My Days Read online

  As for Holden, I found my feelings about him to be rather odd. He was an established star by that time, and yet I never found him to be awe-inspiring. I can’t explain why I felt that way. He was always gracious to me whenever we briefly crossed paths, and I thought he was a good actor and extremely professional in the way he worked. But, to me, he just never had that aura of being a star.

  That was just the opposite of another star I had the chance to work with: Clark Gable.

  When I received word that I had been cast as Katy Fuller, the secretary to Doris Day’s character, Erica Stone, in the romantic comedy Teacher’s Pet, I was looking forward to getting to work with director George Seaton again and having the opportunity to meet Ms. Day. I was also beside myself that I was going to get to work in a film with Clark Gable.

  To me, Gable was the archetype of a Hollywood movie star and leading man. This wasn’t just getting to work with a big star; this was getting to work with the man who was known as “the King of Hollywood.” To me, he was Peter Warne in It Happened One Night, for which he won an Oscar; Fletcher Christian in Mutiny on the Bounty; and, of course, Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind.

  My mother had loved Clark Gable from as far back as I could remember. I had loved Clark Gable for as far back as I could remember. Hell, everyone I knew had loved Clark Gable for as long as I could remember. While Holden did nothing for me, it was just the opposite with Gable. I was unabashedly in awe of him and had to muster up the highest level of professionalism whenever I did a scene with him.

  We were shooting Teacher’s Pet in the spring, and as Easter rolled around, I colored an egg and wrote on it, “M.R. Loves C.G.” I was far too shy to give it to him, so I gave it to his assistant and asked if she would pass it along.

  Later that day, I ran into Gable in the hallway, and he broke out in that big smile of his and said, “Hey, thank you for the egg.”

  I blushed and managed to get out the words “You’re welcome.”

  Throughout my entire career, I have greatly admired many of the people I have gotten to meet and work with. However, there have been a scant few who ever rendered me awestruck. Gable was one of those who did. And, while I always maintained my professionalism, there were times when it seemed surreal to be working with various screen legends—and never more so than when, thanks to my work on Life with Father, I was given the opportunity to work with my childhood inspiration: Noël Coward.

  Having seen a local production of Coward’s play Blithe Spirit and having read his first autobiography, Present Indicative, when I was a young girl, I was excited to learn that CBS was looking to cast the role of Edith, who was an Irish maid, in a live televised production of Blithe Spirit that was a part of a special series of dramatic productions they were presenting. A series like this was a perfect fit for CBS, which had carved out a niche by doing quite a bit of theatrical programming on shows like Studio One, which presented a wide range of dramas and the anthology series Playhouse 90. And the role was a perfect fit for me, as I had carved out a niche of playing maids.

  I was aware that the network knew I was a trained actress and was out of my mind when I learned I had been recommended to play the maid in Blithe Spirit, which was going to be done with Claudette Colbert, Lauren Bacall, Mildred Natwick and Coward himself!

  A few days later, I received a call that I was to meet with the show’s coproducers, Charles Russell and Lance Hamilton, at a coffee shop down the block from Television City to discuss my playing the part of the maid. A theater impresario, costumier, actor and longtime associate of Coward’s, Russell had teamed up with Hamilton, who was his lover, to create costumes for Coward’s 1945 revue Sigh No More. Shortly thereafter, they had formed a management company to produce a touring revival of Coward’s play Fallen Angels. They had followed that with a cabaret show starring Coward and Mary Martin at the Café de Paris in London and had then been tapped to produce the Blithe Spirit special for CBS.

  Arriving at the coffee shop at the prescribed time, I brought something to my meeting with Russell and Hamilton that I didn’t usually take along when I was meeting with producers, directors or casting people: my husband. I can’t really explain why I decided to bring Effie with me, although in the back of my mind, I may have thought it couldn’t hurt to bring along a handsome young man when meeting with a gay couple.

