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Today, September 30, is the birthday of Deborah Jane Kerr-Trimmer, known professionally as Deborah Kerr, who was born in 1921. She was a Scottish film, theatre and television actress who won a Golden Globe Award for her performance as Anna Leonowens in the 1956 musical film, The King and I.
The King and I soundtrack
vinyl LP album cover detail
detail photo of album cover by Styrous®
The film is a beautiful study in fashion history (link below).When Sharaff made use of silks from Thailand for stage production of The King and I (1951), she created a trend in fashion and interior decoration. The costumes are the biggest reason this film was the second costliest film in 20th century fox history, which cost four and a half million dollars. Sharaff won best costume design for The King and I and it was she who advised Brynner to shave his head for his role as the King of Siam.
photographer & date unknown
The music by Richard Rodgers with lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II is brilliant but of course, I have favorites. One is the song for the above scene, Shall We Dance? (link below). But my very favorite is Something Wonderful (link below) which is sung by Terry Saunders who portrays Lady Thiang, the wife of the King. It is a poignant paean to deep love for an imperfect lover; it is achingly passionate and beautiful.
Saunders had understudied the role of Lady Thiang in the Broadway production and in 1952 had taken over the role when it was vacant.
Something Wonderful has been covered by the best: Bing Crosby, Doris Day, Carmen McRae, Nina Simone, Shirley Bassey, Barbra Streisand, Carly Simon, Liza Minnelli, Bernadette Peters and probably many others.
The King and I soundtrack
vinyl LP album back cover detail
detail photo of album cover by Styrous®
While it's beautiful, but not my favorite, I've always thought Hello, Young Lovers is an interesting song on several levels. In it, Anna (Kerr) sings of her dead husband as well as surreptitiously telling two young star-crossed lovers, Lun Tha (Carlos Rivas) and Tuptim (Rita Moreno), that all will end well. That doesn't happen but, oh, well, whoever said life was fair.
Marni Nixon actually sang the vocals for Kerr in the film. Nixon was an American soprano and ghost singer for many actresses in movie musicals. In addition to The King and I, she is now well-known as the real singing voices in West Side Story, and My Fair Lady, although this was concealed at the time from audiences. In 1950, Nixon married Ernest Gold who composed the theme song to the movie Exodus.
top photo: Terry Saunders (Lady Thiang )
bottom photo:
Carlos Rivas (Lun Tha) left &
Rita Moreno (Tuptim) right
The King and I soundtrack
bottom photo:
Carlos Rivas (Lun Tha) left &
Rita Moreno (Tuptim) right
The King and I soundtrack
vinyl LP album back cover detail
detail photo of album cover by Styrous®
Moreno disliked most of her film work during this period as she felt
the roles she was given were stereotypical. The one exception was her
supporting role of Tuptim in this film version of The King and I.
The King and I film poster
The King and I soundtrack
vinyl LP album cover
photo of album cover by Styrous®
This album was released at the time the film was, 1956; stereo recordings were new so albums were releast in stereo as well as mono, this origianl issue is a mono High Fidelity recording.
Deborah Kerr was born in Glasgow, Scotland. Her first stage appearance was at Weston-super-Mare in 1937, as "Harlequin" in the mime play Harlequin and Columbine. She then went to the Sadler's Wells ballet school and in 1938 made her début in the corps de ballet in Prometheus. After various walk-on parts in Shakespeare productions at the Open-Air Theatre in Regent's Park, London, she joined the Oxford Playhouse repertory company in 1940, playing, inter alia, "Margaret" in Dear Brutus and "Patty Moss" in The Two Bouquets.
In 1943, aged 21, she made her West End début as "Ellie Dunn" in a revival of Heartbreak House at the Cambridge Theatre, stealing attention from stalwarts such as Edith Evans and Isabel Jeans. "She has the rare gift", wrote critic Beverley Baxter, "of thinking her lines, not merely remembering them. The process of development from a romantic, silly girl to a hard, disillusioned woman in three hours was moving and convincing".
She made clear that her surname should be pronounced the same as "car". To avoid confusion over pronunciation, Louis B. Mayer of MGM billed her as "Kerr rhymes with Star!"
photo of album back cover by Styrous®
She made her Broadway debut in 1953, appearing in the Robert Anderson play, Tea and Sympathy, for which she received a Tony Award nomination. Kerr repeated her role along with her stage partner John Kerr (no relation) in the Vincente Minnelli film adaptation of the drama.
