My Days Page 9

  While I believed, with my first film under my belt, offers of roles would now come pouring in, that never happened. What did happen when my second six-month contract expired was that no further extension was offered and I was unceremoniously dropped by the studio. I can’t say this came as a total surprise to me. While my solid optimism had kept the belief alive that things were about to happen for me, I had also quietly, on the inside, known that after a year, the powers that be at Paramount were not going to pave my path to success.

  While I had had a feeling my being dropped was inevitable for a while before the ax actually fell, when it did, I was devastated, for a few days. By the following week, after awaking to four or five mornings in which I did not have to go to the lot, I had a great feeling of relief come over me. It had become a terrible strain to go there every day, and so while I still harbored feelings of devastation over being dropped, I was also very relieved. Did I know how I was going to move forward with my career, or even how we were going to continue to pay our bills? No. But, in a way, getting the boot from Paramount proved to be a good thing. Instead of simply being made up as the starlet that I wasn’t, I began going on actual auditions for real parts in real productions, some of which—small as they may have been—I got!

  As a young woman now approaching my midtwenties, I spent a lot of time thinking about how I was going to bring all the pieces of the puzzle together—my training, my degree, my work at Paramount, my having actually appeared in a film—to make it all work out. How can I make this all work? I would sit and ask myself over and over. My answer: I’d hire a press agent!

  The idea stemmed from a woman I knew named Barbara Best, who was a pioneer in the entertainment industry. Barbara was a very interesting woman who had attended the University of Southern California on a full scholarship. After she graduated from USC’s School of Journalism in 1943, she landed a job at 20th Century Fox and, along with being the very rare female, was the youngest unit publicist for a major motion picture studio. After putting in six years with 20th Century Fox, she moved on to work with Stanley Kramer and then Columbia Pictures, where she assisted George Glass, who was the studio’s vice president of advertising, publicity, and public relations.

  After racking up over a decade of experience with the studios, Barbara decided to start her own company: Barbara Best, Inc. I had known her socially for some time and believed she would be of great help to me in putting all the pieces together. When I now look back at the list of both struggles and successes I faced as I was establishing myself as an actress, the decision to enlist the services of Barbara proved to be one that led to successes. She agreed to take me on as a client and went beyond being my press agent and took over the management of my career. She was hard on me, but I knew it was all for my own good.

  Barbara and I clicked with one another right from the start. She was living with a woman, and I had my suspicions that she was a lesbian, but I never gave that much, if any, thought. I knew she was always fond of me, and as the years went by, she became completely devoted to me and my career, but she never made even the slightest unwanted advance toward me.

  I found myself pushing myself harder than I ever had before, both to achieve my dream and to please Barbara. In an odd way that I really can’t explain to this day, although I was her client, I always felt as if I had to do everything I could to please her. I remember getting to the point that I wanted to be successful for her as much as I did for myself. She really worked me, setting up interviews when I had nothing to talk about or sell. That would prove to be uncomfortable for me at times. Sitting with a reporter who, I imagined, was wondering just why the hell they were interviewing me brought back that wave of “nobody” nausea from my Paramount premiere days. But Barbara was always working it on my behalf, was constantly out there doing what she felt was best for me. She gave so much of herself for me that I often felt as if she was working harder on me making it than I was, which would make me work even harder, just to feel like I was pulling my weight in making something happen.

  Barbara made my success her business, which was great for me, but not for Effie, who never thought much of her. When I look back on that, it makes more sense to me than it did at the time. Barbara was a classic type A personality, driven by ambition and constantly applying her high-octane methods to everything she did. Effie was, of course, just the opposite, and his feelings about her ranged from mild resentment to downright detestation, depending on the demands she placed on me, his mood, or the amount of alcohol he had consumed.

  Along with Barbara, I was still working with Jack Weiner, who operated his agency out of this plain little office on Sunset Boulevard, near the Whisky a Go Go. Working outside of the contractual confines of Paramount, Jack was able to help me land some small roles in features, such as The Glenn Miller Story, with Jimmy Stewart. He also encouraged me to audition for television roles.

  Oh my, I would think to myself. I’m not that keen on acting in films, much less television.

  Luckily for me, without any hopes of appearing on Broadway looming on the horizon, I came to terms with television, or at least with my willingness to work in the medium.

