If We Were a Movie

04.17.09 - She rose from relative obscurity to the heights of chart-topping stardom, with her own series, a string of pop albums, merchandise bearing her likeness and a big movie career.

Disney Legend Tutti Camarata was a guiding force in Annette's singing career, as well as for the Disney record labels.

We're talking about Miley Cyrus, right? Yes, of course. But aren't we also referring to Annette Funicello? Yes, indeed. And how about young stars in between? Well, some yes some no.

When Walt envisioned a show in which likable young performers would entertain on a new kind of daytime TV show, he insisted on "realness" for the cast, so most of the original 39 Mouseketeers chosen for his Mickey Mouse Club did not have a great deal of professional experience. Lonnie Burr was already a triple-threat actor, singer and dancer with a TV series, a radio soap plus lots of stage and TV appearances to his credit, so he auditioned for the role of Marty Markham in the Spin and Marty serial.

But David Stollery got the role, so Lonnie became a Mouseketeer by accident — as he explains in his new memoir, aptly entitled Confessions of an Accidental Mouseketeer. In it, he wrote about Annette, with whom he became romantically involved.

"She was a little older than me," he recalled. "She was 13, I had just turned 12. Annie and I were love interests through the first season of shooting and through the [Disneyland] Mickey Mouse Club Circus, from late '55 to early '56. We'd travel down to the Park and hold hands. I didn't know until I read her autobiography, A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes [Hyperion, 1994], that I gave Annie her first kiss."

The Mouseketeers became a sensation with Annette getting the most fan mail. This came as quite a surprise to Disney Studio staffers who predicted stardom for Darlene Gillespie, a confident, naturally talented preteen starring in the Corky and White Shadow serial on the Club. Darlene's stirring singing voice made the folks at Disney's new record label take notice.

One of them was Disney Legend Salvador "Tutti" Camarata, a classically trained musician, arranger and composer with considerable experience in big band and classical music. Since a soundtrack album of 1951's Alice in Wonderland had not been released (and did not appear until 1998), he mounted a lavish version featuring Darlene that rivals the original in grandeur. The album sold for decades — even while the film itself was out of release — and is still available on iTunes.

Tutti and Disneyland Records President (and Disney Legend) Jimmy Johnson tried to launch Darlene as a pop star with an album of hits called Darlene of the Teens. But as Jimmy described in his autobiography, Inside the Whimsy-Works, "To say the record went unremarked in the marketplace is putting it mildly. It was a colossal bomb."

On the other hand, in the Mickey Mouse Club "Annette" serial, a song called "How Will I Know My Love" caused studio phones to ring and mailboxes to overflow with requests for a recording of Annette's little hayride tune. The resulting record sold 100,000 copies. The public had spoken.

Annette performed "Mister Piano Man" in the "Golden Horseshoe Revue" episode of Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color.

Jimmy was at first puzzled by Annette's stardom until he realized what tied back to Walt's vision for the Mouseketeers: identifiability. "The kids watching the Mickey Mouse Club TV show couldn't identify with Darlene," he wrote. "They knew they couldn't sing as well as she could and would never be able to… but Annette didn't do much of anything except be herself and the kids took her to their hearts as one of their own. Somehow they could see themselves in Annette's shoes."

Annette went on to chart 10 hit singles, with two in the top 10, and 15 albums. These records helped sustain Disney's Buena Vista and Disneyland labels, even as Walt was suggesting to Roy to shut down the financially challenged division.

Annette never became a diva, always quick to point out, "I don't sing!" Not to worry, because a unique multi-tracking process — known as the "Annette sound" — allowed her to sound stronger and gain confidence with each album, even developing a vibrato for Something Borrowed, Something Blue, her last album for Disney.

Annette was featured in several hit Disney films and Wonderful World of Color installments. And then there were those "beach party" pictures with Frankie Avalon for American-International Pictures. It is well documented that Walt suggested a more modest swimsuit for Annette, but the Disney connections did not stop there.

"Tons of music from the beach party movies were recorded by Tutti at his Sunset Sound studio," says veteran music producer and engineer Bruce Botnick. "Almost all of it was released on Disney's Buena Vista label." Bruce worked on many of them, in addition to engineering and/or producing Disney recordings like Mary Poppins, The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast and, most recently, The Little Mermaid Broadway cast album.

