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The Sound of Music
Theatrical release poster by Howard Terpning
Directed by	Robert Wise
Screenplay by	Ernest Lehman
Story by	Maria von Trapp (uncredited)
Produced by	Robert Wise
Starring	Julie Andrews Christopher Plummer
Cinematography	Ted D. McCord
Edited by	William H. Reynolds
Music by	Richard Rodgers Oscar Hammerstein II Irwin Kostal (score)
Production company	20th Century Fox
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release dates	March 2, 1965 (1965-03-02) (USA) March 29, 1965 (1965-03-29) (UK)
Running time	174 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$8.2 million
Box office	$286,214,286

The Sound of Music is a 1965 American musical drama film directed and produced by Robert Wise and starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer. The film is an adaptation of the 1959 Broadway musical The Sound of Music, with songs written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, the musical book written by the writing team of Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, and the screenplay written by Ernest Lehman.

Based on the book The Story of the Trapp Family Singers by Maria von Trapp, the film is about a young woman who leaves an Austrian convent to become a governess to the seven children of a naval officer widower. The Sound of Music was filmed on location in Salzburg, Austria; the state of Bavaria in Germany; and at the 20th Century Fox studios in California, United States. It was photographed in the 70mm Todd-AO format by Ted D. McCord.

The film won five Academy Awards including Best Picture and displaced Gone with the Wind as the highest-grossing film of all-time while the accompanying soundtrack album was also nominated for a Grammy Award for Album of the Year. The film has popularized songs from the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, including "Edelweiss", "My Favorite Things", "Climb Ev'ry Mountain", "Do-Re-Mi", "Sixteen Going on Seventeen", "The Lonely Goatherd", and the title song, "The Sound of Music".

In 2001, the United States Library of Congress selected the film for preservation in the National Film Registry as it was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

Plot

In 1938, while living as a young postulant at Nonnberg Abbey in Salzburg, Austria, Maria is constantly getting into mischief to the consternation of the nuns and the Mother Abbess. After receiving a request from a widowed Austrian naval captain for a governess for his seven children, Mother Abbess asks Maria to accept the position, and Maria reluctantly agrees. When she arrives at the von Trapp estate, Maria discovers that Captain Georg von Trapp keeps it in strict shipshape order. He uses a whistle to summon his children, issues orders, and dresses his children in sailor-suit uniforms. Although initially hostile, the children quickly warm to her thanks to her kind nature and she teaches them how to sing and allows them to play.

The Captain takes an extended visit to a lady friend, Baroness Elsa Schraeder, a wealthy socialite from Vienna, who accompanies him upon his return. While taking a boat ride on the lake, the children become excited at their father's return and cause the boat to capsize, precipitating an argument between the Captain and Maria. The Captain is displeased with the activities she has arranged for the children and furiously orders her to return to the abbey. However, the Captain later relents when he hears the children singing for the Baroness, and apologizes to Maria and asks her to stay. Max Detweiler—a mutual friend of the Captain and the Baroness—who is searching for a novel musical act to enter into the upcoming Salzburg Festival, is impressed by the children's singing, but the Captain forbids their participation.

At a banquet the Captain has organized in honor of Baroness Schraeder, eleven-year-old Kurt watches the guests dancing the Ländler and he asks Maria to teach him the steps. When the Captain sees Maria dancing in the moonlight, he cuts in and partners her in a graceful performance, culminating in a close embrace; Maria breaks away and blushes, confused about her feelings. At the end of the evening, the Baroness, noticing the Captain's attraction to Maria, convinces her to return to the abbey. Back at the abbey, Maria keeps herself in seclusion until Mother Abbess persuades her to return to the von Trapp family. When she discovers that the Captain is now engaged to the Baroness, she agrees to stay until they find a replacement governess. Realizing that he is in love with Maria, the Captain breaks off the engagement, and they subsequently declare their love for each other; soon after, the two are married in an elaborate ceremony.

While the Captain and Maria are on their honeymoon in Paris, Max enters the children in the Salzburg Music Festival against their father's wishes. Austria is annexed into the Third Reich in the Anschluss, and upon their return the Captain is informed by telegram that he must report as soon as possible to the German Naval Headquarters in Bremerhaven to accept a commission in the German navy. Strongly opposed to Nazism, the Captain tells his family they must leave Austria. As the von Trapp family attempts to leave during the night, they are stopped by Nazi guards outside their estate. They lie to the guards, claiming they are performing in the Salzburg Festival, so Hans Zeller, the recently appointed Nazi Gauleiter, agrees to accompany them to the hall, but insists that the Captain depart for Germany immediately after the performance. The family takes part in the contest and slip away during their final number, seeking shelter from the patrolling guards at the abbey cemetery. They are discovered hiding by Rolfe (a former messenger boy enamoured of the Captain's sixteen-year-old daughter, Liesl, but now a proud Nazi) who threatens to shoot the Captain. The Captain is able to disarm the boy and tries to persuade him to escape with them, but Rolfe calls for assistance. After the family escapes in a waiting car, the Nazis try to pursue but their cars fail to start, having been sabotaged by the nuns. The von Trapp family hikes over the Alps into Switzerland and to freedom.

Cast

• Julie Andrews as Maria, a free-spirited young Austrian woman studying as a postulant to become a nun at Nonnberg Abbey in Salzburg. Her love of music and the mountains, her youthful enthusiasm and imagination, and her lack of discipline make her seem out of place to the other nuns. She is sent to the home of Captain von Trapp to be governess to his seven children.

