Today’s post is about Nelson, appropriately enough. I like this particular quick blurb:
“3/5/1940 SFC Jimmie Fidler: Nelson Eddy and Jeanette MacDonald, individually concert touring, will try to arrange at least one joint date before returning to Hollywood.”
Background data: Jeanette and Nelson had reunited at this point after his marriage and they kept tabs while both were on tour…However, Nelson started to fall apart as the realization of their predicament hit him. He collapsed after his Chicago concert just before this blurb was published…and he had to cancel a March 5 concert in Cleveland. One wonders whether Jimmy Fiedler was tipped off as to the turmoil going on in Nelson’s life? Could it be coincidence that Nelson and Jeanette decided on a “joint date” so she could go to his side without public suspicion?
If you take a look at “Sweethearts”, pages 275-276, you’ll note that Nelson managed to get through 8 more concerts before suffering “a final crackup,” according to his mother – who flew to Milwaukee to bring her son home to a local hospital.
On page 529 of “Sweethearts,” I reproduced a handwritten letter from 1947 naming a list of people “who know all but are loyal…can you imagine it being this well known and not a leak anyplace?” Jimmy Fidler is on that list!