Hulu’s “We Were the Lucky Ones” is a Gripping Family Drama with the Holocaust as Backdrop and the JAZZ Music of the Period with the Classic “Love Is Just around the Corner”
Based on Georgia Hunter’s New York Times bestselling novel, the television adaptation of “We Were the Lucky Ones” is a limited series inspired by the incredible true story of one Jewish family separated at the start of WWII. The series, which premiered on Hulu on March 28, 2024 and was created by Erica Lipez and directed by Thomas Kail, follows them across continents as they do everything in their power to survive, and to reunite. “We Were the Lucky Ones” demonstrates how in the face of the twentieth century’s darkest moment, the human spirit can endure and even thrive. The series is a tribute to the triumph of hope and love against all odds.
It is the spring of 1939 and three generations of the Kurc family are
doing their best to live normal lives, even as the shadow of war grows closer. The talk around the family Seder table is of new babies and budding romance, not of the increasing hardships threatening Jews in their hometown of Radom, Poland. What the Kurcs don’t know is that their hometown will soon be under Nazi control—and this will be their last Passover together for the next decade. But soon the horrors overtaking Europe will become inescapable and the Kurcs will be flung to the far corners of the world, each desperately trying to navigate his or her own path to safety.
Prior to World War II, the Kurc family, Polish Jews, lived successful and relatively peaceful lives in Radom. Their success protected them from
some of the virulent anti-semitism in the country. Their protection does not last as Hitler’s persecution of European Jewry intensified. Some members of the family find themselves in hiding and in concentration camps. Other members of the family managed to escape to France, Brazil, West Africa and Russia. Once the war ends, survivors from the family attempt to discover any living relatives and reunite. The story centers on siblings played by Joey King and Logan Lerman.
“By the end of the Holocaust, 90% of Poland’s three million Jews were annihilated,” the series rem
inds viewers at the outset. But as the show’s title implies, all immediate members of the Kurc family are fortunate enough to live through the genocide and remain doggedly devoted to reuniting. “There were over 20 survivors in all, including my grandfather and his siblings, parents, cousins and in-laws,” she writes in a blog post on her website. “Together, they accounted for nearly 7% of the total number of Jewish survivors in their hometown of Radom (the city’s thriving prewar population of 30,000 Jews shrank to fewer than 300 after the Holocaust).”
The film makers frequently select the music with lyrics written by Leo Robin for these period films. In “We Were the Lucky Ones,” Leo Robin wrote the lyrics to the classic sentimental ballad “Love Is Just around the Corner,” composed by Lewis E. Gensler. Eddie Condon & His Windy City Seven recording in 1938 topped the charts and is used in the film. The song was was introduced by Bing Crosby in the 1934 film Here Is My Heart.
This song has been performed through the ages by a wide spectrum of entertainers from the most celebrated jazz musicians such as trumpeter Louis Armstrong, pianist George Shearing and drummer Jo Jones to vocalists such as Bing Crosby, Duke Ellington, Billy Eckstine, Frank Sinatra, Vic Damone, Mel Tormé, Michael Feinstein, Paul Anka to groups such as The Four Freshmen, HarryJames and his Orchestra and The Platters.