The Sound of Music The Nuns Sing Mary

"The Sound of Music" (The Sound of Music) is an adaptation of Maria von Trapp's book "The Trapp Family Singers" (en: The Story of the Trapp Family Singers) was originally performed on Broadway as a musical and was later adapted into a film, which ranks third at the box office in North American film history and is also the highest-grossing musical in history.

The play describes a trainee nun in a monastery in the Alps who comes to serve as a teacher in the Trip family, and then wins the hearts of children, falls in love with the single male owner, gets married and forms a family band. , and finally the story of a narrow escape from the clutches of the Nazis. Among them, many songs from the play, such as "Do-Re-Mi" and "Edelweiss" have been sung all over the world and have also been translated and sung into language versions in various countries.

Origin of creation

The inspiration for "The Sound of Music" comes from the real life story of Maria von Trapp: Maria von Trapp was born in the Alps In this area, she originally served as an intern nun at the Benedictine Abbey of Nonnberg. In 1926, due to health problems, she was sent by the abbot to the home of Georg Ritter von Trapp for training, where she also served as Lord Superior. Female caregiver. Maria and Jazz fell in love and got married in 1927. They had two daughters and one son.

Affected by the Great Economic Panic in the 1930s, the Jazz lost almost all their property. So he and Maria led seven children to form a band to sing professionally, and won the first prize at the 1936 Salzburg Music Festival. In 1938, when Nazi Germany merged with Austria, Jazz refused the Nazi call-up order. In order to avoid being hunted, they took a train across the Alps to Italy in the name of camping, and then started touring throughout Europe. After they immigrated to the United States in 1939, they not only expanded their singing career to all parts of the world, but also organized various music camps at their "Yixin" ranch.

In 1956, the Trip Family Singers officially disbanded, and Maria von Trapp published her first book, "The Trip Family Singers." Soon, the book was adapted into the German film "Die Trapp Family" (Die Trapp Family), which caused a sensation in Europe.

On Broadway

In 1958, 43-year-old film director Vincent J. Donehue introduced this story to a Broadway husband and wife team: producer Richard Ha Richard Halliday and actress Mary Martin. The two couples were very interested in the story and began to try to contact Maria herself and gain her support (although she had lost the copyright to the story after being deceived by a lawyer). At that time, Maria, a devout Catholic, was missionary in New Guinea with her three children and had no interest in the proposal in Harderson's letter. Until one time when Maria returned to the United States, she watched Mary Martin's "Annie Get Your Gun" on Broadway and greatly appreciated her performance. From then on, she strongly supported this creative project, and Mary also Agree to donate 375 of the income from the performance to Maria free of charge. So, after acquiring the rights from a German film company, they began planning to recreate a new musical.

Originally, the musical was planned to be based on the famous songs sung by the Trip family, with several composed songs inserted into it, so the Halladays found the famous songwriting partner Richard Rogers. Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. But with the insistence of these two people, a new method was finally adopted: all the lyrics and music in the work were re-written by the pair.

Plot structure

Plot

"The Sound of Music" digital audio and video disc cover: The picture shows the opening scene of Maria singing in the Alps. The plot of "The Sound of Music" can be divided into three turns, unfolding Maria's story, describing her interning in a convent, coming to the Trip family, and then escaping from Nazi control with the latter. Although characters appear in each stage, the main axis of the plot is still "music"-Maria, who is good at singing, educates the Tripp children through music, and finally touches the colonel's heart, and finally finds a happy destiny and proves that... Music can always influence people's hearts.

Note: The following contains the plot, ending or other related content of the work, which may reduce your enjoyment of the original work.

Maria is a nun intern at a monastery in the Alps. Unlike other nuns, she was so naive that she always refused to follow the daily schedule in the courtyard and secretly ran outside the mountain to play and sing. One day, when everyone was praying, they found that Maria was late again - it turned out that she had just been singing outside and did not come back in a hurry until the bell rang.

Several nuns who had had enough of Maria came to the dean's office and decided to discuss Maria's problem. Everyone said something to each other, accompanied by Maria's screams outside the office, and after a long discussion, a conclusion was finally reached under the auspices of the dean... So Maria was called into the dean's office and discussed her future with the dean: the compassionate dean realized that this was not her place to live in the end, so he decided to let her go down the mountain and go to a monastery to ask for a tutor for a long time. people serve as teachers.

