Themes: Musician's Life, Life in the Arts, Rags To Riches
Main Cast: Danny Kaye, Barbara Bel Geddes, Louis Armstrong, Harry Guardino, Tuesday Weld, Bob Crosby
Release Year: 1959
Country: US
Run Time: 117 minutes
Plot
The Five Pennies is the life story of influential jazz cornetist Red Nichols, played here by a remarkably straight-faced Danny Kaye. The somewhat romanticized screenplay chronicles Nichols' rise from obscurity, annotates the many future bandleaders who would play with Nichols' "Five Pennies," and details his self-destructive streak and (seeming) inability to conform to changing musical tastes. Weaving in and out of the main story is a sentimental subplot concerning Nichols' physically impaired daughter Dorothy, played by Susan Gordon as a child and by Tuesday Weld (in her movie debut) as a young woman. Nichols's long-suffering wife is portrayed by Barbara Bel Geddes. The storyline occasionally lapses into sappiness and the ending is almost impossibly lachrymose, but the musical highlights save the day. Especially memorable is Danny Kaye's duet with Louis Armstrong. Among the real-life musicians who grace the supporting cast of The Five Pennies are Bob Crosby, Ray Anthony, Shelly Manne, and, as Jimmy Dorsey, Bobby Troup. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
Undeniably schmaltzy, The Five Pennies still has a certain pull. Most viewers will wince and groan at its soap operatics every five minutes or so, and will probably find themselves saying, "That's enough." Yet they probably won't change the channel until the ridiculously over-the-top finale, and by then the whole picture will have passed anyway. Despite its heavy-handedness, Five Pennies is enjoyable and engrossing enough to keep one's attention. It is immeasurably aided by the generous helping of musical numbers that pervade the film; when one has Louis Armstrong on hand to perform "Bill Bailey Won't You Please Come Home" and "When the Saints Go Marching In," it's hard to complain too much about the scenes that frame them. Add in some expert horn work from the real Red Nichols, a couple of Danny Kaye "specialty" numbers, and a few smooth vocals from Bob Crosby and the strengths become clearer. Kaye's overall performance is quite good -- even managing to make use of the old cliché that a character's impotence is revealed through problems with his musicianship -- and Barbara Bel Geddes is warm and winning throughout. If viewers are prepared to make allowances for the blatant "tugging at the heartstrings" approach of the script, they'll probably have a pretty decent time. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide
Susan Gordon - Dorothy Nichols, ages 6-8; Ray Anthony - Jimmy Dorsey; Bobby Troup - Arthur Schutt; Shelly Manne - Dave Tough; Ray Daley - Glenn Miller; Valerie Allen - Tommye Eden (Tony's Double-Date with Red & Bobbie); Ned Glass - Murray; Bob Hope - Himself; Richard Shavelson - Party; Blanche Sweet - Bit; Earl Barton - Choreographer
The Five Pennies -- Clifford Curry, Benjamin Washington, Charles Holloway, Herbert Myers, and John and James Myers (twins) -- met in high school in Knoxville, TN. Prior to Curry's involvement, they recorded four years earlier as the Echos (unreleased) and backed Faye Adams on her number one smash "Shake a Hand."
Things started poppin' after Curry joined, their manager, Fred Logan (a big bootlegger in Knoxville), got them a deal with Savoy Records in Newark, NJ. Savoy's owner Herman Lubinsky renamed them the Five Pennies (though there were actually six members) to avoid confusion with another group. Out the box they backed Big Al Miller on "All Is Well" b/w "Try to Understand" (1955), credited as Big Al Miller & the Five Pennies. Savoy followed with the first released credited solely to the Five Pennies "Mr. Moon" b/w "Let It Rain" (1955); the A-Side "Mr. Moon," a Curry composition, is quintessential '50s doo wop with a southern flavor. Their final Savoy release, "My Heart Trembles" b/w "Money," made a little noise but not much, a consortium of Curry, Holloway, Washington, and Herbert and James Myers collaborated on both sides.
