I thought that I had always heard it on the Original Cast Recording 1957 (I remember that album cover) and heard “bright” and “tonight”. Of course the amazon clip starts after the first verse! I’ll have to go home and check the vintage of the copy I have, but I’ve been listening to it since the mid 70s and never heard “gay”.
Sorry, but I absolutely hated this commercial. I’m not even sure I get it.
Maria Sharapova stomping through a hotel lobby to a tennis court not cracking a smile and everyone singing that stupid song with the enthusiasm of someone getting a root canal.
I’m sure there’s a cool point I missed, but it didn’t even make sense to me and it just seemed painfully long.
From one semi-source, the stage version is “pretty and witty and bright” (to rhyme with “night”) as on stage, the scene happened at night. In the movie, the scene happens in afternoon so - Maria becomes “pretty and witty and gay,” because nothing rhymes with “afternoon.”
I wanted to like the commercial, but it didn’t quite pull it off. I was waiting for a punchline that never came.
This is the way I have always known it and I am a big fan of West Side Story. In fact, I started singing along with the commercial and it really tripped me up when they changed the lyrics.
Thesesynopses mention the “I Feel Pretty” scene happens at 9:15 pm so bright/tonight fits the stage show.
ACT II I FEEL PRETTY (Maria and the Girls)
ACT II 9:15 P.M - A Bedroom
Act Two
Unaware of the tragedy under the highway, Maria sings to her girl friends about how beautiful she feels (“I Feel Pretty”). She speaks of marriage, and her friends assume she is thinking about Chino.
Anyhoo, I figure the commercial is to say that Maria Sharapova can win, unlike other pretty girls who didn’t, aka Anna Kournikova.
This is what I took from it, too. I liked the commercial. Everyone else goes on about how she’s pretty, presumably implying she’s nothing more, and she’s proving she’s more than just a pretty face. That’s why she’s so stonefaced and angry looking.
For the record, I’ve always heard it sung as “gay,” too, and it was the first thing I noticed about the commercial (and probably made me pay attention to it more than I might have otherwise).
My favorite parts of the commercial were the announcer guys, the guy sitting in the cool looking chair with the microphone, and the really cute smiling girl with the ears towards the end. Close runner up is the overly enthusiastic camera guy who punctuated his line with a sigh.
And yeah, the first two or three times I saw the commercial, I was confused cause I didn’t know who was in it or what was going on (While I know of Maria Sharapova, I’d never paid enough attention to recognizer her on sight). At first I thought maybe it was a commercial for a hotel.
Exactly. In real life, too, the buzz is always about how gorgeous she is; nobody wants to talk about the game. Scads of Google hits every day for pictures of her. She gets more and more steamed as she walks past all the adoring “pretty” fans. Then she gets on the court, and her racket does the talking. Pow! How’s that for pretty?