Kathryn Grayson

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Kathryn Grayson
from trailer for The Toast of New Orleans (1950)
Born	Zelma Kathryn Elisabeth Hedrick February 9, 1922 (1922-02-09) (age 87) Winston-Salem, North Carolina, U.S.
Occupation	Actress/Singer
Years active	1941–2004
Spouse(s)	John Shelton (1941–1946) divorced Johnny Johnston (1947–1951) divorced
Official website

Kathryn Grayson (born February 9, 1922) is an American actress and operatic soprano singer.

Trained as an opera singer from the age of twelve, Grayson was contracted to MGM and established a career in films from the early 1940s. Most of her films were musicals and after several supporting roles, she was given lead roles in such films as Show Boat (1951) and Kiss Me Kate (1953). She was paired with Howard Keel and Mario Lanza in some of her films.

When movie musicals fell out of favor with film audiences, she progressed to theatre work, and appeared in several musicals, including the highly successful Camelot from 1962 until 1964. During the 1960s, she performed in several operas, including La bohème, Madama Butterfly, Orpheus in the Underworld and La traviata.

Life and career

Background

She was born Zelma Kathryn Elisabeth Hedrick in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The Hedrick family later moved to St. Louis, Missouri, where she was discovered singing on the empty stage of the St. Louis Municipal Opera House by a janitor, who introduced her to Frances Marshall of the Chicago Civic Opera, who gave the twelve-year-old girl voice lessons.

Career

with Mario Lanza in The Toast of New Orleans (1950)

Her first fim appearance was in Andy Hardy's Private Secretary (1941) as Andy Hardy's secretary Kathryn Land.^[1][2] Though she started out as MGM's answer to Deanna Durbin in films such as Seven Sweethearts (1942) and Anchors Aweigh (1945), she became a top star in Thousands Cheer, Anchors Aweigh and Two Sisters from Boston, and in the film versions of the Broadway hit Kiss Me Kate (1953). In this film, she teamed up with Howard Keel, with whom she had starred earlier in the 1951 Technicolor remake of Show Boat, and in 1952's Lovely to Look At, a 1952 Technicolor version of Roberta. She and Keel also appeared together in a highly successful cabaret act in the 1960s. She also appeared in a duo of films with tenor Mario Lanza, That Midnight Kiss (1949) and The Toast of New Orleans (1950).

Grayson appeared on television occasionally. Her first TV appearances were in the 1950s, and she received an Emmy nomination in 1956 for her performance in the General Electric Theater episode Shadow on the Heart with John Ericson. More recently, she appeared in several episodes of Angela Lansbury's series Murder, She Wrote in the late 1980s.

Stage career

With the end of MGM's great era of musicals, so ended Grayson's film career. She was on stage in numerous stage musicals such as Show Boat, Rosalinda, Kiss Me, Kate, Naughty Marietta, and The Merry Widow, for which she was nominated for Chicago's Sarah Siddons Award. This led to her as a replacement for Julie Andrews on Broadway in 1962 in Camelot, scoring a great success as Queen Guenevere, before going on to star in the National tour for over sixteen months, after which she left the show due to health problems. During her period with the Camelot tour, all box-office records were broken and she gained uniformly excellent notices. Grayson had a lifelong dream of being an opera star, and she appeared in a number of operas in the 1960s, such as La bohème, Madama Butterfly, Orpheus in the Underworld and La traviata. Her dramatic and comedy stage roles included Night Watch, Noises Off, Love Letters and Something's Afoot as Dottie Otterling.

Grayson now supervises the Voice and Choral Studies Program at the Idaho State University.

Personal life

In Hollywood she married twice, first to the actor John Shelton and then to the actor/singer Johnnie Johnston. She has one daughter, Patricia Kathryn, born October 7, 1948.

Filmography

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Kathryn Grayson

• The Official Kathryn Grayson Website
• Kathryn Grayson at the Internet Movie Database.
• Photographs and literature