• Christopher Plummer as Captain von Trapp, a retired Austrian naval officer who has been raising his seven children alone using strict military discipline to suppress his sadness over the death of his first wife. After Maria reintroduces music to the family, he becomes a warmer and more loving person.

• Eleanor Parker as the Baroness, Elsa von Schraeder, who is the Captain's elegant lady friend and fiancée from Vienna. During her stay at the von Trapp villa, she becomes jealous of Maria, and persuades her to return to the abbey to avoid the Captain's obvious affections. When the Captain calls off their engagement, she is gracious and returns to Vienna.

• Richard Haydn as Max Detweiler, a good friend of both the Baroness and the Captain, and an impresario. While searching Salzburg for talented singers, he hears the von Trapp children singing, and tries to convince the Captain to let him enter them in the Salzburg Festival.

• Peggy Wood as Mother Abbess, the head of Nonnberg Abbey, who sends Maria to the von Trapp villa to work as a governess. When she learns that Maria has returned to the abbey to avoid her feelings for the Captain, she encourages her to return to the villa to look for her life.

• Charmian Carr as Liesl, the first and eldest child, who is sixteen years old. She cares deeply for her younger siblings and believes she does not need a governess at first, but soon comes to trust Maria and welcomes her guidance. She is in love with a messenger boy named Rolfe, who delivers their telegrams, but later betrays her and her family.

• Nicholas Hammond as Friedrich, the second child and elder son, who is fourteen years old. He puts up a tough exterior and tries to be "the man" of the family, but is also very quiet and something of a gentleman. When he introduces himself to Maria, he tells her that he is "impossible", according to one previous governess.

• Heather Menzies as Louisa, the third child, who is thirteen years old. A bit of a daydreamer, she and her younger sister Brigitta are often together. Her two favorite tricks on governesses are to fill their beds with spiders and to pretend that she is one of her sisters. She tries this ruse on Maria, but fails.

• Duane Chase as Kurt, the fourth child and younger boy, who is eleven years old. He often tries to act manly, enjoys playing mischievous tricks on governesses, and tells Maria that he's been called "incorrigible", not knowing what that means. He questions Maria about many things, and at the ball, tries to learn an Austrian folk dance.

• Angela Cartwright as Brigitta, the fifth child, who is ten years old. When called to meet Maria for the first time, she is the last to arrive, casually reading a book. She is sharp-witted, honest, and not afraid to speak her mind about things. Maria later remarks that Brigitta "notices everything".

• Debbie Turner as Marta, the sixth child, who is six years old, but tells Maria that her seventh birthday is approaching. She is the first child to show Maria kindness, and gets along well with her. A sweet and gentle child, she shares Maria's love of the color pink, and hopes to get a pink parasol for her birthday.

• Kym Karath as Gretl, the seventh and youngest child, who is five years old. She initially comes across as shy—her father has to give Maria her name—but soon she opens up to Maria. She is the second child to show Maria kindness, saying that she likes her.

• Anna Lee as Sister Margaretta, a nun who looks fondly on Maria. She and Sister Berthe help the von Trapp family escape by sabotaging the cars of the Gauleiter and his soldiers.

• Portia Nelson as Sister Berthe, a nun who does not believe Maria belongs in the abbey. She and Sister Margaretta help the von Trapp family escape by sabotaging the cars of the Gauleiter and his soldiers.

• Ben Wright as Herr Zeller, an enthusiastic Nazi supporter, who takes exception to the Captain's Austrian patriotism and opposition to Nazism. After the Anschluss, he is appointed Gauleiter of the region.

• Daniel Truhitte as Rolfe, a telegram delivery boy who is in love with Liesl. The two become estranged when his enthusiasm for the Nazi cause leaves him with little time for such trivial matters as romance. The Captain shows him contempt when he learns that the boy is a Nazi supporter.

• Norma Varden as Frau Schmidt, the housekeeper who tells Maria that the Captain may return from Vienna engaged to the Baroness.

• Gil Stuart as Franz, the butler, who supports the Nazi cause and provides Rolfe with information about the Captain.

• Marni Nixon as Sister Sophia, who tells Mother Abbess that she loves Maria dearly, but acknowledges that she "always seems to be in trouble".

• Evadne Baker as Sister Bernice, one of the nuns at the abbey.

• Doris Lloyd as Baronness Ebberfeld, a guest at the Captain's ball.

Background

The Sound of Music story is based on Maria von Trapp's memoir, The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, published in 1949 to help promote her family's singing group following the death of her husband Georg in 1947. Hollywood producers expressed interest in purchasing the title only, but Maria refused, wanting her entire story to be told. In 1956, German producer Wolfgang Liebeneiner purchased the film rights for $9,000 (equivalent to $100,862 in 2023), hired George Hurdalek and Herbert Reinecker to write the screenplay, and Franz Grothe to supervise the soundtrack, which consisted of traditional Austrian folk songs. The Trapp Family was released in West Germany on October 9, 1956 and became a major success. Two years later, Liebeneiner directed a sequel, The Trapp Family in America, and the two pictures became the most successful films in West Germany during the post-war years. Their popularity extended throughout Europe and South America.

In 1956, Paramount Pictures purchased the United States film rights, intending to produce an English-language version with Audrey Hepburn as Maria. The studio eventually dropped its option, but one of its directors, Vincent J. Donehue, proposed the story as a stage musical for Mary Martin. Producers Richard Halliday and Leland Heyward secured the rights and hired playwrights Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, who had won the Pulitzer Prize for State of the Union. They approached Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II to compose one song for the musical, but the composers felt the two styles—traditional Austrian folk songs and their composition—would not work together, and offered to write a complete new score for the entire production. The Sound of Music stage musical opened on November 16, 1959 at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre in New York City and ran on Broadway for 1,443 performances, winning six Tony Awards, including Best Musical. In June 1960, Twentieth Century Fox purchased the film adaptation rights to the stage musical for $1.25 million (equivalent to $12,874,016 in 2023) against ten percent of the gross.

