My Fair Lady: Audrey Sings!

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Faneditor Name:
Original Movie Title:
Fanedit Type:
Original Release Date:
1964
Original Running Time:
173
Fanedit Release Date:
Fanedit Running Time:
172
Subtitles Available?
Available in HD?
Brief Synopsis:
Marni Nixon's dubbing of Audrey Hepburn's singing has been almost completely replaced with recordings of Audrey's voice (only "The Rain In Spain" remains of Marni Nixon).
Intention:
The dubbing always bothered me, but after finding that most of Audrey's vocals had been discovered (no such luck for Jeremy Brett) and were mostly quite good, I knew replacing them would be a definite improvement.
Other Sources:
Audio recordings found on Youtube and blu-ray extra The Making of My Fair Lady Then and Now
Release Information:
Digital
Editing Details:
I attempted to fully replace Marni Nixon's voice with Audrey's while making as few alterations to all other aspects of the film as possible.
Cuts and Additions:
Replaced songs: "Wouldn't It Be Loverly" (including a reprise), "Just You Wait", "Show Me", "I Could Have Danced All Night", "Without You"
Adjusted visual timing of "Without You" to sync with vocal recording (resulting in approximately 20 second reduction to total film runtime).

User reviews

3 reviews
Overall rating
 
9.4
Audio/Video Quality
 
8.7(3)
Audio Editing
 
9.7(3)
Visual Editing
 
9.7(3)
Narrative
 
10.0(3)
Enjoyment
 
9.0(3)
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(Updated: November 29, 2023)
Overall rating
 
9.6
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.0
Audio Editing
 
10.0
Visual Editing
 
10.0
Narrative
 
10.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
Very well done. This movie is a favorite for me and my wife. While the musical numbers have always been kind of jarring, switching from Audrey to an obvious studio dubover, perfect musical numbers are not as critical to this movie as they are in other musicals of the time. Since Rex Harrison gets to leave his singing in the film, it was pretty unfair that Audrey got the dub. So this is a perfect concept, well executed.
Audrey's singing is not as pitch-perfect, but it is authentic. And that authenticity works well when she breaks into song. She is competent enough to merit her own recording.
It is a shame that this edit needed to be done, as the studio could have produced much higher quality authentic tracks with Audrey singing if they had been so inclined. The sources for this edit are not perfect, and there is some crackling, static, and a general difference in tonal quality when the tracks come in. But this does not detract from the enjoyment at all. Audrey's voice is a critical element to My Fair Lady, and hearing it throughout the songs is a marked improvement to the movie.
The video source uses the latest remastered print, so of course it looks as stunning as you've ever seen it, and I believe the video has been left untouched for this edit.

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
A
1 reviews
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Overall rating
 
9.4
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.0
Audio Editing
 
9.0
Visual Editing
 
9.0
Narrative
 
10.0
Enjoyment
 
10.0
This is a long overdue edit, and one of many that sit in the back of many of our minds as "I'll get to that one day"...but catferoze got the cream and actaully delivered...and big thanks for doing so.

Is this a fave musical of mine...? NOPE....

Does this have challenges to pull off? for sure...and this achieves all that with aplomb!

Even as a youngster, it was obvious to me that the lady singing was NOT Audrey hepburn, and of course as the years have passed, we now all know it was MArni Nixon, who dubbed MANY a voice in a host of movies.

What this achieves more than anything is NOT that the original performances have been added back...but in fact it elevates the authenticity of the character and the protagonists believability in the fiulm to the heights it should always have been.

More so, it is yet another example as to why I beieve there should be a CLASSICS category in future FEOTY awards since edits like this not only raise awareness of these classic movies, but in many cases elevate them to new heights.

Highly recommended!
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 1 0
Overall rating
 
9.2
Audio/Video Quality
 
8.0
Audio Editing
 
10.0
Visual Editing
 
10.0
Narrative
 
10.0
Enjoyment
 
8.0
I film that I had only seen once before in its theatrical form and wasn't very fond of, a significant aspect of this was the obvious use of ghost-singers that didn't align with speaking voices; in an amusing piece of film trivia the character played by Hepburn in "Paris When it Sizzles" (produced a couple of years earlier) described "My Fair Lady" as being a Frankenstein-like story, comments that seem very apt in this particular aspect. She was certainly more capable than Harrison, and it felt unfair to me that he gets to practically talk his way through songs while she was re-voiced by Marni Nixon, who (while a gifted singer) was not an ideal vocal match.

The edit does an excellent job of reintegrating the original tracks, though the clarity does sometimes noticeably drop this must be due to the quality of the available sources, and I think that it represents an improvement overall with only one song that sounds like a struggle, but even that is not too bad, certainly better than other examples I can think of! It's a shame that one song could not be replaced, and that Jeremy Brett remains dubbed by Bill Shirley since he never got to record despite having an excellent voice. I also wish that there was some way to liven up Harrison's speak-singing as I've never liked it much, but that would probably necessitate remaking the film altogether! Visual editing is great, didn't notice any new cuts and the only thing to give away the non-originality was occasional loss of AV synchronisation with the new tracks: I'm sure I've seen worse in other, officially released, productions though, and I don't feel that it would be fair to deduct points.

While it's not a film I plan on revisiting any time soon this would likely be the version I turn to, thanks catferoze for finally implementing an idea that must have been floated since the original tracks were unearthed thirty-odd years ago.

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
P
Top 50 Reviewer 78 reviews
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