  Ironically, the television show that gave me my first real break was based on a successful play, Life with Father, which opened on Broadway in 1939. The play, written by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, had been adapted from an autobiographical book by author and cartoonist Clarence Day. The Broadway production, which starred Howard Lindsay; his wife, Dorothy Stickney; and Teresa Wright, proved to be such a success that it was adapted for broadcast on CBS Radio’s The Mercury Theatre on the Air, which starred Orson Welles, and for a 1947 feature film that starred William Powell and Irene Dunne, with a supporting cast that included Elizabeth Taylor, Edmund Gwenn, ZaSu Pitts, Jimmy Lydon and Martin Milner. Six years later, Life with Father took on yet another adaptation, this time as a television series that starred Leon Ames and Lurene Tuttle and ran from 1953 until 1955 on CBS.

  In the first season of Life with Father, the producers put out a casting call for an Irish maid named Nora. Well aware of my ability to do various dialects and accents, including brogues, Jack sent me over to CBS Television City to audition. When I arrived at the then brand-new modern CBS production complex at the corner of Beverly Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue in the Fairfax District of Los Angeles, where Life with Father was shot, I had ambivalent feelings. For one thing, I felt it was just a small role in a television show, a role that consisted of not much more than saying the line “Dinner is served, sir,” and one that I felt may be short lived. I was familiar with the play the show was based on and knew that maids came and went with every scene, because the man of the house was constantly firing them.

  As I made my way through the corridors of Television City, I felt confident enough, but unlike my screen test at Paramount years earlier, after reading for the part, I had no feeling of nailing the audition. I felt I had done well. My penchant for providing the proper accent certainly made me feel comfortable with the reading, and although it wasn’t a role I was coveting, there was one little thing about it that did intrigue me: the show was done live.

  That appealed to me because it meant the show had a live theater, Broadway-esque quality to it. Without the constant starting and stopping of a filmed production, this show had the feeling of doing what I was most comfortable with: theater. I think I may have also given thought to the fact that the show was getting a lot of publicity because it was the first live series to be aired in color. I think I may have also convinced myself that back in New York, some Broadway producer, while diverting his attention from a hard day of casting an upcoming show, may just catch an episode of Life with Father and, knowing it was done live, think to himself, Aha! That girl playing the maid would be perfect! Who is that girl? Who cares! Just get her!

  And so, while I think I may have secretly wanted the job even more than I let on to myself, I didn’t lose any sleep when I left Television City that day with no knowledge of what t
he producers thought of me.

  A few days later, Jack called me to say that they liked me, but that they were looking at quite a few girls. I, again, didn’t give it much thought, until I was called in for another reading. I again left without any indication that I was going to get the role, and I believe I was actually called back a few more times after that before they offered me the part. I was excited. It was work on a popular show that would, hopefully, heighten my notoriety both in Hollywood and, more importantly to me, in New York. The money wasn’t great, but it was money, something I had gotten used to providing for the livelihood of both myself and my husband.

  If I had been concerned that my role in Life with Father would be over before I knew I did it, I was wrong—very wrong. I ended up doing the show for over two years, which made me enough of a “known commodity” to land roles or appearances in a plethora of television shows, such as The Lone Ranger, Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer, The Donna Reed Show, The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show, The Millionaire, Perry Mason, Buckskin, The Barbara Stanwyck Show, Father Knows Best, The Outer Limits, Route 66 and Mr. Novak.

  During this time I also landed roles of slightly more significance than I had been used to in feature films. During the last half of the 1950s, I appeared in numerous films, including The Proud and Profane, with William Holden, Deborah Kerr and Thelma Ritter; Lizzie, which was based on the Shirley Jackson novel The Bird’s Nest and starred Eleanor Parker, Richard Boone and Joan Blondell; the comedy Teacher’s Pet, with Clark Gable, Doris Day and Gig Young; and the Blake Edwards–directed Operation Petticoat, which starred Cary Grant and Tony Curtis and in which I had the role of a nurse.

  With my roles in these films, I may not have seen my name in lights on any marquees or made folks from coast to coast wait in anticipation for the release of the next “Marion Ross film,” but these roles were beefing up my résumé and giving this little Midwestern girl with the big dream the opportunity to work with the biggest names of the day. Yes, films that were playing throughout the United States included scenes with me and Clark Gable, Doris Day, Joan Blondell, Cary Grant and Tony Curtis.

