Ann Miller

She was a whirling dervish as a tap dancer.  I thought she was one of the fastest, most energetic female tappers I had ever seen.  She always looked like she was having a great time, that big, toothpaste smile never leaving her face.  She loved making movies and she adored Hollywood.  She may have been one of its best goodwill ambassadors.  Too bad they didn't regard her as highly as she did them.

Born in Texas in 1923 she was christened Johnnie Lucille Ann Collier.  Dad was counting on a son he wanted to name John Jr. and when a daughter arrived, she became Johnnie.  Most biographers left the Johnnie off and she was Lucille Ann Collier.  Dad was an attorney who worked on cases involving Baby Face Nelson and Bonnie and Clyde.  Her half Cherokee mother who was hearing-impaired apparently could not work and poured all her efforts into her child.

Mama got 5-year old Annie tap dancing lessons because she suffered from rickets and needed her legs to become stronger.  The kid took to it with the fervor that would see her becoming a child dance prodigy.  Before long she was that cute little moppet dancing for all the local civic organizations.  She loved the attention and Mama acted upon it.   When Annie was 10 her parents divorced and Mama and daughter moved to Los Angeles so that the dancing, little attention-seeker could make it in movies.

Even though she was only in her early-to-mid teens and armed with a fake birth certificate, she got a dancing gig at an L.A. venue and then another in San Francisco.  At that one an ingenue from RKO, Lucille Ball, was in the audience with one of the studio's talent agents, Benny Rubin.  They talked about what a talented, pretty brunette they were watching and thought she might be right for their studio.   

Annie signed on and did some bits in five low-budget films and then was costarring with her idol Ginger Rogers and Katharine Hepburn, Ball and a bevy of beauties for Stage Door (1937).  It was another small role but in a big film.

In 1938 Miller was loaned to Columbia to appear as Jean Arthur's quirky, constantly dancing, younger sister in You Can't Take It with You (1938).  She garnered more attention if for no other reason than the film won Oscar's best picture award.  That same year she and Ball got lost in the antics of the Marx Brothers in Room Service.

In 1940 Miller enjoyed her first turn on Broadway to appear in George White's Scandals of 1939 and had two specialty dance numbers, one of which, Mexicongo, was a nightly showstopper.  When producer George Abbott caught the show, he was impressed enough with Miller to ask her to be in his movie, Too Many Girls (1940), again with Ball.  Miller was featured in several song and dance numbers and played the love interest of Eddie Bracken (how lucky can a girl get?).

In 1941 Columbia signed her to a contract and put her in a series of stinko flicks.  It's surprising her film career didn't end.  She did have a rare lead in Reveille with Beverly and gave Gene Autry his first screen kiss in Melody Ranch.  I'm sure you saw What's Buzzin', Cousin, Hey Rookie and Eve Knew Her Apples.  

Miller was married a total of six years... to three husbands, all millionaires.  With one of them she got in a furious argument and despite her being nine months pregnant he pushed her down a flight of stairs and she suffered a miscarriage.

Miller, Montalban, Charisse:  Dance of Fury

In 1948 MGM asked for her services to appear as part of a trio with Cyd Charisse and Ricardo Montalban in the sultry, flamenco tap number, Dance of Fury, in the film The Kissing Bandit.  It is a wretched film starring Kathryn Grayson and Frank Sinatra.  The dance was rightly lauded by everyone (Miller considered it one of the best things she ever did).   One happy event is that it produced a lifetime friendship with Grayson. 

Another happy event was that MGM signed Miller to a seven-year contract.  She had great plans for MGM having great plans for her.  She spoke to L. B. Mayer who told her he was the daddy (!) and she was now family.  If that thrilled her, it must have been short-lived.  She knew she was at the premier Hollywood studio, maker of opulent musicals.  She would work with many of the greatest stars and directors.  In the 13 movies she made for MGM, she was neither the star nor even the leading lady in any of them.  The leading ladies got the handsome leading men and Miller ended up with Red Skelton.

MGM's highest grossing film of 1948 was Irving Berlin's Easter Parade with Judy Garland top-billed.  Gene Kelly was supposed to play her male lead but his foot injuries saw the role going to Fred Astaire.  Cyd Charisse was to play his first dancing partner who leaves the act before Garland steps in but Charisse broke her leg and Miller was given the role.  Miller has three production numbers with Shakin' the Blues Away my favorite. 

Another wildly popular musical was On the Town (1949), the tale of three sailors on leave in Manhattan and the three women who spend it with them.  Gene Kelly was paired with Vera-Ellen (for my money, the best female dancer in the movies at the time), Frank Sinatra was with Betty Garrett (never given the credit she deserved) and Miller was saddled with the master of silly, Jules Munshin,  Her big number was Prehistoric Man.