Maria, who was full of hesitation and uneasiness about the future, carried her luggage and rushed to this house worriedly; what she saw in front of her was a huge mansion with a beautiful garden, and the owner of the house. They are the core figures of the Tripp family - Colonel Geir von Tripp of the Austrian Navy and his seven children from his ex-wife. The eldest Lisa is 16 years old, and the youngest Greta is only 5 years old. Since he has no mother, the colonel, who is also a mother, educates his children in a strict military style, but the arrival of Maria changes the whole family... He teaches these children to sing, plays with them, and teaches them to perform. Puppetry and other talents have won the favor of children. But on the other hand, these things gradually reached the ears of the busy colonel, which made him somewhat unhappy.

In fact, although the colonel has been away from home for so long, it is not all for official duties: he has been dating Countess Elsa of Vienna for some time, and their relationship is about to enter the red carpet. On the other hand, the colonel's eldest daughter fell in love with Lauf, the Nazi's little messenger, so she often sneaked out for private meetings behind the colonel's back. All this gradually changed due to Maria's influence.

Finally, the colonel came back with Countess Elsa. He wanted to "accept" Maria's results over the past few months and confirm some rumors. As a result, he was almost fainted by the children's "evil deeds": climbing trees, swimming, wearing clothes made of unnecessary curtains, and Maria's contradictory words. As a result, the two had a big fight and Maria was kicked out by the colonel. But just as she was about to leave, the children sang "The Sound of Music", and the beautiful singing moved the cold colonel, making him sing along with his beautiful singing voice. So, Malia stayed and led her children to prepare for the dance to be held at the Trip Mansion next week.

The preparation for the ball was very successful, and the relationship between Maria and the colonel also heated up rapidly. The child's performance won applause from the guests, but as soon as the ball was over Maria couldn't wait to run back to the convent. Maria returned to the courtyard as if she had changed. She said nothing all day but only prayed. Until one day, she finally told Sister Margaret her wish to become an official nun as soon as possible: because she found that she had unknowingly fallen in love with Colonel Trip. To escape all this, she decided to become a devout nun. But under the guidance of the dean, Maria finally understood that her dream should not be avoided, but should be faced calmly. So Maria returned to Simpe's house. At this time, without Maria, the Simpe family was plunged into misery. Not only did the children miss Maria, but the colonel was also obsessed with her. After Maria came back, not only did the children become happy, Countess Elsa, who lived with the colonel, also found that she could not win back her lover's heart, so she quit this somewhat ambiguous triangle relationship.

Soon, the colonel proposed to Maria, and she readily accepted this dream-like love.

After entering the auditorium, Maria and Trip's family spent happy family time while actively preparing for the music festival's performances. But at the same time, the clutches of the Nazis gradually moved deeper into this family: after Nazi Germany annexed Austria, it began to recruit Austrian soldiers to join the Nazi camp. Naturally, the loyal and patriotic Colonel Trip was also a talent that the Nazis were eager to recruit. But Colonel Trip refused to nod, so the Nazis had to use various methods, including threats and inducements, to force the colonel into the camp. So the colonel and Maria began to plan a secret escape plan...

Everyone performed brilliantly at the music festival, but the beautiful singing of the Trip family was widely welcomed by everyone. Amid the applause of the audience, Trip's family slowly disappeared from the stage... After some time, the results of the competition were announced: the Trip family successfully won the championship, but they were not seen for a long time when receiving the award: it turned out that under careful arrangements, Maria and the colonel were already escaping with their seven children. On the way. Under the cover of the nuns and Lauf, they escaped the search of the Nazis. Finally, with the blessings of the nuns, they slowly marched towards the mountain of freedom...

Contents with plot or ending end here, and the following has nothing to do with the plot.

Character structure

Others of the Abbey Trip family

Abbott

Sister Sophia

Mar Sister Gretel

Sister Burlis

Sister A

Sister B

Sister C

Cover Colonel Erl von Trapp

Maria

Lisa von Trapp

Frederik von Trapp

Louisa von Trapp

Curt von Trapp

Brigita von Trapp

Marta· Von Trapp

Greta von Trapp

Countess Elsa

Lauf

Max Davidler (Narration)

Banquet Host A

Banquet Host B

Nazi Officer

Track

" The Sound Of Music

Maria

I Have Confidence

How Can Love Survive?**

My Favorite Things*

Sixteen Going On Seventeen), known as "You Are Sixteen" in the original musical

"Do-re-mi"

"The Lonely Shepherd" (The Lonely Goatherd)

"No Way to Stop It"

"Ordinary Couple"**

"Goodbye Song" "So Long, Farewell"

"Something Good"*

"Edelweiss"

"Climbing the Mountains" ( Climb Ev'ry Mountain)

*Songs added in the movie

**Songs originally in the musical but not in the movie

Musical

After a year of preparation, "The Sound of Music" was officially staged at the Lunt-Fontanne Theater on November 16, 1959, with the heroine starring Mary Martin herself. , the male lead is played by Theodore Bikel.