Production

Screenplay and pre-production

In December 1962, 20th Century Fox president Richard D. Zanuck hired Ernest Lehman to write the screenplay for the film adaptation of the stage musical. Lehman reviewed the original script for the stage musical, rearranged the sequence of songs, and began transforming a work designed for the stage into a film that could use the camera to emphasize action and mood, and open the story up to the beautiful locations of Salzburg and the Austrian Alps. The "Do-Re-Mi" sequence in the play, for example, was originally a stagnant number; Lehman transformed it into a lively montage showing some of the beautiful sites of Salzburg, as well as showing Maria and the children growing closer over time. Lehman also eliminated two songs, "How Can Love Survive" and "No Way to Stop It", sung by the characters of Elsa and Max. In January 1963, he saw the Fox English-dubbed version of the two German films, was not especially impressed, and decided to use the stage musical and Maria's memoir for most of his source material. While Lehman was developing the screenplay, he and Zanuck began looking for a director. Their first choice was Robert Wise, with whom Lehman had worked on the film adaptation of West Side Story, but Wise was busy preparing work for another film, The Sand Pebbles. Other directors were approached and turned down the offer, including Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly. Kelly, upon being asked to direct the film, was expelled Lehman his home receiving the comment "Go find someone else to direct this piece of shit." The film was seen by people in the industry and lightweight despite its popularity after release.

In January 1963, Lehman invited one of his favorite directors, William Wyler, to travel to New York with him to see the Broadway musical. After seeing the show, Wyler said he hated it, but after two weeks of Lehman's persuasion, Wyler reluctantly agreed to direct and produce the film. After hiring musical supervisor Roger Edens, Wyler, Lehman, and Edens traveled to Salzburg to scout filming locations. In two weeks they managed to see approximately seventy-five locations—an experience that helped Lehman conceptualize several important sequences. During that trip, Lehman began to have reservations about Wyler's commitment to the project, and communicated this to Zanuck, who instructed the writer to finalize the first draft of the screenplay as quickly as possible. Lehman completed the first draft on September 10, 1963 and sent it to Wyler, who had no suggestions or changes. At that time, Lehman also secretly gave a copy of the script to the agent of Robert Wise, whom Lehman still wanted as the director. Later that month, Wyler's agent approached Zanuck asking that production on the film be delayed so Wyler could direct The Collector. Zanuck told him to tell Wyler to make the other film, and that they would move ahead on schedule with another director, ending Wyler's participation.

Meanwhile, Wise, whose film The Sand Pebbles had originally been scheduled to shoot at the same time was itself postponed due to typhoons in Southeast Asia, read Lehman's first draft, was impressed by what he read, and agreed to direct the film. Wise joined the picture in October 1963, and flew to Salzburg with associate producer Saul Chaplin and members of his production team to scout filming locations, including many that Wyler had identified. When he returned, Wise began working on the script. Wise shared Lehman's vision of the film being centered on the music, and the changes he made were consistent with the writer's approach—mainly reducing the amount of sweetness and sentimentality found in the stage musical. He had reservations about Lehman's opening aerial sequence because they'd used a similar opening in West Side Story, but decided to keep it. Other changes included replacing "An Ordinary Couple" with a more romantic number, and a new song for Maria's departure from the abbey—Rodgers provided "Something Good" and "I Have Confidence" especially for the film. Lehman completed the second draft on December 20, 1963, but additional changes would be made based on input from Maria von Trapp and Christopher Plummer about the character of the Captain. Plummer especially helped transform a character lacking substance into a stronger, more forceful complex figure with a wry sense of humor and a darker edge. Lehman completed his final draft on March 20, 1964.

Casting and rehearsals

Lehman's first and only choice for Maria was Julie Andrews. When Wise joined the project, he made a list of his choices for the role, which included Andrews as his first choice, Grace Kelly, and Shirley Jones. Wise and Lehman went to Disney Studios to view footage from Mary Poppins, which was not yet released. A few minutes into the film, Wise told Lehman, "Let's go sign this girl before somebody else sees this film and grabs her!" Andrews had some reservations—mainly about the amount of sweetness in the theatrical version—but when she learned that her concerns were shared by Wise and Lehman and what their vision was, she signed a contract with Fox to star in The Sound of Music and one other film for $225,000. Wise had a more difficult time casting the role of the Captain. A number of actors were considered for the part, including Bing Crosby, Yul Brynner, Sean Connery, and Richard Burton. Wise had seen Christopher Plummer on Broadway and wanted him for the role, but the stage actor turned down the offer several times. Wise flew to London to meet with Plummer and explained his concept of the film; the actor accepted after being assured that he could work with Lehman to improve the character.

