Why wasn''t Dolores Gray a bigger movie star?

Too late to the party. By the time she got to MGM the heyday of the musical was winding down. And she had kind of a horse face.

She gave Dore Schary crabs.

She also had a mother who made unrealistic demands of anyone Dolores worked for.%0D %0D She and Michael Kidd had an infamous feud with Dolores during the Broadway run of DESTRY - not a gracious lady....and as the poster above pointed out, she was a bit.....equine.

She had exactly the career she deserved.

The old Gray mare, she ain't what she used to be.

She had a face best suited for an orchestra situated between it & an audience.

This photo alone ought to reserve her a high shelf in the Datalounge pantheon:

Not pretty. Not photogenic. Not warm. Way too wooden. Couldn't really act.

Indeed, she had all the movie career she was suited to having.

Actually Lipsynka, wasn't most of your original act lifted from obscure Dolores Gray LPs?

She introduced this fabulous song which has since been covered by the likes of Liza and Kristen Chenoweth.

Great Dolores Gray number from "Designing Woman." She certainly could wear clothes!

She couldn't do warmth. Looked hard and ridden.

I just looked at some pictures of her on google images. She was simply too ugly.

You bitches: turn in your gay cards if you don't like Dolores.

If you're not enthralled with her after watching this, then you might as well be heterosexual.

I wonder if the producers of this number were trying to send us a message about Dolores' likely audience:

Sorry: try again.

She is perfect as Madeline the arch artificial hostess of "The Throb of Manhattan" television show in "Its Always Fair Weather" where she does "Thanks a lot but no thanks" one of the campest numbers ever, and tipping the plate of ravioli into Greg Peck's lap in "Designing Woman" and her very spiteful Sylvia in "The Opposite Sex" - the musical remake of The Women. Still to see her in "Kismet" - Minnelli must have liked her....%0D %0D There is a Youtube clip of her doing "I'm still here" from "Follies" but she was really too old and matronly by then. I was suprised at the amount of her albums available on iTunes, I got a good one: "Warm Brandy".

The Warners Archive just this month has remastered and released (for the first official time) on DVD "The Opposite Sex" which is the 50s musical remake of "The Women". Dolores plays Sylvia, the Roz Russell role in the original.

She sings the title song over the credits, but doesn't sing in the film itself (neither do Ann Miller or Ann Sheridan, who had previously been big musical stars). Only the leads, June Allyson and Joan Collins (in the Crawford part!) get to actually sing on-screen. Other ladies in the cast include Agnes Morehead (as The Countess), Joan Blondell, and Carolyn Jones (Morticia Addams) in the role originally played by Butterfly McQueen!

Oh, and there's men in this version too, including a ridiculously young Leslie Nielsen as Stephen Haines, the husband June and Joan are fighting for.

Great fun, campy, a real guilty pleasure.

"Thanks But No Thanks" from It's Always Fair Weather is one of my all time favorite musical numbers, Dolores and the flying, jumping, flipping tuxedoed male dancers were fantastic. I also love her cool, sophisticated acting in Designing Woman, the ravioli scene and her confession to Lauren Bacall's character as she's having her gown altered were well done. She wasn't the greatest, but she had some nice moments.

Dolores Gray made a cameo appearance in 1988 in the 'Doctor Who' story 'Silver Nemesis'. It is out on DVD this fall if you are interested.

She can be seen and heard singing "It had To Be You" (or some other standard) in 1944's Mr. Skeffington when Bette and her gangster beau go to a speakeasy.

Was Dolores Gray her real name?%0D %0D Somehow I suspect not.

Because she lived in Maine, only had experience as a domestic and was rumored to have killed her husband during an eclipse.

Too Dykey!

People criticizing her for being cold, hard, horse-faced are wrong.

While it's true she would not have been a viable leading lady, you have only to see her in supporting roles to understand how incredibly talented she was.

The real reason is that she was extraordinarily difficult, temperamental, and bossy. Period.