The musical created a sensation after its performance. It not only performed for 1,443 consecutive performances, but also won 6 Tony Awards, including the Best Actress Award, Best Musical Award and other important awards. Due to its outstanding performance, in 1960, Twentieth Century Fox initiated the idea of ??adapting the play into a movie.

On January 15, 1963, "The Sound of Music" was released and was re-adapted and staged in the UK, Australia and other places. More than 30 years after the original show was released, it ran on Broadway for half a year in 1998 until it was released in 1999.

New London Version

In 1981, at the request of producer Ross Taylor, Petula Clark agreed to star in London's West End Theater The Sound of Music is back on stage at the Apollo Victoria Theatre. Although she worried that at 51 she was too old to be convincing in the role of the heroine, Clark was unanimously praised by all the theater critics (the play also became the highest-grossing production in British theater history at the time). Maria von Trapp herself attended the premiere and described Clark as "the best Maria ever". Due to the unprecedented demand for theater tickets, Clark extended her originally planned six-month performance contract to three and a half years. The show's attendance rate of 101 in a single week (October 26-October 31, 1981) was also ranked by Guinness A world record is included for the highest attendance ever for any musical theater production in the UK. This is also the first version to put on the stage two songs newly composed by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II in the film version, and its live recording is also the first to use digital recording method, but the recording result has never been Published on CD-ROM.

Other regional versions

The Australian version was performed at the Lyric Theater of the Queensland Performing Arts Center in Sydney, Australia, by the famous Australian drama "Blue Heelers" stars Lisa McCune as Maria, TV personality Bert Newton as Max and John Waters as Colonel Trip.

Movies

The Sound of Music

IMDB movie information

Country/Region: United States

Language: English

Color/B&W: Color

Produced by Robert Wise

Screenwritten by Maria von Original work by Trip

Musical adaptation by Hawa Lindsay

Musical adaptation by Luther Krauss

Ernst Lehmann

Director Robert Wise

Main actor Julie Andrews

Christopher Plummer

Produced by Company Twenty Century Fox

Released on March 2, 1965

In June 1960, 20th Century Fox purchased the film rights for US$12,500,00. However, the treaty stipulates that Fox must wait until the musical is finished and not start filming until after 1964. Fox was in financial trouble due to the huge cost of filming "Cleopatra", and there have been rumors in the industry that it The company would go bankrupt in 1962. In order to save the situation, 20th Century Fox hired playwright Ernest Lehman, who had adapted "The King and I" (The King and I) and "West Side Story" (West Side Story), for the film. As a screenwriter, he plans to start filming with director William Wyler, who has made films such as "Roman Holiday". However, Wheeler's idea obviously could not be recognized by Lehman, so he turned to Robert Wise.

Wise originally had little interest in the play, but after reading Lehman's script he was so attracted that he took over the director's job.

The filming of "The Sound of Music" officially started in Salzburg in 1963. Since Mary Martin was already over 50 at the time and could not bear the pressure of filming on location, the production team found a former actress "My Fair Lady" (My Fair Lady) and the movie "Mary Poppins" British actor Julie Andrews plays the role of Maria, while Colonel Trip is played by Christopher Plummer Play. Because Julie Andrews' singing and acting were first-class, and the production team successfully used the beautiful scenery and cultural landscape of Salzburg, the film caused a sensation around the world after its release, not only becoming the highest-grossing film in history at that time , many songs in the film, such as "Do-re-mi" and "Edelweiss", have also been adapted into sung versions in many languages. In addition, the film received 10 nominations at the Academy Awards, and finally won 5 awards, including Best Picture and Best Director.

In order to meet the needs of the plot in the movie, the production team made many changes that were different from the musical version:

(1) "How Can Love Survive" in the musical ?) and "Ordinary Couple" were replaced by "My Favorite Things" and "Something Good" respectively. The lyrics and music of the latter two were all written by Richard Rogers, because Oscar Hammerstein II had died of cancer on August 23, 1960 (his last work before his death was "Edelweiss" which was completed while he was hospitalized. ).

(2) The scenes between Countess Elsa and Max in the play were greatly deleted, and even the singing part was cancelled. In addition, the film uses a lot of scenery from Salzburg and even the Alps, making the scenes far more than the artificial stage sets in musicals.

Interestingly, the content of the movie affected the later adapted versions of the musical, making the movie and the musical more and more homogeneous.