They cut six tracks for Savoy but only 2 singles surfaced. Herald Records acquired the masters and rights to two tracks ("Wedding Bells" and "Put This Ring on Your Finger") in 1956 but shelved them; they didn't see daylight until King Tut Records exposed them in the '80s. According to Curry, the group also recorded his "Mine for a Lifetime" (unreleased) for Savoy. The members splintered. John Myers banded with the Chimes for two Arrow Records' singles in 1957, and then the Four Jokers for one Sue single in 1958. In 1964, he revived the Five Pennies as the Four Pennies for one release on Brunswick Records, "You're a Gas With Your Trash" written by John Myers and "You Have No Time to Lose" composed by Bill Buie, Johnny Ellis, and Joseph Myers.
John Myers moved to Tampa, FL, in the early '60s; he gave it another try via Motown's VIP label in 1970 with a group he assembled in Tampa, the Hearts of Stone, who had an album and two single releases on VIP produced by Hank Cosby. Herbert and James Myers live in Knoxville and now sing only gospel music, they didn't participate in the Hearts of Stone. Ben Washington and Charles Holloway relocated to New York, NY, where Holloway hasn't been seen or heard from in years. Curry went solo and charted with "She Shot a Whole in My Soul" on Elf Records in 1967. Curry maintained high level of activity, and in January 2000, he rushed to record a Toyota commercial. ~ Andrew Hamilton, All Music Guide
The film received four Oscar nominations: Best Musical Scoring (Leith Stevens), Best Original Song (Danny Kaye's wife Sylvia 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. Unfortunately, the other musicians in Red's band were not asked to provide their musical contributions and the sound of his "band" was supplied by session players.
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" (a play on Nichols' name, since a nickel equals five pennies). As their popularity peaks, their young daughter Dorothy (Susan Gordon) contracts polio and the family leaves the music business, moving to Los Angeles. When Dorothy becomes a teen (Tuesday Weld) 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.
The drummer in the scenes with Louie Armstrong was Vel Tino, Sr.
The German 1959 dubbing of the movie named 5 Pennies Machen Musik (literally Five Pennies Make Music; released January 29, 1960 in Germany) carries a very special secret: in this dubbing Danny Kaye himself sings phonetically in German. All of Kaye's dialogue was dubbed by his regular German voice Georg Thomalla. But Danny Kaye personally went to Berlin to re-dub his vocals of some of the movie's songs into German. It's very obvious that he doesn't understand a word of what he sings at all, but nevertheless does very well. His performance is charismatic, highly sympathetic and works surprisingly fine in spite of his strong accent and pronunciation.
The dubbing was carried out at the renowned company Berliner Synchron GmbH Wenzel Luedecke, which produced the German language versions of almost every Paramount film throughout the 50s and 60s. The dubbing director was Volker J. Becker. The German lyrics were written by Fritz A. Koeniger, who was one of the most skillful writers for dubbing dialogues in Germany ever. Koeniger also provided the German dialogue book for Five Pennies as well as for Kaye's Knock on Wood, The Court Jester, and White Christmas. The German song titles are: "Der kleine Penny" ("Five Pennies"), "Wiegenlied in Ragtime" ("Lullaby in Ragtime"), "Gut' Nacht, schlaf sacht'" ("Good Night - Sleep Tight"), "Die Musik faehrt Karussell" ("The Music goes round and around"), "Klingeling, klingeling, laeutet's immerzu" ("Jingle Bells").
Sigrid Lagemann, the German dubbing voice for Barbara Bel Geddes, also joins in singing together with Danny Kaye in "Wiegenlied in Ragtime" and sings the final reprise of "Der kleine Penny" on her own. All songs Kaye does together with Louis Armstrong remain in the original English (although Armstrong was around at Berlin that time and did a guest appearance in the 1959 film La Paloma!). The German songs were never released commercially on record and are exclusives of the German movie track.
In early 1960 a German movie magazine published a picture which shows Danny Kaye and his wife Sylvia Fine at the dubbing atelier of Berliner Synchron. There is also a picture of Kaye together with company owner Wenzel Luedecke taken during his recording session. The German track with the phonetical singing is available on the Region 2 PAL DVD versions released in Germany, Great Britain and France.
Danny Kaye also dubbed his vocals by himself into French in the French version Millionaire de Cinq Sous released in France on March 4, 1960. The French dubbing is also available on European Paramount Region 2 DVD releases.
Features an energetic Charleston and an exaggerated Tango with Lizanne Truex and Danny Kaye, who hammed up the Tango during the rehearsal to such a degree that the director added it to the scene.