  Effie, as I so hoped, was on his game that day. He was charming and personable, and Russell and Hamilton seemed as interested in him as they did in me assuming the role of the maid. It was a delightful meeting, and as we parted, they told me they would be in touch with me soon—and they were. They called me the following day and asked me a question that, even in the grandest of my old Albert Lea dreams, I could have never imagined being posed to me: Could I come to meet with Mr. Coward on Sunday afternoon at the Bogarts’ home? That’s the Bogarts, as in Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.

  After a moment of stunned silence and a bit of confused stammering, I remember saying something like, “Okay, ah, sure. I mean, ah, yes. I mean, of course I’ll be there. Oh, and what should I wear? A skirt, a sweater, a dress?”

  Russell and Hamilton both laughed. “Come just the way you were the other day, dear,” said Russell. “That will be fine.”

  When Sunday came, I drove out to 232 South Mapleton Drive in the mansion- and movie star–rich Holmby Hills section of Los Angeles. I could feel my heart pounding under my blouse as I turned into the driveway of the house that was the meeting place of the original Rat Pack, which was composed of Bogart, Bacall, Judy Garland, Frank Sinatra, Nathaniel Benchley, Sid Luft, David Niven, John Huston, Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, George Cukor, Cary Grant, Rex Harrison and Jimmy Van Heusen. Long before the more commonly known members of the pack, such as Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Joey Bishop and Peter Lawford, came along, this group became notorious throughout Hollywood for their hard-drinking all-night parties.

  The Rat Pack got their name from Bacall, who, in the early morning hours of a Las Vegas party, walked in on a few of the charter members, along with Mike and Gloria Romanoff, Angie Dickinson and a few others, after they had put in a night of heavy imbibing. Bacall looked around at the bleary-eyed mess of humanity and said, “You look like a goddamn rat pack.” The name stuck, and back in Los Angeles, the Bogarts’ Holmby Hills home became the pack’s de facto clubhouse, where they threw legendary all-nighters that included visits from Errol Flynn, Cesar Romero, Ava Gardner, Robert Mitchum, Elizabeth Taylor, Nat King Cole, Janet Leigh, Tony Curtis, Mickey Rooney, Lena Horne and Jerry Lewis.

  As I stepped out of the car, all sorts of thoughts were rushing through my head, most notably, that along with the man and lady of the house, who were one of the most iconic couples ever to appear together on the screen, behind the big wooden door, which was getting closer and closer with each step I took, was Noël Coward, the man who had made such an impression on me when I was a young girl back in Albert Lea.

  I remember taking a pause to smooth my skirt just prior to ringing the bell, and within moments the door swung open and a formally dressed butler asked me a question I gather most guests to that house didn’t want to waste any time being asked: “What may I get you to drink?” I wasn’t a drinker, so I just asked for what I knew Effie would have requested: a Scotch and water. The butler gave me a nod and led me down the hall to a large room with a parquet floor, wood-paneled walls, a large brick fireplace and, sprawled out on a rug, one of the most famous movie stars in the world, who was playing with his children.

  Bogart, who was wearing a sweater with no shirt underneath, greeted me and explained that he wasn’t a part of the day’s reading. I stood there, not having any idea of what I should say or do and hoping beyond hope that I didn’t look as nervous as I felt. A few moments later I was invited to move on to another room—a large den that housed a long table with chairs all around it and, in the corner, a grand piano with a framed photo of Ethel Barrymore sitting atop its closed lid.

  And then, in a true through-th
e-looking-glass scenario of the surreal that I’ll never forget, a door swung open and in came Claudette Colbert, wearing a magnificent Dior suit with a fur collar. She gave me a curt nod with what seemed to be a forced smile, scanned her eyes over my sweater and skirt, and before I could even say a word, she was followed by Bacall, who was wearing a tailored gray men’s suit dress with a beautiful pin. Bacall motioned for me to take a seat at the table, as Colbert, who seemed very high strung and nervous, never stopped talking. My God, I thought to myself as I sat in awkward silence, will she ever stop talking?