(Note to Datalounge: I flagged above post by mistake -- nothing wrong it it, sorry).

Maybe it's her bad -- and very obvious -- nose job?

I'd like to have seen here in the London Follies in the late 80s? - but by the time I saw it Eartha Kitt had taken over as Carlotta - she stopped the show every night!

One can be incredibly talented and still have equine features, R25. One doesn't cancel out the other.

I think Dolores Gray was beautiful. %0D %0D I just don't see the "equine" features.

Dolores Gray also had a legendary backstage feud with Bert Lahr when they co-starred in the Broadway musical-comedy revue, TWO ON THE AISLE. %0D %0D Apparently her outspoken bitchery was a well-established fact.

Here she is in "Doctor Who". She played a Southern belle who visits England to research her roots:

[quote]I just don't see the "equine" features.%0D %0D I agree completely, Sarah Jess.%0D %0D *smooches*

She was a cunt. And so was her mother!

[post redacted because independent.co.uk thinks that links to their ridiculous rag are a bad thing. Somebody might want to tell them how the internet works. Or not. We don't really care. They do suck though. Our advice is that you should not click on the link and whatever you do, don't read their truly terrible articles.]

Dolores created a sensation in London's Annie Get Your Gun. She'd been ignored in Hollywood and New York previously but it was that London performance that finally made her an international star. And she went back there in the 60s with Mame and did it all over again. They loved her!

[quote]During the show's (DESTRY RIDES AGAIN) tryout in Boston there had been several arguments between Gray and the director-choreographer Michael Kidd, which culminated when he called her a "slut" and she slapped him. Her mother threatened to kill him.%0D %0D Do you suppose they were fighting over the same chorus boy?

No, r 36 - Kidd was straight. One of the very few choreographers who was, other than Fosse.

She came off like a drag queen on film, which kind of limited the kinds of things she could play.

But an absolutely great, creamy voice. Her recording of the title track from "The Opposite Sex" is the single gayest song I have ever heard.

Being difficult and being unattractive do not disqualify one from being a star... if you've got a great voice and you've got "oomph," that's enough.

The real question: Why wasn't Virginia O'Brien (whom i first learned about on datalounge) a bigger star?

Go start your own thread and pose then question there, r39. It's obnoxious to try to hijack this one.

When her MGM contract lapsed and she was blacklisted on Broadway after "Destry" (because she fought with Michael Kidd), Dolores married a wealthy oil man and retired from performing.

It was only after he died that she came out of retirement to do "Follies" in London and "42d Street" on Broadway (as Dorothy Brock).

She had Alzheimer's at the end of her own life and died not knowing who she was...

I remember once a great post someone made on this forum a few years about seeing Dolores in a very third-rate production of "Gypsy," and a door not opening on stage during the "Mr. Goldstone" scene and Dolores wrenching it open anyway because, by God, she was the star and she was going to MAKE it open! Does anyone else remember this?

She replaced Lansbury in GYPSY in London. Did anyoe see her in the role?

These threads are why I come to DL. Someone who had a minuscule career and that absolutely no one has ever heard of, except a few old queens and the subjects relatives, can still manage to get a thread.

I liked it best when Ed Sullivan introduced her in his audience as "Dolores Gray - now STARVING on Broadway in 'Sherry!'"

R44, you are being facetious, right? Dolores Gray had a long and largely successful career. Even if she wasn't a household name, she was a great enough performer to command star billing from her twenties right through to her retirement.

r44 = 22 and 2 hot 2 B Blieved

Dolores singing "Here's That Rainy Day" on Merv Griffin is one of the most powerful and heartfelt performances I've ever seen. I love Dolores Gay. Youtube doesn't seem to have the clip anymore, it used to.

"Here's that Rainy Day" (which, BTW, was Johnny Carson's stated favorite song, and Bette Midler sang it to and for him on his next-to-final broadcast) was written for Dolores for the Broadway show "Carnival in Flanders". The show ran only 6 performances in 1953, but Dolores won the Tony that year as Best Actress in a Musical.

