Updated On: 12/15/13 at 06:59 AM

[The Other One]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 7:38am

best12bars: The King And I was released in 1956 and An Affair To Remember was released in 1959. You have the order wrong there. Kerr did not work nearly as closely with Nixon on the later film (which doesn't have nearly as much singing) and the lip-syncing is not as seamless.

Hepburn knew that Warner was planning on casting Elizabeth Taylor if she turned him down. The role was not going to Julie Andrews, period. Once she understood that, she saw no reason not to take it. She discussed this on an interview she gave Larry King many years later. I remember that she had forgotten Marni Nixon's name, and could only remember that she was a "lovely girl".

Updated On: 12/15/13 at 07:38 AM

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 7:56am

Well, that's what I get for not looking the date up when I typed! Marni and Deborah did go into The King and I knowing the dubbing would happen. That much I've read from an interview with Marni, but I confused the timeline. Marni had already worked as a dubber for Fox before (most notably for Marilyn Monroe in the first part of Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend), and in my haste I assumed it was for Affair, but you're right, that came after. And no, they didn't work closely together on Affair, as you say. But for The King and I, yes. It was all planned out in advance. Marni was very complimentary about Deborah Kerr in the interview, too.

My apologies and thanks for the correction.

Updated On: 12/15/13 at 07:56 AM

[The Other One]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 8:06am

You're welcome!

I believe Marni was hired for The King And I when the original singer who'd been hired was killed in a car accident. I am not sure who she was.

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 8:10am

By the way, Deborah Kerr's big competition was Maureen O'Hara, who could actually sing. She even went so far as to record several of the King and I songs to convince Fox that she could do it. They didn't see Maureen as being right for the character of Anna (too overtly strong), so they went with Kerr even though they had to dub her. This devastated Maureen. One of the biggest disappointments of her career, according to her.

EDIT: Maureen O'Hara singing (with her own voice) ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcU483A0Fe4

Updated On: 12/15/13 at 08:10 AM

[The Other One]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 8:50am

Didn't Rodgers actually state that they couldn't have a barmaid play Anna, a reference to a recent O'Hara performance? Kerr is great, but I'm sure O'Hara would have been as well, and it would have been the greatest role of her career. She did have a lovely voice.

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 9:09am

I think from a 1950s sensibility, Maureen O'Hara was too strong, too forward, too in-your-face ... a gorgeous beauty, and yes, she could have sung it well, but not right for Anna, who needs to be strong, but also is a "lady" with a more genteel demeanor to go against the King of Siam. It's not "clash of the titans," it's more beauty and the beast.

And while Kerr was enough of an actress to play barmaids, nuns, tarts, or ladies ... O'Hara wasn't quite as much of a chameleon. She was a good actress and a big movie star ... but not right for Anna.

Today, they would probably cast O'Hara anyway because she could sing it even if she wasn't right for the part. Back then, they would get the casting right, first and foremost, then dub the singing to make it work, if needed. They even dubbed people who could sing (like Rita Moreno in WSS for A Boy Like That, because her own voice wasn't right for the song). There is no "attention to detail" like that today. I miss it.

[The Other One]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 9:29am

So do I.

I have seen Maureen O'Hara interviewed and read excerpts from her autobiography and by today's standards she was very much a lady, but in terms of the 1950s you are probably right. It's one thing to go toe to toe against Yul Brynner. It's another to take on John Wayne.

[MCfan2]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 1:54pm

If it's true that Elizabeth Taylor would have played Eliza had Hepburn not taken the role . . . then if I could, I'd give Audrey an award just for keeping Liz away from the film. My apologies to the Liz fans, but I think she would have been all wrong for it.

[trentsketch]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 2:03pm

There was a DVD release a few years ago that had a featurette just on the dubbing. They played Audrey's original audio for most of Wouldn't It Be Loverly? and she sounded great. It felt really believable for the character. Then they put the finished audio back in and it was unrecognizable as Audrey's voice. That song got a total overhaul.

