The Five Pennies
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Five Pennies was a semi-biographical 1959 film starring Danny Kaye as cornet player and bandleader Red Nichols. Other cast members included Barbara Bel Geddes, Harry Guardino, Bob Crosby, Louis Armstrong, and Tuesday Weld. The film was directed by Melville Shavelson.
The film received four Oscar nominations: Best Musical Scoring (Leith Stevens), Best Original Song (Silvia Fine), Best Cinematography (Daniel L. Fapp), and Best Costumes (Edith Head).
The real Red Nichols recorded all of Kaye's cornet playing for the film soundtrack.
[edit] Plot summary
Red Nichols (Kaye) is a small-town cornet player who moves to New York City in the 1920s and finds work in a band led by Wil Paradise (Crosby). He meets and marries singer Bobbie Meredith (Bel Geddes), and the two form their own Dixieland band called "The Five Pennies." As their popularity peaks, their young daughter Dorothy contracts polio and the family leaves the music business, moving to Los Angeles. When Dorothy (Weld) becomes a teen she learns of her father's music career and persuades him go on a comeback tour. The tour borders on failure until several notable musicians from Nichols' past appear to save the day.