She departed from typecasting with a performance that brought out her sensuality, as "Karen Holmes", the embittered military wife in the Fred Zinnemann film, From Here to Eternity (1953), for which she received an Oscar nomination for Best Actress. The American Film Institute acknowledged the iconic status of the scene from that film in which Burt Lancaster and she romped illicitly and passionately amidst crashing waves on a Hawaiian beach. The organisation ranked it 20th in its list of the 100 most romantic films of all time.
In 1955, Kerr won the Sarah Siddons Award. she experienced a career resurgence when she played the role of the nurse, played by Elsa Lanchester in the 1957 movie, Witness for the Prosecution, on television in the early 1980s. Later, Kerr rejoined screen partner Robert Mitchum in Reunion at Fairborough. She also took on the role of the older Emma Harte, a tycoon, in the adaptation of A Woman of Substance by Barbara Taylor Bradford. For this performance, Kerr was nominated for an Emmy Award.
She departed from typecasting with a performance that brought out her sensuality, as "Karen Holmes", the embittered military wife in the Fred Zinnemann film, From Here to Eternity (1953), for which she received an Oscar nomination for Best Actress. The American Film Institute acknowledged the iconic status of the scene from that film in which Burt Lancaster and she romped illicitly and passionately amidst crashing waves on a Hawaiian beach. The organisation ranked it 20th in its list of the 100 most romantic films of all time.
In 1955, Kerr won the Sarah Siddons Award. she experienced a career resurgence when she played the role of the nurse, played by Elsa Lanchester in the 1957 movie, Witness for the Prosecution, on television in the early 1980s. Later, Kerr rejoined screen partner Robert Mitchum in Reunion at Fairborough. She also took on the role of the older Emma Harte, a tycoon, in the adaptation of A Woman of Substance by Barbara Taylor Bradford. For this performance, Kerr was nominated for an Emmy Award.
1709 Vine Street, Los Angeles, California
Deborah Kerr was nominated six times for the Academy Award for Best Actress, more than any other actress without ever winning. In 1994, however, having already received honorary awards from the Cannes Film Festival and BAFTA, she received an Academy Honorary Award with a citation recognising her as "an artist of impeccable grace and beauty, a dedicated actress whose motion picture career has always stood for perfection, discipline and elegance". She was the ultimate 'Lady'.
She won a Golden Globe Award for "Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy" for The King and I in 1957 and a Henrietta Award for "World Film Favorite – Female". She was the first performer to win the New York Film Critics Circle Award for "Best Actress" three times (1947, 1957 and 1960).
Kerr was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1998, but was unable to accept the honour in person because of ill health.
Deborah Kerr died, aged 86, on the 16th of October, 2007, at Botesdale, a village in county of Suffolk, England, from the effects of Parkinson's disease.
photo by Styrous®
photo by Styrous®
Tracklist:
Side 1:
A1 - Overture
A2 - I Whistle A Happy Tune
A3 - My Lord And Master
A4 - Hello, Young Lovers
A5 - The March Of Siamese Children
A6 - A Puzzlement
Side 2:
B1 - Getting To Know You
B2 - We Kiss In A Shadow
B3 - I Have Dreamed
B4 - Shall I Tell You What I Think Of You?
B5 - Something Wonderful
B6 - Song Of The King
B7 - Shall We Dance?
B8 - Something Wonderful (Finale)
Companies, etc.
Copyright (c) – Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
Credits:
- Vocals [Anna Leonowens] – Deborah Kerr
- Vocals [Lady Thiang] – Terry Saunders
- Vocals [Lun Tha] – Carlos Rivas
- Vocals [The King] – Yul Brynner
- Vocals [Tuptim] – Rita Moreno
Directed By – Walter Lang
Executive-Producer – Charles Brackett
Featuring – Carlos Rivas, Deborah Kerr, Rita Moreno, Terry Saunders, Yul Brynner
Lyrics By – Oscar Hammerstein II
Music By – Richard Rodgers
Musical Assistance – Ken Darby
Screenwriter – Ernest Lehman
Rodgers And Hammerstein* – The King and I
Label: Capitol Records – W-740
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Mono
Country: US
Released: 1956
Genre: Stage & Screen
Style: Musical
Viewfinder links:
Yul Brynner
Golden Globe Award
Deborah Kerr
Rita Moreno
Something Wonderful lyrics
Net links:
Devorah Kerr Filmography
The King and I ~
Plot
Cast
Wonderful World of Cinema ~
Irene Sharaff’s Costumes for The King and I
Fashion & Film ~ The King & I (1956)
YouTube links:
Shall We Dance?
Something Wonderful
The King And I Trailer
"It's [acting] an unbelievable terror, a kind of masochistic madness.
