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Finian's Rainbow Overview:

Finian's Rainbow (1968) was a Musical - Fantasy Film directed by Francis Ford Coppola and produced by Joel Freeman and Joseph Landon.

Academy Awards 1968 --- Ceremony Number 41 (source: AMPAS)

AwardRecipientResult
Best Music - ScoringAdaptation score by Ray HeindorfNominated
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Finian's Rainbow BlogHub Articles:

Warner Archive Blu-ray: Musical Stars Go Modern in Finian's Rainbow (1968) and S.O.B. (1981)

By KC on Apr 6, 2017 From Classic Movies

This month, Warner Archive has released a pair of titles on Blu-ray where classic musical stars adapt themselves to modern times. Fred Astaire abandons the controlled environment of a big studio sound stage for wide open spaces in Finian's Rainbow (1968), while Julie Andrews exposes her raunchy side... Read full article

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Finian's Rainbow Quotes:

Sharon McLonergan: [singing] When a rich man doesn't want to work/ He's a bon vivant/ Yes, he's a bon vivant. But when a poor man doesn't want to work / he's a loafer, he's a lounger he's a lazy good for nothing...
Finian McLonergan: He's a jerk. When a rich man loses on a horse/ isn't he the sport /oh, isn't he the sport / but when a poor man loses on a horse / he's a gambler, he's a spender, he's a lowlife, he's a reason for divorce. When a rich man chases after dames, he's a man about town/ a man about town / but when a poor man chases after dames / he's a bounder, he's a rounder, he's a rotter, and a lotter dirty names.
Finian McLonergan: Don't be superstitious, it's bad luck.
Finian McLonergan: America is full of millionaires.
Sharon McLonergan: But Father, are there no ill clad or ill housed in America?
Finian McLonergan: Aye, but they're the best ill clad and the best ill housed in the world.
Finian McLonergan: [singing] Green is the color of the shamrocks /and the grass on Blarney hill / Oh, the darlin' green of Ireland /and the good old dollar bill.
Sharon McLonergan: Father is a mineralogist from the old country. He can make gold sprout out of the ground.
Senator Billboard Rawkins: Gold? There's no gold in Ireland.
Finian McLonergan: I meself discovered a vein our countrymen have been searching for ever since the reign of... Alfred the Thoughtless.
Senator Billboard Rawkins: Who?
Finian McLonergan: You've never heard of Alfred the Thoughtless? He was King of Erin following his father, Thomas the Temporary, who in turn was the only son of the Virgin Queen, Serena the Spotless.
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Finian's Rainbow Facts
The character "Woody Mahoney" was based loosely on songwriting wanderer Woody Guthrie.
Petula Clark, who had many hit records in French and English, does her own singing in the French-dubbed version of this film. The French audio track is included on the DVD.
Because of its satire on racism, this popular 1947 Broadway musical was considered such a hot potato in Hollywood that studios would not touch it unless they were allowed to change the story. Its original creators, E.Y. Harburg, Burton Lane and Fred Saidy, held out and by 1968 it was able to be filmed with very few changes.
Not heard in the film is a soulful rendition of "Necessity," taken from the Burton Lane-E.Y. Harburg 1947 Broadway score and sung by Brenda Arnau with a chorus. Fortunately, this version has been preserved on the soundtrack LP from Warner Bros. Records, and more recently, on the soundtrack CD from Rhino Handmade.
According to the commentary track on the DVD, choreographer Hermes Pan was fired part of the way through production because Francis Ford Coppola felt his choreography was too old-fashioned. Pan was replaced by a much younger choreographer, Claude Thompson, who was familiar to many of the dancers in the film.
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