Trivia / Singin' in the Rain

• Breakaway Pop Hit: The songs to their original films:
  • "Singin' in the Rain": The Hollywood Revue of 1929.
  • "All I Do Is Dream of You": Sadie McKee.
  • "Should I?": Lord Byron of Broadway.
  • "Beautiful Girl": Going Hollywood.
  • "Would You": San Francisco.
• Creative Differences: John Alton was initially hired as cinematographer after impressing Gene Kelly with his lensing of the ballet sequence in An American in Paris, but was fired over the objections of Kelly and Stanley Donen due to what Donen later described as "political reasons."
• Cut Song:
  • Originally, Kathy was to sing "You Are My Lucky Star" to a billboard of Don Lockwood after he sang to her in the studio, by way of dramatizing that she was the president of the Don Lockwood Fan Club. It was shot, but didn't end up in the finished film. However, it's available on the film's original soundtrack, DVD, and digital extras.
  • A reprise of "All I Do Is Dream of You" was to be sung by Don at his home after the party, musing about Kathy.
• Dyeing for Your Art: Cyd Charisse had to diet off the extra pounds she had just gained during her recent pregnancy. She also had to learn to smoke for her introductory scene, as she was a lifelong non-smoker.
• Executive Meddling: The studio felt there had to be a musical number in which the titular song was sung. Hence, the Singin' in the Rain sequence with Gene Kelly literally singing in the rain. In a case of Tropes Are Not Bad, "Singin' in the Rain" was placed third in the AFI's "100 Years... 100 Songs" list.
• Hostility on the Set: Debbie Reynolds and Donald O'Connor did not enjoy working with Gene Kelly since Kelly was somewhat of a tyrant. O'Connor said that for the first several weeks, he was terrified of making a mistake and being yelled at by Kelly. Because he knew that her crying would hold up filming, Kelly would use O'Connor as his 'whipping boy' when he was frustrated with Reynolds. Kelly knew O'Connor could take the tongue-lashing he really wanted to lay on Reynolds, who was only 19 at the time of filming. This fact was revealed to Debbie Reynolds by Donald O'Connor years later.
• Non-Singing Voice: While the film makes a central point of the idea that Kathy's voice is dubbed over Lina Lamont's, what is not told is that, ironically, in some of these songs - notably "Would You" and "You Are My Lucky Star" - Debbie Reynolds was actually dubbed by Betty Noyes. However, Reynolds' own singing voice can be heard on the outtake footage of "Lucky Star" as performed next to the giant billboard of Gene Kelly.
• Prop Recycling: Kathy's car was previously Andy Hardy's car. Don Lockwood's mansion is filled with furniture from Flesh and the Devil.
• Referenced by...:
  • The film is discussed and seen quite a bit in the 1994 French action thriller The Professional from Leon watching it in a movie theatre to Mathilda dressing up as Gene Kelly and singing the titular song.
  • In Rainbow Magic, this is Hayley the Rain Fairy's favourite movie.
  • Babylon (2022) contains several allusions to this film (with both films being about silent film stars struggling to make the switch to talkies), and ends with a scene of Manny watching the film in a theater 30 years later and being driven to tears at just how much the film's subject matter resonates with him as someone who experienced that time period firsthand.
• Scully Box: Gene Kelly choreographed his dance scenes with Cyd Charisse to hide that she was taller than he was. To keep the height difference from being obvious, Kelly arranged the routine so that they were never both standing upright when they were next to each other, always bending toward (or away from) one another instead.
• Star-Making Role: For Debbie Reynolds, who was 19 when this movie was made. Invoked by the studio, who felt she was ready to be pushed to the next level of stardom.
• Troubled Production:
  • As Singin' lore reveals, it was a bumpy ride for Debbie Reynolds. Although Reynolds and Gene Kelly's characters (eventually) became sweethearts on screen, in reality the two actors did not get along and frequently bumped heads (not in the least because she had not been his first choice, as she had to learn not just to do the dances for the film but to dance, period, in just three months). In fact, Kelly, in his role as director, once mocked Reynolds' dancing to the point where, after shooting finished, Fred Astaire (who was visiting the set that day) found her huddled under a piano sobbing. He helped her get her dancing closer to Kelly's draconian standards. Kelly also made Reynolds tap so much for the number "Good Morning" without any break that her feet began to bleed and she needed to be carried to her dressing room. In the end, Kelly hated how Reynolds' tapping came through so he dubbed over it. Bear in mind that Reynolds was entirely new to tapping until Astaire came along and helped her. It should be noted that Gene Kelly did apologize to both actors several years later and the three remained in speaking terms after release. This shocked Reynolds in particular who was under the impression Kelly couldn't stand her.
  • She wasn't the only one to have problems. Kelly spent three days filming the title number while running a high fever, including the day they shot the iconic title sequence, though he powered through and sang and danced at full capacity. Donald O'Connor was so exhausted after one of his big numbers that he needed four days of bed rest afterwards.
• What Could Have Been:
  • An early draft of the script featured the title song as a number for all three of the leads, not just Don.
  • An un-filmed alternate ending reveals that Don and Kathy eventually married, and continued acting in movies together. It also reveals that Lina married Cosmo, and landed movie roles that wouldn't require her to deliver a lot of spoken dialogue (such as an unintelligible Jungle Princess).
  • Originally, Debbie Reynolds was going to play Gene Kelly's partner in the "Broadway Melody" sequence, but her dancing wasn't up to the task. Leslie Caron, who had danced with Kelly in An American in Paris, was the second choice, but she was unavailable.
  • In the first draft, Zelda Zanders was to sing "I Got A Feeling You're Fooling", but after script revisions the song was used in the montage before the number, "Beautiful Girl", along with "The Wedding Of The Painted Doll" and "Should I".
  • Very early on in the pre-production stage, Judy Garland was considered for Kathy Selden, but was considered "too old", despite being ten years younger than Gene Kelly.
  • Also in the pre-production stage, before Gene Kelly became attached to the project (MGM wasn't sure he would be available as he was working on An American in Paris at the time), Howard Keel was considered for the lead, and the story would involve his character, a bit-player in silent films, suddenly rising to stardom as a singing cowboy.
  • The role of Cosmo was originally intended for the pianist Oscar Levant, who had played Gene Kelly's best friend the previous year in An American In Paris; that's why Cosmo is a professional pianist. However, Levant couldn't dance, and having agreed to take Debbie Reynolds despite her lack of dancing experience, Kelly wanted another dancer to work with, and got MGM to borrow Donald O'Connor from Universal.
• Write What You Know: Part of the film's plot was inspired by the screenwriters having bought a house in Hollywood from a former silent film star, who lost his wealth when the rise of sound film killed his career.
• Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: The script was written after the songs, and so the writers had to generate a plot into which the songs would fit.

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