Follow the Boys (1963 film)
Encyclopedia
Follow the Boys is a 1963 comedy film
and also the theme song which was a Top 20 hit for Connie Francis
.
and shot on location on the French
and Italian Riviera
, Follow the Boys was MGM's second film vehicle for its label's top recording artist Connie Francis following 1960's Where the Boys Are
. While Francis role in the earlier film had been somewhat secondary she had a distinctly central role in Follow the Boys playing Bonnie Pulaski, a newlywed traveling the Riviera visiting ports-of-call in hopes of a rendezvous with her naval officer husband (Roger Perry
) who was summoned to active duty from their honeymoon. Missing the original point and time of rendezvous in the port of Nice
by a few minutes, Bonnie Pulaski follows the ship to Italy in a somewhat rickety and battered pink 2 CV accompanied by veteran navy wife Janis Paige
and two sailors' girlfriends - played by Francis' Where the Boys Are co-star Paula Prentiss
and by Dany Robin
- likewise intent on romantic reunions. Happy endings for each of the ladies are delayed by a series of romantic and comedic misunderstandings. Paige's husband is played by Ron Randell
, Richard Long
and Russ Tamblyn
are the respective love interests for Robin and Prentiss.
Follow the Boys was the first instance of Prentiss and her husband Richard Benjamin
performing in the same screen production although Benjamin's part as Aide to the Admiral did not make the final cut.
The first version was recorded on June 30, 1962 during the shooting of the on-location scenes in Italy, where Francis overdubbed her vocals to a playback which had been pre-recorded under the direction of Geoff Love
at EMI's Abbey Road Studios in London. This version was used for the opening and closing credits of the film.
The second recording of the "Follow the Boys" theme song was conducted by LeRoy Holmes
, a veteran of the classic MGM musicals who by 1963 had left that studio to compose for United Artists
films; however he returned to MGM to work with Francis whose 1958 hit "Stupid Cupid" he'd conducted. The recording took place on September 27, 1962. This version was released on the original MGM Records Single.
The third recording was recorded on January 10, 1963. This version used the original September 1962 playback with Francis overdubbing new vocals. This version was released on the album "Follow the Boys" (MGM Records SE-4123), which featured the film's songs on the A-Side and a selection of Italian-flavored songs to fit the movie's setting on the B-Side although they didn't appear in the actual movie.
"Follow the Boys" was stylistically reminiscent of the hit theme song from Where the Boys Are written by Neil Sedaka
and Howard Greenfield
but was in fact written by Benny Davis
and Ted Murry (pseudonym for Murray Mencher) the composers of Francis 1962 #1 "Don't Break the Heart That Loves You
".
Released in February of 1963, "Follow the Boys" reached #17 that April on the Billboard Hot 100
where it would be Francis' final Top 20 entry. The song was markedly more successful as ranked by Cash Box spending two weeks at #11.
The B-side of "Follow the Boys", "Waiting For Billy", written by Davis and Murry with Dramato Palumbo was also from the Follow the Boys film, and refers to the Roger Perry character's name being Billy Pulaski. "Waiting For Billy" received enough airplay to "bubble under"
the Billboard Hot 100 at #127.
Francis recorded several foreign-language versions of "Follow the boys":
For all versions the playback of the September 1962 recording was used.
Unlike the original US release of "Follow the boys", the foreign language versions were not coupled with "Waiting for Billy", but with a foreign language version of "Tonight's my night", another song from the movie's soundtrack:
Comedy film
Comedy film is a genre of film in which the main emphasis is on humour. They are designed to elicit laughter from the audience. Comedies are mostly light-hearted dramas and are made to amuse and entertain the audiences...
and also the theme song which was a Top 20 hit for Connie Francis
Connie Francis
Connie Francis is an American pop singer of Italian heritage and the top-charting female vocalist of the 1950s and 1960s. Although her chart success waned in the second half of the 1960s, Francis remained a top concert draw...
.
