So Tony Curtis was dubbed in "Some Like It Hot" by Voiceover King Paul Frees

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by Ghostworld, Sep 13, 2011.

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  1. Ghostworld

    Ghostworld Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    US
    I always suspected as much. When he goes into his "female" voice, I always thought it was too good. I'm watching Some Like it Now, right now, on Netflix and decided to look it up. He was dubbed. What's interesting is that he was dubbed by vocal performer Paul Frees, who was everyone form Boris Badinov on Rocky and Bullwinkle to being the "ghost host" of the Haunted Mansion! What a voice! Funny that someone who could give Orson Welles a run for his money, does such a good womans voice!


    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlR9YeewwJw&feature=youtube_gdata_player
     
  2. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    I could tell it was Paul Frees the first time I saw it on TV in the 1960s as a kid. He was all over that movie. I was a big fan of Rocky & Bullwinkle and knew the guy's voice, also from Ludwig Von Drake, etc.

    More news: Tony wore a toup in later years as well (don't tell anyone). ;) So did Paul Frees.

    Didn't Paul Frees play John Lennon and George Harrison in the Beatles cartoon show?
     
  3. Ghostworld

    Ghostworld Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    US
    The toupee -- not a surprise! In my heart, I always secretly wished it was Tony doing the voice. Something's a cheat about the dubbing. The whole transformation, ruse magic wrecked. That's probably why I never bothered to look it up. I did, however, recognize June foray dubbing in Roy Schieders son's voice in Jaws! I'd never heard of Pal Frees before, but I did know that voice of Disney!
     
  4. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    I'd love to hear an undubbed SOME LIKE IT HOT. It being United Artists, I'm sure everything was ashcanned years ago.
     
  5. Claviusb

    Claviusb A Serious Man

    Paul Frees also does the voice of Mozzerella, the Funeral Parlor owner at the beginning of the movie and I think a couple of other voices that are one or two word fill ins.

    Billy Wilder liked to use cartoon voice actors in his movies, I suspect. In "Kiss Me, Stupid!" he had Mel Blanc play a dentist. My kids love that movie.
     
  6. noirbar

    noirbar Forum Resident

    Location:
    San Antone
    "We're up the creek and you want to hock the paddle!"
    "I'm Daphne!"
    "Look how she moves, it's like jello on springs."
    "I'm a boy, I'm a boy, I'm a boy."
    "He has an empty stomach and it's gone to his head."
    "Yes, we're the new girls...brand new!"


    I'm sorry, but this is greatest movie of all time.
     
  7. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    I got to record Paul many times in VO sessions during the late 1970s. He was quite a character; drove a very expensive red Mercedes convertible, and always carried a small loaded gun in one of his boots (claiming he had almost been car-jacked one time). His voices for Disney were legendary; Paul is gone, but the ghosts of the Haunted Mansion live on...

    People forget that Tony Curtis actually did commercials for a men's toupee company in the early 1980s; I think he had a financial interest in the company. I don't think he ever made a secret of it, unlike (say) Bill Shatner or Charlton Heston.

    We could do a whole thread about famous celebrities who wore rugs. My favorite was Pat Boone, whose toupee was made famous in this notorious TV clip. There's some surprising people out there whom nobody suspects wore rugs, or at least wore a "partial piece" (especially in the world of rock). And practically every male star in their 30s and 40s gets what I like to call "strategic combing." Then there's the TV stars who had suspicious hairlines; Kevin James and Jeremy Piven are prime examples. We're talking velcro hair here.

    I did a music video for Loverboy back in the 1980s, and was shocked when the lead singer dropped by the session and he was as bald as Larry Fine. Looked great on camera, though.
     
  8. Meng

    Meng Forum Resident

    It's a contender.

    "There was something' in dat cake dat didn't agree with him!!"
     
  9. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    I always heard Paul Frees was a grump. He owned Disneyland voice wise as far as I was concerned. His MONSANTO "I'm shrinking!" moments are gone from the park though. That's a bummer.

    Tony Curtis used to eat at the deli in the 1990s with a bunch of us on Saturday morning in-between wives Lisa and Jill. He always had a hot chick with him and he always asked how we liked his toup. A droll, funny guy who I really liked. Sorry he's gone.:( He was a real movie star from the old days and it was a pleasure to get to talk with him. Never brought up the dubbing in SOME LIKE IT HOT though. I'm not crazy.
     
