Mitzi Gaynor, renowned musical actress best known for her turn as Nellie Forbush in the 1958 musical romance South Pacific, has passed away. She was 93.
Rene Reyes and Shane Rosamonda, Gaynor’s management team, announced the actress passed away “peacefully” Thursday (Oct. 17) from natural causes.
“For eight decades she entertained audiences in films, on television and on the stage,” they wrote. “She truly enjoyed every moment of her professional career and the great privilege of being an entertainer.”
The statement continued, “Off stage, she was a vibrant and extraordinary woman, a caring and loyal friend, and a warm, gracious, and every funny and altogether glorious human being.”
Gaynor earned a Golden Globe nomination for her performance in South Pacific, which went on to win an Oscar for best sound. The 1958 musical starred Gaynor as a young nurse who falls in love with Rossano Brazzi’s mysterious character.
The Associated Press reports Frank Sinatra helped Gaynor land the role. They were set to film a big scene for The Joker Is Wild, but the schedule coincided with the one shot she had to audition for lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II. He reportedly told her, “Don’t worry, I’ll change the schedule.”
Born Francesca Marlene de Czanyi von Gerber in 1931, Gaynor forged a career as a bold performer with several notable roles in big-screen musicals through the ’50s that included The I Don’t Care Girl and Anything Goes. She also starred alongside Marilyn Monroe in the 1954 comedy There’s No Business Like Show Business, and later alongside Gene Kelly and Kay Kendall in Les Girls.
Her final credited acting role was in the 1963 film For Love or Money before she pivoted to becoming an entertainer. Per AP, Gaynor was the only woman to appear alongside Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Jimmy Durante, and Dean Martin on ABC’s The Frank Sinatra Timex Show.
She also became the star of her own show several times over with the 1968 self-titled TV special, followed by Mitzi’s 2nd Special in 1969 and several successors. She later set her sights on Las Vegas where she performed a musical comedy show, complete with a troupe of male dancers and a complete orchestra. She and her husband Jack Bean continued touring until 2002 when Bean’s health took a turn.
“I quit films because they quit me,” she said in an interview in 2012. “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.”
Gaynor’s career was chronicled in the 2008 PBS documentary Mitzi Gaynor: Razzle Dazzle! The Special Years, for which she finally won an Emmy Award.