  She finally did when the door once again opened and in walked Coward, wearing a velvet smoking jacket. He greeted the three of us and paced around the room, wringing his hands and going on and on in dramatic fashion about how he had just gotten in from Palm Springs. I had to remind myself to allow my eyes to blink and to take breaths as he went on and on about how everything and everyone out in “the Springs” was “fabulous, darling” and “marvelous, darling,” phrases he seemed to work into either the beginning or the end of every other sentence.

  Colbert and Bacall, who had joined me at the table, sat in rapt attention as Coward regaled us with all sorts of tidbits about this “fabulous chap” and that “magnificent dinner party.” While continuing his stories, he reached into a satchel, pulled out copies of the script for Blithe Spirit, and placed them on the table in front of us. He continued on with another fabulous tale or two and then abruptly switched gears. “And now we’ll read the play, darlings,” he said.

  I looked at the hefty three-inch-thick scripts in front of me and thought, This will take hours to read.

  Coward passed on taking a place at the table and sat in an overstuffed chair in a corner of the room. For the first time since he had walked in, I had gained enough feeling in my legs to turn around toward him. And then, in a move that completely surprised me but seemingly went unnoticed by the others, I got up, crossed the room, and planted myself on the hassock adjacent to his chair. As he flipped through the pages of his script, I sat looking at him from just a few feet away.

  My gosh, I thought to myself. I can’t believe I’m sitting next to Noël Coward . . . with Claudette Colbert and Lauren Bacall behind me . . . and Humphrey Bogart just down the hall, playing with his son and daughter.

  I took a quick glance behind me to see Colbert and Bacall with their noses just as buried in their scripts as Coward’s was. I pretended to do the same, although I found it impossible to take my eyes off Coward. I watched as he put a cigarette to his mouth and lit it without looking up from the script.

  I read this man’s first autobiography when I was a teenager at the Albert Lea Library, I thought. And now, here he is, right next to me, and I am working with him.

  Thinking about that gave me a momentary flash of confusion. As a thirteen-year-old girl reading Present Indicative, I had perceived Coward as being a middle-aged man, and yet all these years later, here he was in front of me, a middle-aged man. He was actually fifty-six at the time, which made me do a quick little figuring in my head. Okay, I thought. That makes sense. He would have been in his late thirties when he wrote his first autobiography, so it would not have been unreasonable for a thirteen-year-old to have thought of him as being middle aged. Still, in spite of the age calculations that were going on in my head, I couldn’t take my eyes off of his face and his hands. To me, he didn’t seem to be any older than I had thought of him being when I was a young girl.

  When I think back on those moments—sitting there and looking at him, with only a few feet of nothing between us—I tend to think of myself as being almost in a trancelike state of awe, one that was broken when the tailcoated butler cleared his throat to get my attention and then handed me a tall glass that contained what had to have been a triple Scotch and water. Without thinking, I took a big sip of the drink, which slapped me back to reality. God, that is just awful, I thought as the alcohol hit the back of my throat like a burning-hot slap.

  “Shall we begin?” said Coward as I placed the Scotch (which I would never touch again) on a nearby end table.

  I followed along with the reading, and when my part came, I looked up, directly into Coward’s eyes, and he delivered his lines with nonchalant aplomb, as if we were just having a real conversation. The reading, as I had suspected, went on forever, and through it all Coward was gentlemanly and kind as he periodically broke out of character to make an observance or give directions. After we finished the reading, we had a bite to eat, and Coward commented positively on my Irish accent, which sent me over the moon.

  It was all so wonderful and exciting, and following our good-byes, I walked out of the Bogarts’ mansion with my head in the clouds, so much so that I forgot to release the car’s emergency brake, which, in just a matter of minutes, had my tailpipe filling the tony streets of Holmby Hills with billows of black smoke.

  As we moved into serious rehearsals for Blithe Spirit, which had been scheduled to air on January 14, 1956, I came to like Coward more and more. He was stylish and dramatic, which I had expected, but he was also very nice to me. He was always fair in giving his time when I had a question, and was extremely patient as he worked with me to get the right emphasis on a line or to change one of my hand gestures.

