Remembering Doris Day — Her Films, Her Music, Her Legacy and Her Life: ‘She Couldn’t Help But Be a Star’

From Dancer to Singer Without Really Trying

She was born Doris Mary Ann Kappelhoff on April 3, 1922 in Cincinnati, Ohio. Early on in life she had developed a love for dancing and really thought that’s what she do, though an injury she suffered to her right leg in a car accident on October 1937 changed all of that. “She was in a car that was hit by a train,” Tom explains, “and her leg was so broken she couldn’t even go to school. They said, ‘You’ll be lucky if you walk again, but you’ll never dance.’ So there she was, convalescing at home, and she would sing along with the radio. Her favorite singer was Ella Fitzgerald, and all of a sudden everybody realizes that Doris can really sing. And that’s the start of it. From there she started working with a little dinky band in Cincinnati, and that led to Bob Crosby which led to Les Brown, who was a big deal, and that’s when she recorded ‘Sentimental Journey,’ which became such a huge hit. On top of that, she was so pretty, that that’s when Hollywood first started to pay attention.

“Rock Hudson was her most famous costar, and he used to tell this great story that he was in the Navy at the end of the second World War. When they were shipping out, he said they were on a ship and going under the Golden Gate Bridge when the ship’s loudspeakers were playing Doris Day singing ‘Sentimental Journey.’ He said that there wasn’t a dry eye on the ship, so somehow it was if those two were fated to be together.”

The Road to Hollywood

While touring across the United States with Les Brown and performing for nearly two years on Bob Hope‘s weekly radio show, it was only a matter of time before Doris came to Hollywood’s attention. “This was 1948, so the studio system was still in full effect,” offers Tom, “which meant that you had to sign a seven-year contract, and she did so with Warner Bros and that’s where she thought, ‘Well, I guess I’m going to be here for a while.'”

He adds, “The Warner Bros contract ran from ’48 to ’55 and some of the movies were good and some were terrible — but you had to do what the studio said, right? But what happened is that even in the terrible films, the moment our star starts to sing, the audience was gone. It’s like they just wanted to watch her and listen to her, and that’s what set her apart from all the other contract players at the time.”

Changing Image

When Doris’ seven-year contract with Warner Bros expired, she became an independent agent. “That,” says Tom, “is when she made her greatest films. She made three fantastic movies in a row, starting with Love Me or Leave Me with James Cagney, who said, ‘Doris Day is my idea of a great actor.’ Then there was [Alfred] Hitchcock and The Man Who Knew Too Much, a fantastic film where she showed how dramatic she could be. Which was followed by The Pajama Game, this great musical comedy choreographed by Bob Fosse. As a result, all of a sudden people thought, ‘Wow, there’s a lot more to her than those Warner Bros’ — what I call — ‘Barnyard Musicals.’ And then she would reinvent herself again with the Rock Hudson sex comedies, which is when she became the biggest star in the world in 1959 with Pillow Talk.” Those films became a mainstay of the early ’60s as Doris would not only team up on screen with Rock again, but also be paired with the likes of Cary Grant, James Garner and Rod Taylor.

The question, of course, is why those films appealed the way that they did. “That’s actually a complicated question,” Tom suggests, “because people forget now that at the time those were actually daring films. That’s how repressed everything was. So to see Doris and Rock Hudson having sexually charged innuendo was startling, and the appeal was twofold. People forget that in all of those movies, Doris was playing a career woman and women lived vicariously through her. She was always playing a career woman with a fantastic wardrobe in a New York apartment the size of Yankee Stadium — which I could never figure out how she could afford. But the point is, she lived this life and women responded to her, because the options for women were so limited at the time. As a result, she became a role model.”

“It’s funny to think about it that way when you’re talking about sex comedies,” he continues, “but she really was ahead of her time. She was also appealing to men, because they thought she was sexy and, of course, they want to go to bed with her. And at the same time, they wanted to take her home to meet mom.”

Falling Out of Step With the Times?