Wise also spent considerable time and effort on casting the secondary characters. For the role of Max Detweiler, Wise initially considered Victor Borge, Noël Coward, and Hal Holbrook among others before deciding on Richard Haydn. For the character of Baroness Elsa Schraeder, Wise looked for a name actress—Andrews and Plummer were not yet well known—and decided on Eleanor Parker. The casting of the children characters began in November 1963 and involved over two hundred interviews and auditions throughout the United States and England. Some of the child-actors interviewed or tested and were not selected included Mia Farrow, Patty Duke, Lesley-Anne Down, Geraldine Chaplin, Shelley Fabares, Teri Garr, Kurt Russell, and The Osmonds. Most of the actors selected had some acting, singing, or dancing experience. Charmian Farnon, however, was a model who worked part-time in a doctor's office and had no ambition to pursue a career as an actress. After a friend sent her photo to Wise's office, she was asked to interview. Wise later recalled, "She was so pretty and had such poise and charm that we liked her immediately." The last person to be cast was Dan Truhitte in the role of Rolf.

Rehearsals for the singing and dance sequences began on February 10, 1964. The husband-and-wife team of Marc Breaux and Dee Dee Wood, who had worked with Andrews on Mary Poppins, worked out the choreography with Saul Chaplin on piano—the arrangements could not be altered under Rodgers and Hammerstein's contract. The stage choreography was not used because it was too restrictive. Breaux and Wood worked out all new choreography better suited for film that incorporated many of the Salzburg locations and settings. They even choreographed the puppet dance sequence for "The Lonely Goatherd". The choreography for the Ländler strictly followed the traditional Austrian folk dance. The musical arranger Irwin Kostal prerecorded the songs with a large orchestra and singers on a stage prior to the start of filming. Kostal used seven children and five adults to record the children's voices; the only scene where the child-actors actually sing is when they sing "The Sound of Music" on their own after Maria leaves. The voices of some of the adult actors also had voice doubles, including Peggy Wood and Christopher Plummer.

Filming and post-production

Principal photography began on March 26, 1964 at 20th Century Fox studios in Los Angeles, where scenes from Maria's bedroom and the abbey cloister and graveyard were filmed. The company then flew to Salzburg where filming resumed on April 23 at Mondsee Abbey for the wedding scenes. From April 25 through May 22, scenes were filmed at the Felsenreitschule (festival concert), Nonnberg Abbey, Mirabell Palace Gardens, Residence Fountain, and various street locations throughout the Altstadt (Old Town) area of the city. On days when it rained—a constant challenge for the company—Wise arranged for scenes to be shot at St. Margarethen Chapel and Dürer Studios (Reverend Mother's office). From May 23 to June 7, the company worked at Schloss Leopoldskron and an adjacent property called Bertelsmann for scenes representing the back of the Von Trapp villa. From June 9 to 19, scenes were shot at Frohnburg Palace which represented the front of the villa. The "Do-Re-Mi" picnic scene in the mountains was filmed above the town of Werfen in the Salzach River valley on June 25 and 27. The opening sequence of Maria on her mountain was filmed from June 28 to July 2 at Mehlweg mountain near the town of Marktschellenberg in Bavaria. The final scene of the Von Trapp family escaping over the mountains was filmed on the Obersalzberg in the Bavarian Alps.

The cast and crew flew back to Los Angeles and resumed filming at Fox studios on July 6 for all remaining scenes, including those in the villa dining room, ballroom, terrace, living room, and gazebo. Following the last two scenes shot in the gazebo—for the songs "Something Good" and "You Are Sixteen"—principal photography concluded on September 1, 1964. A total of eighty-three scenes were filmed in just over five months. Post-production work began on August 25 with three weeks of dialogue dubbing to correct lines that were ruined by various street noises and rain. In October, Christopher Plummer's singing voice was dubbed by veteran Disney playback singer Bill Lee. The film was then edited by Wise and film editor William Reynolds. Once the film was edited, Irwin Kostel, who orchestrated the musical numbers, undercored the film with background music consisting of variations on Rodgers and Hammerstein's original songs to amplify or add nuances to the visual images. When dubbing, editing, and scoring were complete, Wise arranged for two preview showings, the first one held in Minneapolis on February 1, 1965 at the Mann theater, and the second one held in Tulsa, shortly thereafter. Despite the "sensational" responses from the preview audiences, Wise made a few final editing changes before completing the film. According to the original print information for the film, the running time for the theatrical release version was 174 minutes. The film was eventually given a G rating by the Motion Picture Association of America.

The Sound of Music was filmed in 70 mm Todd-AO by Ted McCord and produced with DeLuxe Color processing. Aerial footage was photographed with an MCS-70 camera. The sound was recorded on 70 mm six-track using a Westrex recording system. The sets used for the film were based on the storyboards of sketch artist Maurice Zuberano, who accompanied Wise to Austria to scout filming locations in November 1963. Wise met with the artist over a ten-week period and explained his objective for each scene—the feeling he wanted to convey and the visual images he wanted to use. When Zuberano was finished, he provided Wise with a complete set of storyboards that illustrated each scene and set—storyboards the director used as guidance during filming. Zuberano's storyboards and location photos were also used by art director Boris Leven to design and construct all of the original interior sets at Fox studios, as well as some external sets in Salzburg. The von Trapp villa, for example, was actually filmed in several locations: the front and back facades of the villa were filmed at Frohnburg Palace, the back patio was a set constructed on a property adjacent to Schloss Leopoldskron called Bertelsmann, and the interior was a constructed set at Fox studios. The gazebo scenes for "Something Good" and "Sixteen Going on Seventeen" were filmed on a reconstructed set at Fox studios, while some shots of the gazebo were filled on the grounds at Frohnburg Palace in Salzburg.

