In New York, Joseph Randall (Bill Goodwin), the owner of Randall Records, names his son John (William Reynolds) as the company's new vice-president, to the pleasure of A&R man Danny Phillips (Jeffrey Stone). John immediately urges his father to eschew the company's middle-of-the-road love ballads in favor of newer musical genres, such as rock and roll, calypso or rhythm and blues, but Joseph refuses to deviate from the standards. For this reason, Danny's girlfriend, celebrated singer Cindy Adams (Gogi Grant), has decided not to sign a contract with Randall Records.
John admires his new office and young secretary, singer Nikki Collins (Andra Martin), who is impressed by his persistence in pitching a more up-to-date record label to his father. At the end of John's first day, Danny is, as usual, too busy working to take Cindy out to dinner, and so encourages John to take his place. John and Cindy go to a nightclub to see George Shearing & the Quintet perform, and there Cindy admits that she is eager to marry Danny, who maintains an emotional distance while he builds his career. John then accompanies Cindy to her television show and, after watching her sing, enthusiastically offers the band, a beatnik rock combo called the Preston Trio, an audition at his office.
The next day, however, Joseph refuses to record the group, and in frustration John turns to the sympathetic Nikki. She brings him to her apartment, where her neighbors, the Lancer family, May Gordon (Rose Marie), and sculptor Vladimir Skolsky (Hans Conried), entertain him with an impromptu show. Days later, before leaving for an eight-week trip to Europe, Joseph announces that he is incorporating a new company, Revue Records, as a test label for John. He gives half-ownership to John and forty percent to Danny, who is moved by the gesture. Over the next few weeks, Danny tries to groom John and teach him how to market his songs, but John is impatient and signs acts recklessly. At a launch party for the label, John is consumed with new ideas and research about the record business, prompting Nikki to use all her wiles to engage him in a kiss. Meanwhile, Cindy tells Danny that she no longer wants to perform, preferring the prospect of marriage, and he promises that if Revue is successful, they will wed. With that in mind, when John and Nikki urge Cindy to record a song for Revue, she agrees, hoping to spur on the label's success.
Eight weeks later, however, the label is floundering, due to the huge, unsold backlog of records that John has produced. When Joseph returns, he is furious, warning John to sell the records or relinquish his share of the company. John, devastated that he has disappointed his father, goes to Nikki's to commiserate, but they are interrupted by Vlad, who insists on hearing about their dilemma. Although Nikki urges Vlad to leave, John seems inspired by his visit, and the next day gathers all his old textbooks in the certainty that there is valuable information somewhere in them. By nighttime, John has realized, from a photo in his economics books, that Vlad is in reality supermarket mogul B. J. Carson.
Upon confronting Vlad, the executive drops his phony accent and admits that for six months of every year he lives a quiet life in disguise. The next day, John calls a meeting of Joseph, Danny, Nikki, Cindy, and the department heads. When Vlad enters, everyone is shocked, especially Nikki, who suspects the sculptor is tricking them. He explains, however, that John has convinced him to buy the back stock of records for sale in his supermarket chain. After Vlad orders thousands of albums per month, Danny turns to Cindy with a marriage proposal and Joseph exults that he trusted John all along. To prove his conversion, when the Preston Trio visits, Joseph boasts that he "digs them from down under to the polar cap."
As stated during the opening credits, "the following artists were chosen for this picture because you.. the public... have acclaimed their talent by purchasing four hundred million of the records":
Universal has not officially released The Big Beat on DVD or VHS. A few bootleg DVD-R copies of varying quality exist but otherwise, not much else is known.
Joy Division were an English post-punk band formed in Salford in 1976. The group consisted of vocalist, guitarist and lyricist Ian Curtis, guitarist and keyboardist Bernard Sumner, bassist Peter Hook and drummer Stephen Morris.
Edward William May Jr. was an American composer, arranger and trumpeter. He composed film and television music for The Green Hornet (1966), The Mod Squad (1968), Batman, and Naked City (1960). He collaborated on films such as Pennies from Heaven (1981), and orchestrated Cocoon, and Cocoon: The Return, among others.
Big in Japan were a punk band that emerged from Liverpool, United Kingdom in the late 1970s. They are better known for the later successes of their band members than for their own music.
