The Buddy Holly Story
| The Buddy Holly Story | |
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The Buddy Holly Story DVD cover
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| Directed by | Steve Rash |
| Produced by | Fred Bauer Edward H. Cohen Frances Avrut-Bauer Fred T. Kuehnert |
| Written by |
Novel: John Goldrosen Story: Alan Swyer Screenplay: Robert Gittler |
| Starring |
Gary Busey Don Stroud Charles Martin Smith Conrad Janis Paul Mooney |
| Music by | Joe Renzetti |
| Cinematography | Stevan Larner |
| Edited by |
David E. Blewitt James Seidelman |
| Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
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Release date
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Running time
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113 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $1.2 million |
| Box office | $14.3 million |
The Buddy Holly Story is a 1978 biographical film which tells the life story of rock musician Buddy Holly. It features an Academy Award-winning musical score, adapted by Joe Renzetti and Oscar-nominated lead performance by Gary Busey.
The film also stars Don Stroud, Charles Martin Smith, Conrad Janis, William Jordan, and Maria Richwine, who played Maria Elena Holly.
It was adapted by Robert Gittler from Buddy Holly: His Life and Music, the biography of Holly by John Goldrosen, and was directed by Steve Rash.
Buddy Holly, a teenager from Lubbock, Texas, emerges into the world of rock and roll with friends and bandmates, drummer Jesse Charles and bass player Ray Bob Simmons, forming a trio known as The Crickets.
The band's first break comes when it is invited to Nashville, Tennessee to make a recording, 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, who, after listening to their audition, very reluctantly allows Buddy and the Crickets to make music the way they want.
Turner's secretary, Maria Elena Santiago, quickly catches Buddy's eye. Their budding romance nearly ends before it can begin because her aunt initially refuses to let her date him, but Buddy persuades the aunt 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 at a New York booking. Sol Gittler signs up the Crickets sight-unseen for the famous Apollo Theater in Harlem, assuming from their music that they're a black band. When three white Texans show up instead, he is stunned. Unwilling to pay them for doing nothing, and because Buddy and the Crickets have a contract specifying a week's engagement for $1000.00, Gittler 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. (This is a little exaggerated; a number of white groups had played there before, and there was often a mixed audience. But the dancing in the aisles was true, just not on the first night.)) After an uncomfortable start, Buddy's songs soon win over the audience and the Crickets are a tremendous hit.
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