Twentieth Century-Fox insisted that Marni Nixon sign a contract agreeing not to disclose that she had dubbed any part of Deborah Kerr's vocals in "The King and I" (1956). If she did, the studio threatened to make sure she never worked "in this town (i.e., Hollywood) again." Deborah Kerr, with whom Nixon worked extremely closely and extremely well, thought this was deeply unfair, and it was Mrs. Kerr herself who revealed the dubbing secret in an interview with the popular columnist Earl Wilson.
She provided Natalie Wood's singing voice in West Side Story (1961). She was also Deborah Kerr's singing voice in both An Affair to Remember (1957) and the musical classic The King and I (1956).
When Harvey Fierstein was asked who should star in the film adaptation of the musical "La Cage Aux Folles," he replied: "Me! Dubbed by Marni Nixon!"
She also dubbed the singing voice of Anita (Rita Moreno) for the song "Tonight" in West Side Story (1961) when Betty Wand came down with bronchitis at the last minute.
She went on an extensive tour with both Liberace and Victor Borge.
In the late '70s and early '80s she appeared in her own local children's TV series in Seattle called "Boomerang," and won four Emmys for her efforts.
In 1965 Marni appeared as a contestant on the popular show "To Tell the Truth." Half the panel, made up of Tom Poston, Peggy Cass, Orson Bean and Kitty Carlisle, was fooled.
She earned her reputation as the "Singing Voice of the Stars" by also "ghosting" for other film stars such as Margaret O'Brien, Janet Leigh and Jeanne Crain in some of their song sequences. She even touched up some of the parts Marilyn Monroe sang in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), voicing the line "These rocks don't lose their shape" and some of the high notes in the "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" number.
In the touring production of My Fair Lady she played Mrs. Higgins (Prof. Higgins's mother).
She appeared in a film alongside Julie Andrews: The Sound of Music (1965). She also provided Audrey Hepburn's singing voice as Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady (1964), a role Andrews had created on stage.
Natalie Wood recorded all the songs she was to sing in the film West Side Story and was told that only some of her high notes would be dubbed, but in the end all of them were voiced by Marni.
Of her three children, Andrew Gold is a rock musician, composer and producer; her daughter Martha Gold Carr is a psychologist; and Melanie Gold is a singer and songwriter.
Of her three best-known dubbing jobs — Anna in "The King and I," Maria in "West Side Story" and Eliza in "My Fair Lady" — Nixon was able to establish a warm personal and professional relationship only with Deborah Kerr. The following year (1957), Nixon again dubbed Kerr's vocals in "An Affair to Remember," in which Kerr played a successful nightclub singer.
Although Marni Nixon never dubbed Julie Andrews's voice, she did voice the role of Mary Poppins on the children's version of the film's music (Disneyland record label).
She performed as the Mother Abbess in The Sound of Music at the Hollywood Bowl with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra.
She appeared in a concert touring the United States ("The Sound of Hollywood").
Ernest Gold's children: Andrew Gold, Martha Gold Carr (b. July 22, 1953) and Melanie Gold.
She began as a violinist at the age of four and started singing with her sisters at the age of eight.
She hosted the Seattle children's TV series "Boomerang."
Her voice appeared in the film Dementia (1955) and, of course, in the film re-released in 1957 and known as Daughter of Horror (and she was credited).
In the Broadway revival of Stephen Sondheim's "Follies" she replaced Joan Roberts as Heidi Schiller (who sings the song "One More Kiss").