Here's Dory and Andre Previn before Mia broke up their marriage. In 1969, when she was 24, Mia became pregnant by Andre, who was still married to Dory Previn. Dory had a mental breakdown and was institutionalized, during which she received electroshock therapy.
DORY AND ANDRE
MIA AND ANDRE
DORY's SONG TO MIA AND ANDRE, as they embarked on their adulterous affair:
Beware Of young girls Who come to the door Wistful and pale Of twenty and four Delivering daisies With delicate hands
Beware Of young girls Too often they crave To cry At a wedding And dance On a grave
She was my friend My friend My friend She was invited to my house Oh yes She was And though she knew My love was true And No ordinary thing She admired My wedding ring She admired My wedding ring
She was my friend My friend My friend She sent us little silver gifts Oh yes She did Oh what a rare And happy pair She Inevitably said As she glanced At my unmade bed She admired My unmade bed My bed
Beware Of young girls Who come to the door Wistful and pale Of twenty and four Delivering daisies With delicate hands Beware Of young girls To often they crave To cry At a wedding And dance On a grave
She was my friend My friend My friend I thought her motives were sincere Oh yes I did Ah but this lass It came to pass Had A dark and different plan She admired My own sweet man She admired My own sweet man
We were friends Oh yes We were And she just took him from my life Oh yes She did So young and vain She brought me pain But I'm wise enough to say She will leave him One thoughtless day She'll just leave him And go away Oh yes
Beware Of young girls Who come to the door Wistful and pale Of twenty and four Delivering daisies With delicate hands
Beware Of young girls To often they crave To cry At a wedding And dance On a grave
Beware of young girls Beware of young girls Beware
Poor Dory Previn. She really was kind of a hanger-on that got lucky, wasn't she?
"Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”
~ Muhammad Ali
Everybody I know who has had a partner cheat on them with a close friend said it was worse to lose the close friend.
"Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”
~ Muhammad Ali
My cousin Arlene always said Dory Previn was an unrecognized genius of a singer-songwriter on the level of a Laura Nyro or a Joni Mitchell.
Arlene's favorite song was "Yada Yada (La Scala)," which used the phrase "yada yada" way before Seinfeld and still has a lot of insight into male-female relationships--and same-sex ones too, for that matter.
PJ, I happened to notice the other day that an early form of "yada yada" may be heard in ALLEGRO, from 1947. (In the show, the expression appears as "yatata yatata", but its meaning is the same.)
I'm not an expert on Mrs. Previn (except for the VALLEY OF THE DOLLS song), but I think the two lyrics you repeated here are rather great. And the following is brilliant:
"Beware Of young girls Too often they crave To cry At a wedding And dance On a grave"
This lyric has haunted me ever since I first heard Dionne Warwick sing it.
In my mind it has gone from being drug-addled camp to being pure poetry to being camp about being drug-addled and, ultimately, I think it ends up clearly as poetic.
All I know is that there have been times in my life when the lines (and Andre Previn's haunting melody) about "When did I stop feeling sure, feeling safe / And start wondering why...wondering why...?" made so much sense that it hurt. And I know too many people, lost to various drugs, who got "caught in the game" and never got off the merry-go-round and never got hold of their pride again.
But, camp or poetry, the incomplete questions sure as hell are daring in style and substance for a 1960s pop song.
THEME FROM VALLEY OF THE DOLLS
Gotta get off...gonna get... Have to get off from this ride. Gotta get hold...gonna get... Need to get hold of my pride.
When did I get--? Where did I--? How was I caught in this game? When will I know? Where will I--? How will I think of my name?
When did I stop feeling sure, feeling safe And start wondering why...wondering why...? Is this a dream? Am I here--where are you? What's in back of the sky? Why do we cry?
Gotta get off...gonna get Out of this merry-go-round. Gotta get off...gonna get... Need to get on where I'm bound.
When did I get--? Where did I--? Why am I lost as a lamb? When will I know? Where will I--? How will I learn who I am?
Is this a dream? Am I here--where are you? Tell me, when will I know? How will I know? When will I...know why?
And I adore Dionne Warwick's recording of "You're Gonna Hear From Me" (from Inside Daisy Clover), even though it's not Dory's most profound lyric and it's not Dionne's best recording. (But what Dionne does at the modulation around 2:55 is astonishing.)
When you watch the film of VALLEY and hear the haunting theme being sung by Dionne throughout the film you will notice that through Dory's lyrics it is a comment on what stage the character of Anne Welles is in her life, what she is feeling and what she is going through. It actually supports the narrative. It was an ingenious use of the song. The recorded version as such isn't complete. The only true complete version only exists in the film.
Also, for anyone who owns the original soundtrack album it is Dory herself who sings the theme song. Dionne's record company (at the time) Scepter Records refused to loan her for the soundtrack album that was released on 20th Century-Fox Records.
"Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”
~ Muhammad Ali
You are prescient, PJ. Allen has written what he says will be his final rebuttal to the charges in an op-ed in today's NY Times and it includes this:
"Undoubtedly the attic idea came to her [Farrow] from the Dory Previn song, 'With My Daddy in the Attic.' It was on the same record as the song Dory Previn had written about Mia’s betraying their friendship by insidiously stealing her husband, André, 'Beware of Young Girls.'"
Here's another sweet and haunting theme featuring the lyrics of Dory Previn: COME SATURDAY MORNING from the film THE STERILE CUCKOO. Music by Fred Karlin.