As successful and popular as Doris was in the 1960s, society began going through wholesale changes and it seemed as though she and her films were suddenly out of vogue. “Society changed,” says Tom matter of factly, “and when it did, everybody started making fun of those films and called Doris the perennial virgin; people saying things like, ‘I knew Doris Day before she was a virgin’ and that kind of thing. But that’s so wrong, because it’s just a misreading of the films. The basis of their appeal is that they were fun and she could be on screen as a role model. Then, though, the films started to dwindle in quality. She did a movie with Rod Taylor called Do Not Disturb, which was so formulaic and therefore had no sense of fun to it. Then she got stuck in a really horrible movie called Where Were You When the Lights When Out?, and another bad movie called The Ballad of Josie.’ In her autobiography, she said she would read these scripts and think, ‘Thank goodness I don’t have to do this.’ And Marty, her husband and manager, would say, ‘You’re signed to do it.'”

On top of this, mores in society were changing, censors were lightening up and it would seem that those elements combined to drive her type of film out of style. “That absolutely was part of it,” concurs Tom. “She herself said Hollywood had changed so much. The studio system was gone, you didn’t have that sense of camaraderie, so I think with Hollywood changing along with the more permissive times, that just didn’t fit Doris. For instance, Mike Nichols wanted her to play Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate, but it didn’t fit her sense of morality, the idea of an older woman seducing a younger man.”

A Husband’s Betrayal

The above statement is representative of the change in life that was going to happen to Doris, as she discovered upon husband Martin Melcher‘s death in 1968. Explains Tom, “Her husband would sign her to these terrible films because he needed the money; he’d gone through her entire fortune without her knowing. When he died, her son came to her and said, ‘I don’t know how to tell you this, but you have absolutely no money, you’re $500,000 in debut and you’re signed to make a CBS sitcom.'”

The Television Years

Between 1968 and 1973, Doris starred in her own television series as well as two TV specials, representing what Tom refers to as the “last act of her career.” But there was actually a benefit to her financially. “She made a lot of money from that,” he says, “and it emphasizes one of the motifs or themes in Doris’ life: she wasn’t ambitious, but whenever things really went wrong, like with the terrible marriages and financial disaster, she went back to work and work saved her. She herself said that after her husband had stolen her money, she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, but the fact she knew she had to get up every morning to go the studio and that other people’s jobs depended on her actually saved her. She was much more complicated than people ever thought she was.”

“The TV show,” he elaborates, “was really hit and miss in terms of quality and it was sometimes overly sunny. But the reason why it worked is because Doris Day was always a comforting presence. You wanted to invite her into your living room on a weekly basis and that doesn’t always happen with movie stars. I wrote a book on my other idol, [Frank] Sinatra, and if you’ve seen footage of his TV show, he’s too edgy a personality to have in your living room every week. You felt like he was going to jump through the screen and grab you.”

‘Doris Day’s Best Friends’

Following the end of The Doris Day Show, the actress primarily devoted herself to animal activism, though between 1985 and 1986 she hosted her own talk show on CBN called Doris Day’s Best Friends. It only lasted 26 episodes, but it garnered great attention by featuring Rock Hudson, who was making his first public appearance after having contracted AIDS. “After Rock Hudson had died, Doris said she didn’t know he was gay or had AIDS and didn’t care one bit,” says Tom. “She just knew she loved her friends. She had this cable television show and wanted him to be her guest. He was so sick at the time, but he wanted to do it for her. And his appearance was so shocking, because nobody had seen him for a while. I bring this up because we forget now, but back in the ’80s people were afraid to be in the same room as somebody with AIDS, and there is Doris Day, on camera, hugging her friend. And Doris hugging Rock Hudson had the same impact of those photos of Princess Diana hugging AIDS patients when other people were afraid. That’s where you use your celebrity to good advantage, just the way she did with her decades of activism on behalf of animals.”

“Like I said about Doris, she was completely uninterested in being a celebrity,” he notes. “It’s why when she walked away from Hollywood back in the ’80s, she didn’t have a second’s hesitation and was still in demand, but she said she just wanted to do other things. I always say she walked away from the Church of Fame and she did it on her own terms.”

