The Release of Robert Preston Forever The Music Man with Debra Warren 10/05/22

For Video Edition, Please Click and Subscribe Here: https://youtu.be/CdirO0e7kpU

Born Robert Preston Meservey in the suburbs of Boston in 1918, Preston moved with his family to Los Angeles as a toddler. He caught the acting bug in high school and continued as an actor with a Shakespearean acting troupe and at the Pasadena Playhouse before being discovered by Paramount Studios in 1938 at the age of nineteen. The song “Seventy-Six Trombones” from The Music Man would forever link Robert Preston to the Broadway musical and the iconic 1962 film that would establish him as a Hollywood and Broadway star. His role as Harold Hill in The Music Man was a pivotal moment for the actor who appeared in dozens of films as well as theater and television productions. A master at shielding his private life, Robert Preston was a distinguished actor and gifted artist on the public stage, yet remained a reclusive, enigmatic man in his private life. Extensive archival research, and interviews Preston’s family members and fellow actors including Rosemary Harris, Christopher Walken, Lesley Ann Warren, Loretta Swit, Bob Gunton, Neva Small, and others, has unveiled a richly detailed portrait of the gifted actor’s personal life as well as an overview of the films and Broadway productions to which he lent his talent. REVIEWS "Debra Warren has written a fascinating and meticulous chronology of a heretofore enigmatic star – gregarious but intensely private, overachieving but underestimated, charismatic but modest, strategizing but sincere. Preston is now revealed in the full spectrum of his personality. Ms. Warren's passion for detail makes this biography as invaluable a reference as it is an enticing read.” - Ron Spivak, Musical Theater Historian