Neat trick - she clearly had a huge talent.

The Tony voters must have REALLY loved her because if the show ran for only 6 performances, it's doubtful most of them even saw her in it.

Saw her in GIRL CRAZY with Ann Reinking at the St. Louis Muny. For a couple of years, Gray was a favorite at the Muny. ANNIE GET YOUR GUN, UNSINKABLE MOLLY BROWN, KISMET are a few of the shows she did at the outdoor venue. She also did a tour of 42nd STREET.

Brittle, yet brilliant, sophistication only get you so far in the cinema.

Trust me

Actually, Kay......were you responsible for any of Dolores' moves in her MGM numbers? %0D %0D Thanks A Lot, But No Thanks has you written all over it.

[quote]I'd like to have seen here in the London Follies in the late 80s?

I did and I was too entranced with Diana Rigg for Delores Gray to register with me. I had to ask my mother who she was when she expressed excitement upon reading her name in the program.

I love her now and wish I could remember her performance.

I think I understand why I didn't remember her...

Kay's time at MGM ended in 1948; Dolores didn't join us until the mid-50s (after she won her Tony).

So there was no overlap at the studio, R53.

But they certainly crossed paths in the 50s, when both women were headliners in Las Vegas and at the major supper clubs around the country - Dolores plugging her "Warm Brandy" album and Kay touring with the Williams Brothers.

She really was the original horsey-faced actress, and that's it in a nutshell.

I looked for a clip of Dolores singing "Not Since Ninveveh" in KISMET, but couldn't find it. But I did find Barbara Eden singing it in the 1967 TV version -

Barbara was like the beautiful, likable version of Dolores.

[quote]It was only after he died that she came out of retirement to do "Follies" in London and "42d Street" on Broadway (as Dorothy Brock).

No, that's not right. She did SHERRY! on Broadway in 1966 and replaced Lansbury in the London GYPSY, both well before the London FOLLIES and 42ND STREET.

Kay Thompson was cast in FUNNY FACE after Gray turned it down.%0D %0D Imagine Dolores Gray singing "Think Pink".%0D %0D

r4, Rosetta were you a Lesbian?

I guess the script for Funny Face must have indicated the role be played by a chic, horse-faced actress, and when they couldn't get Gray, they got the next best thing (or some would say, the better thing).

I was the NICE Lesbian, Eva. You were the bitch. Rosetta wants nothing to do with you.

No sex appeal whatsoever.

...A great voice and face that were perfect for radio!

actually, r49, I don't recall Midler singing Who's That Rainy Day on that last Carson appearance.

I recall her singing Miss Otis Regrets and One For My Baby.

Here's Bette and Johnny singing "Here's That Rainy Day" on the next to last ever Carson show, R66

She would have been great in FUNNY FACE but I imagine she chaffed at second fiddle yet again. Too bad because none of her films approach classic status and at least FUNNY FACE gets some play. %0D %0D Although I called her horse faced early on in the thread (R1), don't get me wrong, I love Gray. I don't know how many times I watched 'Not Since Nineveh' as a kid just to hear her sing out , 'Baghdad!'

Great question, OP. The same reason that made her so special. She was unique. She wasn't the first person one thought of as being this type or that type. She was often not right for any particular role. She did her own thing, but what a thing! %0D %0D Also, the case could be made that she was born too late. She was possessed of a sophistication that would have served her better as a prewar filmstar than a postwar filmstar. She was not classically beautiful by any stretch but she had a killer body. She was one of the greatest singers who ever lived. In the era of her prime, her talents were peraps much better suited to the material in vogue in musical theatre than film. %0D %0D When she scored in film it was usual in a very niche role as in "It's Always Fair Weather," in which she nailed "Thanks A Lot But No Thanks," one of the great MGM production songs.

If she didn't arrive at MGM until the mid-50s, as another poster noted, than she was waaaaaay too late.

