White Christmas » Trivia (Movie)

# # When Bob Wallace (Bing Crosby) appears on the Ed Harrison TV show, he is briefly shown - as if the audience is watching him at home - on a 1950s television set. The brand of the television is DuMont, one of the first manufacturers of TVs in America and the name of TV network from the 1950s. 'Jackie Gleason', Morey Amsterdam and Bishop Fulton J. Sheen were some of the notables that began on the DuMont Network, which ceased operations in 1956.

Though Rosemary Clooney couldn't be on the original album due to contractual conflicts, she recorded the song "Sisters" with her real-life sister, Betty Clooney. On the official album, Peggy Lee recorded the song and sang both parts via overdubbing, a new technology in 1954.

Although this movie musical has been a beloved favorite for decades -- especially at Christmastime -- there has never been an official "original soundtrack" album released in any form. Decca controlled the soundtrack rights, but Rosemary Clooney was under exclusive contract to Columbia, who would not allow her to appear on a competing label. As a result, Decca and Columbia each released their own White Christmas albums in 1954, although neither is an official soundtrack. Decca's album featured the movie cast minus Rosemary Clooney, with Peggy Lee taking over Clooney's part. Columbia's album had Rosemary Clooney singing 8 songs from the film. Both albums have been issued on CD in recent years.

The train scene had to be shot at Fox, the only studio to house a standing train set.

Many of Bob Wallace's more unusual turns of phrase were lifted straight from Bing Crosby's own speech patterns.

According to Rosemary Clooney, the "midnight snack" scene in which Bob Wallace expounds on his theory of what foods cause what dreams was almost entirely improvised.

# # The song, "What Can You Do with a General?", which Leonard Maltin calls Berlin's least memorable tune, was originally written for an unproduced project called Stars on My Shoulders.

Rosemary Clooney was not allowed to record her voice for the soundtrack album because it was being released by a record company (Decca) other than hers (Columbia). She was replaced on the soundtrack album by Peggy Lee.

Released in 1954, it became the top grossing film of that year.

# # For The song "Gee, I Wish I Was Back In The Army" there is a small section which say's "Jolson, Hope And Benny all for free" This is a reference to three wartime entertainers; Al Jolson, Bob Hope and Jack Benny. The original words were "Crosby, Hope and Jolson all for free", with Bing Crosby in the film it would seem rather weird and it would most likely break the mood.

Vera-Ellen did not actually sing any of the songs for the movie. Trudy Stevens sang all her songs (with the exception of the song "Sisters", on which Rosemary Clooney sang both parts). Vera's own voice is heard singing only in the "arrival in Pine Tree" scene at the railroad station where the quartet reprises the opening lines of "Snow".

Even though Betty was the elder of the Haynes sisters, Rosemary Clooney was actually seven years younger than Vera-Ellen in real life.

# # The "Sisters" comedy act that Bing Crosbyand Danny Kaye perform was not originally in the script. They were clowning around on the set and the director thought it was so funny that it was written in.

# # The song "Snow" was written by Irving Berlin a while before the film was made but with a different lyric and title and indeed subject (it had nothing to do whatsoever with snow): it was called "Free" and it was recorded by the composer.

The Vermont inn is the remodeled Connecticut inn set of Holiday Inn (1942).