Please scroll down for a look at every one of Doris Day’s films, as well as closing thoughts from Tom.

‘Romance on the High Seas’ (1948)

Her first effort, Romance on the High Seas, was set on a cruise ship, where misunderstandings result in a married couple beginning to suspect each other of being unfaithful. Added into the mix is a nightclub singer, who is on board with a false identity. Doris is in a supporting role in this film.

‘My Dream is Yours’ (1949)

In her second film, Doris steps into the spotlight as a single mother discovered by an agent who is trying to replace a popular singer for a radio show.

‘It’s a Great Feeling’ (1949)

Judy Adams (Doris) is a waitress who works at the Warner Bros commissary. Desperate to break into movies, she comes to believe that a pair of actors will be able to help her do so.

‘Young Man With a Horn’ (1950)

Kirk Douglas plays young trumpeter named Rick Martin, who discovers his ability to play the trumpet and begins to enjoy some incredible highs, which are accompanied by a marriage that is falling apart, the death of his mentor and falling into alcoholism. Starring alongside Doris was Lauren Bacall.

‘Tea for Two’ (1950)

When her uncle agrees to finance her dreams of being a Broadway star, Nanette (Doris) is thrilled — until she learns that, in return for doing so, she must say “no” to all questions for two days. Definitely not as easy as it seems.

‘The West Point Story’ (1950)

James Cagney portrays a Broadway director who must turn himself into a cadet so that he and his girlfriend (Virginia Mayo) can stage a show at the U.S. Military Academy. Doris as Jan Wilson finds herself in the middle of the scheme.

‘Storm Warning’ (1951)

With Doris in a supporting role, Ginger Rogers takes center stage as a traveling dress model, who, while visiting her sister in a Southern town, finds herself helping the district attorney (future president Ronald Reagan) take on the Ku Klux Klan after she witnesses them murder someone.

‘On Moonlight Bay’ (1951)

A battle of the generations ensues when Majorie (Doris) goes from tomboy to blossoming woman after meeting and beginning a romance with William (Gordon MacRae). Her father, however, isn’t a fan of William’s unconventional ideas.

‘I’ll See You in My Dreams’ (1951)

Gus Kahn (Danny Thomas) is a prolific songwriter who amasses a fortune for writing a number of hit tunes in 1908, which is about the time he falls in love with Grace LeBoy (Doris). Eventually, though, everything takes a downward turn in the aftermath of the 1929 stock market crash.  

‘The Winning Team’ (1952)

Describes Google, “In 1908 Nebraska, young Grover Cleveland ‘Alex’ Alexander (Ronald Reagan) saves to buy a farm for himself and his fiancée, Aimee (Doris Day), but also longs to realize his dream of playing baseball. His pitching skills win him a position on an Illinois team, but an injury almost ruins his chance. Once he recovers, he and Aimee wed, and he returns to baseball and begins an increasingly successful career — until he’s diagnosed with epilepsy, which he struggles to hide from the public and Aimee.”

‘April in Paris’ (1952)

Ethel “Dynamite” Jackson (Doris) is a Broadway chorus girl who, through a series of odd circumstances, ends up traveling to Paris to represent the American theater. While there, she falls in love with assistant secretary to the assistant to the undersecretary of state (Ray Bolger), but there are all sorts of complications with that (not the least of which is his fiancée (Eve Miller).

‘By the Light of the Silvery Moon’ (1953)

This sequel to 1951’s On Moonlight Bay relates the further adventures of the Winfield family in small town Indiana. Notes Wikipedia, “As daughter Marjorie Winfield’s (Doris) boyfriend, William Sherman (Gordon MacRae) returns from the Army after World War I, Bill and Marjorie’s on-again, off-again romance provides the backdrop for other family crises, caused mainly by son Wesley’s (Billy Gray) wild imagination.”

‘Calamity Jane’ (1953)

Watching the success of Annie, Get Your Gun, Warner Bros decided to film this musical comedy that is loosely inspired by Wild West personality Calamity Jane (Doris), and the supposed romance between her and Wild Bill Hickock (Howard Keel).