Columnists and others wondered why MGM promoted her as one of its top stars and yet never gave her starring parts.  Perhaps her explanation around this time is worth noting.  I never played politics.  I never was a party girl and I never slept with any of the producers.  She didn't offer anything about directors and costars.

A ridiculous Esther Williams picture, Texas Carnival, and Two Tickets to Broadway (about a gaggle of wannabes), both 1951, did nothing for Miller's career or anyone else who was in either film.  In the former, Miller had a couple of nice dance numbers but one shouldn't have to sit through the whole movie to see them. 

Movies like Lovely to Look At (1952) give musicals a bad name.  A slight nod to the film Roberta is the basis here... about three Broadway producers down on their luck who suddenly see some sunshine when one of them inherits an interest in a Parisian fashion house.  Actually it's just one big fashion show with some good singing and dancing.

It's real purpose was to reunite Kathryn Grayson and Howard Keel from the stunning success of 1951's Show Boat.  Skelton was there to romance Miller and she not only had to compete in the dancing segments with Marge and Gower Champion (also in Show Boat) but she was billed under them.  Miller's big number was I'll Be Hard to Handle.

Small Town Girl (1953) was a notch or two above its predecessors but marginally so.  What it did have was a wonderful contribution by Miller as sexy as she had been on the screen so far.   She has a couple of musical numbers that I have always quite liked, especially the one performed to I've Gotta Hear that Beat.  Anyone who knows Miller's work is quite aware of it.  Choreographed by the dance genius Busby Berkeley, Miller dances among gorgeous musical instruments that seem to come out of the floor.  You see no one playing them and they keep to the beat and do a little swaying.  It is so inventive and so memorable.  Miller sparkles.

The best thing the lady ever did on the screen, if I may be so bold, is Kiss Me Kate (1953).  Featuring 15 tunes from Cole Porter, it concerns a battling divorced couple, both Broadway stars, who have a time of it in the musical version of The Taming of the Shrew.  Grayson and Keel are in top form but it's Miller and some of her dancing buddies that I most remember.  She and Bobby Van, Tommy Rall and Bob Fosse perform dancing magic in the Tom, Dick or Harry number which is one of my favorite musical numbers ever.  She and Rall also mix it up to the tune of Always True to You in My Fashion.  She was also a ball of fire in the Too Darn Hot number performed in the living room of Keel's apartment.  She was featured in two more numbers as well.  I think she should have been nominated for a supporting Oscar but noooooo.  Understandably, it was Miller's favorite movie role.

Hoofing it with Rall, Van and Fosse

Hit the Deck (1955) with its naval theme didn't shake my rafters and it probably helped put a nail in movie musicals.  But in my oh-gosh, sentimental way I was feeling all blustery about that big battleship finale... a piece called Hallelujah.   It is a multi-segment production that featured Miller, Jane Powell, Debbie Reynolds, Tony Martin, Vic Damone, Russ Tamblyn and stage singer Kay Armen.  Miller's was the final segment in which she tap dances in a bouncy gold dress with the backing of around 80-100 crewmen.  

She was quite effective along with her glittering castmates in The Opposite Sex (1956), a musical remake of The Women.  Hanging with these actresses, looking and acting as they do, was always fun for me.  Everything can't be westerns and film noir and murder, you know.  There's nothing wrong with two hours of les femmes at their witchy best.   Once said, it is not a particularly good film and I doubt that anyone working on it thought it would be an Oscar winner.   Miller managed fifth billing.  The largest role went to June Allyson.

Miller made the poorly-received The Great American Pastime, also in 1956, and that was the end of her movie career for 20 years.

She filled in most of her time by doing a fair amount of television, especially variety shows (Hollywood Palace, Ed Sullivan) and nightclubs, the latter of which suited her since she was so chatty.  Ultimately she made her way to dinner theater, performing in famous musicals all over the country.

In 1969 Miller scored a triumph on Broadway in Mame.  The critics felt she rivaled Broadway's original Mame, Angela Lansbury, and gave the show the shot in the arm it needed.  There was a little more tapping in Miller's version than some of the others.  At last the lady was a star and she reveled in it, deservedly so.

She did a famous Busby Berkeley-inspired commercial in 1972 for Heinz's Great American Soups where she dances atop an 8-foot soup can, surrounded by 24 water fountains, a full retinue of chorus girls and a 24-piece orchestra.  (There's a so-so copy of this at the end.)

