Post #9- "Once" a Singer Always a Singer, or Using Professional Singers in Films Centered Around Music

Whether to use professional singers or actors who can sing is a very interesting dynamic in the film industry. Some film actors, especially those that come from a theatre background, are very accomplished singers. However, there are many actors in the film industry that are not that great at singing. This issue has come up many times in the history of film. One notable example is that of the 1964 film My Fair Lady. Audrey Hepburn's singing voice was considered not good enough for the movie so the producers had Marni Nixon dub over the songs in the film.

There is a terrific example of the flip side of this dynamic from a little independent Irish film that came out in 2007. In an earlier post I gave my favorite winners for the Best Original Song Oscar. My number one choice was the song "Falling Slowly" from the film Once. The film is unique in the fact that the two leads were not professional actors, but instead professional musicians instead.

Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová play the unnamed characters of "Guy" and "Girl," respectively. Irglová, is a Czech singer and pianist. She joined the film when the director and writer, John Carney, was looking for a Czech singer for the role, as the original idea had Irish and Czech leads in mind. Hansard, an Irish musician and lead singer of The Frames, had worked with Irglová previously and brought her to the director, who immediately asked her to join onto the project as both a songwriter and lead actress. Hansard himself was actually not originally going to be in the film. He had worked with the director on the music for the film when the original star, Cillian Murphy, decided to pull out of the film. This departure led Carney to ask Hansard to step into the role, which he agreed to do.

Because they had worked together previously, the dynamic and chemistry of the Hansard and Irglová was incredible. This is something that is not always found with onscreen relationships and this helped make the film that much more realistic and musically good.

Here is a scene from the film that shows just how natural it is to use professional musicians as actors:


When Your Mind's Made Up - Once (2006) from spedkey on Vimeo.