Атенея: Музыкалық фильмнің тарихы мен құпиялары

1954 film by Richard Thorpe
"Athena" (Chorus)
"The Girl Next Door" (Vic Damone), a slight variation on the 1944 hit "The Boy Next Door" from Meet Me in St Louis
"Vocalize" (Jane Powell) which is reprised later in a choral arrangement as "Harmonize" (Jane Powell, Louis Calhern, Chorus)
"Imagine" (Debbie Reynolds, Vic Damone)
"Love can change the Stars" (Jane Powell, Sisters, Vic Damone)
"Never felt better" (Debbie Reynolds, Jane Powell, Sisters)
"Venezia" (Vic Damone)
Donizetti's "Chacun le sait" from La fille du régiment (The Daughter of the Regiment) (Jane Powell)

The film was an original story. It was originally meant to star Elizabeth Taylor rather than Jane Powell. Esther Williams then became attached. In 1953 Williams left for maternity leave. Before her departure, she had assumed she would appear in Athena when she returned, as she claimed that she had helped create the premise with writers Leo Pogostin and Charles Walters. MGM initially announced that Williams' appearance in Athena would be postponed to enable her to make another musical Bermuda for Joe Pasternak. However, the studio decided to cast Williams in Jupiter's Darling and replaced her with Jane Powell, who was taken off Love Me or Leave Me. They changed the main character from a swimmer to a singer, to accommodate Powell. Janet Leigh and Vera Ellen were also cast in the film, but dropped out. The male lead was given to Edmund Purdom who had become a leading man in The Student Prince (1954). MGM head of production Dore Schary was keen to build up Purdom as a star. Filming was pushed back so Purdom could replace Marlon Brando in The Egyptian. Chiquita and Johnson from the Moulin Rouge were meant to appear in the film.

Director Dick Thorpe was less than enthusiastic about the picture. After a scene was finished, he would toss the pages of the script over his shoulder and walk away. In her autobiography, Jane Powell said that it really discouraged the cast. Powell also said that the film would have been better received had it been made twenty years later. Edmund Purdom and Linda Christian had an affair during filming and later married.

According to MGM records the film made $1,222,000 in the US and Canada and $658,000 elsewhere resulting in a loss of $511,000. This was one of two films where Reeve's actual voice was heard; Jail Bait (1954) is the other. His European films were all dubbed by voice actors.