Marni Nixon, the American soprano, is best-known to MM fans for dubbing the operatic introduction to ‘Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend’ (as seen in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, though omitted from the soundtrack recording. It should be emphasised that all other vocals on the song are Marilyn’s.)
Nixon, now 83, spoke to The Guardian recently about her movie work, including her far more extensive dubbing work in The King and I and West Side Story.
“‘It was just a part of the working singer’s job in Hollywood to do anything that was necessary and a lot of dubbing was going on,’ she says. To subsidise a classical career that had her eventually singing for Stravinsky and Schoenberg, ‘you just worked any way you can.'”