Historical accuracy

The Sound of Music film, like the stage musical, presents a history of the von Trapp family that is not completely accurate. The following are examples of the dramatic license taken by the filmmakers:

• Georg Ludwig von Trapp was indeed an anti-Nazi opposed to the Anschluss, and lived with his family in a villa in a district of Salzburg called Aigen. Their lifestyle depicted in the film, however, greatly exaggerated their standard of living. The actual family villa, located at Traunstraße 34, Aigen 5026, was large and comfortable but nowhere near as grand as the palace depicted in the film. The house was also not their ancestral home, as depicted in the film. The family had previously lived in homes in Zell Am See and Klosterneuburg after being forced to abandon their actual ancestral home in Pola following World War I. Georg moved the family to the Salzburg villa shortly after the death of his first wife in 1922.

• The von Trapp family lost most of its wealth during the worldwide depression of the early 1930s, when the Austrian national bank folded. In order to survive, the family dismissed the servants and began taking in boarders. They also started singing onstage to earn money—a fact that caused the proud Georg much embarrassment.

• Maria Augusta Kutschera had indeed been a novice at Nonnberg Abbey in Salzburg and had been hired by the von Trapp family. However, she was hired only to be a tutor to young Maria Franziska ("Louisa" in the movie), who had come down with scarlet fever and needed her lessons at home, not to be a governess for all of the children.

• Maria and Georg married for practical reasons, rather than love and affection for each other. Georg needed a mother for his children, and Maria needed the security of a husband and family once she decided to leave the abbey. "I really and truly was not in love," Maria wrote in her memoir, "I liked him but didn't love him. However, I loved the children, so in a way I really married the children." They were married in 1927, not in 1938 as depicted in the film, and the couple had been married for over a decade by the time of the Anschluss and had two of their three children together by that time. Maria later acknowledged that she grew to love Georg over time and enjoyed a happy marriage.

• Georg is referred to as "Baron" in the film, but his actual family title was "Ritter" (German for "knight"), a hereditary knighthood. Austrian nobility, moreover, was legally abolished in 1919 and the nobiliary particle von was proscribed after World War I, so he was legally "Georg Trapp". Both the title and the von particle, however, continued to be widely used unofficially as a matter of courtesy.

• In the film, Georg is depicted as a humorless, emotionally distant father. In reality, third child Maria von Trapp (called "Louisa" in the film) described her father as a doting parent who made handmade gifts for the children in his woodshop and who would often lead family musicales on his violin. She has a different recollection of her stepmother, who she described as moody and prone to outbursts of rage. In a 2003 interview, Maria remembered, " had a terrible temper ... And from one moment to the next, you didn't know what hit her. We were not used to this. But we took it like a thunderstorm that would pass, because the next minute she could be very nice."

• Georg was offered a position in the Kriegsmarine, but this occurred before the Anschluss. He was heavily recruited by the Nazis because he had extensive experience with submarines, and Germany was looking to expand its fleet of U-boats. With his family in desperate financial straits, and having no other marketable skills other than his training as a naval officer, he seriously considered the offer before deciding he could not serve a Nazi regime. Rather than threaten arrest, the Nazis actually continued to woo him.

• The character Max Detweiler, the scheming family music director, is fictional. The von Trapps family priest, the Reverend Franz Wasner, was their musical director for over twenty years and accompanied them when they left Austria.

• In the film, the von Trapp family hike over the Alps from Austria to Switzerland to escape the Nazis, which would not have been possible; Salzburg is over two hundred miles from Switzerland. The von Trapp villa, however, was only a few kilometers from the Austria–Germany border, and the final scene shows the family hiking on the Obersalzberg near the German town of Berchtesgaden, within sight of Adolf Hitler's Kehlsteinhaus Eagle's Nest retreat. In reality, the family simply walked to the local train station and boarded a train to Italy. Although Georg was an ethnic German-Austrian, he was also an Italian citizen, having been born in the Dalmatian city of Zadar, which at that time was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and later fell into Italian territory after World War I. From Italy, they traveled to London and ultimately the United States.

• The character of Friedrich (the second oldest child in the film version) was based on Rupert, the oldest of the real von Trapp children. Liesl (the oldest child in the film) was based on Agathe von Trapp, the second oldest in the real family. The names and ages of the children were changed, in part because the third child (who would be portrayed as "Louisa") was also named Maria, and producers thought that it would be confusing to have two characters called Maria in the film.

The von Trapp family had no control over how they were depicted in the film and stage musical, having given up the rights to their story to a German producer in the 1950s who then sold the rights to American producers. Robert Wise met with Maria von Trapp and made it clear, according to a memo to Richard Zanuck, that he was not making a "documentary or realistic movie" about her family, and that he would make the film with "complete dramatic freedom" in order to produce a "fine and moving film"—one they could all be proud of.

Soundtrack

The soundtrack to The Sound of Music was written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, and arranged and conducted by Irwin Kostal, who also adapted the instrumental underscore passages. The soundtrack album was released on the RCA Victor label in 1965, and reached the number one position on the Billboard 200 that year in the United States. The album has been reissued several times, including a 30th Anniversary Edition in 1995, a 35th Anniversary Edition in 2000, a 40th Anniversary Edition in 2005, and a 45th Anniversary Edition, which reached the number one position on the Billboard 200 in 2010 and again in 2013. A 50th Anniversary Edition was released in 2015, which reached the number five position on the Top Soundtracks chart. The Sound of Music soundtrack album was the biggest-selling album in the United Kingdom in 1965, 1966, and 1968 and the second biggest-selling of the entire decade. The Sound of Music also stayed 73 weeks on the Norwegian charts, becoming the seventh best-charting album of all time in that country.