  10. Ghostworld

    Ghostworld Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    US
    Watching it today, listening to that brilliant script, it has too certainly be one of the top - if not the top - comedy of all time. They don't write em like that anymore. Smart, smart, smart.
     
  11. Laservampire

    Laservampire Down with this sort of thing

    I have to politely disagree. This movie did nothing for me, not even a giggle. "Dr. Strangelove" is still my top comedy :righton:
     
  12. ATR

    ATR Senior Member

    Location:
    Baystate
    Nobody's perfect. :D
     
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  13. pdenny

    pdenny 22-Year SHTV Participation Trophy Recipient

    Location:
    Hawthorne CA
    You're gonna have to answer to the Coca-Cola company. :D
     
  14. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    No, he was OK. A little distant, but very pro. He chuckled when I reminded him of doing the intro to War of the Worlds ("a modern miracle of super science!"), and he agreed that he may have done Orson Welles' voice more often than Orson did.

    My understanding is Frees eventually installed a recording studio in his home in Northern California, and did everything from about 1980 on while being directed over phone lines. You'd send him a script, direct him over the phone, then he'd FedEx the tape to you the same day. Pretty good business.

    Cartoon voice actor Corey Burton does all of the fake Frees stuff nowadays. He stays pretty busy, including redoing most of the Disney rides.
     
  15. MLutthans

    MLutthans That's my spaghetti, Chewbacca! Staff

  16. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    A better Peter Lorre than Peter Lorre!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwKKFn_hczQ

    Some fascinating Paul Frees outtakes here:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlR9YeewwJw

    Man, that guy was good. From what I remember of his sessions, he'd do a couple of takes and be gone. I believe the AFTRA union rate was $750 per recording session during this time, and Frees would literally be done in five minutes and run off to his next session. Sounds like easy work, but he had a one-in-a-million voice.
     
  17. abescan

    abescan Forum Resident

    Location:
    Grafton,Ohio USA
    I met Tony about 9 months before he died. He was at an AFTERNOON with Tony Curtis at the Las Vegas Library for free. They showed a movie reel with tons of highlites and an interview with his friend from the Las Vegas paper and his way younger wife. Afterward there was a meet and greet with him and his new book about the making of Some Like it Hot was on sale. He could not have been nicer. Nothing came up about the dubbing in the movie. Very glad I got to meet this LEGEND and get a photo with him and also a signed book!
     
  18. indy mike

    indy mike Forum Pest

  19. I've always loved his rendition of "My Old Flame" as Lorre for Spike Jones and his City Slickers...made me laugh my butt off!!!:agree::laugh:
     
  20. apileocole

    apileocole Lush Life Gort

    Remember the one where he "sung" as Boris Karloff? "Evrrybo-dy is my brraathur. My blood brraathur."

    These people can't get the Peoplemover running but they can bungle around having somebody else re-record Paul Frees' perfect narration everywhere.
     
  21. He also overdubbed Pete Duel's voice for the uncompleted episode of "Alias Smith and Jones" after Duel committed suicide. He came pretty darn close to sounding like Duel.
     
  22. Ghostworld

    Ghostworld Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    US
    Okay, so reading this thread and learning about Paul Frees, I now know he was also a great mimic as well as a VoiceOver artist. Knowing that begs this question: Do you think Pual Frees is doing Tony Curtis doing a woman? I read that Curtis, because of his deep voice kept "slipping" in pitch. I wonder if Paul Frees heard Tony Curtis' Take on a woman's voice and then imitated Curtis doing a woman, but with consistency. Now, that would be cool and rescue the fact that it was dubbed. A dead on imitation of Curtis doing a woman!
     
  23. Oatsdad

    Oatsdad Oat, Biscuits, Abbie & Mitzi: Best Dogs Ever

    Location:
    Alexandria VA
    The crazy thing is that Piven denies he has anything other than his real hair even though he looked like this on "Seinfeld"!
     

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  24. tommy-thewho

    tommy-thewho Senior Member

    Location:
    detroit, mi
    Some Like It Hot has always been a fav. of mine. Never thought Tony was dubbed....
     
  25. Sgt. Pepper

    Sgt. Pepper Member

    Location:
    Pittsburgh, PA
    Really? Certainly there must be a few that still have all of their hair?
     
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