Great Barrington — Julia Greenberg, co-director of the documentary “Dory Previn: On My Way to Where,” remembers the first time she heard a song by Dory Previn. “I heard one of her songs in my friend’s car on a mix CD that someone made for my friend,” Greenberg said. “I immediately sensed its complete uniqueness, and I thought it was a current song because it felt so vibey and smart. It was a period when these great anti-folk artists were coming up. I was like, ‘Oh God, this is brilliant!’”
It turns out the song that so captured Greenberg was recorded several decades before she first heard it. The song was “Holy Man on Malibu Bus Number Three,” and it came out on Previn’s album “Mary C. Brown And The Hollywood Sign” in 1972.
“That song opened up a vista somehow for me,” Greenberg explained. “I think it was a mix between 1970s folk and pop. It was beautifully produced, and this classic melody struck me in a way that I sensed that it had roots somewhere else. I knew nothing about her at the time.”
That first fateful listen in her friend’s car led Greenberg down a road of discovering Previn’s songs, albums, and learning more about her career that stretched for several decades and through many genres. Eventually, Greenberg co-directed the documentary “On My Way to Where,” which will be screened at The Triplex on Saturday, August 17, at 4 p.m. Greenberg will be present for the screening with animator Emily Hubley, who animated and brought to life multiple entries of Previn’s journals during the documentary.
As the documentary recounts, Previn (née Langan) grew up in Woodbridge, N.J., during the Great Depression with an abusive father who pushed her into show business.
Previn attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City for one year before dropping out because she could not afford to pay tuition.
For years, she toured as a dancer and singer worked odd jobs all in the pursuit of being a songwriter.
In the late 1950s, by chance, she met film producer Arthur Freed (“An American in Paris,” “Singin’ in the Rain,” “Gigi”), which led her to a job as a lyricist at MGM Studios. Through her job as a lyricist, she met and collaborated with André Previn, whom she would later marry in 1959. The two would collaborate on many songs used for films.
Judy Garland singing “Faraway Part of Town” from the movie “Pepe”, co-written by André Previn and Dory Previn, and nominated for an Academy Award in 1960:
“A Second Chance” performed by Sammy Davis Jr., co-written by André Previn and Dory Previn, and nominated for an Academy Award in 1962.
Dory and André Previn’s songs were performed by numerous artists over the ensuing decade, including Judy Garland, Sammy Davis Jr., Rosemary Clooney, Frank Sinatra, and Tony Bennett.
In the mid-1960s, André Previn switched his attention to touring worldwide as a classical music conductor. But Dory Previn did not join her husband due to her fear of air travel, and she also suffered a psychiatric breakdown in 1965, for which she was briefly hospitalized. Despite this, the Previns continued to collaborate, co-writing five songs for the 1967 movie “Valley of the Dolls.”
“(Theme From) Valley Of The Dolls” as performed by Dionne Warwick, co-written by André Previn and Dory Previn:
But in 1968, while he was in London working with the London Symphony Orchestra, André Previn had affair with actress Mia Farrow. In 1969, Dory Previn discovered the affair after Farrow became pregnant by André Previn. The couple separated in 1969 and finalized their divorce in 1970.
“Beware of Young Girls”, a song off of Dory Previn’s 1970 album “On My Way To Where” is about her ex-husband’s affair with Mia Farrow:
After her divorce, Dory Previn reinvented herself as a singer-songwriter, releasing the 1970 album “On My Way To Where.”
She continued on through the 1970s releasing multiple albums with lyrics that were frank and confrontational, dealing with personal experiences including her mental health and personal relationships.
“Mary C. Brown and the Hollywood Sign” by Dory Previn, from the 1971 album “Mythical Kings and Iguanas”:
“Taps Tremors And Time Steps (One Last Dance For My Father)” by Dory Previn, from the 1971 album “Reflections in a Mud Puddle”:
During the 1970s she released six studio and one live album. While she was not as popular as other female performers of her time, her albums were all critically acclaimed.
Greenberg explained that, over the ensuing decades, Dory Previn’s work has fallen into obscurity. “Until very recently, you could not even find her solo work on streaming,” Greenberg said. “I think the reason some of her work has fallen into obscurity was because of a combination of career choices that she made and who she was as a person. Dory didn’t tour because of her fear of flying, which created barriers to promoting her music. Most of her songs were emotional and rooted in her lived experience of mental illness. All of that placed limits on how much the records were promoted. There was also a limit on how the record company could promote her. We live in a misogynistic music business world, and here she was a woman in her late 40s and early 50s putting out brutally honest, sexually alive songs that dealt with mental illness and family trauma that touched people deeply. But I think those songs also scared a lot of people.”
“Lemon Headed Ladies” by Dory Previn, from the 1971 album “Mythical Kings and Iguanas”:
Dory Previn eventually pulled back from making albums and started working for television. She won an Emmy Award in 1984 for co-writing the song “We’ll Win This World” for the movie “Two of a Kind.” In her acceptance speech during the award ceremony, Previn thanked her imaginary friends “Mama,” “Max,” and “The Lion,” which Hubley animates in the film.
“She spoke so openly about her ambivalences and her depression,” Greenberg said. “These were all things that, at the time, were not the stuff of song lyrics. She decided to very specifically handle her diagnosis in her way. She heard voices, and at the time, there were very specific ways that they were dealt with, which were with drugs, and through institutionalizations, all of which she went through. But at a certain point, she decided to try and interact with her voices more positively. She thought, ‘Well, what if these voices are here to support me in some way and not scare me?’”
Hubley animates the process of Dory Previn embracing her voices, along with her journals, throughout the film. “I think balancing the animation with performance and archival footage were all key to the documentary,” Greenberg said. “For a musician who is considered to be obscure, she sure was on television a lot. In her interviews, she speaks with such grace, deliberateness, and authority about her turmoil.”
Over the years, Greenberg has become an advocate for Dory Previn’s music and career. Years before she started work on the documentary, Greenberg had performed concerts of Dory Previn’s music, eventually meeting and becoming friends with her.
At one point in her later life, Previn was a resident of Southfield.
Previn died in 2012, at the age of 88, in Southfield.
Greenberg said that she hopes that the documentary will lead to a revaluation of Dory Previn’s work. “I want her body of work to be recognized as among the most unique, brilliantly structured, and hilarious songwriting of the 1970s,” Greenberg said. “I also feel the same way about her work with André Previn. The problem is that, when it comes to those songs, most people just see André Previn’s name. When we interviewed Michael Feinstein in the film, he was on the record saying, ‘Don’t forget about Dory. She is a huge piece of the puzzle for these songs.’ She should be part of American cultural history. I do think that her struggle with her mental health and how she embraced her voices has a lot to teach all of us about what goes on in our heads and how to relate to it. I hope it also can be a help to people who hear voices, have family members who hear voices, and can see an example of a positive example of how one might deal with it.”
For more information about the August 17 screening, visit The Triplex’s website.
