The Buddy Holly Story
The Buddy Holly Story is a 1978 biographical film which tells the life story of rock musician Buddy Holly. It stars Gary Busey, Don Stroud, Charles Martin Smith, Conrad Janis, William Jordan, and Maria Richwine, who played Maria Elena Holly.
The movie was adapted by Robert Gittler from the biography of Holly by John Goldrosen. It was directed by Steve Rash.
It won the Academy Award for Best Music, Original
Song Score and Its Adaptation or Best Adaptation Score, and was nominated for
Best Actor in a Leading Role (Gary Busey) and Best Sound.
The film opens with Buddy Holly's beginnings as a teenager in Lubbock, Texas and his emergence into the world of rock and roll with his fictional good friends and bandmates, drummer Jesse Charles (Don Stroud) and bass player Ray Bob Simmons (Charles Martin Smith), soon to be known as The Crickets. Their first break comes when they are brought to Nashville, Tennessee to record, but Buddy's vision soon clashes with the producers' rigid ideas of how the music should sound and he walks out. Eventually, he finds a more flexible producer, Ross Turner (Conrad Janis), who, after listening to their audition, very reluctantly allows Buddy and the Crickets to make music the way he wants.
While there, he meets Turner's secretary, Maria Elena Santiago (Maria Richwine). His budding romance with her nearly ends before it can begin, when her aunt initially refuses to let her date him, but Buddy persuades her to change her mind. On their very first date, Maria accepts his marriage proposal and they are soon wed.
A humorous episode results from a misunderstanding in one of their early bookings. Sol Gittler (Dick O'Neill) signs them up sight-unseen for the famous Apollo Theater in Harlem, assuming from their music that they're an African-American band. When three white Texans show up instead, he is stunned, but unwilling to pay them for doing nothing, he nervously lets them perform and prays fervently that the all-black audience doesn't riot at the sight of the first all-white band to play there. (In real life, that distinction belongs to Jimmy Cavallo and The House Rockers, who played at that venue in 1956.) After an uncomfortable start and an initially hostile crowd, Buddy's songs soon win them over and the Crickets are a tremendous hit. Gittler books them to come back several times.
After two years, Ray Bob and Jesse decide to break up the band, feeling overshadowed by Buddy and not wanting to relocate to New York City. Initially, he is saddened by their departure, but he soldiers on. When Maria announces that she is pregnant, Buddy is delighted.
On February 2, 1959, preparing for a concert at Clear Lake, Iowa, Holly decides to charter a private plane to fly to Moorhead, Minnesota for his next big concert. The Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens (who is reluctant to fly, but wins a coin toss with Tommy Allsup for the last seat) join him on the flight. Meanwhile, the Crickets, feeling nostaglic, appear unexpectedly at Maria's door, expressing their desire to reunite the band. They trace Buddy's next tour stop at Minnesota, and they plan to surprise him there. After playing his final song, "Not Fade Away", Holly bids the crowd farewell with "Thank you Clearlake! We love you. C'mon....we'll see you next year.", unaware that, for him, next year will never come. A caption at the end reveals the deaths of Holly, Valens, and the Bopper in a plane crash that night and dedicates the film to his family and friends. The movie ends by saying "...And the rest is Rock and Roll."
Trivia
Keith
Moon, drummer for English rock group The Who, died just after leaving the premiere
of the movie.
Every year on Buddy Holly's birthday, Paul McCartney always
screens this film as part of a "Buddy Holly Festival."
Buddy Holly's
widow, Maria Elena, allegedly wept during a private screening at the scene where
Busey (as Buddy) sings the song "True Love Ways".
Inaccuracies
Many
consider the film to be a highly fictionalized portrayal of Holly's life. As with
many biopictures, the Buddy Holly Story tends to let historical accuracy take
a back seat to dramatic effect, folklore and legend for audience entertainment.
For example:
The scene in the garage in which the members of the band hear
a cricket on a recorded tape is pure embellishment. This event did indeed occur,
in the Norman Petty Studio in Clovis, NM, but it did not inspire the Crickets
to choose the name. This happened after they already decided on using the name
the Crickets. The cricket can actually be heard chirping at the end of the song
"I'm Gonna Love You Too".
The poignant scene in which Buddy's former
mates in the Crickets appear unannounced at Maria's door in New York is also a
fabrication, but a full reunion with the Crickets had been discussed with Buddy
prior to the Winter Party Dance Tour in 1959, and was scheduled to occur after
the tour.
The scene showing Lubbock with mountains in the background of the
bus station caused gales of laughter when the film was premiered in Lubbock, which
is located on the flat West Texas plain.
The family name on their truck is
spelled "Holly," but the correct spelling was "Holley." Buddy's
name was misspelled on the record deal, so he simply adopted the revised name.
Buddy, Ritchie Valens, and the Bopper gave their final concert at the Surf
Ballroom, not at the Clear Lake Auditorium, as depicted in the film.
In one
scene, Buddy is shown writing a music score in a studio. In reality, he could
not read or write music, but he instead hummed the beat and worked it out himself.
Also in the scene where Buddy sings "Rave On", "It's So Easy"
and "Oh Boy!" at the Apollo, the year was 1957. However, none of these
songs were written or released until 1958. So none of these songs would have been
performed at the Apollo Theatre at that time.
The Crickets were angry at being
portrayed (with names changed to avoid legal action) as racists — this prompted
their then singer Sonny Curtis to pen a critical song about the film called "The
Real Buddy Holly Story." In turn, this became the title of a Buddy Holly
documentary made by Holly fan Paul McCartney and his MPL Productions company in
association with the BBC. They were also angry that there were only two Crickets
portrayed (rhythm guitarist Niki Sullivan was left out entirely), and their names
changed, as they had already sold their movie rights to another studio. Norman
Petty, the Crickets' manager, was also not depicted.
The guitars used by Buddy
Holly in the movie are a complete mess from a historical point of view. Buddy
Holly is known as the first prominent Stratocaster player. In the movie the Strat
appears towards the end, but the guitar shown seems to be an early 70’s model.
The first guitar shown in the movie is a Bronco, launched for the first time by
Fender in 1968. The actual guitar seems to be from the early 70’s. The main
guitar in the movie is a Fender Telecaster. Even though the Telecaster was launched
in the early 50’s, the guitar used in the movie is most likely an early 70’s
model as well. But more important - as far as we know - Buddy Holly never played
a Telecaster on stage.
Animation
- Comedy - Crime
- Documentary
-
Family - Foreign
Language - Historical
- Horror - Musical
- Political
Recommended- Romance- Science Fiction and Fantasy - Sport Movies -- Thriller - War - Western - Wildlife
A map of where different US films & TV programmes blanket across the USA are
ZANADU - A FUN BASED SITE, WITH SOME FILM RELATED SECTIONS
Flight Las Vegas Nevada - Find a flight to Las Vegas
Cheap flights Beijing - Get your tickets here Fly to Beijing
Bank Interest Rates - A Website on Bank Interest Rates
Car Cheap Insurance - Get Cheap Car Insurance from here
Flights London - Want to fly to or Visit London get your Flight and Hotel place here
Get
your fave music here for your IPOD
Buy DVD Rent DVD Get your DVDs from here