Mitzi Gaynor, “South Pacific” star, dead at 93

Singer, dancer and actress Mitzi Gaynor, who wowed audiences in movie musicals like “South Pacific,” and became a fixture on TV variety shows and a headliner in Las Vegas, died Thursday. She was 93.

Gaynor died of natural causes in Los Angeles, according to an announcement by her representatives.

In an eight-decade career, Gaynor appeared in numerous musicals in the 1950s, including “There’s No Business Like Show Business,” “Anything Goes,” “Les Girls,” and the film version of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s smash hit “South Pacific.

Gaynor beat out a plethora of Hollywood stars, including Doris Day, Elizabeth Taylor and Susan Hayward, who vied for the role of Nellie Forbush, a Navy nurse who sings of how she wants to “wash that man right out of my hair.” Her performance in the blockbuster movie made her an international star, and earned her a Golden Globe nomination.

It was the peak of a string of Hollywood hits for Gaynor, but as musicals fell out of favor (her last film was the 1963 comedy “For Love or Money” with Kirk Douglas), she turned to concert performances. In 1961 she made her nightclub debut at the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas, smashing box office records with her four-week residency.

She also turned to TV. She was a guest on “The Ed Sullivan Show,” on the same program that The Beatles made their second U.S. TV appearance. Seventy million people tuned in.

She appeared on variety shows hosted by Frank Sinatra, Donald O’Connor, Jack Benny, Danny Thomas and Perry Como.

Gaynor also starred in a string of over-the-top, hit TV specials, in which she sang and danced, and alerted audiences that she was always in on the joke. “I won’t do a number unless I can have a good time doing it,” she said.

She won a New York Emmy award for a documentary about her variety series, “Mitzi Gaynor: Razzle Dazzle! The Special Years.”

In 2019, then 88, Gaynor was still performing live, but due to a leg injury, sang while seated on stage, accompanied by singer and pianist Michael Feinstein. 

“It’s been quite some time since I’ve been able to really jig, but I want to go jigging again,” she said.  

She was born Francesca Mitzi Marlene de Czanyi von Gerber on Sept. 4, 1931, in Chicago. Her parents were Henry von Gerber, a Hungarian musical director and cellist, and Pauline Fisher Gerber, a former vaudeville dancer and aspiring songwriter.

After her parents’ divorce, Mitzi moved with her mother to Detroit, where she began classical ballet training. In 2019, Gaynor told “Sunday Morning” that when she was 11, her dance instructor said, “Mitzi’s gonna go to Hollywood and become a star.”

She did move to Los Angeles, and while in high school, “Frances Gerber” (as she was known) performed on stage alongside the prima ballerina of the Ballet Russe, Mia Slavenska, in a production of Tchaikovsky’s “Song Without Words.” 

She made her Broadway debut at 15 in “Gypsy Lady” in 1946, and performed in light opera productions in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago and Philadelphia.

Not even 20, Mitzi Gerber was signed to a contract at 20th Century Fox. She recalled that a producer there thought her name sounded like a delicatessen, “so he said, ‘How about Gaynor, [like] Janet Gaynor?’ My father loved it.”

Her first major role was in “My Blue Heaven” (1950), starring Betty Grable and Dan Dailey. She quickly followed that with such lighthearted fare as “Down Among the Sweltering Palms,” “We’re Not Married,” “Bloodhounds of Broadway,” and “The I Don’t Care Girl.” She also starred in a western, “Three Young Texans.” 

In 1954 she earned some of her best reviews for Irving Berlin’s big-budget “There’s No Business Like Show Business,” showcasing her singing and comedic talents opposite Ethel Merman, Dan Dailey, Donald O’Connor, Johnny Ray and Marilyn Monroe. But before filming was even completed, 20th Century Fox informed Gaynor that they were ending their contract.

With her new husband, manager Jack Bean, Gaynor signed a new contract with Paramount, where she starred in the Bing Crosby musical “Anything Goes.” Other credits included the comedy “The Birds & The Bees,” with David Niven, and the Frank Sinatra drama “The Joker Is Wild.” She was directed by George Cukor in MGM’s “Les Girls,” opposite Gene Kelly, and then returned to Fox for “South Pacific.”

Her final films were comedic roles, in “Happy Anniversary,” “Surprise Package,” and “For Love or Money.” 

But she made further inroads in Vegas, where she became the city’s highest-paid female entertainer. In 1970 Gaynor became the first female performer to be awarded “Star Entertainer of the Year.” She was also the first star client for an up-and-coming costume designer named Bob Mackie. 

In 2017, Gaynor was inducted into The Great American Songbook Hall of Fame.

In 2019, Gaynor recalled to “Sunday Morning” her early romance with eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes. She calculates they were together for eight months. Did she love him? “I thought I did. He asked me to marry him. Then I found out he’d asked 47 other women at the same time.”

Gaynor broke it off with Hughes, and left with quite the parting gift. “He said, ‘OK, I want you to buy some dirt.’ I said, ‘Some dirt?’ He said, ‘Yes, in Las Vegas.’ $25 an acre, which I sold maybe eight years ago for two million bucks.”