Nelson Eddy…43 years ago today he died at age 65, too young and too soon. While he brought pleasure to millions with his voice, his personal life wasn’t particularly blissful. There’s no doubt that stress and unhappiness helped lead him to an early death.
In the midst of this Oscar weekend in which Hollywood and the film industry is celebrated, this is one sad note for the many Nelson Eddy fans who still remember.
It is always a sore point that Nelson Eddy and Jeanette MacDonald never had one of their great films acknowledged by the Academy with a Best Picture Oscar. Their movie Maytime, the highest grossing movie worldwide of 1937, wasn’t even nominated! In fact, it only received a single nomination for the score by Herbert Stothart.
I attended an Oscar party once and I held a real Oscar in my hands. It was heavy and yes, there was something special about it.
But all the awards in the world don’t replace undying loyalty and caring of filmgoers or fans that endures for half a century and even more. Or a movie that is entertaining, timeless and enjoyable as well as excellent – even decades after its first release. Being able to watch a film over and over – 20 or 50 or 100 times – and still love it and find something new to see or hear – now that is a Best Picture!
Thank you, Nelson, for the musical legacy you left us.
This chandelier from the Jeanette MacDonald-Nelson Eddy movie "Maytime" now hangs in the Mishler Theatre, Altoona, PA
The Jeanette MacDonald – Nelson Eddy story will be featured in the musical stage production of “A Scandalous Affair” on March 13, 2010. Location: Mishler Theatre, Altoona, PA. Tickets: $35. The show stars international opera singers Hallie Neill and Theodore Lambrinos (formerly of the Metropolitan Opera). “A Scandalous Affair” was written by Hallie Neill and and based on the best-selling biography Sweethearts by Sharon Rich. Rich will be a featured guest and will answer questions and sign books after the performance. This event is a fundraiser for the theatre.
The Mishler website link is here andticket info here. A highlight for Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy fans is that an original chandelier used in the 1937 movie Maytime was purchased at the MGM auction and now hangs in the Mishler Theatre.
Sharon Rich was friends with Jeanette MacDonald’s older sister Blossom Rock (“grandmama” on the original TV series The Addams Family). Ms. Rock wanted her sister’s bittersweet life story told and authorized Rich to write it. Rich not only interviewed over 200 people in researching Sweethearts but also had access to Jeanette MacDonald’s unpublished autobiography, the unfinished memoirs of Nelson Eddy’s mother, plus hundreds of pages of handwritten love letters, diary entries and other contemporary source materials.
Update: Looks like we were the very first to break this news early in the morning on a major website. Within a few hours of our posting this, an official statement was made and subsequently the news wires picked up the story.
I just received news that Kathryn Grayson passed away last night at age 88.
No formal announcement has been made yet and it isn’t in the news yet. Sometimes it takes 2 or 3 days before an official press release is announced; this was the case when Susanna Foster died. But I wanted to let everyone know.
Kathryn Grayson was a kind lady who in the early days of the club attended our Jeanette MacDonald Nelson Eddy club meetings in Los Angeles. Grayson was a fan of MacDonald’s and also, when she first came to MGM she was supposed to co-star with Nelson Eddy in what would have been his final movie there, Lucky Star. In that movie Nelson would have played 2 roles and he had already read and made written notations on his script when he decided instead to buy out his contract and leave MGM.
Below is a screenshot of our magazine #3 from Spring 1978, after Grayson attended two events and for a time became an honorary member, along with Eleanor Powell, Miliza Korjus and others.
More recently Kathryn Grayson attended the Nelson Eddy Drive ceremony at Hollywood Forever. She spoke afterward to the group there. You can see pictures of her at the dedication ceremony at this link.
If you are in the New York City area, please join us on the evening of February 18 for a production of “A Scandalous Affair.” This is the musical based on the book “Sweethearts” and stars Hallie Neill and Theodore Lambrinos. The show is a fundraiser for the famous Players Club. There will be a celebrity reception afterwards with some “name” actors and also Sharon Rich will be featured in a “Meet and Greet” and book signing at this reception.
For this performance, the pianist is William Lewis, the accompanist for famous Irish tenor Ronan Tynan.
The Players Club is a very famous NYC landmark. It was founded by actor Edwin Booth – older brother of the infamous John Wilkes Booth. Mark Twain and other luminaries were members, as was John Barrymore and current stars like Al Pacino and Angela Lansbury. This is going to be a fabulous evening of entertainment and nostalgia. If you can get to NYC, please join us!
Ticket info and more details here at this link.
Admission is tax deductible however the reception fee afterwards is not.
