Ann with Don Ameche on Quincy, M.E.

Ann Blyth with Don Ameche and Ron Masak in a publicity photo for a 1979 episode of Quincy, M.E.  From my book, Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star.:

“The Death Challenge” brings together Ann and Don Ameche (with whom she appeared on TV in The Triumphant Hour in 1954) as a show-biz couple on whom the glare of the spotlight is focused after a long period of being ignored.  They also attract the attention of the police and our intrepid medical examiner, Quincy, played by Jack Klugman, when a stunt goes terribly wrong.

It’s the first of two episodes of the TV program Quincy, M.E. on which Ann appeared.  One of the sublime joys of episodic television in the 1970s and 1980s, for lovers of classic films at least, is that a huge roster of players from Hollywood’s heyday took their final curtain calls as guests on these shows...  

Ann with Fernando Lamas - ROSE MARIE (1954)

Ann Blyth appears in the above publicity photo with Fernando Lamas.  The film is Rose Marie (1954), a glorious CinemaScope color movie that casts a new spell on an old-fashioned hit.  

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

Ann Blyth was twenty-four going on twenty-five when she played the title role in this musical, and one is impressed by her ability to appear so young, so naturally and effortlessly a teenager when in her teen years she often played characters who were older, or least more poised and sophisticated.  Very light, natural-looking makeup, a tan, and her loose woodsman’s buckskins covering her shape help to create this illusion, but two things she does herself complete the picture—her animated expressions which, with the innocence of youth, do not mask her emotions, but let us see every flickering thought passing through her mind, and also the way she moves.  With an animal-like ease and strength, she lives the outdoor life like someone completely at home in the woods, not stomping about in her buckskin with exaggerated mannishness like Doris Day in Calamity Jane, but hiking, climbing on rocks, and running with the grace of an athlete. 

The picture of her seeming physical change was overshadowed in the press of the day, which took greater notice, with greater surprise, at her singing voice.  This was her first big singing role after her one song in The Great Caruso.  A review in the St. Petersburg (Florida) Times:

The surprise in Rose Marie is Ann Blyth’s singing voice, which is gloriously pitched, full, and strong.

The “new Ann Blyth” of the headline “New Ann Blyth Emerges in Classical Rose Marie,” (in pretty much every film she did she was always “new”), emphatically declares herself with her first song, the exhilarating “Free to Be Free.”  Just like the character Rose Marie, who wants to live life in the wild without being forced into a “ladylike” life of restricted freedom in town, Ann Blyth is declaring her freedom in a way that says, “Look at me.  I can really sing.  This is my movie.”  Her range is quite demonstrably large in this song, even drifting down into the mezzo area, and her control is stunning, bang-on notes with no vibrato or trilling.  It’s a magnificent delivery and a great song to come charging out of the gate in this movie, as if to make the audience take notice—this is Rose Marie, the old chestnut you thought you knew, but didn’t.

Ann Blyth and Robert Stack on radio - 1953

Here is a studio portrait of Ann Blyth from 1953.  She had transitioned from her longtime contract at Universal and had begun her new contract at M-G-M.  Her first film for them was released this year, All the Brothers Were Valiant.  She was still doing quite a bit of radio at this time, with at least half a dozen radio guest appearances in 1953.  One of these was a dramatic episode of Family Theater titled "Round Trip."  From the listing in my book Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star.:

Family Theater.  March 25, 1953.  “Round Trip.”  Ann and Robert Stack play former lovers whose chance meeting on a commuter train brings back memories of their pre-war romance.  Jack Bailey is host.  Interesting script by Martha Wilkerson, and well-acted by the two-person cast in a presentation that is thought provoking and intimate.

You can listen to the episode here, and even download it to your computer from the site, Old Time Radio Downloads.