Pete Kelly's Blues (film)
| Pete Kelly's Blues | |
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Videocassette poster for Pete Kelly's Blues
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| Directed by | Jack Webb |
| Produced by | Jack Webb |
| Written by | Richard L. Breen |
| Starring | Jack Webb Janet Leigh Edmond O'Brien |
| Music by |
Arthur Hamilton Ray Heindorf David Buttolph Matty Matlock |
| Cinematography | Harold Rosson |
| Edited by | Robert M. Leeds |
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Production
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| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
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Release date
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Running time
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95 min. |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $2,000,000 |
| Box office | $5 million (US) |
Pete Kelly's Blues is a 1955 musical-crime film based on the 1951 original radio series. It was directed by and starred Jack Webb in the title role of a bandleader and musician. Janet Leigh is featured as party girl Ivy Conrad, and Edmond O'Brien as a gangster who applies pressure to Kelly. Peggy Lee portrays alcoholic jazz singer Rose Hopkins (a performance for which she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in a Supporting Role). Ella Fitzgerald makes a cameo as singer Maggie Jackson (a character played by a white actress in the radio series). Lee Marvin, Martin Milner and a very young Jayne Mansfield also make early career appearances.
Much of the dialogue was written by writers who wrote the radio series Pat Novak for Hire, (1946-1949) and the radio version of Pete Kelly's Blues (1951), both in which Webb starred for a time before creating Dragnet.
Jazz cornetist Pete Kelly (Webb) and his Big Seven are the house band at the 17 Club, a speakeasy in Kansas City in 1927 during Prohibition. New local crime boss Fran McCarg (Edmond O'Brien) wants a percentage of the band's meager earnings. When the band is opposed, Kelly decides to decline and see what happens.
However before the night ends, Rudy, the manager of the club, orders Kelly and the band to go to the house of wealthy Ivy Conrad (Janet Leigh), a woman with a reputation for hosting rowdy parties and who has designs on Kelly. Reluctantly, Kelly arrives at the party and leaves a message for McCarg to call him there. When the call comes through, it is intercepted by Kelly’s drunk, hot-tempered drummer, Joey Firestone (Martin Milner), who turns McCarg down. Kelly and his band are run off the road as they drive back to Kansas City.
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Wikipedia