Online retailer Fox Connect also has a limited time discount for the biggest Sound of Music fan in your life! The 45th Anniversary Box Set is just $25 starting on Friday Dec. 21 through Dec. 24. For more details, visit Fox Connect. It’s a perfect find for those belated holiday gifts!
To join in on this year’s Sound of Music television extravaganza, we’ve compiled some fun facts and little-known tidbits about the iconic film that might surprise even the most learned fan!
- THE SOUND OF MUSIC ran on Broadway for four years between Nov. 16th, 1959, and June 15th, 1963. It played for a total of 1,443 performances, and won five Tony Awards in 1960, including Best Musical and Best Actress in a Musical for star Mary Martin.
- In 1965, Twentieth Century Fox premiered the movie version of THE SOUND OF MUSIC, directed by Robert Wise and starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer. It played in New York for a record-setting 93 weeks. The movie's initial U.S. release lasted 4.5 years, and from 1966 to 1972 THE SOUND OF MUSIC was cited by Variety as the “All-Time Box Office Champion." It remains the most popular movie musical ever made.
- At the end of THE SOUND OF MUSIC, the von Trapp family climbs over the mountains to freedom into neighboring Switzerland. In reality, Salzburg does not border Switzerland; it borders Germany. If the real von Trapp family had actually climbed over the Obersalzberg Mountain, as they do in the film version, they would have found themselves face to face with Hitler’s mountain retreat, Eagle's Nest at Berchtesgaden.
- The first shot of Maria on the mountain was done the last day of THE SOUND OF MUSIC filming, because of bad weather!
- "I Have Confidence" was written for THE SOUND OF MUSIC after Hammerstein passed away - Rodgers wrote both music and lyrics himself.
- Bing Crosby, Sean Connery, Rex Harrison, and Yul Brynner were considered for Captain von Trapp before Christopher Plummer was cast in THE SOUND OF MUSIC.
- Actor Jon Voight played Rolf Gruber during the original Broadway run of THE SOUND OF MUSIC.
- Did you know? On the first day of filming the dance in “Sixteen Going On Seventeen” for THE SOUND OF MUSIC, Charmian Carr (as Liesl) danced right through the plate-glass windows of the gazebo! She sprained her ankle. Although her bandage was covered with makeup, it was still visible during the scene - until recent DVD releases, when digital magic removed it entirely.
- "Schnitzel with noodles" is a "favorite thing" in THE SOUND OF MUSIC, but it’s not Austrian - Hammerstein invented this dish for the movie!
- Film director Robert Wise cast Julie Andrews as Maria in THE SOUND OF MUSIC as soon as he saw her scenes in Mary Poppins.
- The real Georg von Trapp from THE SOUND OF MUSIC was a skilled and fearless naval captain, sinking over 30 boats during World War I.
- The actor who portrayed Captain von Trapp in the original Broadway production, Theodore Bikel, was a guitar player and folk singer. This helped to inspire the THE SOUND OF MUSIC song "Edelweiss"
- "Edelweiss" was Oscar Hammerstein's 1,589th and last lyric, written for THE SOUND OF MUSIC.
- For her THE SOUND OF MUSIC audition Kym Karath (cast as Gretl) sang "Sixteen Going On Seventeen." Young Kym was only fivewhen filming started.
- In 1966 at the 38th annual Academy Awards, THE SOUND OF MUSIC received five Oscars, including Best Picture of the Year.
- The crew hung a bell outside Nonnberg Abbey for the children to pull in THE SOUND OF MUSIC. The nuns liked the bell, and kept it!
- In THE SOUND OF MUSIC, "Something Good" was shot in silhouette because the lights were making comedic noises. Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer kept bursting out laughing while trying to film this serious, romantic scene – and shooting had to be suspended until the lighting was changed.
- The oldest real von Trapp son was 16 when 22–year-old Maria married the Captain in 1927.
- The real eldest von Trapp child, Rupert, would jokingly say "I'm Liesl!" when asked which character represented him.
- The real von Trapps were asked to sing for Hitler's birthday. They refused, and later fled - as they do in THE SOUND OF MUSIC.
- Each von Trapp child was given the choice to stay rather than to leave Austria - and all chose to leave. Agathe von Trapp wrote about her family's emigration in the book MEMORIES BEFORE AND AFTER THE SOUND OF MUSIC : "Even though it was clear to us that we had to leave Austria as soon as possible [following the Anschluss of March 1938]...Mother [Maria von Trapp] looked for divine approval concerning the move. Papa [Baron Georg von Trapp] called us all together, opened the Bible, and let his finger pick a passage at random. Then he read to us:"Now the LORD had said unto Abraham: Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show thee" (Gen. 12:1 KJV.)"
Watch ‘THE SOUND OF MUSIC’ on ABC, Sunday, December 23rd at 7pm ET/ 6pm CT
Buy ‘THE SOUND OF MUSIC 45th Anniversary Box Set’ for just $25 between Friday, December 21 and Monday, December 24, only on Fox Connect.
Follow Rodgers & Hammerstein @RnH_Org #THE SOUND OF MUSIC for more triva.
U.S. Trademark Notice: THE SOUND OF MUSIC™ THE SOUND OF MUSIC is a trademark used under license.
You can own THE SOUND OF MUSIC 45th Anniversary Limited Edition Collection on Blu-ray for just $25 between Friday 12/21 and 12/24 on Fox Connect.
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