For a number of years she lived in a big old Hollywood mansion full of Hollywood memorabilia and pictures of her on film sets and with her myriad friends.  For much of that time she lived with her mother who had for decades been president of the Movie Stars' Mothers Club.

Sometime in the 70s she did a television interview where she said that back in the forties she developed the idea for what would become panty hose.  She said that when she danced the top of her stockings needed to be sewn into the bottom of her dress.  One day she suggested to the wardrobe man that he add a top to the stockings so they could be worn as one piece.  I just report these things...

She wrote a couple of books.  In 1972 there was a memoir, Miller's High Life (enormous fun and just what you'd think it would be), and in 1990 there's Tapping into the Force which is about her experiences with the psychic world.  It was a serious component of the life of Ann Miller.

While promoting her books on television, folks couldn't help but notice that Miller took on a new and quite distinctive look.  It harkened back to a studio-era ideal of glamour... flamboyant, Nefertiti-like eye makeup, crimson lips, seriously teased and lacquered wigs and clothing that emphasized her lithe figure and long dancer's legs.  A neighbor of mine called her Ann B. Miller.  The B is for bouffant.  She became the butt of jokes about falling down and breaking her hair.  But her sense of self was so entrenched she could not betray it.

If this new exaggerated look started with her book promotions, in time I suspect she was booked for talk shows (Merv Griffin loved her) just to see how outrageous she looked and acted.  I recall a guest one time telling her she was looking more and more like a drag queen.  Could it have been Don Rickles?   She took on the persona of Hollywood's newest ambassador, never shutting up, forever gushing about yesteryear in Tinseltown. 

Seriously?  Won Ton Ton: The Dog Who Saved Hollywood (1976) is the movie that brought Miller (in little more than a cameo) back before the cameras?  Well, Miller and 100 or so more.  I know they thought a knee-slapping, uproarious tribute to Rin Tin Tin's rise to early Hollywood stardom would be an ingenious way to reintroduce these many former stars (Madeline Kahn is just about the only one looking fresh and new) to a new audience.  Too bad it didn't work out so well.  I hate to go here but this is simply a ridiculous film.  Not ridiculously funny, just ridiculous.  Junk.  No redeeming value.  Many of the people in it never made another movie.  They probably sat in their dens with the shades drawn.  Hell, it isn't even a true story of Rin Tin Tin's rise to fame.   

Imagine.  All this haughty criticism from a man who has a DVD of Can't Stop the Music.   I am so ashamed.  

Miller's life certainly turned around in 1979 when she joined her old MGM pal Mickey Rooney starring in the Broadway production of Sugar Babies.  I think many thought of it as a tribute to those two troupers.  It is a singing/dancing salute to the old burlesque era.  Miller would pull off a three-year run on The Great White Way and she and Rooney took it on the road for an even longer time.

She unquestionably enjoyed the stardom she felt had always been denied her.  She had never received this kind of attention from MGM although she was grateful to them and always sang their praises.  She still could dance up a storm although her singing voice was a bit shrill.  She was nominated for a Tony award.  

In 1998 she appeared on the stage for a final time.  She played Carlotta Campion in Follies and most appropriately got to belt out I'm Still Here.  Audiences loved her.

As Coco in Mulholland Drive

When Miller was heavily doing talk shows and gushing about old-time Hollywood, she often added that she disliked the nudity and sex in current movies and would never have been involved in a movie like that.  By 2001 she must have changed her mind when she made David Lynch's Mulholland Drive.  I confess the only time I've seen this film was when I was drifting in and out of sleep on a friend's sofa trying to make sense of the fragments I was seeing.  I must give it another shot because there are those who found it brilliant.  I do remember Miller with her hair pulled tightly back, looking rather severe, and playing a landlord in a few scenes.  It would be her last film.

Three years later in 2004, she would be dead of lung cancer.  Despite the energy and breathing required to dance, Miller was a lifelong smoker.  She died in a Los Angeles hospital at age 80.

She once said... at MGM I always played the second feminine lead.  I was never the star in films.  I was the brassy, good-hearted showgirl.  I never really had my big moment on the screen.  'Sugar Babies" gave me the stardom that my soul kind of yearned for.  Once during an interview regarding her return to films in Mulholland Drive, she said there's always a part of me that will be Lucille Collier and she's just waiting for this long-winded affair with Hollywood to end with that Ann Miller creature.

By the way... if you're interested, check YouTube for Miller's (1) Dance of Fury, (2) I've Gotta Hear That Beat and (3) Tom, Dick or Harry.  If you like her dancing or you like dancing, these are such a lot of fun.

Ok, now, have some soup?

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