‘Lucky Me’ (1954)

Doris is a singer who brings her lower-tier theatre troupe to Florida hoping for success, but not achieving much. Things could change, however, when a songwriter (Robert Cummings) from Broadway comes looking for a new leading lady.

‘Young at Heart’ (1955)

The official synopsis reads: Gregory Tuttle (Robert Keith), a widowed musician, is the father of three extraordinarily gifted daughters, Laurie (Doris Day), Fran (Dorothy Malone) and Amy (Elisabeth Fraser), all of whom are facing different romantic troubles. The arrival of two handsome musicians, Alex Burke (Gig Young) and Barney Sloan (Frank Sinatra), who have been invited by Gregory to board at the house while working on a new musical, further complicates the daughters’ love lives.

‘Love Me or Leave Me’ (1955)

Love Me or Leave Me is a 1920s drama in which James Cagney plays a criminal named Martin Snyder who discovers Doris’ dancer character of Ruth Etting, and turns her into a star. Things take a darker turn, however, when he finds his obsession for her growing.

‘The Man Who Knew Too Much’ (1956)

How’s this for a different type of project for Doris: An American physician and his wife (James Stewart and Doris) take matters into their own hands after assassins planning to execute a foreign prime minister kidnap their son. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

‘Julie’ (1956)

Offers Wikipedia, “A former stewardess, widow Julie Benton (Doris) is terrorized by her insanely jealous second husband, Lyle (Louis Jourdan). It becomes a life-or-death matter after friend Cliff Henderson (Barry Sullivan) relays his suspicions to Julie that her first husband’s death might not have been a suicide.”

‘The Pajama Game’ (1957)

In this musical comedy, Doris plays a worker at an Iowa pajama factory who finds herself falling in love with a superintendent (Jon Raitt) who has been brought aboard to thwart the workers’ attempts to get a raise.

‘Teacher’s Pet’ (1958)

Clark Gable plays hard-nosed editor James Gannon, who decides to attend night school in order to win the heart of a journalism teacher (Doris) who wants no part of him.

‘The Tunnel of Love’ (1958)

A series of misunderstandings leaves a married man believing he has impregnated the owner of an adoption agency, and that she will be his and his wife’s surrogate. Let’s face it, that’s a pretty big misunderstanding. Richard Widmark costars with Doris.

‘It Happened to Jane’ (1959)

Details Google, “After a shipment of fresh lobsters isn’t delivered on time to Jane Osgood (Doris), a widowed mother of two running a failing restaurant supply business in Maine, she hires her lawyer friend George Denham (Jack Lemmon) to sue the railroad company she believes is responsible for the damages. The court case generates lots of publicity and Osgood is famous. A charismatic news reporter (Steve Forrest) takes to Osgood, but that doesn’t sit well with Denham, who also has eyes for her.”

‘Pillow Talk’ (1959)

Granted that the premise is kind of silly — a man and a woman who share a party line cannot stand each other, but he has fun romancing her with his voice disguised — but it’s the first one to bring together Rock Hudson and Doris Day. Talk about screen magic! Doris scored her only Oscar nomination for this role.

‘Please Don’t Eat the Daisies’ (1960)

David Niven portrays a university professor who decides to leave his job so that he can become a theater critic, never suspecting the impact this move will have on his family (including a wife played by Doris) and friends. It was inspired a 1965-67 TV series that starred neither David nor Doris.

‘Midnight Lace’ (1960)

Doris plays Kit Preston, a recently wed woman relocated to London with her husband who has her sanity questioned when she starts to believe that she’s become a stalking victim. Also starring are Rex Harrison and John Gavin.

‘Lover Come Back’ (1961)

It’s a reunion for Rock Hudson and Doris. This time he plays an advertising exec who has developed a campaign for a product that doesn’t yet exist, yet he uses it — by pretending to be the inventor — to get the attention of another exec (Doris).

