Gale Sherwood
Actress and singing partner of Nelson Eddy who played a jungle girl in the film Blonde Savage
GALE SHERWOOD, who has died aged 88, was a Canadian-born singer and actress, and the onstage singing partner of Nelson Eddy from 1953 until his death in 1967. Eddy had become famous for his screen partnership with Jeanette Macdonald in operettas that were showy but by the 1950s had become dated. The middle-aged crooner jumped at the suggestion that he might duplicate his rather wooden screen performances for theatre audiences. Knowing that Gale Sherwood was no Jeanette Macdonald, the producers decided that her costumes should make up for her slightly inferior voice and dressed her in wisps of chiffon. “I gave the act sex appeal,” she explained.
She was born Jacqueline Nutt in Hamilton, Ontario, on March 4 1929. Her family moved to California and she attended the Mar-ken School in Hollywood, which catered for showbusiness children. Her screen debut was as Betty in They Shall Have Music (1939). She then played a high-school singer in the musical Let’s Make Music (1941). But it was not until Blonde Savage in 1947, by which time she was being billed as Gale Sherwood, that she landed a leading role.
Billed as a “blonde package of TNT”, she played Meelah, a statuesque “jungle girl”, and won praise for her soprano voice, which was put to good use in a scene in which she is heard from across the Amazon during a tribal ceremony.
She took a supporting role in Rocky (1948) with Roddy Mcdowall, before singing her heart out in the B-movie Song of My Heart (1948). She then went to MGM for a cameo in The Merry Widow (1948), with Lana Turner and Fernando Lamas.
It was Eddy who provided her with the boost that she needed. Impressed with her work with him, RCA Records engaged her in 1954 to duet with Mario Lanza on a recording of Summertime in Heidelberg, though ultimately her version was not released.
Despite their success together on stage, Eddy still hankered after a screen comeback with Jeanette Macdonald, but the older singer rejected the idea, saying that he should be happy with his new musical partner. Gale Sherwood then played Morgan Le Fay in a television version of A Connecticut Yankee (1955) with Eddie Albert, before joining Nelson Eddy for a wellreceived live television performance as Margot, dressed in a harem costume with a jewel in her navel, in The Desert Song (1955).
To the audience’s delight, their performance finished with a lingering kiss, during which Eddy removed the jewel. Gale Sherwood later referred to this as the “belly-button controversy”, adding: “It was too risqué, too rude for diehard Nelson Eddy fans.”
The pair continued to perform across America. She and his accompanist Ted Paxon were at Eddy’s side in Palm Beach on March 5 1967 when he suffered a cerebral haemorrhage on stage. He died the next day.
Without Eddy, Gale Sherwood continued to perform at clubs and on television variety shows. She retired during the 1970s.
She was twice married.
Gale Sherwood, born March 4 1929, died December 31 2017