  While my relationship with Coward was professional and positive, I, along with the entire cast and crew, soon realized the same could not be said for the way he interacted with Colbert, whom I rapidly came to detest. She had been what I perceived as cold, uncooperative and at times downright rude during rehearsals and even into the taping. While I, of course, hung on every word and direction Coward gave us, Colbert often interrupted him and rudely questioned his direction. Coward seemed to take her antics in stride, and knowing that he and Colbert were longtime friends who would often spend time together at his home in Jamaica, I just figured they were close enough—in the way an old married couple might be—for her to get away with that sort of behavior.

  If that was the case, or if something else was going on between them, I don’t know. All I do know is that Colbert never seemed comfortable during rehearsals, and by the time we got to the actually taping, she was a nervous wreck. She was constantly dropping pages of her script and fiddling with her scarf, which kept falling off. It was also apparent to me, and everyone else, that her constant interrupting of Coward escalated as each day went by. Still, in spite of the growing tension on the set, and the perceived frigid air that was forming between them, Coward retained his composure . . . for about a week. Then he had had it.

  As we were taping one scene, Colbert abruptly dropped character and started yammering about something that was bothering her. When Coward asked what was wrong, she just kept interrupting him, until he finally stood up and yelled, “Shut your fucking face, Claudette!”

  The entire set went stone-cold silent, and no one dared look up or at another.

  “Shut my fucking face?” Colbert seethed back at him with a hateful glare. “Shut my fucking face?” she repeated at the top of her lungs.

  Oh my, I thought as I stood frozen like a statue. Now this is war.

  Once the drama of that little scene was over and we had moved on, I did all I could to avoid Colbert. Even in passing, I did all I could to keep out of her way. And when I did have to interact with her on the set, she was awful to me. As I would bend over to pour tea, she would gruffly grab my arm and push me over to where she thought I should be standing. She was downright rude to me at times, which, while it certainly added to my dislike of her, didn’t really bother me that much, because she didn’t seem to hit it off with anyone. I have since learned she was known for throwing tantrums from the time she was very young, but beyond that, it seemed as if something was bothering her. She always seemed extremely nervous and off-kilter from that first time I met her at the Bogarts’ house right on through to the day we wrapped production.

  Perhaps she was just at an odd place in her life and career. Her film work was behind her by that time, although she went on to w
in a Tony Award a year or two later, when she played the part of Dr. Content Lowell in The Marriage-Go-Round on Broadway. She also continued to do both theater and television work well into her eighties, and she won a Golden Globe and earned an Emmy nomination for her 1987 portrayal of Alice Grenville in the televised miniseries The Two Mrs. Grenvilles, which was based on the 1985 novel of the same name by Dominick Dunne.

  So, I don’t know what had gotten into her while we were doing Blithe Spirit, but whatever it was, it was evident to everyone, including Coward, who, from what I heard, wasn’t shy about telling people that Colbert had been very difficult to work with during that show. I know he even touched on it in one of his later diaries, where, in referring to her performance in Blithe Spirit, he said that he had found her behavior to be “extremely tiresome.” He also went on to write that while he felt she was an excellent actress and that he had “a definite affection for her as a person,” working with her on Blithe Spirit had wilted that affection considerably, a situation he called “a sad pity.”

  If working on Blithe Spirit left me with cold feelings toward Colbert (which it definitely did), just the opposite was the case with Lauren Bacall, who I thought was divine. Bacall was only a few years older than me, but she was worldly and wise in a way that made her seem much older. That perception may have come from her being married to a man who was old enough to be her father (and who was already ill with the cancer that would claim his life the next year) and from her being the mother of two young children. By this time, she was a well-established star, having done that string of classic films with Bogart—To Have and Have Not, The Big Sleep, Dark Passage and Key Largo—and the romantic comedy How to Marry a Millionaire with Marilyn Monroe. But she was thrilled to be Mrs. Bogart and to be in Hollywood.