For years, porn star Jack Wrangler told people he was Dolores Gray's son, until she threatened to sue him.

What was the story of why Michael Bennett fired her from "Ballroom?"

Lovely Dorothy Loudon said that she met her at a party and all Gray did was complain about the show and Loudon thought she was a cunt. Her words.

r72 do you mean that Dolores originally was cast in Dorothy's lead role in Ballroom? I find that hard to believe as the character is so vulnerable, not exactly Gray's strong suit.

I believe so. It was in the workshop phase, so perhaps they were still developing the character.

It seems obvious that Tori Spelling took this photograph to her plastic surgeon.

hard to believe that Loudon wasn't Bennett's first choice for Ballroom.

Actually Beverly Sills was Bennett's first choice.

Dolores was fired because she couldn't act.

Other responses have already corrected r41... DGray appeared in the West End replacing Angela Lansbury in the renowned revival of GYPSY. This was prior to the London staging of FOLLIES.%0D %0D r43 : I saw this production. Gray was very good and the show was strong with; enough to foster my lifelong love of that musical.%0D %0D At the time, I was disappointed I was not seeing Lansbury. (I would have been equally famestruck by Gray but I was too young to know who she was). %0D %0D None the less, the London audience was crazy for her.

Funny, R79, I saw Dolores Gray touring in 42nd STREET when I was 18 and I had no idea who she was until I read up on her in the playbill. I was struck by her funny-buzzy speaking voicealmostliek acartoon character. She was hilarious in the role of Dorothy Brock and she sang the piss out of it.

BTW, BALLROOM is returning to B'way in 2012 - with Tyne Daly in the lead.

Really.

[quote]BTW, BALLROOM is returning to B'way in 2012 - with Tyne Daly in the lead.

I think you meant to say she's been cast in the title role.

A woman should never lead in the Ballroom.

Dolores WAS a big movie star, it was the pictures that weren't worthy of her talent and the demise of the studio system that killed her Hollywood episode. Dolores however went on to greater triumphs in cabaret, nightclubs and only the best variety television programs.

I have to agree with the comments in reply #83. I don't think Dolores was at all unattractive...just very different.%0D %0D The best case for big stardom is in her performance of "Thanks A Lot but No Thanks". I love her subtle gestures, slinky dancing, and the she works that incredible red dress with her legs, curvy hips, and tiny waist. All this as she massacres chorus boys. Very sexy!

Correction to reply #84....%0D %0D ....and the(way)she works that incredible....

Dolores sings The Ladies Who Lunch

I'll try that again

I've tried finding the name of this song but google doesn't recognise the lyrics. Any DL contempories recognise it?

R88 the song is called "Shadrack, Meshach and Abednego."

There are slight differences between the lyrics printed hat the link and the ones Dolores sings but it's the same song.

I also saw her as Carlotta in the 1987 London version of "Follies". I was too young of a homo at the time to realise who she was and like R54, too entranced by Diana Rigg to care.%0D %0D You must see her in a small role in one of my favorite movies, "Love Has Many Faces". She and Ruth Roman play horney middle-aged women in Acapulco who hire beachfront gigolos for a good time. The whole movie is way over the top, including Lana Turner getting gored in the vagina by a bull.

Because she has Tori Spelling's face.

r90%0D %0D Did you even read the cast list? There's a Virginia Grey but no Dolores...%0D %0D r89%0D %0D Thanks! I thought that was the title - had no idea how to spell it.

I'm a huge fan of Dolores but I gotta say.....even if she had arrived at MGM in the 1930s or 1940s, I dont think they would have done much more with her than they did in the 1950s. %0D %0D As fabulously talented as she was, what roles might she have logically played in those earlier decades, even as a yunger woman? She was too much the "fag hag" to appeal to the likes of LB Mayer.

r93%0D %0D She could've done Annie Get Your Gun on film. I wonder if she was even considered after Garland was fired...%0D %0D She's completely different in this clip than say, It's Always Fair Weather.

