By Michaela Gordoni
SOUND OF MUSIC child stars Kym Korath and Nicholas Hammond stayed tight through the years and even went to prom together.
“I loved my SOUND OF MUSIC siblings — I still love them!” said Korath, who was 5 when she played Gretl, the youngest Von Trapp. “It was such a gift to be given six siblings. My sister and brother were 16 and 15 years older than I was, respectively, so I almost grew up as a little bit of an only child.”
“So I suddenly had all of these siblings…And yeah, they’ve remained in my life forever,” she said. “Nicky — Nick Hammond — took me to my first prom because my mother did not trust anybody else with me at that point. And she thought she could trust Nicky — and she could trust Nicky.”
Hammond played Friedrich Von Trapp, the oldest brother.
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“I think the secret behind our friendship is the secret of all enduring friendships, although ours started at a film studio; staying close, loyal, and being there for one another,” Karath told Fox News Digital.
“We know we’ve been through a lot with each other: we’ve been through marriages, we’ve been through divorces; we’ve been through the deaths of family members and deaths of now two of our siblings from the film. And those are huge things,” Hammond said.
Hammond said it’s a unique and heavy experience to be a child star in one of the world’s most successful films.
“It was only us seven that knew what that experience was like,” he said. “Our own siblings and our parents kind of did, but didn’t really. They didn’t know what it was like to walk into the school cafeteria and suddenly 500 people just stop eating and turn and stare at you.”
When their oldest “sibling,” Charmian Carr, who played Liesl, died, Hammond stepped in as the big brother.
“You know, we’ve each got kind of our relationship with each other. I mean, very much like a real family,” he said. “When Charmain Carr, playing Liesl was alive, she was clearly the sort of leader of the pack.”
“And we all turned to Charmain. She was older than us, you know, and we really looked upon her as kind of a mentor,” he told Parade.
Hammond says that now, after 60 years, he still hears from his co-stars every week.
“I know there are stories of child actors who have had really unfortunate times, and I feel for that, and I can see how it can happen,” he said. “I just feel so blessed that I had a series of good, positive experiences working with people whom I admired and who treated me respectfully. And so to me, it was just the greatest job in the world.”
THE SOUND OF MUSIC 60th anniversary was available in theaters on Sept. 13, and is available to stream on digital outlets.
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