The film
Directed by Richard ThorpeRichard Thorpe
Richard Thorpe was an American film director.Born Rollo Smolt Thorpe in Hutchinson, Kansas, he began his entertainment career performing in vaudeville and onstage. In 1921 he began in motion pictures as an actor and directed his first silent film in 1923. He went on to direct more than one hundred...
and shot on location on the French
French Riviera
The Côte d'Azur, pronounced , often known in English as the French Riviera , is the Mediterranean coastline of the southeast corner of France, also including the sovereign state of Monaco...
and Italian Riviera
Italian Riviera
The Italian Riviera, or Ligurian Riviera is the narrow coastal strip which lies between the Ligurian Sea and the mountain chain formed by the Maritime Alps and the Apennines...
, Follow the Boys was MGM's second film vehicle for its label's top recording artist Connie Francis following 1960's Where the Boys Are
Where the Boys Are
The kind of cool modern jazz popularized by such acts as Dave Brubeck, Gerry Mulligan, and Chico Hamilton, then in the vanguard of the college music market, features in a number of scenes with Basil...
. While Francis role in the earlier film had been somewhat secondary she had a distinctly central role in Follow the Boys playing Bonnie Pulaski, a newlywed traveling the Riviera visiting ports-of-call in hopes of a rendezvous with her naval officer husband (Roger Perry
Roger Perry
Roger Perry is an American film and television actor whose career began in the late 1950s.In the 1960-1961 television season, Perry portrayed a handsome young attorney, Jim Harrigan, Jr., in the ABC and Desilu Studios sitcom Harrigan and Son, with co-stars Pat O'Brien, Helen Kleeb, and Georgine...
) who was summoned to active duty from their honeymoon. Missing the original point and time of rendezvous in the port of Nice
Nice
Nice is the fifth most populous city in France, after Paris, Marseille, Lyon and Toulouse, with a population of 348,721 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Nice extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of more than 955,000 on an area of...
by a few minutes, Bonnie Pulaski follows the ship to Italy in a somewhat rickety and battered pink 2 CV accompanied by veteran navy wife Janis Paige
Janis Paige
Janis Paige is an American film, musical theatre and television actress. Born Donna Mae Tjaden in Tacoma, Washington, she began singing in public from the age of five in local amateur shows...
and two sailors' girlfriends - played by Francis' Where the Boys Are co-star Paula Prentiss
Paula Prentiss
Paula Ragusa , better known by her stage name Paula Prentiss, is an American actress well-known for her film roles in Where the Boys Are, Man's Favorite Sport?, The Stepford Wives, What's New Pussycat?, The Black Marble, and The Parallax View and her co-starring role in the television situation...
and by Dany Robin
Dany Robin
Dany Robin was a French actress of the 1950s and the early 1960s who was married to fellow actor Georges Marchal.She performed with Peter Sellers in The Waltz of the Toreadors and co-starred opposite Kirk Douglas in the 1953 romantic drama Act of Love.Robin co-starred with Connie Francis, Paula...
- likewise intent on romantic reunions. Happy endings for each of the ladies are delayed by a series of romantic and comedic misunderstandings. Paige's husband is played by Ron Randell
Ron Randell
Ronald Egan "Ron" Randell was an Australian-born American film and stage actor.-Biography:Randell was born in Sydney. He started his career as a stage and radio performer in his teens. He soon established himself as a leading male juvenile for radio, acting for 2KY Players, George Edwards, BAP...
, Richard Long
Richard Long (actor)
Richard Long was an American actor better known for his leading roles in several ABC television series, including The Big Valley, Nanny and the Professor and Bourbon Street Beat.-Early life:...
and Russ Tamblyn
Russ Tamblyn
Russell Irving "Russ" Tamblyn is an American film and television actor, who is arguably best known for his performance in the 1961 movie musical West Side Story as Riff, the leader of the Jets gang....
are the respective love interests for Robin and Prentiss.
Follow the Boys was the first instance of Prentiss and her husband Richard Benjamin
Richard Benjamin
Richard Benjamin is an American actor and film director. He has starred in a number of productions, including Goodbye, Columbus , based on the novella by Philip Roth, and Westworld .-Life and career:...
performing in the same screen production although Benjamin's part as Aide to the Admiral did not make the final cut.
The song
Three different versions of the song exist.The first version was recorded on June 30, 1962 during the shooting of the on-location scenes in Italy, where Francis overdubbed her vocals to a playback which had been pre-recorded under the direction of Geoff Love
Geoff Love
Geoff Love was a British easy-listening, and disco orchestra leader. He was born in the industrial town of Todmorden in the West Riding of Yorkshire. His father was a mixed race American-born guitarist and dancer, and his mother an actress. As a child, Love began to learn to play the violin but...
at EMI's Abbey Road Studios in London. This version was used for the opening and closing credits of the film.
