Mitzi Gaynor: Actress and dancer who starred in South Pacific and alongside Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly dead at 93
Mitzi Gaynor, who has died at 93, was an effervescent dancer and actress who starred as Nellie Forbush in the 1958 film South Pacific and appeared in other musicals with Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly.
Ms Gaynor was among the last survivors of the so-called golden age of the Hollywood musical. Her career spanned eight decades across film, television and the stage and she appeared in several notable films, including We’re Not Married! and There’s No Business Like Show Business. But she is best remembered for South Pacific.
The screen version of the Rodgers and Hammerstein wartime musical received three Academy Award nominations and won for best sound, while Gaynor was a best actress nominee for a Golden Globe.
The role of the lovesick nurse Nellie, created on Broadway by Mary Martin, had been eagerly sought by Hollywood stars. It was Sinatra who helped Gaynor land it.
She was starring with him in The Joker Is Wild when she had a one-day opportunity to audition for the lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II.
It was the same day she was scheduled for her biggest scene with Sinatra. When she explained her plight, he told her: “Don’t worry, I’ll change the schedule.”
Hammerstein was impressed with Gaynor, who had already won the approval of director Josh Logan and composer Richard Rodgers. She was cast opposite Rossano Brazzi, about whom she sang I’m In Love With A Wonderful Guy.
South Pacific was not the turning point in her career that Gaynor had hoped it would be and she shifted her focus from film to television, making early appearances on Donald O’Connor’s variety series Here Comes Donald and on CBS’s The Jack Benny Hour.
In October 1959, she was the only woman to guest star alongside Sinatra, Crosby, Dean Martin and Jimmy Durante on ABC’s The Frank Sinatra Timex Show special.
Later in her career, Gaynor reinvented herself as a performing entertainer. Working with her husband and manager Jack Bean, she starred in her own musical revue that was a big draw in theatres throughout the US, Canada, the UK and Australia.
Gaynor became a mainstay in Las Vegas for several years, performing in weeks-long residencies for more than a decade, notably at the Flamingo Hotel and Riviera Hotel.
When touring with a full orchestra, a corps of dancers and backstage personnel became too unwieldy and expensive, Gaynor slimmed down the production, eventually making it a one-woman show. They continued touring every year until 2002 when Bean’s illness required a hiatus.
Born Francesca Marlene de Czanyi von Gerber (Mitzi is diminutive for Marlene) in Chicago on September 4 1931, she was part of a musically inclined family and started singing and dancing at a young age.
She had been taking ballet and tap lessons and at the age of seven was scheduled for a tap routine at the dance school recital. She had neglected to use the toilet and when she faced the audience a puddle formed on the stage.
“I got huge applause,” she recalled, “so I dried off and put some lipstick on. After the next girl did a hula with batons and slipped on the wet floor, I went out and said, ‘I’m OK now. Can I do it?’ And I got cheers.”
Gaynor and Bean married in 1954 and bought a spacious house in Beverly Hills that remained their home until his death in 2006. The couple had no children.