I have long been fascinated at the way real people (not necessarily famous) are depicted in the movies. Sometimes the casting is uncannily accurate in terms of physicality, sometimes the impersonation can be done with just a gesture or a voice. When I heard that Geoffrey Rush was to play Peter Sellers in a biopic I couldn't see anyway it would work but it did and Rush, fine actor that he is, managed to bring Sellers back to life. When Joaquin Phoenix was cast as Johnny Cash I thought it was a wonderful choice but despite the rave reviews I never felt that he was able to capture the essence of Cash, unlike Jamie Foxx who was quite amazing as Ray Charles. Of course, I appreciate that a lot depends on how we personally see the person being depicted on the screen. In this occasional series I'm going to show some photographs of real people who have been depicted on the screen alongside pictures of the people who have portrayed them. First off the starting block is chanteuse Ruth Etting and her mobster husband, Marty Snyder.
Etting and Snyder had the story of their turbulent relationship told in the excellent 1956 musical drama LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME which featured powerful performinces by Doris Day and James Cagney as the couple.
Accurate ? I leave you to decide.
4 comments:
NEITHER ONE of them looks a bit like Peter Sellers!!!
It is totally your imagination that I actually left out the title of the film - would I do that? You know that if you catch Doris in a certain light she looks remarkably like Sellars in his Goon Show Years. Marty Snyder was known as "Moe the Gimp" which sounds just like a Goon Shoe character.
I just loved the story of Ruth Etting. She showed courage and strength in an era which is totally different to 2020. Doris Day did an amazing job in portraying Ruth and James Cagney was also at the top of his game. Very credible actors and of course you can’t deny the great music and lyrics of that time. Excellent music, songs and movie. Should be more of it.
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