MIDDLETOWN — A would-be groom feuding with friends and his future father-in-law early Saturday morning, the day of his wedding, leaped from a third-floor motel balcony, suffering serious injuries, according to the police.

The apparently intoxicated groom survived the plummet — a rental car cushioned his fall —but he missed his scheduled nuptials; he’s remained hospitalized since the incident.

The Middletown police responded to the Comfort Inn Saturday at about 1:50 a.m. for a report of a man who had fallen. In the Aquidneck Avenue parking lot, the police found the groom, coherent but in the fetal position and bleeding from his head and face. He was taken to Newport Hospital and later transferred to Rhode Island Hospital, where his condition was not being released yesterday evening.

The police spoke with the groom at Newport Hospital, but he appeared drunk and was uncooperative, telling the police he didn’t remember where he lives or what had happened that night, according to a police report.

Members of the wedding party told the police that they had gone to dinner at Sardella’s restaurant, in Newport, and then to the Sports Ticket Bar and Grill, next door to the Comfort Inn. Friends told the police that the groom had had several drinks, the police said.

Back at the motel, the groom argued with one of his friends, and when another buddy tried to separate the two, the groom allegedly punched the peacemaker in the chin, the police said. The brother of the bride-to-be separated the men, but the groom went to another room and began arguing with his prospective father-in-law.

(At some point during the scuffles, a Comfort Inn staffer went to the third floor to try to quiet the loud group. The staffer told the police that the groom was acting aggressive and tried to attack him but was restrained by members of the wedding party, according to the police.)

The groom’s friends told the police that they saw the groom grabbing his fiancée’s father. A friend put the groom in a headlock, but the future father-in-law told the group that he would handle the situation, according to a police report.

The two continued yelling at each other in earshot of the groom’s friends, who heard the groom tell his fiancée’s dad, “I hate you, I’m out of here.”

The groom then jumped from the third-floor balcony, striking the fender of a 2007 Toyota Avalon before falling to the pavement.

mwims@projo.com