Walt discovered Annette dancing in a local ballet recital; few anticipated how the public would embrace her.

Bruce also played a pivotal role in making Annette's most famous musical collaboration possible. "My sister was dating one of The Beach Boys," he recalls. "Tutti said it would be really great if we could get them to sing with Annette. I called my sister, got a hold of them and they agreed. It was very simply that."

The record was The Monkey's Uncle. It led to other Botnick/Beach Boys albums, including the history-making Pet Sounds — a masterwork that influenced Paul McCartney just as The Beatles embarked on Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

Whether she intended it or not, such monumental things happened through the magic of Annette: Saving a record company. Getting great artists together with great technical virtuosos. Building a certain vacation kingdom in Florida.

"Wha----?" you may ask. Bear with us now, please, with our humble hypothesis.

Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman were struggling songwriters who were among the throngs who responded to, and greatly succeeded at, the Disney Studio's need for Annette songs. Annette's chart-topping songs got Walt's attention. He asked to meet the young duo writing the songs for Annette.

Then followed a meeting that is also quite well documented; Walt began by describing a new film about twins who meet at camp and try to reunite their parents, though the Shermans were supposed to demonstrate a song they had written for Annette in a film called The Horsemasters. He liked their song, so Jimmy suggested the brothers might write songs for what would become The Parent Trap. Huge hit. Walt pleased.

Richard and Robert came on staff, which led to Mary Poppins, a classic that would arguably be very different without Sherman songs. A share of the gigantic Mary Poppins box office profits were used to create a company called MAPO to construct Disney Theme Park attractions, including Walt Disney World Resort.

Maybe it's a bit of a stretch, but… thank you, Annette. For everything.

Beyond Annette, Walt nurtured up and coming talent like The Wellingtons (a folk group you may have heard singing the Gilligan's Island theme) and Billy Storm (an immensely talented R&B singer who was the first African American to headline a Disney album). In the decades that followed, two more Mickey Mouse Club TV series brought more young stars before the public, most notably Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears and Oscar® nominee Ryan Gosling.

And of course today, Disney Channel continues to "grow" young talent through various series and original movies, providing them a chance to stretch and allowing viewers to decide about their appeal in different roles, much as MGM did with Donna Reed in The Courtship of Andy Hardy or Columbia Pictures with Rita Hayworth in Blondie on a Budget.

Equally unknown was Miley Cyrus when she auditioned for the role of a schoolgirl with a double life as a rock star. She was initially turned down for being too young. While success was everyone's goal, no one could have imagined the level to which Miley and Hannah Montana reached — perhaps because she had that "identifiability" thing.

Today, Miley Cyrus follows in the trailblazing footsteps of another bigger-than-life talent — Annette Funicello.

So are Hannah/Miley and Annette as identical as Sharon McKendrick and Susan Evers? Musically, Annette took on teenybopper tunes suited to the current trends just like Miley has. As Annette matured, even with Walt's swimsuit suggestion, her later films featured teeny bikinis as well as innuendo — tame as it was by today's standards, but less wholesome than her Disney projects. Today, Miley is exploring new subject matter for songs and film roles outside of her Hannah role.

Although some of us credit her with helping build the "world," Annette was never listed as one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People in The World as Miley was. But Annette never had to deal with nonstop, often unwelcome publicity like Miley.

"Annie would have fans come up to her, and she never had a problem with that," Lonnie says."Things were different then. People can be more insistent now, in my experience. And Miley has to have a retinue because of the paparazzi, which weren't around in the '50s."

Miley Cyrus is only at the threshold of movies and music outside her Hannah role. Annette Funicello semi-retired from show business to raise a family after the beach movie craze. When her kids were older, Annette began making appearances, including the hit film Back to the Beach, until she was stricken with Multiple Sclerosis.

"Annie has her good days and her bad days," says Lonnie, who, like Sharon Baird and other longtime friends, has always stayed in touch. "But she knows she has the love of close friends and family and by her side."

When you've got that, no matter what challenges showbiz and your personal life toss you, you've really got the best of both worlds.