The second recording of the "Follow the Boys" theme song was conducted by LeRoy Holmes
LeRoy Holmes
LeRoy Holmes was an American songwriter, composer, arranger and conductor....
, a veteran of the classic MGM musicals who by 1963 had left that studio to compose for United Artists
United Artists
United Artists Corporation is an American film studio. The original studio of that name was founded in 1919 by D. W. Griffith, Charles Chaplin, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks....
films; however he returned to MGM to work with Francis whose 1958 hit "Stupid Cupid" he'd conducted. The recording took place on September 27, 1962. This version was released on the original MGM Records Single.
The third recording was recorded on January 10, 1963. This version used the original September 1962 playback with Francis overdubbing new vocals. This version was released on the album "Follow the Boys" (MGM Records SE-4123), which featured the film's songs on the A-Side and a selection of Italian-flavored songs to fit the movie's setting on the B-Side although they didn't appear in the actual movie.
"Follow the Boys" was stylistically reminiscent of the hit theme song from Where the Boys Are written by Neil Sedaka
Neil Sedaka
Neil Sedaka is an American pop/rock singer, pianist, and composer. His career has spanned nearly 55 years, during which time he has sold millions of records as an artist and has written or co-written over 500 songs for himself and other artists, collaborating mostly with lyricists Howard...
and Howard Greenfield
Howard Greenfield
Howard Greenfield was an American lyricist and songwriter, who for several years in the 1960s worked out of the famous Brill Building...
but was in fact written by Benny Davis
Benny Davis
Benny Davis was a vaudeville performer and writer of popular songs. He composed the classic 1926 standard "Baby Face" with Harry Akst.-Life and career:...
and Ted Murry (pseudonym for Murray Mencher) the composers of Francis 1962 #1 "Don't Break the Heart That Loves You
Don't Break the Heart That Loves You
"Don't Break the Heart That Loves You" is an American song written by Benny Davis and Ted Murry. The song would become a success for two artists in two different genres: Connie Francis in the pop field in 1962, and Margo Smith as a country version in 1978....
".
Released in February of 1963, "Follow the Boys" reached #17 that April on the Billboard Hot 100
Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
where it would be Francis' final Top 20 entry. The song was markedly more successful as ranked by Cash Box spending two weeks at #11.
The B-side of "Follow the Boys", "Waiting For Billy", written by Davis and Murry with Dramato Palumbo was also from the Follow the Boys film, and refers to the Roger Perry character's name being Billy Pulaski. "Waiting For Billy" received enough airplay to "bubble under"
Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles
The Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles is a chart published weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States. It lists the top 25 singles below number 100 that have not yet charted on the Billboard Hot 100. Sometimes, however, singles halt their progress on this chart, and never appear on the Hot 100...
the Billboard Hot 100 at #127.
Francis recorded several foreign-language versions of "Follow the boys":
- German: "Mein Schiff fährt zu dir"
- Italian: "Per sempre con te"
- French: "En suivant mon Coeur"
- Spanish: "Detras del amor"
- Japanese (Latin writing of song title unknown)
For all versions the playback of the September 1962 recording was used.
Unlike the original US release of "Follow the boys", the foreign language versions were not coupled with "Waiting for Billy", but with a foreign language version of "Tonight's my night", another song from the movie's soundtrack:
- German: "Die Nacht ist mein" (in Germany, this was also the A-Side of the single, peaking at # 2 on the charts, with "Mein Schiff fährt zu dir" banned to the B-Side)
- Italian (regular language): "Che bella notte"
- Italian (NeapolitanNeapolitanNeapolitan may refer to:* Neapolitan, of or pertaining to the city of Naples, Italy and sometimes its wider Duchy or Province of Naples** Previously a nationality, during the time of the Kingdom of Naples or the Neapolitan Republics* Neapolitan cuisine...
): "Che bella notte" (US album release only) - French: "Décidement"
- Spanish: "Esta es mi noche"
- Japanese (Latin writing of song title unknown)