Mitzi Gaynor, a beloved star of the 1950s whose effervescent personality, radiant personality and triple-threat skills as an actress, singer and dancer earned her a Golden Globe nomination for her role as Ensign Nellie Forbush in the 1958 film adaptation of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific had died at 93.
The star’s managers announced her death in an Instagram post, noting that she “passed away peacefully” on Thursday morning (Oct. 17) of natural causes. “For eight decades she entertained audiences in films, on television and on the stage,” read the announcement. “She truly enjoyed every moment of her professional career and the great privilege of being an entertainer.”
Gaynor, born Francesca Marlene de Czanyi von Gerber in Chicago on Sept. 4, 1931, was best known for her run of starring roles in a series of 1950s movie musicals, including 1954’s There’s No Business Like Show Business, 1956’s Anything Goes and 1957’s Les Girls. Born to a violinist father and dancer mother, Gaynor got an early start on her career when her family moved from Detroit to Los Angeles when she was 11-years-old, leading to her landing a spot as a singer/dancer in the Los Angeles Civil Light Opera two years later.
By 17, she signed a contract with Twentieth Century-Fox, making her film debut in 1950’s My Blue Heaven, where she starred alongside Betty Grable. By the next year she landed her first starring role in the musical western Golden Girl, where she played a character based on early 20th century actress Lotta Crabtree.
Her first big screen success came in 1952 with the musical Bloodhounds of Broadway — based on a Damon Runyon story — which kicked off nearly a decade of starring roles that showcased her versatility and winning, shining personality, which manifested in film with a mix of innocence and sex appeal. She shared the screen with such established stars of the day as Ethel Merman, Johnnie Ray and Marilyn Monroe and sang songs penned by Irving Berlin in There’s No Business Like Show Business, as well as Bing Crosby and Donald O’Connor in the 1956 adaptation of Cole Porter’s stage musical Anything Goes. Other highlights included 1957’s The Joker Is Wild, with Frank Sinatra and Charles Vidor, and that year’s Les Girls, which also featured music by Porter and co-starred Gene Kelly.
Her winning streak continued with top billing in the WWII romantic musical South Pacific, which earned her a Golden Globe nomination for best motion picture actress – comedy/musical for her exuberant performances of “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Out of My Hair” and “Some Enchanted Evening.” She appeared in a handful of other movies over the next few years, including 1963’s For Love or Money with Kirk Douglas, Gig Young and Julie Newmar, before pivoting to a successful run as the hots of a series of TV specials.
“I quit films because they quit me,” she told the TV Academy Foundation in a 2012 in explaining why she moved from the big screen to the little one. “Marilyn Monroe was now the new Alice Faye/Betty Grable, she was doing the musicals at Fox. I wasn’t going to do My Fair Lady, and I wasn’t going to [sing] ‘The Hills Are Alive With the Sound of Screaming’ — there was nothing for me to do.”
She famously performed between the two sets by the Beatles on a Feb. 16, 1964 episode of the Ed Sullivan Show, singing a 13-minute medley of “Too Darn Hot” along with “The More I See You,” “Birth of the Blues” and “When the Saints Go Marching In.” The episode from the Deauville Hotel in Miami Beach aired a week after Sullivan legendarily introduced the Fab Four to American audiences in one of the most-watched TV moments of all time.
Before he teamed up with Cher, Gaynor was glittery celebrity gown designer Bob Makie’s first A-list client, modeling his one-of-a-kind creations during her stint as a headliner in Las Vegas in the 1960s.
That run paved the way for Gaynor’s first TV special, Mitzi, which aired on NBC in Oct. 1968 and was followed by a second one on the network the next year, as well as half a dozen similar song-and-dance specials on CBS from 1973-1978; her nine specials were nominated for a total of 16 Emmy Awards, though she didn’t take one home until 2008 thanks to her PBS special Mitzi Gaynor: Razzle Dazzle! The Special Years.
A frequent performer on the Academy Awards broadcasts — wowing the crowd in 1954 with her take on “The Moon Is Blue” and again in 1959 with her signature “There’s No Business Like Show Business” — Gaynor also recorded two albums for Verve Records, 1959’s Mitzi and Mitzi Gaynor Sings the Lyrics of Ira Gerswhin.
“We take great comfort in the fact that her creative legacy will endure through her many magical performances capture on film and video, through her recordings and especially through the love and support audiences around the world have shared so generously with her throughout her life and career,” wrote managers Rene Reyes and Shane Rosamonda in their tribute.
See the statement announcing Gaynor’s death and some of her career highlights below.
