Artist:Ann Sothern
Song:The Last Time I Saw Paris
Album:Academy Award Winners
Actress Ann Sothern Was mainly known for comedy like her Maisie films and her 50s sitcom. But she was a very versatile performer on stage as well. The Last Time I Saw Paris is from the 1941 film Lady Be Good. She was born Harriette Arlene Lake Jan. 22, 1909 in Valley City, ND but she grew up in Minneapolis. Her mother was a concert singer. Ann started taking piano lessons at age five and attended McPhail School of Music where her mother taught piano. She went on concert tours with her mother. She continued to study in high school. After graduating, After graduating, her mom moved to Los Angeles and worked as a vocal coach at Warner Bros. Ann studied at University of Washington for a year. She moved to Los Angeles and while appearing in bit parts at MGM, she met producer Flo Ziegfeld at a party and he took her to Broadway. She starred in the musicals America's Sweetheart and Everybody's Welcome. Ann signed with Columbia Pictures in 1934. Columbia head Harry Cohn changed her name to Ann Sothern after her mom and Shakespearean actor E.H. Sothern. At Columbia and RKO, Ann appeared in B movies. Then she signed with MGM and got her big break when she starred in the 1939 film Maisie. Maisie was based on the 1935 Wilson Collison novel Dark Dame. MGM acquired it as a vehicle for Jean Harlow. She died before a script was completed. The Maisie films were very successful. MGM did ten of them from from 1939-47. So now they want to turn Ann into a musical star. She was cast in the 1941 film Lady Be Good with Eleanor Powell and Robert Young. Ann sang The Last Time I Saw Paris and the song even won an Oscar. You can get her performance on this Rhino various artists budget comp. It was written by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II and originally recorded by Kate Smith in 1940. So it shouldn't have been eligible for an Oscar. Kern was so upset about this that he got the Motion Picture Academy to change the rules. Though Lady Be Good was a hit, it didn't help Ann and she returned to Maisie films. She left MGM in 1947 and appeared in the 1949 film A Letter to Three Wives. In the 50s she had success on TV with the sitcoms Private Secretary and The Ann Sothern Show. Then in the 60s Ann appeared in Here's Lucy and My Mother, The Car. She starred with Henry Fonda in the 1964 film The Best Man. At that point she did mostly TV guest shots. After a Best Supporting Actress nomination for the 1987 film The Whales of August, Ann retired and moved to Idaho. Ann Sothern died on Mar. 15, 2001 at age 92. Here's Ann Sothern performing The Last Time I Saw Paris in the 1941 film Lady Be Good.
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