Song:Tonight
Album:West Side Story: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
I know what you're thinking. Everyone has seen Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer performing Tonight in the film West Side Story. But it's common practice in Hollywood musicals to dub vocals for the actors using studio singers. So it was Marni Nixon and Jim Bryant who actually sang Tonight. Of course West Side Story is the musical written by famed composers Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim. It's basically a modern retelling of Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet as reimagined by choreographer Jerome Robbins. The 1961 film version directed by Robert Wise was a huge hit and the soundtrack album topped the Billboard Hot 200 for 54 weeks and was the best selling album of the 60s. It was a hit on Broadway but the film used different actors and some of them couldn't sing. Marni Nixon made a career out of doing this kind of work. She was born Margaret McEathron Feb. 22, 1930 in Altadena,CA. She's a trained opera singer and started working in films in 1948. She sang for Deborah Kerr in the 1956 film The King & I and for Audrey Hepburn in the 1964 film My Fair Lady. In West Side Story, she did all the singing for Natalie Wood and some of Rita Moreno's singing. According to Nixon's autobiography, she didn't know she was going to do all of Wood's parts until the film was released. Musical director Saul Chaplin had her sing everything and made the decision afterwards. Jim Bryant is a composer who did occasional dubbing work in the 60s including the 1967 film Thoroughly Modern Millie. None of these singers ever got a screen credit because the studios don't want you to know about it. Sony released the West Side Story soundtrack on CD in 2004 with some bonus tracks. Marni Nixon was married to film composer Ernst Gold (Exodus). Their son Andrew Gold had a couple of top 10 hits in the 70s. Marni Nixon has only recorded two albums under her own name so I guess she may be the best singer you've ever heard but never heard of. Here's the scene from the 1961 film West Side Story with Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer performing Tonight.
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