Please email us if you are planning to attend. If we can get a good-sized Mac/Eddy group together, we’ll try to plan a before-or-after event.
If you live near Altoona, PA or can get there on Saturday, March 13, please join us for one performance at 8 pm of “A Scandalous Affair” starring Hallie Neill and Theodore Lambrinos. The musical show is based on the book Sweethearts.
Sharon Rich will do a book signing and Q&A after the performance.
The evening is a fundraiser for the theater. Maybe you’re not aware of this but the chandelier in the theater is the very one that was used in the movie Maytime – when Jeanette and John Barrymore go to the court of Louie Napoleon! It was purchased at the MGM auction years ago and is a highlight of this beautiful theater!
Since this is a Saturday, we might try to put together a Mac/Eddy get-together in the afternoon as well. Please email us if you would like to attend a Mac/Eddy club event in the afternoon prior to the evening performance! This would probably be a free event since there is an admission fee for the evening show.
Tickets for the performance are available online at this link. You can learn more about the theater here.
Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy fans: Click here to see the entire cruise gear line of Jeanette and Nelson shirts, mugs, tote bags and other items! You don’t have to be actually joining us on this year’s cruise to be with us in spirit!
In the heyday of Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy, MGM was the most prestigious movie studio in Hollywood, boasting “more stars than there are heaven.” Studio mogul Louis B. Mayer always attributed the studio’s success to himself and sure enough, when he was finally toppled from his throne in the 1950s, MGM began a slow decline from which it never recovered. Additionally, the new moguls did away with a studio tour which was briefly available in the 1960s. Rather than turn history into a thriving tourist attraction – as Universal Studios did, MGM’s back lots were sold off for real estate value. Studio treasures such as costumes, sets, props, were sold at auction and other memorabilia such as movie stills and negatives were literally destroyed in mass burnings. I know this to be true because at the time, we had a friend who was employed at MGM and managed to salvage hundreds of Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy film stills before they were trashed. This was done at great risk to himself, because employees were fired on the spot if they were caught saving anything. Needless to say, many employees tried to protect MGM’s history as best they could, and all this memorabilia has scattered across the globe into private collections.
In recent years, Sony took over the legendary studio grounds and has its own low-key tour. I’ve taken it and it’s fine for what it is. I enjoyed seeing the music building where Herbert Stothart worked, conducting his orchestra while Jeanette and Nelson sang along and recorded their songs such as “Indian Love Call” and “Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life.”
The other memorable spot was the sound stage in which the tour guide said: “Under this current flooring is the yellow brick road from The Wizard of Oz.” Gee, don’t you think MGM could have build an entire studio tour empire just around that one sound stage?
The friends I was with during the tour were familiar with the studio from the “old days” and were able to point out to me what films (that history cares about) were filmed in which sound stages. The tour guide was asking them questions!
Today, in 2009, MGM faces yet another crisis, and soon may exist only as a name, a memory of Hollywood’s golden years. According to this press release, all that is left is their film library and current film rights:
MGM’s creditors have rejected a proposal to turn their $3.7 billion in loans to the company into equity as part of a restructuring plan to keep the studio out of bankruptcy, BusinessWeek reported today (Wednesday), citing a source with knowledge of a November 4 meeting between the creditors committee and MGM CEO Stephen Cooper. Instead, two days after the meeting, they asked Cooper to seek a buyer for the company but were told that it was unlikely that the studio would fetch more than $1.5 billion, roughly what the studio’s rights to the James Bond franchise alone might be worth, the magazine said. It noted that several studios are interested in buying MGM — but not to maintain it as a viable studio. They are interested instead in its film library, the Bond franchise, and MGM’s share of the rights to the Lord of the Rings prequel, The Hobbit.
Ironic that the once “lesser” studios, Paramount, Universal, 20th Century Fox, have all reinvented themselves and continue to flourish into the 21st century.
We have finalized plans for our 2010 Valentine’s week cruise – a 7-day on the Carnival Pride, sailing from Baltimore, MD. Date: February 7-14, 2010!
I have set up a separate informational website with all the cruise details in one place. You also need to make your reservations there – fill in the registration form online. A $25 deposit will hold your cabin. The cruise website: http://www.maceddy.com/cruise.
Your reservations need to be made in the next week or so, to get the prices that are quoted on that website.
Last time, the Convention Fee was combined into the overall price. This time, we will collect the convention fee separately on our main website, at this link. We will process your cruise payments for you directly to Carnival.
We are excited about putting this cruise together ourselves, and definitely want your input about which 3 films to show, talent night and any other activities you’d like to do during our time together.
