The Gene Krupa Story The audience rewards Krupa with a standing ovation. The film ends as Ethel tries to sneak off, sure Gene will return to his old ways. He catches up with her, and asks where she is going, "without me"? The closing credits come down on a shot of them walking away together, into the night. In real life, the two were first married from 1934 to 1942; they remarried in 1946 and were together until Ethel's death in 1955. Krupa himself played the drums on the soundtrack for the film, and for the sequences in which Mineo, as Gene, plays the
Gene Krupa excepted—to be led by a female musician. The Playboys were the house band at The Golden Pumpkin nightclub in Chicago and toured throughout the eastern and central United States. Krupa made his first recordings in 1927 with a band under the leadership of Red McKenzie and guitarist Eddie Condon. Along with other recordings by musicians from the Chicago jazz scene, such as Bix Beiderbecke, these recordings are examples of Chicago style jazz. Krupa's influences during this time included Father Ildefonse Rapp and Roy Knapp (both teachers of Gene), and drummers Tubby Hall, Zutty Singleton and Baby Dodds. Press rolls were