Anecdotes

This musical has created some misconceptions about Austria: many people think that the song "Edelweiss" is the country's national anthem. In fact, the song is not very popular in Austria (there is a humorous legend that it was played during a visit to the White House by Austrian representatives during President Ronald Reagan).

In the scene where "Do-re-mi" appears in a market, there is an obvious error: a crate of oranges is labeled "Made in Israel," yet Israel did not exist in the 1930s. . The error apparently went undetected during filming.

Another error that was spotted by keen observers of geography was the scene in which the Trip family climbs a mountain where they are supposed to be heading to safety, but in fact they are heading "in the direction" of Austria.

"I Have Faith" was a song Rogers wrote as a "cut-scene" to take Maria from the convent to the Trip family mansion (according to him) in the film. In this scene, Maria is going through an arch. According to the highlights in the DVD, there is a real-life daughter of Maria, and "her" daughter (that is, Maria's granddaughter) can be seen preparing to cross the road to that location. In fact, the Trip family had just arrived at the scene that day, and Director Wise asked them to play the role of passers-by. It's said that while Andrews was filming the sequence, the film's editor was also on hand for a moment because he seemed like a perfect fit for the role.

As the film was well-received and became the second highest-grossing film at the time (after "Gone with the Wind"), the famous film critic Pauline Kael continued to criticize the film, and Called it "The Sound Of "Money"" (The Sound Of "Money"), a move that allegedly got her fired from McCall's magazine.

The film’s high creative value remains undiminished 40 years later.

In a commentary accompanying the soundtrack, Richard Rogers said after the film was completed: "When you start watching this movie, you immediately say it 'doesn't' come from a sausage factory."

In 2001, the U.S. Library of Congress recognized the film as an "important cultural symbol" and was selected into the U.S. national collection.

According to boxofficemojo, the film ranks as the third-highest grossing in North American box office history ($142,415,400) and inflation-adjusted ($911,458,400) (after "Gone with the Wind" and after Star Wars). If you add in the global successful box office record, video tapes, laser discs, digital audio and video discs and frequent TV broadcasts, it is called "the most widely viewed Hollywood film creation" by the British Amazon online bookstore.

The seven children in the Tripp family are five girls and two boys. In the film, they are:

Lisa von Tripp (16 years old "about to turn 17") is played by Sharmine Carr ( Charmian Carr, who was 21 at the time.

Frederik von Trapp (14 years old) is played by Nicholas Hammond.

Louisa von Trapp (13 years old) is played by Heather Menzies.

Curt von Trapp (11 years old) is played by Duane Chase.

Brigita von Trapp (10 years old) is played by Angela Cartwright.

Marta von Trapp (6 years old, although according to the opening line "I will be 7 on Tuesday!") is played by Debbie Turner.

Greta von Trapp (5 years old) is played by Kym Karath.

Daniel Truhitte: The actor who played Lauf ("17 almost 18") was 21 years old at the time. This was Zuhit's first and last on-screen appearance.

Kim Darby and Mike Farrow lent their voices to the role of Lisa, who was injured when Sharmine Carr, who played the character, jumped over a branch during her first balcony scene. .

Jazz musician John Coltrane adopted "My Favorite Thing" as his signature melody. His version was heavily modified and played on soprano saxophone, making the opening rhythm repeat itself to break away from long personal improvisations.

Honors and Awards

◎1960 Tony Award

Award-winning projects (6 items)

Best Musical Award

Best Actress in a Musical: Marie Martin

Best Supporting Actress in a Musical: Patricia Neway

Best Set Design: Ollie Ford Smith

Toni Award for Best Production and Direction of a Musical: Frederick Dvonch

Theater World Award: Lauri Peters

Nominated but not awarded project ( 3 awards)

Best Supporting Actor in a Musical: Theodore Bikel, Kurt Kasznar

Best Supporting Actress in a Musical: Lauri Peters and other actors who played the children: Kathy Dunn , Evanna Lien, Mary Susan Locke, Marilyn Robers, William Snowden and Joseph Stewart.

Best Musical Director Award: Vincent Donahue

◎1965 Academy Awards

Winning projects (5 items)

Best Picture Award

Best Director Award: Robert Wise

Best Editing Award: William Reynolds

Best Sound Award: James Corcoran (20th Century-Fox SSD), Fred Hynes (Todd-AO SSD)

Best Score Award: Irwin Kostal

Nominated but not awarded projects (5 awards)

Best Actress Award: Julie Andrews

Best Supporting Actress Award: Peggy Wood

Best Art Direction Award: Boris Leven, Walter M. Scott , Ruby R. Levitt