In 1964, Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer, seven child actors
and a bunch of people dressed as nuns and Nazis all came to
Salzburg, Austria to film “The Sound of Music.” And
when you go there today, you can still feel the history spraying
out of every fountain, shining from every raindrop on every rose,
and singing from every hill.
“The Sound of Music” was one of the most significant
movies of my childhood, so the first thing I did in Salzburg
(before even dropping my backpack off at the hostel) was buy a
ticket for the Sound of Music Tour. On the tour, an ordinary
looking bus drove us to the spots where the movie was filmed. And
sometimes the bus would stop and we could get out and take pictures
““ the best 30 euros I ever spent.
Most of the people on the tour were young and from either the
U.S., Australia, England or Canada. Our energetic, thin,
gray-haired tour guide (who hilariously broke into coughing fits
every six or seven sentences) explained that “The Sound of
Music” is not popular in Austria. Apparently it does not
translate well into other languages. Salzburg natives think their
town is famous because Mozart was born there.
Their loss.
One of the first stops we made was the white house where they
filmed the back-patio scenes. We were not able to actually go to
the house, because our guide explained it was privately owned (by
Harvard University), but we could stand on the other side of the
lake and use our zoom lenses. The lake that separated us from
seeing the backyard and gate was the lake that Maria and the
children fell into from their boat when they were late for greeting
the baroness. It was raining and cold, so it looked like a horrible
lake to fall into, though the surrounding trees were
picturesque.
Another stop was the church where they filmed Maria and Captain
von Trapp’s wedding. It was a testament to the magic of
movies. Because I ran off the bus, I was one of the first to get
there and had a moment of being almost alone under the super-high
ceiling. Yet even when it was almost empty, the church did not look
as big as the film had made it seem.
In the film, it takes Maria almost the entire length of
“Maria” to walk down the aisle. In reality, it
shouldn’t take any longer than getting to “Many a thing
you know you’d like to tell her … .”
When I watched that scene the next day (the hostel had daily
“Sound of Music” screenings), I realized they filmed
Maria walking down the aisle from the very top of the church so you
see the whole aisle and it looks big and distant from way up there.
Then they switch and show her walking from the side. They probably
had the actress back up and walk it again, since all the pews look
the same. But despite its short aisle, and the fact that most of
the walls were under repair, you could still feel the presence of
Julie Andrews.
The white gazebo, however, is just as pretty as it looks on
film. This is the gazebo that Rolfe and Liesl run to when it starts
to rain. Once inside, they sing and dance to “Sixteen Going
on Seventeen.” They leap across the benches and end the scene
with the happiest, sweetest movie kiss I’ve ever seen.
The gazebo now sits in a public park surrounded by beautiful
trees and flowers. But the gazebo itself is not public; the door is
locked, probably because they don’t want people to injure
themselves trying to jump from bench to bench while singing ““
a task the actors made look easy. I was disappointed because it was
raining hard and I wanted to seek shelter from the storm in the
same gazebo that Rolfe and Liesl sought shelter.
It would have been so poetic.
But my favorite stop on the tour was the small mountain town
that was the birthplace of Mozart’s mother. This town had the
most spectacular mountain views and I really did feel like bursting
into song. I only whispered one chorus of “The Sound of
Music” because I didn’t want to look stupid. This town
had no real “Sound of Music” connection, but it had a
really great gift shop. I bought one of those green Austrian hats
with the feather in the side.
The fountain that the children skip around during
“Do-Re-Mi” would be a very plain fountain in any other
city. But with the memory of the von Trapp children, the
“Do-Re-Mi” fountain became an incredibly cool
sight.
I hadn’t seen “The Sound of Music” in at least
five years but it was amazing how well I remembered each landmark.
I felt as if I had been to Salzburg before, but that this time was
better because I got to be in the picture.
Amy Crocker is currently studying abroad. E-mail her at
acrocker@media.ucla.edu.