I wonder what a remake of The Eddy Duchin Story would be like today. Would or could they tell some of the real story, especially since Peter Duchin is still with us.
The real Eddy Duchin was a stylish and elegant pianist who broke in with the Leo Reisman Orchestra and then went out on his own with a band. Eddy came along in what we would call the sweet era of popular music, just before swing came in. His golden years would have been the early to middle Thirties.
Eddy also married Marjorie Oelrichs, a noted interior designer for the Park Avenue set and she died in 1937 within days of giving birth to their son Peter.
Tyrone Power bore more than a passing resemblance to Duchin which no doubt helped the believability of his very sincere performance. Kim Novak played Marjorie Oelrichs Duchin and she was quite good although she does die off in the first half of the film. Eddy himself died in 1951 of leukemia at the age of 42, leaving young Peter an orphan.
The man who took in young Peter was not the fictional Sherman Wadsworth as played by Sheppard Strudwick. Sherman Wadsworth was a pseudonym for the man who at the time was the Governor of New York, Averill Harriman, who at that point was a contender for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1956.
According to a recent biography of Harriman, Harriman believed though he could never prove that the widower Duchin and his wife Marie were having an affair. This was while Harriman was over in Great Britain serving as President Roosevelt's personal representative to Winston Churchill. Also while Harriman was over there he wasn't playing the martyred husband, he was having an affair with Pamela Digby Churchill, wife of Randolph Churchill who later Harriman married after both were rid of their respective spouses.
Eddy Duchin made several film appearances in the Thirties and has a page on the Internet Movie Database. If you look at his biography section you will note that it only lists one wife for him. The character that Victoria Shaw played must have been a bit of fiction dreamed up by the author of the screenplay, Leo Katcher. Katcher at the time was a reporter for the New York Post which in those days was a most liberal paper and a supporter of Governor Harriman.
Even though Eddy was not quite the man that Ty Power is on the screen, I'm sure he would have approved of the film. What is also true is the relationship with the son he had and how time and circumstance made it all too brief. The best scenes in the film are Power with young Rex Thompson who plays a juvenile Peter. Also note a scene in the Phillipines when Duchin is in the Navy with little Warren Hsieh.
The Eddy Duchin Story is a good bit of entertainment and the piano music of Carmen Cavallaro pinchhitting for Duchin made the original cast album a big seller.
The real Eddy Duchin was a stylish and elegant pianist who broke in with the Leo Reisman Orchestra and then went out on his own with a band. Eddy came along in what we would call the sweet era of popular music, just before swing came in. His golden years would have been the early to middle Thirties.
Eddy also married Marjorie Oelrichs, a noted interior designer for the Park Avenue set and she died in 1937 within days of giving birth to their son Peter.
Tyrone Power bore more than a passing resemblance to Duchin which no doubt helped the believability of his very sincere performance. Kim Novak played Marjorie Oelrichs Duchin and she was quite good although she does die off in the first half of the film. Eddy himself died in 1951 of leukemia at the age of 42, leaving young Peter an orphan.
The man who took in young Peter was not the fictional Sherman Wadsworth as played by Sheppard Strudwick. Sherman Wadsworth was a pseudonym for the man who at the time was the Governor of New York, Averill Harriman, who at that point was a contender for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1956.
According to a recent biography of Harriman, Harriman believed though he could never prove that the widower Duchin and his wife Marie were having an affair. This was while Harriman was over in Great Britain serving as President Roosevelt's personal representative to Winston Churchill. Also while Harriman was over there he wasn't playing the martyred husband, he was having an affair with Pamela Digby Churchill, wife of Randolph Churchill who later Harriman married after both were rid of their respective spouses.
Eddy Duchin made several film appearances in the Thirties and has a page on the Internet Movie Database. If you look at his biography section you will note that it only lists one wife for him. The character that Victoria Shaw played must have been a bit of fiction dreamed up by the author of the screenplay, Leo Katcher. Katcher at the time was a reporter for the New York Post which in those days was a most liberal paper and a supporter of Governor Harriman.
Even though Eddy was not quite the man that Ty Power is on the screen, I'm sure he would have approved of the film. What is also true is the relationship with the son he had and how time and circumstance made it all too brief. The best scenes in the film are Power with young Rex Thompson who plays a juvenile Peter. Also note a scene in the Phillipines when Duchin is in the Navy with little Warren Hsieh.
The Eddy Duchin Story is a good bit of entertainment and the piano music of Carmen Cavallaro pinchhitting for Duchin made the original cast album a big seller.