Meet Howard Keel (1952) 🇺🇸
Howard Keel, Metro singing star, really hit the jackpot in Exhibitor’s Laurel Awards International Poll last year.
by Paul Manning
He topped the new personalities division in a year which heralded the debut of many other potential stars, and, just to outdistance the field safely, his solid performance in Annie Get Your Gun was voted the best performance in a musical by an actor. For his first real crack at Hollywood, this wasn’t bad going.
Proving the value of these annual polls, the tabulations this year show him high up in the star category, a long ways removed from the new personalities division. This proves that the voters who accorded him the high honor last year had real faith in him, and it appears as though he has really come through for his pluggers. Show Boat didn’t exactly hurt him, methinks.
I bumped into the Keels at the annual Red Book magazine award dinner. His charming frau, awaiting a blessed event (number two) this June, made the meeting a warm three-cornered interview.
A rapid fire biog of Howard Keel seems in order at this point, so here goes. Born in Gillespie, Ill., he came to California after his second year at Gillespie High School. Completing his education in Fallbrook, Cal., he became engrossed in studying voice, encouraged by the fact that his friends didn’t bombard him with overripe vegetables when the urge to sing came to him. In fact, they urged him to enter a vocal scholarship contest held in Los Angeles. He won this easily, and, during the next few years, while working at Douglas and North American aircraft plants, he participated in as many stage events as he could squeeze into the 24 hours of each day. Then came the travelling concerts and a gradual building of the Keel name and repertoire. In New York, Oscar Hammerstein, seeking a replacement for Carousel, found Keel’s rich booming baritone just what the doc ordered, and Keel found public favor from his first performance. From here, he went in the smash hit Oklahoma!. It was in Oklahoma!, playing in London, that he was signed by Metro, looking for a male lead for Annie Get Your Gun to play opposite Betty Hutton. His playing of that role is now history. We know that there can only be bigger and better roles for this talented guy. — P. M.
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Good Things to come from Hollywood… 20th-Fox’s ‘“With a Song in My Heart”
Here is screen entertainment with a real heart, one which will surely put a song in the heart of every ticket buyer, not to mention the ticket sellers who will be doing business like in those good old days!
by Paul Manning
The courage and artistry of Jane Froman becomes a screen gem of quality and substance under the expert guidance of 20th’s artisans of production. Studio Survey takes this opportunity of getting off brief comments on individual contributions to this truly excellent film:
Lamar Trotti: When Trotti produces, well, you’ve got yourself a production! Thoughtful, sensitive, and complete, Lamar Trotti has always brought to the screen pictures of quality. This one is a real milestone.
Walter Lang: A script is a script, a few pages of dialogue. A set is a set, four walls, or an open sea, or a mountain peak. Actors are actors, and a strip of film is still an inanimate strip of film until the director combines all these into a motion picture. Walter Lang is a past master in this high art. With a Song in My Heart proves it again.
Susan Hayward: 20th-Fox is sure mining real high test gold in this dynamic actress. Even though I have never seen Jane Froman in person, she will live in my memory through the great performance with which Miss Hayward smashes through. Backing up the great Froman voice, Hayward hits the screen with a stunning brand of Technicolor beauty and depth of character, as is fitting such a tribute to Froman’s courage.
Thelma Ritter: A toast to this gal who really socks home with each word and gesture. She almost steals this show, and, when you consider the talent stacked up against her, this, brother, isn’t exactly petty larceny!
David Wayne: A difficult role made simple and realistic by a smooth and convincing actor. Wayne may be small in size but whenever he does his stuff in front of the cameras, he grows in stature. A solid force in any role, however diversified, David Wayne impresses both critic and moviegoer alike. We know,
Rory Calhoun: He plays the “real” love in Froman’s life, the pilot who saves her life after the plane crash in Lisbon, Portugal. Again, he displays the charm and sex appeal which is zooming his stock heavenward. A hit with ladies of all ages, he doesn’t harm himself with this fine performance. — P. M.
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These scenes from 20th-Fox’s Technicolor With a Song in My Heart show, in the usual top to bottom, left to right, order; Susan Hayward, portraying Jane Froman, in a shot with Thelma Ritter, Miss Hayward with Bob Wagner [Robert Wagner], producer Lamar Trotti, and director Walter Lang.
Collection: Exhibitor Magazine (Studio Survey), March 1952