17 Actors Who Appeared Singing In Movies But Didn’t Use Their Own Voices (We’ll Show You Who Really Singed)

Music plays an important role in cinema, being, in some cases, the main element of the narrative and responsible for attracting the public. Maybe you remember a famous person who appeared singing very well in a role, but know that not everything is what it seems to be. In several circumstances, the actors just synchronize their lips, following the rhythm of a voice that belongs to someone else, the real person responsible for reaching high notes and singing in tune verses, thus contributing to the achievement of quality work in several productions.

We, from awesome.club, we decided to find out which were the celebrities who didn’t sing in the movies and, mainly, the real voices behind the main characters. Check out!

Deborah Kerr received an Oscar nomination for her performance as Anna Leonowens, including her musical performance, although not her voice. The real singer was Marni Nixon, known for participating in several voiceovers on the big screen, without even receiving public credit for it. Nixon commented that the contract with the 20th Century Fox production company said that no one should know about her involvement. Otherwise, she would not return to work in the film industry.

The actress who starred in this film in the role of Maria also received help from Marni Nixon for the musical scenes. The soprano singer revealed in an interview that the production made Natalie Wood believe that she would sing, so recordings of the songs were made with the orchestra. After the end of these sessions, Nixon entered the studio to sing the same songs with his own voice, which, in the end, ended up being immortalized in the feature.

Audrey Hepburn was chosen to play Eliza Doolittle in the film adaptation of this musical, but at the time of singing, her voice was replaced by that of Marni Nixon. “The voice of Hollywood” explained that Hepburn did not want someone else to sing in her place and tried to record the songs herself, but decided to incorporate the singer’s experience in the final edition, whose result is what we know.

Christopher Plummer played Captain von Trapp, who appeared in one scene singing Edelweiss🇧🇷 The only detail is that, in fact, he didn’t sing. In an interview, the actor commented that he participated only in the beginning and end of the songs, while the rest was done by someone else, as the production was careful to leave every detail similar to the original musical. The real voice in the captain’s songs was Bill Lee, a member of the quartet The Mellomenwho also collaborated on other films, mainly on Disney features.

In that biopic, Lou Diamond Phillips was cast to revive 1950s rock singer Ritchie Valens. To attract the Latin audience, the famous singer’s original songs were reinterpreted by the group Los Lobos for the soundtrack. Therefore, the real voice belonged to vocalist David Hidalgo, while the actor was careful to lip-sync as best as possible.

Both in the first film and in Habit Change 2: More Troubles in the Convent, from 1993, the actress played Mary Robert, a shy nun, but with a powerful voice. Wendy revealed that she auditioned for this singing role but was unable to hit the high notes. So the producers had to find a professional for that. The chosen one was Andrea Robinson, a singer who also participated in the cast meeting held 15 years after the premiere of the film.

Jonathan did the English dub of the character Simba when he was a young lion, but when it came to singing the original version of What I want most is to be king and Hakuna Matata, the actor handed the microphone to Jason Weaver. The actor and singer recalled his experience and revealed that it was Elton John, the co-creator of the film’s original music, who heard him sing in a television studio and invited him to participate in an audition for the role. Disney contacted him and offered him a singing contract on this animated classic.

Interestingly, just as it was done with the young Simba, Disney decided that someone else should sing the songs of the adult Simba and the responsibility was with Joseph Williams, lead singer of the band Toto. Matthew believes that he needed to train his voice better to interpret the songs, although he made two recordings. For his part, Williams mentioned that he was called because he could hit the notes to sing Hakuna Matata.

This film was one of the works responsible for designing Jennifer Lopez’s artistic career, although she did not sing in it. At the time, the actress confessed that she did not consider herself a singer, and this fact was reinforced by producer Gregory Nava in an interview, which is why the songs where Selena herself sang were used for the scenes in which the character had to sing. In 2015, Jennifer paid tribute to the “queen of tex-mex” at an awards show, but this time with her own voice.

The actor did the original voice acting for the character Captain Li Shang, except for the singing moment. the english version of I Won’t Give Up None/Man Ser🇧🇷 Donny Osmond was chosen by Disney to participate in the cartoon, because the voices of both were similar, and, therefore, he was offered the responsibility of interpreting the song. Twenty years after its release, the singer recalled his moment of glory and commented that he hit his own stomach when recording the song to make the scene more realistic.

The actor was ready to sing I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow in a recording studio. However, it seems that the result was not what the directors had hoped, or so the actor remembers this episode. That’s why they hired singer Dan Tyminski to interpret the song and Clooney was in charge of moving his lips to the rhythm of the lyrics. The musician expressed his astonishment when the soundtrack became a hit on and off the film.

If you thought Zac Efron performed every song in the trilogy High School Musical in the role of Troy Bolton, will need to eliminate the first film from the list. Despite having made the musical recordings, the actor realized that his voice had not been inserted, and received no explanation from the editors. Drew Seeley was the one who actually voiced the character when he sang, but that wasn’t his only contribution to the musical. The singer later filled in for Efron on the cast’s concert tour following the film’s premiere.

Marion Cotillard received several nominations and several awards thanks to this film, which deals with the life of Édith Piaf. By decision of the production, she did not have to sing and the real recordings of the famous French singer were used. The actress confessed that, anyway, she attended singing lessons to perfect lip sync, tongue position and breathing, in order to get as close as possible to Piaf’s gestures.

Yaya DaCosta was tasked with bringing singer Whitney Houston to life in the made-for-television biopic, but was assisted by someone else in the singing scenes. The director of that production, Angela Bassett, invited singer Deborah Cox to re-record Whitney’s best-known songs and get closer to the true artist’s tone of voice. Despite this, the actress was allowed to sing, to the delight of the extras who participated in the filming.

One of the most remembered songs from this musical is Never Enough, sung by the character Jenny Lind. However, Rebecca Ferguson only played her physically. The actress herself recognized that “singing” was the most complicated part of the recordings. The one who actually sang this melody was Loren Allred, who bragged to everyone that the real voice sung in the film was his.

Despite being recognized with an Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in that film, Rami Malek was unable to replicate the vocal qualities of the real Freddie Mercury. According to its producer, Graham King, the solution was to combine old recordings by the Queen member with new recordings made by Marc Martel, a Canadian rock singer, whose voice is similar to that of the British musician.

The actress, protagonist of this film, played Sigrit Ericksdóttir, member of an Icelandic duo, who aspire to participate in a music contest held in Europe. Although Rachel initially sang in some scenes, the production decided to merge her voice with that of Molly Sandén, a Swedish singer who participated in the children’s version of the real Eurovision. Sandén, however, guarantees that the only female voice that can be heard in the character’s songs is her own.

Now that you know some actors who pretended to sing like a pro, let us know in the comments which famous people from the movie world you would like to see demonstrate their musical skills.