Cher Version
Although Black's version of "Alfie" had served as a promotional tool for the film's UK release rather than as the film's theme - being in fact featured nowhere on the soundtrack of the film's UK release - for the US release of the film Alfie the film's distributor United Artists wanted the song featured on the film's soundtrack despite the objections of the film's director Lewis Gilbert who felt the song "Alfie" would distract from the jazz score he had had Sonny Rollins provide for the film. United Artists compromised with Gilbert in keeping the prospective theme song out of the main body of the film Alfie but having it play during the closing credits.
Rather than utilize Black's version, United Artists commissioned a new version of the song "Alfie" by Cher who was on the roster of Imperial Records which was a United Artist subsidiary. Recorded at Gold Star Studios, Cher's version of "Alfie" was released at the end of June 1966 almost two months prior to the film's US premiere (August 25, 1966); Sonny Bono's heavy-handed production (à la Phil Spector) did not showcase the song appealingly and despite being the follow-up to the No.2 hit "Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)" Cher's version of "Alfie" rose no higher than No.32.
The versions of "Alfie" by both Cilla Black and Cher were released in Australia in July 1966, with Black's becoming the major hit at No.22; the Cher version's Australian chart peak was No.96.
"Alfie" was featured on the October 1966 album release entitled Chér.
Despite her 1966 version being a relative chart disappointment, Cher was recruited to remake the song "Alfie" to play under the closing credits of the 2004 remake of the film Alfie, Cher by then being the only one of the song's early interpreters to have had any recent recording success. After previews, audiences responded to Cher's updated version of the theme song with laughter which led to the track being subsequently dropped from the soundtrack. After unsuccessfully wooing Norah Jones to remake "Alfie" for the film, the producers successfully recruited Joss Stone.
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“Truth cannot be defined or tested by agreement with ‘the world’; for not only do truths differ for different worlds but the nature of agreement between a world apart from it is notoriously nebulous. Rather—speaking loosely and without trying to answer either Pilate’s question or Tarski’s—a version is to be taken to be true when it offends no unyielding beliefs and none of its own precepts.”
—Nelson Goodman (b. 1906)