The Girl He Left Behind

Andy Schaeffer is a spoiled mama's boy who usually gets his way. He breezes through college while girlfriend Susan Daniels studies hard while also working at a job to pay for her education. She isn't sure where their relationship is going. Where it's going for Andy is the Army, because his grades have become so poor at school, he's being drafted. Andy reports for basic training at Fort Ord, making it clear to everybody there that he'd rather be anyplace else.

• Tab Hunter as Private/Corporal Andy Schaeffer
• Natalie Wood as Susan
• Jessie Royce Landis as Mrs. Schaeffer
• Jim Backus as Sgt. Hanna
• Murray Hamilton as Sgt. Clyde
• Henry Jones as Hanson
• Alan King as Majors
• James Garner as Preston
• David Janssen as Capt. Genaro

Marion Hargrove had a huge success with his book See Here Private Hargrove which sold 3,500,000 copies. Warner Bros approached him to see if he would be interested writing a story about a draftee in the army in peacetime.

Hargrove agreed but wanted the story to be accurate, and he had left the army in 1945. He arranged through Warners to undertake enlistment and some basic training at Fort Ord. Hargrove told Warners he had enough material for the book. The studio paid him to write the novel and retained only the screen rights.[2]

The novel was published in 1956. Hargrove wanted to call it All Quiet in the Third Platoon but Warners preferred The Girl He Left Behind.[3]

Tab Hunter and Natalie Wood had just appeared in The Burning Hills together and Warner Bros were keen to build them into an on screen team.[4]

Filming started June 1956.[5] Much of the film was shot at Fort Ord and used real soldiers.[2]

Garner later wrote that the film "was awful and I was awful but it was the best I could do at the time."[6]

• List of American films of 1956

Notes

• The Girl He Left Behind on IMDb