elizabeth lambert schrafft
GORDON MACRAE DIES: STAR OF MOVIE MUSICALS
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Jan 25, 1986
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Gordon MacRae, the singer and thespian who starred in the film versions of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein 2d's benchmark musicals ''Oklahoma!'' and ''Carousel,'' died yesterday at Bryan Memorial Hospital in Lincoln, Neb. He was 64 years sometime and lived in Lincoln.
Mr. MacRae had been undergoing treatment for cancer of the oral fissure and jaw as well equally pneumonia.
His 1955 operation as a robust cowboy in ''Oklahoma!'' was acclaimed by Bosley Crowther of The New York Times as ''wonderfully relaxed and unaffected.'' The critic praised Mr. MacRae'south portrayal of a swaggering carnival barker in the 1956 fantasy ''Carousel'' equally ''most attractive.''
The alpine, able-bodied thespian-singer fabricated iv genial, sometime-fashioned musical films with Doris Mean solar day - ''Tea for Two'' (1950), ''The West Point Story'' (1950), ''On Moonlight Bay'' (1951) and ''By the Low-cal of the Silvery Moon'' (1953). Their teamwork prompted Thomas H. Pryor of The Times to conclude that ''these 2 complement each other like peanut butter and jelly.''
Other MacRae movies included a 1953 remake of Sigmund Romberg'due south ''Desert Vocal,'' co-starring Kathryn Grayson; ''Three Sailors and a Girl'' (1953), with Jane Powell, and ''The Best Things in Life Are Free'' (1956), co-starring Sheree North, in which Mr. MacRae played the Tin Pan Aisle composer-lyricist Buddy DeSylva. A Cocky-Taught Actor
Mr. MacRae, who was self-taught in both singing and acting, lent his rousing baritone voice, clean-cut good looks, and boy-adjacent-door personality to 16 movies. But in the mid-1950's, audiences' involvement in musicals waned, and he got no more expert offers.
He returned to telly, where he had been a singing host and main of ceremonies on a serial of programs, including ''The Railroad Hour'' and the ''Colgate Comedy Hour.'' Philosophic nearly the terminate of his film career, he remarked in 1956: ''What counts is that what you're doing, yous're doing well; that you're happy in what you're doing and information technology'south non a task. Nothing that you similar is hard.''
The performer was the host of goggle box'southward live ''Gordon MacRae Show'' in 1956, starred in a string of book-musical broadcasts and was 1 of the first popular singers to appear on the ''Voice of Firestone'' plan. For decades, on radio and television, the show had featured merely opera singers.
Mr. MacRae starred in national tours of musicals and in summer stock, and for about a decade he and his wife, Sheila, performed in nightclubs, on television and in concerts from declension to coast. They both sang, and she did satiric impersonations of show business figures. Starred With Four Children
In 1961, the MacRaes starred in a summertime-stock version in Kansas City of ''Annie Get Your Gun'' with their four children - Meredith, Heather, Garr and Bruce.
Gordon MacRae was built-in March 12, 1921, in East Orange, North. J., to William Lamont MacRae, a toolmaker from Scotland who became a radio baritone in Syracuse, and the former Helen Violet Sonn, a concert pianist. The youth attended schools in Buffalo and Syracuse, played the pianoforte and clarinet, spent spare time at lacrosse and football and was graduated from Deerfield Academy, where he sang in many shows.
At 19, he went to New York City and won an amateur singing contest at the 1939-xl World's Fair. This won him a two-week stint at the fair with the Harry James band. He became a page at NBC, was heard singing past a scout for Horace Heidt and sang with the Heidt band for two years. In World State of war Ii, he was a navigator in the Air Force.
After the war, Mr. MacRae resumed radio singing and gained a role as a military policemen in a 1946 Broadway revue, ''3 to Make Prepare,'' starring Ray Bolger. The show drew mixed reviews, simply Mr. MacRae'south singing won him a flick contract with Warner Brothers. Returned to Broadway in 1967
He did non appear on Broadway again for 21 years, returning in 1967, when he and Carol Lawrence took over the roles originated past Robert Preston and Mary Martin in the musical ''I Practise! I Do!'' and were praised by reviewers. In 1967, he and Sheila MacRae were divorced. Later that yr, he married Elizabeth Lambert Schrafft.
In recent years, Mr. MacRae, acknowledging he was an alcoholic, fabricated many public appearances on behalf of the National Council on Alcoholism. He had been the national honorary chairman of the quango and a member of its board since 1983.
Surviving are his wife, Elizabeth, and five children - three daughters, Meredith, Heather and Amanda, and 2 sons, Garr and Bruce.
A memorial service is scheduled for Monday at 11:30 A.M. at the Sheridan Lutheran Church in Lincoln. In lieu of flowers, the family asked that contributions be given to the National Quango on Alcoholism, 12 West 21st Street, New York, N.Y. 100l0.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1986/01/25/obituaries/gordon-macrae-dies-star-of-movie-musicals.html
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