Stars and Stripes Forever (film)

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Stars and Stripes Forever
Starring	Clifton Webb Debra Paget Robert Wagner Ruth Hussey
Release date(s)	1952
Running time	90
Country	United States
Language	English
Allmovie profile

Stars and Stripes Forever is a 1952 bio-pic about 19th century composer John Philip Sousa, played by Clifton Webb. He is best known for his military marches, of which Stars and Stripes Forever is the best known.

[edit] Plot Summary

While loosely based on Sousa's autobiography Marching Along, the film takes considerable liberties and dramatic license, often expanding and extrapolating on themes and passages in the book. Much of the film is devoted to a romance between fictional characters Willie Little (Robert Wagner), a musician who joins the U.S. Marine Band under Sousa, and Lily Becker (Debra Paget), an aspiring concert singer. In the film, Willie is credited with designing the Sousaphone and naming it after his mentor, while in real life, Sousa himself designed the instrument. The film follows Sousa from his days as head of the Marine Band to his leaving the Marine Corps to form his own band in 1892 (taking Willie and Lily with him) and the ups and downs of his band. A mention in the book that Sousa discouraged the married men in the band from bringing their wives on tour is expanded into a subplot where Willie and Lily elope and keep the marriage a secret to continue touring together. An episode where Sousa's Band plays at the Atlanta, Georgia Cotton States and International Exposition (1895), despite the sponsors' attempt to renege on their contract, stays relatively close to fact.

The inspiration for the title march is depicted with a voiceover of Webb quoting Sousa's actual description of the event while at sea; however, the sea voyage in real life was due to Sousa and the band rushing back to the U.S. from a tour in Europe upon the sudden death of his manager, while in the film he takes the voyage to recover from illness contracted while attempting to resume military service during the Spanish-American War of 1898. Sousa then produces his operetta El Capitan with Lily as one of the castmembers, while Willie reenlists in the Marines but serves as an infantryman rather than as a musician. Willie loses a leg in a friendly fire incident in Cuba, but while recovering at the Brooklyn Navy Yard Hospital, he is called upon to rejoin Sousa's band in a surprise concert, where the band plays the title march in public for the first time. (In real life, the march was first played publicly at a concert on Christmas Eve 1896, nearly two years earlier than depicted.)