Celebrity Biographies
Kathryn Grayson
Kathryn Grayson, who traded a possible career in opera for one on movie screens, died on February 18, 2010 in Los Angeles. She had just turned 88 and in her legacy there are several unforgettable musicals.
Zelma Kathryn Elisabeth Hedrick was born on February 9, 1922 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, United States. She was the third of three siblings, and she was immediately aware that she had a good voice, so she began to cultivate her vocal cords with the intention of dedicating herself to opera. At the age of 15, the entire family moved to California, and Kathryn’s voice garnered enough attention that she was signed to Red Seal, RCA Victor Records’ classical music label. But things took a turn for the worse when Metro executives heard the girl on the radio, and saw that she was a pretty, petite brunette, who would do well on screen, and perhaps match the then-hot TV star. Universal Deanna Durbin; they immediately convinced her to give up her operatic career and devote her best efforts to film. Then came the contract that lasted 13 years –more than her two marriages, with John Shelton (1941-46), the other with Johnny Johnston (1947-51), who gave her a daughter–, the acting lessons, and the publicists they bet on the stage name of Kathryn Grayson, with the mother’s last name.
Her debut in 1941 was one of the films in the Andy Hardy saga, Andy Hardy’s Private Secretary , where she tried out her soprano voice with songs like “Voices of Spring” by Johan Strauss.
His film career is made up of barely twenty films, but these are musicals in the category of Raising Anchors (1943), Magnolia (1951) and Kiss Me, Kate (1953). Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly were her unforgettable co-stars in the first mentioned film. She also worked with Howard Keel doing the Magnolia (1951) duets “Make Believe” and “You Are Love”; the actor described her as the most beautiful woman in the history of cinema. With Mario Lanza , a great tenor, she did That Midnight Kiss (1949) and The Toast of New Orleans (1950).
After the disappointment of the period musical The Vagabond King (1956), he would have an isolated appearance in television series such as Baretta or Murder, She Wrote . She wouldn’t go on to sing on the big opera stages, her childhood dream, but she did in Broadway musicals like “Camelot,” where she filled in for Julie Andrews .