Jump to content

Dance Girl Dance


Neil

Recommended Posts

This person has a very interesting youtube channel with many Lucy videos lovingly put together  (Watch "In Memoriam").   The clip below features songs from Dance Girl Dance:  the group singing "Roll Out The Barrel" followed by Lucy's "My Mother Told Me".   In the latter: do you all think that is Lucy singing?   I'm not sure.  It's a little too good to be Lucy but not good enough for an actual dubber.  If it's the latter:  well done!     It's possible it's a combination of the two----which I wish they had done for "Mame".  There was just enough of Roz singing in Gypsy that it fooled everybody (including Roz herself who stated in her book "That's ROZ (referring to herself in the 3rd person is interesting) and nobody else on the soundtrack").   Actually there's very little of Roz's singing in the movie.  She does the comedy song "Goldstone" and the first half of "Rose's Turn" (through the "Mama's talkin' loud...." sequence with Liza picking up with "I had a dream....").   A strange thing about the Gypsy soundtrack album: "Rose's Turn" on the album is ALL Liza, no Roz as in the movie.   Some expert editor cobbled together "Some People" combining Roz's recorded tracks with Liza Kirk's. Without the font notation, you can't tell the difference.  He/She put in a lot of  Roz's voice but inserted Liza's whenever there was a sustained note or a passage that required vibrato.  Again, I ask Warners (who produced both movies), why didn't you do that for "Mame"?

So wha't the consensus?  Is this Lucy?  Is this a dubber?  OR is this a very skillfully done combination of the 2?  (and have we had this debate before?  if we did, I don't remember). 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I really think it's her singing in all this movie. The songs in the stage act go from talking to singing and nothing sounds jarring to my ear. With all the other times she's dubbed in movies it's such a drastic change. I can't believe RKO would go to the expense for this type of film to combine her vocals with another. And if she was dubbed by someone else, why did they not get this dubber for Too Many Girls, which clearly sounds nothing like Lucy and was done right after this movie. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

38 minutes ago, Luvsbway said:

I really think it's her singing in all this movie. The songs in the stage act go from talking to singing and nothing sounds jarring to my ear. With all the other times she's dubbed in movies it's such a drastic change. I can't believe RKO would go to the expense for this type of film to combine her vocals with another. 

Agreed.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's all Lucy, pre-recorded (which is why she sounds pretty good, no doubt enhanced by studio recording "tricks" and techniques, even back then), but it's definitely her. Makes one wonder why she was so frequently dubbed elsewhere.

It was a different time I guess. Watching these few minutes though after not having seen this in ages makes me wonder why from this role alone they didn't know what to do with her: she never looked better, she obviously did well with the material given her and in this case, had a strong director showing her off at her best...and her comedic chops and timing were already on display.  Weird. :vanda:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well MGM didn't know what to do with her after Easy To Wed. Stupid, stupid people. She's hilariously funny and gorgeous. Was that combo such an outrages concept that the studio men couldn't figure out that can work?

On the singing front the most odd dubbing comes in Dubarry. They dub her at the beginning but not at the end in Friendship. Did they think the audience wound't notice, or maybe forget how she sounded an hour before?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 minutes ago, Luvsbway said:

Well MGM didn't know what to do with her after Easy To Wed. Stupid, stupid people. She's hilariously funny and gorgeous. Was that combo such an outrages concept that the studio men couldn't figure out that can work?

On the singing front the most odd dubbing comes in Dubarry. They dub her at the beginning but not at the end in Friendship. Did they think the audience wound't notice, or maybe forget how she sounded an hour before?

That was so strange. The DuBarry number was not that complex and certainly within her range. No idea why they didn't have her sing it. 

None of Lucy's dubbers sounded like her at all. Lisa Kirk would've been the only one to come close had they used her for Mame. Hell, it would've been nearly impossible to tell she'd been dubbed. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

OK, I'm convinced it's Lucy's singing.  And I must say: I'm impressed!   The studios would dub at the drop of a hat.  The worst non-sensical dubbing of Lucy was on TV: Carole Cook doing Big Spender on a Jack Benny special, ruining what would be one of Lucy's better musical performances (Carole's voice is great but she sounds NOTHING like Lucy).  Original tracks of the stars doing their own singing have surfaced and some of them actually sound pretty good.  Joan Crawford in Torch Song.  Ava Gardner in Show Boat.  For reasons completely non-sensical, South Pacific's Juanita Hall (Bloody Mary) was dubbed and she sang it on Broadway!  Lisa did such an amazing job dubbing for Roz in Gypsy because if Roz could sing, that's exactly what she'd sound like.   Lisa toned down her own marvelous singing ability.   Evidently Roz made 2 attempts pre-recording the Gypsy score.  People in the know say her 2nd attempt was better.  The 1st attempt was released as bonus tracks on the Gypsy soundtrack CD and her vocals are truly awful. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Carole dubbed Lucy on "Hey Big Sender" again on Dinah Shore's Like Hep and it's still just as weird. Although Carole's dub of Lucy as Mary Poppins isn't as bad since Lucy just floats from afar and she doesn't have to act much. 

Another singing question. On The Lucy Show, Here's Lucy and lot of other variety shows, when Lucy was singing with a much stronger singer I sometimes have a hard time hearing Lucy in the mix. Did she just get dialed down in post or did she just tone it down herself?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I love Carole as an actress but I cannot stand her dubbing Lucy.  I wonder why Lucy sang on the Lucy Show and Carnival Nights then is dubbed in early HLs.  Around 1968 her voice started to deepen at a faster rate.  I know I read she was ill on that Jack Benny special.  I remember on HL Lucy and Wayne Newton you can barely hear her only Lucie and Wayne.  I thought that was odd. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...