Whenever I see clips of that bigscreen '50s Anything Goes remake, I imagine what it might've been with Dolores belting out the likes of Blow, Gabriel, Blow.%0D %0D Dolores was way better on screen than Merman. She could also have done Call Me Madam onscreen

Loved Gray when I saw her onstage but always found her playing too much to the second balcony in film.

Though she was obviously not the ingenue, KISMET must have been the closest she came to playing a true leading lady and not some character shrew who sang and danced sensationally.

On the screen, Dolores Gray looked like a cross dresser. Or a donkey chewing grass through a barbed wire fence. Take your pick. Like the equally ghastly Betty Hutton, she couldn't dance, she was utterly charmless, and she was nothing more than an average singer. How she became as big as she was, is one of the greatest mysteries in the history of film.

[quote] Veteran musical comedy star Helen Gallagher made her Broadway debut in the same show as Gray. A longtime friend and frequent co-worker of Gray's, Gallagher said, "Dolores was a very special voice. It's one of the great theater voices. I still remember seeing her in Two On the Aisle. Her voice was so enormous that it came out and enveloped you in the audience. And this was before microphones! Dolores had an instrument capable of delivering not only a lush sound, but also power and emotion. %0D %0D [quote] In her autobiography, [Mary] Martin recalled that Dolores, at age 15, was overweight, but already had a very exciting mature and dramatic voice; and when she sang 'How Deep Was The Ocean', "It was the deepest ocean in the world and the sky was the highest sky." %0D

100.

How on Earth can anyone not love Dolores in The Opposite Sex?? Everything she does is hilarious! Her body is unbelievable, too. The way she manipulates her dresses... She's wonderful! Drippy June Allyson you can have.

What a sexy goddess she is in thanks but no thanks. She makes the men her helpless little slaves and I just love it. And what a body she have OOOOHHHHHHH

Fuck movie stardom, Dolores has this live audience calling for more in London, 1978.

Here's Dolores singing her great signature song, "Here Comes that Rainy Day" on the Merv Griffin Show.

What a voice! but she's like Andy Karl--a great voice, a great body, and a face made to be seen at a great distance.

Here's Gray's version of "Not Since Nineveh." She's a MUCH better singer than Barbara Eden, but not nearly so pretty.

This clip must be from around the time of "Designing Woman". She recreates the "There'll Be Some Changes Made" number, complete with dancing boys and a pair of French maids to help with the costume reveal.

I saw Kismet without knowing who was Dolores Gray was. She and Jack Cole's choreography just sort of explode on the screen when "Not since Nineveh" comes to wake things up. I'd have loved to have seen her live.

Thing is there were a number of slightly brassy blondes with low voices--and the one who got the big careers were Betty Hutton (who can be really, really irritating in the wrong part) and Doris Day who had a bit more range as an actress--she was a bit more vulnerable and girl-next-door. Others, like June Havoc, had talent, but just didn't click for any number of reasons.

C'est Si Bon.

Restored "Rahadlakum" with Howard Keel.

It’s the makeup. The techniques used by actual drag queens makes women look masculine.

All the influencers and makeup artists are currently into this hideous look. It’s a shame, because it’s unnecessary.

Dolores sings at a tribute to Harold Rome. I don't why there's a double tracked effect on the audio.

*I don't know

Hello, fellas!

The new-ish KISMET Blu-Ray is so merciless in its clarity that you can see traces of Dolores' pockmarks, even though she is carefully lit and photographed and wearing layers of MGM full-slap face spackle.

Well, she's looking pretty sensational here.

I was lucky to see Dolores Gray in the London production of Follies. She stopped the show cold with "I'm Still Here" -for a full five minutes. And, yes, like the others here my eyes were on Diana Rigg all evening. The original London Follies was "Follies lite" but it was a great evening, and the cast were phenomenal.

Diana Rigg said that she would watch Dolores Gray working the stage every night during Dolores' solo. Diana Rigg had talent and she KNEW talent.

No, just no.