All tracks are written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, except where noted

Release

Critical response

"No one is comfortable with an excess of hearts and flowers, but there is no valid reason for hiding honest emotion. This has always been a major element in the theatre, and it's my conviction that anyone who can't, on occasion, be sentimental about children, home or nature is sadly maladjusted."

The film had its opening premiere on March 2, 1965 at the Rivoli Theater in New York City. Initial reviews were not positive. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticized the film's "romantic nonsense and sentiment", the children's "artificial roles", and Robert Wise's "cosy-cum-corny" direction. Judith Crist, in a biting review in the New York Herald Tribune, dismissed the movie as "icky sticky" and designed for "the five to seven set and their mommies". Wise later recalled, "The East Coast, intellectual papers and magazines destroyed us, but the local papers and the trades gave us great reviews." Indeed, reviewers such as Philip K. Scheuer of the Los Angeles Times described the film as "three hours of visual and vocal brilliance", and Daily Variety called it "a warmly-pulsating, captivating drama set to the most imaginative use of the lilting R-H tunes, magnificently mounted and with a brilliant cast". The "wildly mixed film reviews" reflected the critical response to the stage musical, according to The Oxford Companion to the American Musical After its Los Angeles premier on March 10, The Sound of Music opened in 131 theaters in the United States, including a limited number of "road show" events at select theaters with 70-mm screenings and six-track stereophonic sound. After four weeks, the film became the number one box office movie in the country, and held that position for thirty out of the next forty-three weeks in 1965. The original theatrical release of the film in America lasted four and a half years.

A few months after its United States release, The Sound of Music opened in 261 theaters overseas—the first American movie to be completely dubbed in a foreign language, both dialogue and music. The German, French, Italian, and Spanish versions were completely dubbed, and other versions were released with foreign subtitles. The film was a popular success in every country it opened, except the two countries where the story originated, Austria and Germany. In these countries, the film had to compete with the much-loved Die Trapp-Familie (1956), which provided the original inspiration for the Broadway musical, and its sequel Die Trapp-Familie in Amerika (1958)—both films regarded in German-speaking Europe as the authoritative von Trapp story. According to a documentary titled From Fact to Phenomenon: The Real Story of the von Trapp Family Singers (1994), which was narrated by Claire Bloom and included on the 30th Anniversary Laserdisc box set of the film, "...the film's Nazi overtones brought about the unauthorized cutting of the entire third act," which begins directly after Maria's wedding to the Captain and contains images of post-Anschluss Austria. This version, ending at the church altar, did passably well at the box office, but when the American studio forced the third act to be restored to the German release, audience attendance plummeted. Austrian filmgoers in particular resented the way Naziism in their country was depicted. Other offenses in the Austrians' eyes were the way the family's kindly manager, Father Wasner, was transformed into a sleazy huckster; changing the family's genre of music into show tunes; and a contrived (and fictional) climactic flight over the mountains to Switzerland, which does not border Salzburg. As a result, in Austria and Germany the movie is often ignored.

Box office

Upon its initial release, The Sound of Music briefly displaced Gone with the Wind as the highest-grossing film of all-time. The film was re-released in the United States during 1973 and earned an estimated $11 million in rentals. Taking re-releases into account, it ultimately grossed $286 million internationally.

It is credited as the film that saved 20th Century Fox, after extreme high production costs and financial losses incurred by Cleopatra (1963) that almost bankrupted the studio. Adjusted to contemporary prices it is the most successful musical ever made, as well as being the third highest-grossing film at the North American box office and the fifth highest-grossing film worldwide.

Accolades

Awards and nominations

AFI recognition

The Sound of Music has been included in numerous top film lists from the American Film Institute.

• AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies – No. 55
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) – No. 40
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Cheers – No. 41
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains: Maria Von Trapp (hero) – Nominated
• AFI's 100 Years of Musicals – No. 4
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions – No. 27
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs: "The Sound of Music" – No. 10
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs: "My Favorite Things" – No. 64
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs: "Do-Re-Mi" – No. 88

Legacy

• Sing-a-long Sound of Music revival screenings began in London in 1999, leading to a successful run at the Prince Charles Cinema. During the screenings, audience members were encouraged to sing along to lyrics superimposed on the screen. In July 2000, Sing-a-long Sound of Music shows opened in Boston and Austin, Texas. Some audience members dressed up as cast members and interracted with the action shown on the screen. The film began a successful run at the Ziegfeld Theatre in New York City in September 2000, with the opening attended by cast members Charmian Carr (Liesl), Daniel Truhitte (Rolf), and Kym Karath (Gretl). Sing-a-long Sound of Music screenings have since become an international phenomenon.
• As of March 2015, The Sound of Music holds an 85% critical approval rating on the Rotten Tomatoes website.

Television and home media

The first American television transmission of The Sound of Music was on February 29, 1976 on ABC, which paid $15 million for a one-time only broadcast that became one of the top-rated films ever shown on television to that point. The movie was not shown again until NBC acquired the broadcast rights and telecast the film on February 11, 1979. NBC continued to air the film annually for twenty years. During most of its run on NBC, the film was heavily edited to fit a three-hour time slot—approximately 140 minutes without commercials. The thirty minutes edited out of the original film included portions of the "Morning Hymn and Alleluia" sung by the nuns, part of the dialogue between Mother Abbess and Maria in the abbey, part of Liesl and Rolf's dialogue preceding "Sixteen Going on Seventeen", Liesl's verse of "Edelweiss" sung with the Captain, the Captain and Baroness waltzing at the party, and minor dialogue cuts within existing scenes.

