After another short-lived marriage to musician George Weidler, Doris Day wed again, this time to her agent, Marty Melcher, giving her son her new husband’s last name. That marriage lasted until Melcher’s death in 1968, but during their union, Day claimed that Melcher would force her to take big money roles, and she thought at the time he was taking care of what she earned.
Upon Melcher’s death, her son, Terry, had to inform her that her husband had embezzled money from her and squandered most of it away, leaving her in a tax debt worth nearly half a million dollars. While she sued Melcher’s lawyer, Jerome Rosenthal, and was rewarded $22 million in 1974, The New York Times reported that her son, Terry, said in an interview that after a small payout from an insurance company, she got “nothing like that amount.”
Day went on to earn money with a television sitcom and wed again in 1976, but her marriage to Barry Comden only lasted six years.
