GUEST REVIEW: LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME

The late great Bruce Kogan is back with another review for these pages...

Curiously enough after I viewed my VHS copy of Love Me or Leave Me, I went to the movies and saw Walk the Line. One of the things that struck me was that while Joaquin Phoenix had a much tougher job because Johnny Cash was performing almost up to the end and had a distinctive sound that I didn't think anyone could match, Phoenix did a very good job in capturing him.
On the other hand Ruth Etting had not been seen in films for over 20 years, nor had she made a record in that length of time either. She was living very quietly in retirement. So except with older members of the public, Doris Day did not have to compete with an image people had in their minds.

Also people left out of this story include Martin Snyder's first wife and his daughter from that marriage. Also the fact that Snyder was Jewish. My guess is that MGM did not want a false issue of anti-Semitism raised.

There sure were enough issues anyway. Ruth Etting, a girl from the sticks with lots of singing talent, is determined to succeed. So she latches on to a small time Chicago hood named Martin Snyder who gets her career started and in gear.

I remember reading that in her life with Snyder, Etting found it impossible to socialize due to Snyder's boorish behavior. One of the few other show business personalities that she did socialize with was her co-star in Kid Boots on Broadway, Eddie Cantor. Cantor who was brought up on the Lower East Side of New York, lived with guys like Snyder in his youth so he was used to it and put up with him. Very few others would.

Incidentally the title tune Love Me or Leave Me comes from the score of Kid Boots.

In Love Me or Leave Me, we don't have Doris doing an imitation of Ruth Etting, we have Doris singing like Doris which is just fine for me. She sings the songs that were identified with Etting very well. The album for this film sold very well for her.

James Cagney made his third and final trip to the Oscar Derby with his portrayal of Martin "the gimp" Snyder. In its way Snyder is as complex a role as Cagney's Cody Jarrett. He's an uneducated kid from the slums who made it in the rackets, but feels terribly inferior around all the show business creative types that his wife now by necessity has to associate with, where ironically due to his drive has pushed her there. Cagney lost the Oscar race to Ernest Borgnine for Marty. Ain't that a piece of irony itself.

Cameron Mitchell as Johnny Alderman (real first name Myrl) does very well as the man who eventually became her second husband as does the rest of the cast.

All three of the people that Day, Cagney, and Mitchell portray were still alive at the time that Love Me or Leave me was being filmed. All signed off on the picture, I assume all parties were satisfied with it.

And so should you...

BRUCE'S RATING: 8 out of 10

MY RATING: 10 out of 10

SOURCE

DORIS DAY AS RUTH ETTING

The 1950s saw the downfall of the Hollywood movie musical. With the coming of rock 'n' roll and the end of the studio system, musicals were falling out of favor. However, the decade saw some of the most beloved musicals made like "Singin In The Rain" and "The Band Wagon". Both were released by MGM, and not to be forgotten is the movie bio of torch singer Ruth Etting called "Love Me Or Leave Me". The movie was the first film undertaken by Doris Day in 1955 after her 'liberation' from Warner Brothers. She was now free to make her own choice of films and she was very intrigued with the idea of playing the role of Ruth Etting. Not only that but she had an outstanding producer, director and a very literate script. However, it was the idea of playing opposite Jimmy Cagney that finally convinced her to tackle the role. The film also had a great musical score that also attracted her. One of her biggest pleasures was working with the great musical department at MGM.

On the recommendation of former Warner star, James Cagney, Doris Day was offered the coveted lead in the Ruth Etting story. Miss Etting had been a top singing star of the 1930s whose career had spanned the speakeasies of Chicago, nightclubs, recordings, radio, the Ziegfeld Follies and Hollywood films. Superstar, Ava Gardner, desperately wanted to play Etting, but MGM, influenced by the already-cast Cagney, who felt that Doris Day had the depth and talent as an actress and singer to bring life to this highly dramatic role, offered the part to her. She was such a huge star in 1955, that she would become the first actress to receive billing over James Cagney in 30 years. Ruth Etting, who died in 1978 at the age of 80, reportedly disapproved of Day playing her. Etting had wanted Jane Powell to play her, but the studio insisted on an actress with more acting ability. Not to say that Jane Powell was a bad actress, but she did not have the range that Doris Day had.

In her book, Doris Day, Her Own Story, she said: “I prepared for the role by listening to all the Ruth Etting records. She had a quiet way of speaking and singing. It was not my intention to mimic her, but to suggest her style with little inflections and shadings that I picked up from the recordings.” She obtained 112 sides of songs that Miss Etting originally waxed when she was the toast of Broadway, and it was from that group of songs that the songs for the film were ultimately selected.


Ruth Etting, Martin "the Gimp" Snyder and Johnny Alderman were all living and were consulted during the preparation for the film. This is highly unusual, for most biographies are produced after the principals are deceased. Their firsthand remembrances enhanced the realistic depiction presented in the movie. It was amazing what the movie depicted, being produced in 1955. It shows the physical and mental abuse that Ruth Etting had during her marriage to Martin Snyder. It even eludes to an incident where Snyder raped Etting. Doris Day later said that more graphic sceness were filmed that never made it into the movie.

Doris Day wrote in her autobiography that she hesitated before accepting the lead in this film. Ruth Etting was a kept woman who clawed her way up from seamy Chicago nightclubs to the Ziegfeld Follies. It would require her to drink, wear scant, sexy costumes and to string along a man she didn't love in order to further her career. There was also a certain vulgarity about Ruth Etting that she didn't want to play. Producer Joe Pasternak convinced Day to accept the role because she would give the part some dignity that would play away from the vulgarity. After this film was released, Doris Day was deluged with mail from fans attacking her, a Christian Scientist, for playing a lewd woman who smoked, drank, and wore scant costumes in the nightclub scenes. Day cared about everyone who was disturbed by her characterization, and she answered every piece of mail, explaining the necessity for realism, and that it was essential to separate actress Doris Day from character Ruth Etting. She felt that as a performer, she had the same responsibility to the public that a politician has to the electorate.

The movie was different than any movie that Doris Day had been in, and I feel that although this movie was a musical, it displayed Day's acting ability more than any movie she had ever been in. James Cagney was nominated for his role, but unfortunately lost. Doris Day was sadly not even nominated. The story of Ruth Etting was the role of a lifetime at the time, and I feel that Day portrayed it as accurately as 1955 Hollywood would allow. Reading the true account of Ruth Etting's life, "Love Me Or Leave Me" only touched upon the real Ruth Etting. Etting died long after the jazz era was over on September 24, 1978. As for Martin Snyder, he lived out the rest of his life is vitual obscurity, and he outlived Etting. He died on November 9, 1981.  Doris Day as Ruth Etting was one of those memorable roles in a splashy Hollywood  musical that they really do not make anymore...