In 1995, the film aired in its uncut form (minus the entr'acte) on April 9, 1995 on NBC. Julie Andrews hosted the four-hour telecast which presented the musical numbers in a letterbox format. As the film's home video availability cut into its television ratings, NBC let their contract lapse in 2001. That year, the film was broadcast one time on the Fox network, in its heavily edited 140-minute version. Since 2002, the film has aired on ABC, generally during Christmas week, and has been broadcast on its sister cable network, ABC Family, periodically around Easter and other holidays. Most of its more recent runs have been the full version in a four-hour time slot, complete with the entr'acte. ABC first broadcast an HD resolution version on December 28, 2008. ABC's December 22, 2013 airing of the film attracted 6.5 million viewers—its highest ratings since 2007. The increased viewership was credited to NBC's broadcast of a live adaptation of the musical based on the Broadway version earlier that month.

The film has been released on VHS, LaserDisc, and DVD numerous times. The first DVD version was released on August 29, 2000 to commemorate the 35th anniversary of the film's release. The film is often included in box sets with other Rodgers & Hammerstein film adaptations. A 40th anniversary DVD, with "making of" documentaries and special features, was released in 2005. The film made its debut issue on Blu-ray Disc on November 2, 2010, for its 45th anniversary. For the Blu-ray release, the original 70 mm negatives were rescanned at 8K resolution, then restored and remastered at 4K resolution for the transfer to Blu-ray, giving the most detailed copy of the film seen thus far. On March 10, 2015, Fox Home Entertainment will release The Sound of Music 50th Anniversary Ultimate Collector's Edition—a five-disc set featuring thirteen hours of bonus features, including a new documentary The Sound of a City: Julie Andrews Returns to Salzburg.

References

Notes

1. Twentieth Century Fox also purchased the rights to the two German films for distribution in the United States. Fox combined the two films, Die Trapp-Familie and Die Trapp-Familie in Amerika, dubbed them in English, and released them as a single 106-minute film titled The Trapp Family, which was released on April 19, 1961.
2. Maria's morning run back to Nonnberg Abbey would have been about 11 miles (18 km).
3. The start times are based on the 45th Anniversary DVD version of the film. The track lengths refer to the 2005 reissue of the original soundtrack album on CD.
4. In her review for McCall's magazine, Pauline Kael called the film "the sugar-coated lie people seem to want to eat", and that audiences have "turned into emotional and aesthetic imbeciles when we hear ourselves humming the sickly, goody-goody songs". This review generated significant negative response from readers and contributed to Kael's dismissal from the magazine.