‘That Touch of Mink’ (1962)

Sorry, Rock, time to make room for Cary Grant, who plays a rich businessman drawn to a woman (Doris), but the two of them have different goals: his is a short-lived affair, while her’s is saving herself for marriage.

‘Bill Rose’s Jumbo’ (1962)

Pop and Kitty Wonder (Jimmy Durante and Doris, respectively) are a father-daughter circus hands trying to save their tiny business from rival owner John Noble (Dean Jagger), whose son, Sam (Stephen Boyd) has secretly joined their circus as a tightrope walker. Kitty falls for Sam, not suspecting who he really is and the threat that he poses to the circus.

‘The Thrill of It All’ (1963)

If you’ve got a premise that works, stick with it: A housewife’s sudden rise to fame as a soap spokesperson leads to chaos in her home life. Doris, needless to say, is the housewife, but new into the mix is leading man James Garner.

‘Move Over Darling’ (1963)

For the second time in the same year, Doris and James Garner star alongside each other.  Now she is a wife, long thought dead, who returns following five years lost at sea, finds that her husband has just gotten remarried.

‘Send Me No Flowers’ (1964)

It’s the Rock Hudson and Doris Day show! A hypochondriac (Rock) believes he is dying and makes plans wife (Doris), who completely misinterprets them.

‘Do Not Disturb’ (1965)

Obviously England is not good for Doris, although this time out is a lot lighter than the first. American couple Janet and Mike (Doris and Rod Taylor) move to the U.K. because of his job, and it isn’t long before she begins to suspect that he’s having an affair with his secretary. Her way of combatting it? Pretending that she’s being unfaithful as well.

‘The Glass Bottom Boat’ (1966)

A lot of the movies Doris made would not exist if it wasn’t for a series of misunderstandings that trigger the main plot. In this case, Rod Taylor is the head of an aerospace research laboratory who begins to suspect his new girlfriend (Doris) is a Russian spy.

‘Caprice’ (1967)

In this thriller, an industrial spy (Doris) for a cosmetics firm falls for another (Richard Harris) who, she finds out, may not be on her side.

‘The Ballad of Josie’ (1967)

IMDB describes this one as follows: “A widow stirs things up in a western town by raising sheep instead of cattle, and organizing the local women to demonstrate for women’s suffrage.”

‘Where Were You When the Lights Went Out?’ (1968)

During a massive blackout in Manhattan, an actress (Doris), who has left her husband, meets a New York executive and sparks ensue. Also starring are Robert Morse and Patrick O’Neal.

‘With Six You Get Eggroll’ (1968)

We’ll give you that The Iverson Bunch doesn’t exactly roll off the tip of your tongue, but there is something very familiar about the premise of this, Doris’ last film: Two widowed people fall in love and marry, unprepared for the hostile reactions of their six children. What we’re wondering is how much of a fan Sherwood Schwartz was of this movie, because the following year saw the arrival of The Brady Bunch.

‘The Doris Day Show’ (1968-73)

This TV series went through a number of format changes over the course of its run, beginning with Doris as widowed mother of two, Doris Martin, living on a ranch with her boys. Season two sees her commuting to San Francisco to work as an executive secretary at Today’s World magazine. Season three has her, having gotten tired of commuting, relocating the family to San Francisco, but, then, in season four and five, the kids are gone (she kill ’em or something?) and she’s a single career woman who is a staff writer at Today’s World. This show more or less marked Doris’ goodbye to Hollywood.

A Final Gift From Doris Day

Like so many others, Tom found himself stunned at the the news of Doris’ death, but it also reminded him of something very personal she gave him. “When I wrote the book,” he explains, “I didn’t speak to Doris, because she didn’t do interviews. But when the book came out, late one night the phone rang and it was her. We had this extraordinary talk for an hour, because she was so happy with the book. I’m not saying it’s because I’m such a good writer or anything, but she felt it was the first book to take her seriously as an artist. The point of the anecdote is that the image you saw on screen, she was even nicer on the phone. She was such a good person. I think that’s why long after she retired she still had this immense fan base, because people understood that.”