Ann Blyth in The Helen Morgan Story - on TCM

Ann Blyth stars as torch singer Helen Morgan in The Helen Morgan Story (1957), her last motion picture.  Director Michael Curtiz, with whom she worked in Mildred Pierce (1945), chose her among several other actresses for her stunning audition, and she enjoyed working with him again, despite the controversy of the studio's decision that her singing voice would be dubbed.  Her sensitive portrayal of the troubled Jazz Age star is the highlight of the film.  From my book Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star.:

At the time he was writing his column in New York, when Helen Morgan was starring at the Ziegfeld Theater on Sixth Avenue and 54^th Street (long since torn down) in Hammerstein and Kern’s colossal hit Show Boat (Edna May Oliver played the role of the overbearing Parthy), Ann Blyth was a baby on the other side of town, in a considerably lower rent district, an area along East 31^st Street.  In twelve years Ann would be on Broadway herself while still a child, and in fifteen she’d be in Hollywood, where she got to know Mark Hellinger when she appeared in his productions of Swell Guy (1946), and Brute Force (1947).  Hellinger would say of Ann:

Outside, she’s as untouched as a convent girl—and inside, she’s as wise as a woman of 50.

Perhaps one could say the opposite about Helen Morgan.

You have a chance to watch The Helen Morgan Story today on Turner Classic Movies, 11:30 a.m. ET.

Ann Blyth and Friends Sing The Oceana Roll

Ann Blyth sings "The Oceana Roll" in Jack Carson's waterfront dive tonight as Turner Classic Movies gives us another chance to visit Mildred Pierce (1945).

From my book, Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. --

Much later on in the movie we will see that when Joan Crawford kicks Veda out of the house and Veda has to find work, she ends up in Jack Carson’s waterfront dive singing the ragtime saloon song “The Oceana Roll” and we may wonder if she got her training for that unlikely career by playing with Kay in the living room singing a song like “South American Way.”  She has a little of Kay’s flamboyance if not her unselfconscious joy, as she is leered at by sailors in the dismal dive.

Joan Crawford’s sickened expression in the saloon watching her daughter is priceless.

Ann's chum Jane Powell also got a turn to sing the old ragtime tune in Two Weeks with Love (1950), a much more family-friendly performance here from YouTube:

Vaudevillian Beatrice Kay also revived the number, probably for television, in 1956 here:

Both charming performances with a turn-of-the-20th century flare.  For a little ragtime raciness, however, tune in tonight for Ann's come-hither vamp of the old piano roll favorite.  Catch Mildred Pierce tonight on TCM at 10 p.m. ET.

Deep in My Heart - Ann Blyth on CD

Ann Blyth demonstrated an exquisite singing voice in her films, radio and musical stage appearances and concerts, but fans have one great regret --  that her discography is so limited.  With someone so accomplished a vocalist, we might naturally expect a number of recordings, but unfortunately, we are left with only a few singles and cast albums of movie soundtracks.  

However, there was a compilation CD produced by Flare Records, a company in London, England, in 2007, Deep in My Heart - The Golden Voice of Ann Blyth, which is a very nice collection of some of Ann's hits from her four M-G-M musicals.

It is a pleasure to focus in on her musical moments from The Great Caruso (1951), Rose Marie (1954), The Student Prince (1954) and Kismet (1955).  Her duets with Mario Lanza, Howard Keel, Fernando Lamas, and Vic Damone are included.  A special added feature is the inclusion of the song "Rhymes Have I," sung with Howard Keel that was cut out of Kismet.  It's an energetic, soaring performance from both, and a real shame that it was left out of the movie.

Flare Records, established in 1995, is dedicated to re-issuing pop music from the past.  Have a look here for their catalogue. 

Our Very Own - 1950 - production still

Ann Blyth gives the evil eye to sister Joan Evans in the above production still of Our Very Own (1950).  Farley Granger plays her boyfriend, and young Martin Milner is a hoot as he pursues Joan (more interested in the food on the buffet table here).  That's Donald Cook in the background as the girls' concerned dad.

From my book, Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star.:

Ann Blyth, with top billing here, stars as the teen who discovers she was adopted, and that her adoption has been treated like a family secret.  Unlike some of the other troubled young women she had played up to this time in such films as Mildred Pierce (1945), Swell Guy (1946), and A Woman’s Vengeance (1948), she’s a good girl here, a model daughter, poised, mature, far less mercurial than those other girls, and her strong sense of self is almost a metaphor for her confident and comfortable post-war world—that will be shaken to the core by something so small as a birth certificate.   

For more on Our Very Own, have a look here at this post on my Another Old Movie Blog.
http://anotheroldmovieblog.blogspot.com/2014/05/our-very-own-1950.html