I am surprised that Priscilla Lane was a successful singer, known as much for that as for her acting. To me, her singing comes across as that of a female lead in a small town high school play. On-key and competent, but nothing special about tonality or vocal quality.
Great songs in this movie, though.
What, that WAS Priscilla Lane singing??? No way! Dubbing was the moviemaking method of choice in those days!
And the gal's voice may have been nothing earthshaking, but it's nice enough, and she was playing a moderately successful nightclub singer. Good movie, BTW.
I sorta thought that was the point. Eddie was pushing her hard even though she was only an average performer because Eddie was head-over-heels for her. She doesn't wow Panama or the nightclub owner when she auditions. It's only Eddie who's nuts for her singing and that's 'cause he's gaga for Jean.
Don't get me wrong, I thought she sounded good, but not as fantastic as Eddie makes her out to be.
OP's saying she was a successful singer away from this movie though.
I do agree though that that was the point of it in this movie - that she was OK but not spectacular and not nightclub-headliner material.
I haven't heard any of her other work - maybe Priscilla Lane is a better singer than she sounds in this movie - maybe she deliberately dumbed her voice down for this movie to sound more average.
Thank you for the clarification.
Yeah, I don't know. She could be doing a Minnie Driver (in either Phantom of the Opera or GoldenEye). Or maybe tastes have just changed. Based on the reactions, though, I'd say she has to be deliberately flattening her performance. If she was a famous singer and the actors were giving those, "Really? Her?" looks, I feel like she wouldn't like that unless she was in on the plot and performing accordingly.