Lucky is the eighth album by singer-songwriter Melissa Etheridge, released in 2004. The album made a debut on Billboard chart at No. 15 with almost 92,000 copies sold.
Hans Georg Conried Jr. was an American actor and comedian. He was known for providing the voices of George Darling and Captain Hook in Walt Disney's Peter Pan (1953), Snidely Whiplash in Jay Ward's Dudley Do-Right cartoons, Professor Waldo P. Wigglesworth in Ward's Hoppity Hooper cartoons, was host of Ward's live-action "Fractured Flickers" show and Professor Kropotkin on the radio and film versions of My Friend Irma. He also appeared as Uncle Tonoose on Danny Thomas' sitcom Make Room for Daddy, twice on I Love Lucy, and as the Mad Hatter along with Daws Butler, Dolores Starr, Stanley Adams, Francis Condie Baxter and Cheryl Callaway in The Alphabet Conspiracy (1959).
Myrtle Audrey Arinsberg, known professionally as Gogi Grant, was an American pop singer. She is best known for her No. 1 hit in 1956, "The Wayward Wind".
Robert Joseph Weston was a British rock guitarist, who was a member of Fleetwood Mac in the early 1970s. He also recorded and performed with a number of other musicians, including Graham Bond, Long John Baldry, Murray Head, Sandy Denny, and Danny Kirwan.
"Mad About the Boy" is a popular song with words and music by actor and playwright Noël Coward. It was introduced in the 1932 revue Words and Music by Joyce Barbour, Steffi Duna, Norah Howard and Doris Hare. The song deals with the theme of unrequited love for a film star. It was written to be sung by female characters, although Coward also wrote a version which was never performed, containing references to the then-risqué topic of homosexual love. The song gained new popularity in 1992 when Dinah Washington's rendition was used in the Levi's television advertisement "Swimmer", directed by Tarsem Singh.
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Danny Davis was an American country music band leader, trumpet player, vocalist and producer, best known as the founder and leader of the Nashville Brass. He is also famous for performing the English theme song of the anime series Speed Racer.
No Down Payment is a 1957 American drama film directed by Martin Ritt. It was written by Philip Yordan, who fronted for an uncredited and blacklisted Ben Maddow, and is based on the novel of the same name by John McPartland. The film stars Joanne Woodward, Sheree North, Tony Randall, Jeffrey Hunter, Cameron Mitchell, Patricia Owens, Barbara Rush, and Pat Hingle.
Stanley Beresford "Donn" Reynolds was a Canadian country music singer and yodeler most widely known for his Bavarian style of yodeling. Often referred to as Canada's "king of the yodelers", Reynolds established two yodeling world records. He recorded 38 singles and six albums throughout a performing career spanning over 40 years.
The 65th Writers Guild of America Awards honor the best film, television, radio and video-game writers of 2012. The television and radio nominees were announced on December 6, 2012. Film nominees were announced on January 4, 2013. All winners were announced on February 17, 2013, at the JW Marriott Hotel in the L.A. Live entertainment complex.
Lewis Joseph Bedell was an American music business executive and comic entertainer who founded Era Records and then Doré Records in Los Angeles, California in the 1950s. Originally named Lewis Joseph Bedinsky, he also used the pseudonyms Louis Bideu and Billy Joe Hunter, among others.
Jeryn "Jeri" Hogarth is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. He is a friend of Iron Fist's father Wendell and an attorney for the Heroes for Hire, a team of heroes of which Iron Fist is a member.
Don Williams Volume Two is the second studio album by American country music singer and songwriter Don Williams. Released in January of 1974 on the JMI Records label, the album reached number thirteen on the US Country Albums Chart. "Atta Way to Go" was released in 1973 as a single preceding the album, and "We Should Be Together" and "Down the Road I Go" were released as singles in 1974.
Half a Hundred Years is the 26th studio album by American country band Asleep at the Wheel. Produced by the band's frontman Ray Benson and manager Sam Seifert, it was released on October 1, 2021 by Home Records, a sub-label of Bismeaux Productions, with Thirty Tigers. The album was produced to mark the 50th anniversary of the band's 1970 formation and features a wide range of guest performers, including several former band members and frequent collaborator Willie Nelson.
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