I just watched the 1934 version of "The Merry Widow" the other day and decided to compile some neato f(un)-facts about it. Did you know...
*The operetta on which this was based was titled "The Rather Sprightly and Dare We Say Quite Gay In Spirit Woman Who, Having Lost Her Husband, Encountered Love." Director Ernst Lubitsch said, "Hey, let's call it 'The Merry Widow.'" That's the Lubitsch Touch!
*Star Maurice Chevalier took 3 weeks of voice lessons to lose his thick New York accent for this film.
*Co-star Jeanette MacDonald's singing voice was dubbed by a young Andy Williams.
*The opening musical number "Girls! Girls! Girls!," in which soldiers march and sing about how the only reason they wage war is for Girls! later inspired the Motley Crue hit single of the same name.
*If you look closely at the scene in which Chevalier's character reintroduces himself to the ladies of Parisian society, you can see Cloris Leachman dancing in the background.
*This story, set in the kingdom of Marshovia, is based on a real incident. Only the real incident precipitated World War I, while the movie takes some dramatic license and ignores that consequence.
*In an ironic turn of events, the producers, lured by tax breaks, filmed "The Merry Widow" not in Marshovia, but in neighboring Freedonia.
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