It really is a testament to Marni Nixon that you wouldn't be able to tell how much wasn't Audrey's own vocals in My Fair Lady. The only unaltered Audrey song is Just You Wait and it's totally believable with all the mixing and full on dubbing that happened the rest of the film.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 4:50pm

Trent, I believe it was pointed out above that Nixon DOES sing part of "Just You Wait", but only the middle "head-voice" section. To me, it's just another moment that makes the dubbing intrusive.

***

Granted, I was only 10, but I don't recall any Julie Andrews fans blaming Audrey Hepburn. Hepburn was also well loved and even fans understood that the decision not to cast Andrews had been made before Hepburn accepted the role.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 4:53pm

best12, do you have an opinion on Wendy Hiller in the film PYGMALION? I haven's seen the film since I was a kid, but I know a lot of scholars think of her as the best film Eliza. It seems GBS thought so, too.

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 5:13pm

I absolutely love Wendy Hiller in Pygmalion! And I would agree, overall, that she embodies Eliza's transition from flower girl to lady with the most believability ... although her shortcomings (if any) are on the "lady" side, rather than the shop girl side, believe it or not. That's the opposite of both Andrews (from what I can tell and have read) and definitely Hepburn, who made the finest lady of the bunch, IMO.

Wendy does very well, don't get me wrong, but she doesn't transform into one of those head-turning creatures of aristocracy the way her musical counterparts did.

And of course, I'm a tad too young to have seen Mrs. Patrick Campbell.

... although Shaw wrote the role for her, and she was the real-life daughter of a count, in addition to being a celebrated actress.

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 5:19pm

Mrs. Patrick Campbell, the original Eliza Dolittle ...

Updated On: 12/15/13 at 05:19 PM

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 5:51pm

Thank you for the response, best12. I am always interested in your opinion.

Thinking about this whole issue while taking a shower, I wonder if part of Julie Andrews' problem (and part of the reason neither she nor Hepburn seems a true "guttersnipe") is that despite superficial similarities, L&L's Eliza is ultimately a very different creature than Shaw's.

In PYGMALION, everything points forward to Henry and Eliza's eventual separation; in MY FAIR LADY, everything has to point toward their eventual union.

Or to put it another way, Wendy Hiller never had to sing "Wouldn't It Be Loverly?" and imagine "someone's 'ead resting on my knee/Warm and tender as 'e can be". Of course guttersnipes can dream, but I doubt British guttersnipes dream in American romantic terms.

Now that I think of it, I'm not surprised a 21-year-old Julie Andrews struggled a bit--particularly when, by Lerner's account, Harrison was demanding most of the attention.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 5:56pm

Thanks also for the Maureen O'Hara clip. (McCLINTOCK is my favorite John Wayne film after STAGECOACH.) She did indeed have a lovely voice.

It's hard to imagine THE KING AND I without Deborah Kerr, but O'Hara would have sung it beautifully--certainly better than Gertrude Lawrence.

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 6:40pm

You have a very good point, Gav, about Eliza's "flower girl" music, particularly Wouldn't It Be Loverly?, taking a bit of the street edge off of the character before that should happen. She's dreaming of a better life and a more refined life, but at this stage, the song is a tad too refined for her. I'm sure that contributes to my comparison of the actresses who have played her in musical and non-musical productions.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 7:27pm

Well, the song is certainly too refined for Shaw's Eliza, but perhaps not for Lerner's. The latter rather famously said, "I refuse to pay good money to go into the theater to see the same ugly people I can see on the street." (I'm paraphrasing from memory, but that's the gist.)

PYGMALION is a brilliant (and hilarious) study of the effects of dialect on social class in Edwardian England. MY FAIR LADY takes Shaw and turns it into CINDERELLA. (And does so very well; this isn't a criticism.)

[justoldbill]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 8:28pm

As for Maureen O'Hara, it was Richard Rodgers who said he didn't want a pirate queen playing "his" Anna. And when Marni Nixon sang for Deborah Kerr in AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER, she received album credit on the soundtrack album.

[MCfan2]

Posted: 12/15/13 at 11:08pm

Shaw died in 1950. I think he only ever saw two film Elizas.