Citations

1. ^ "The Sound of Music (1965): Original Print Information". Turner Classic Movies. Retrieved January 26, 2015.
2. ^ "The Sound of Music". The Numbers. Retrieved April 26, 2011.
3. Solomon 1989, p. 254.
4. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 4.
5. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 6.
6. Hirsch 1993, pp. 7–8.
7. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 8.
8. Hirsch 1993, p. 11.
9. ^ Hirsch 1993, pp. 23–25.
10. Hirsch 1993, p. 28.
11. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 13.
12. http://www.wsj.com/articles/book-review-the-sound-of-music-story-by-tom-santopietro-1425069491
13. Hirsch 1993, pp. 13–14.
14. Hirsch 1993, p. 15.
15. Hirsch 1993, p. 31.
16. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 16.
17. Hirsch 1993, p. 17.
18. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 34.
19. Hirsch 1993, p. 75, 78.
20. Hirsch 1993, pp. 34–37.
21. Hirsch 1993, p. 38.
22. Hirsch 1993, pp. 38–42.
23. Hirsch 1993, p. 42.
24. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 49.
25. Hirsch 1993, p. 50.
26. Hirsch 1993, p. 51.
27. Hirsch 1993, pp. 51–53.
28. ^ Hirsch 1993, pp. 53–54.
29. Hirsch 1993, p. 61.
30. Hirsch 1993, pp. 61–63.
31. ^ Hirsch 1993, pp. 66–67.
32. Hirsch 1993, p. 92.
33. Hirsch 1993, pp. 92–93.
34. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 93.
35. Hirsch 1993, p. 95.
36. Hirsch 1993, pp. 100–101.
37. Hirsch 1993, p. 103.
38. Hirsch 1993, pp. 101–104.
39. Hirsch 1993, pp. 105–106.
40. ^ Hirsch 1993, pp. 106–108.
41. Hirsch 1993, p. 123.
42. ^ Hirsch 1993, pp. 109–110.
43. Hirsch 1993, p. 111.
44. Hirsch 1993, p. 86.
45. ^ Hirsch 1993, pp. 111–113.
46. Hirsch 1993, pp. 105–113.
47. Hirsch 1993, p. 159.
48. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 160.
49. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 162.
50. ^ Hirsch 1993, pp. 162–163.
51. ^ "The Sound of Music Physical Properties". American Film Institute. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
52. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 70.
53. Hirsch 1993, pp. 75, 77.
54. Hirsch 1993, p. 76.
55. Hirsch 1993, pp. 79–82.
56. Hirsch 1993, pp. 155–157.
57. ^ Gearin, Joan (Winter 2005). "Movie vs. Reality: The Real Story of the von Trapp Family". National Archives. 37 (4). Retrieved February 17, 2013.
58. Hirsch 1993, pp. 201–202.
59. "The Story of My Family". Trapp Family Lodge. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
60. Hirsch 1993, p. 40.
61. ^ "The Sound of Music (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack): Awards". AllMusic. Retrieved February 21, 2015.
62. ^ "The Sound of Music (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack): Releases". AllMusic. Retrieved February 21, 2015.
63. "Best of All Time: Albums". VG-lista. Hung Medien. Retrieved June 22, 2012.
64. "The Sound Of Music (An Original Soundtrack Recording)". Discogs. 2005. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
65. Rodgers 1975, p. 300.
66. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 174.
67. "The Sound of Music". American Film Institute. Retrieved August 4, 2014.
68. Crowther, Bosley (March 3, 1965). "The Sound of Music Opens at Rivoli". The New York Times. Retrieved February 27, 2015.
69. ^ Tucker, Ken. "A Gift for Effrontery". Salon. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
70. ^ Purdum, Todd (June 1, 2005). "The Sound of Music:40 years of unstoppable success". International Herald Tribune. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
71. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 175.
72. Hischak 2008, p. 697.
73. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 176.
74. Hirsch 1993, p. 179.
75. Hirsch 1993, p. 181.
76. Dassanowsky, Robert Von (2003). "An Unclaimed Country: The Austrian Image in American Film and the Sociopolitics of The Sound of Music". Bright Lights Film Journal. 41. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
77. Thomas, Bob (November 24, 1969). "'Sound of Music' Sound Finance". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. p. 22. Retrieved January 27, 2015.
78. "Big Rental Films of 1973". Variety. January 9, 1974. p. 19.
79. "All Time Box Office Adjusted For Ticket Price Inflation". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved January 27, 2015.
80. Glenday, Craig (ed.) (2012). Guinness World Records 2012. New York: Bantam. p. 211. ISBN 978-0-345-53437-8. {{cite book}}: |first= has generic name (help)
81. ^ "The Sound of Music (1965): Awards". The New York Times. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
82. "AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Movies". American Film Institute. Retrieved February 20, 2013.
83. "AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Movies, 10th Anniversary Edition". American Film Institute. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
84. "AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Cheers". American Film Institute. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
85. "AFI's 100 Years, 100 Heroes and Villains" (PDF). American Film Institute. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
86. "AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Musicals". American Film Institute. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
87. "AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Passions". American Film Institute. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
88. ^ "AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Songs". American Film Institute. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
89. ^ Vinciguerra, Thomas (August 20, 2000). "Do You Really Call That Sound Music?". The New York Times. Retrieved January 27, 2015.
90. Asch, Amy; Ehren, Christina (September 7, 2000). "Crowds Turn Out for Opening of 'Sing-a-Long Sound of Music' in NYC". Playbill. Retrieved January 27, 2015.
91. Maslon 2015, pp. 157–158.
92. "The Sound of Music". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved January 18, 2015.
93. ^ Hirsch 1993, p. 209.
94. "Chaos in Television". Time. March 12, 1979. Retrieved April 2, 2008.
95. "'The Sound of Music' Continues to Echo Across the Ratings Landscape". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved December 24, 2013.
96. Calogne, Juan (August 31, 2010). "The Sound of Music Blu-ray announced". Blu-ray.com. Retrieved November 16, 2010.
97. Smotroff, Mark. "HomeTechTell Review: The Sound of Music 45th Anniversary Blu-ray". Hometechtell. technologytell.com. Retrieved March 29, 2012.
98. Head, Stephen Slaughter (January 20, 2015). "'The Sound of Music' 50th Anniversary ..." Post-Movie. Retrieved March 2, 2015.

Bibliography

• Bawden, Liz-Anne (1976). The Oxford Companion to Film. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-192-11541-6.
• Herman, Jan (1995). A Talent for Trouble. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. ISBN 978-0-399-14012-9.
• Hirsch, Julia Antopol (1993). The Sound of Music: The Making of America's Favorite Movie. Chicago: Contemporary Books. ISBN 978-0-809-23837-8.
• Hischak, Thomas (2008). The Oxford Companion to the American Musical. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-195-33533-0.
• Maslon, Laurence (2015). The Sound of Music Companion. New York: Universe. ISBN 978-0-789-32935-6.
• Rodgers, Richard (1975). Musical Stages: An Autobiography. New York: Random House. ISBN 978-0-394-47596-7.
• Solomon, Aubrey (1989). Twentieth Century Fox: A Corporate and Financial History. Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press. ISBN 978-0-810-84244-1.

External links

• The Sound of Music at IMDb
• The Sound of Music at the TCM Movie Database
• The Sound of Music at Box Office Mojo
• The Sound of Music at Rotten Tomatoes
• 'The Sound of Music' history at RNH
• Original NY Times review
• The Sound of Music album at Discogs (list of releases)
• The Sound Of Music : Salzburg 1964–2011

• 1965 films
• The Sound of Music
• 1960s biographical films
• 1960s drama films
• 1960s musical films
• American films
• American biographical films
• American musical drama films
• American romantic musical films
• English-language films
• Films directed by Robert Wise
• Best Musical or Comedy Picture Golden Globe winners
• Best Picture Academy Award winners
• Films about Roman Catholicism
• Films about music and musicians
• Films based on biographies
• Films based on musicals
• Films featuring a Best Musical or Comedy Actress Golden Globe winning performance
• Films featuring puppetry
• Films set in Austria
• Films set in country houses
• Films set in the 1930s
• Films shot in Austria
• Films that won the Best Sound Mixing Academy Award
• Films whose director won the Best Director Academy Award
• Films whose editor won the Best Film Editing Academy Award
• Films that won the Best Original Score Academy Award
• Musical films based on actual events
• Musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein
• Nuns in fiction
• Salzburg
• Trapp family
• World War II films based on actual events
• United States National Film Registry films
• 20th Century Fox films