  Doing these films was exciting and yet, in a strange way, frustrating. I guess the best way to describe it would be to be a member of some sort of sports team in which the big-name players were always out on the field, scoring and getting cheered on by the crowd, while you were sitting on the bench. I was a part of the film business, a member of the cast, and yet I spent way too much time for my liking on the bench. That doesn’t mean I didn’t have wonderful experiences that have made for great memories. One of my most favorites was when I was doing the war romance film The Proud and Profane, which was directed by George Seaton and was based on Lucy Herndon Crockett’s novel The Magnificent Bastards. I may have still been a nobody, but for a very short period of time, during the making of that film, I got the full-on star treatment.

  Many scenes of that film were shot on location in the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, in cooperation with the United States Department of Defense, and just prior to shooting in the islands, the stars—William Holden, Deborah Kerr and Thelma Ritter—were in New York, while I was still in Los Angeles. I was scheduled to fly down to meet up with the crew, along with a lovely man from the art department who was going to be responsible for all the palm trees and fronds and shells and sand on the set. It was going to be the longest flight I had ever taken, and it was all so exciting to board a TWA Constellation for the first leg of our journey, which would take us from L.A. to Miami. It was not a direct flight, which meant we would have to make a connection, though I can’t recall where. All I do remember is we missed our connection and didn’t get into Miami until the middle of the night. We then met up with other cast and crew members, who had been waiting for our arrival, and we all got on a small plane that the production company had chartered to take us on to Puerto Rico.

  By the time we got to San Juan, it was two or three o’clock in the morning, and this press agent, who had obviously been indulging in the airport’s lounge while awaiting our arrival, was so inebriated that when I stepped off the plane, he thought I was Deborah Kerr. “Good morning, Mrs. Kerr,” he slurred as he presented me with an orchid in a plastic box and this huge sombrero.

  I was a bit taken aback and wasn’t sure if this was a joke or if he really thought I was her. He kept going on about something, but I could make out very little and really had no idea as to exactly what was going on, but being polite, I graciously accepted his gifts, thanked him, and went along with everything he was telling me. Then, before I could ask a question or even think of anything to say, I was whisked out of the terminal and into the backseat of a big black limousine that was waiting just outside the doors.

  There I was, all by myself, in the back of this shiny black limousine, with my orchid and this straw hat, which were taking up more room than I was. I may have been tired, but I was far more confused, and all sorts of thoughts started swirling through my head. Did that fellow really think I’m Deborah Kerr? I wondered. Should I say something to someone? But what should I say? ‘Excuse me, but I’m not Deborah Kerr’? That would be awkward. And even if I was to say it, who should I say it to?

  As I was contemplating these thoughts, we pulled into a long driveway and up to the front doors of a Hilton hotel. The next thing I knew, the door of the limo was opened and I was escorted up to this beautiful suite, where I recall the curtains being opened to reveal the sounds of the ocean and my being asked if there was anything I needed. I said something about being fine and was told to just pick up the phone and call the front desk if there was anything I was in need of.

  Once I was left alone in this beautiful room, I went over to look out at the moonlit sea, and within moments the phone rang. I picked up the receiver, and a voice on the other end confirmed what I had known for the better part of the past hour: that a terrible mistake had been made and that I had been given the wrong room. The poor person calling me was very apologetic and told me that while they were going to change my room, I was more than welcome to stay at the hotel.

  “Is this where everyone else, other than the stars and the director, is staying?” I asked, pretty much knowing that it wasn’t.

  I was told that the rest of the cast and crew were staying at some nearby hotel, but that because of the mistake, there would be no reason for me to have to change accommodations. There may have been no reason for a change to be made as far as the poor hotel night manager, or whomever it was I was speaking to, was concerned, but I knew I needed to get out of that place, fast. I was exhausted from the long trip and would have loved to have just thrown myself onto that big fluffy bed and drifted off to sleep, with the sound of the sea providing a lullaby, but I also knew that would have resulted in hell to pay from someone.

  Knowing I had to get the hell out of that place, I asked if there was any way I could be helped with transportation to the hotel where I was supposed to be staying. Told that could be easily arranged whenever I wished to go, I can only remember replying with one word: “Now!”

  And so, with a lack of the whisking fanfare with which I had been earlier escorted to my room, I placed the boxed orchid and the sombrero on the bed, made my way back downstairs, was again sheepishly apologized to, was packed into a vehicle that was far less shiny or long as the one that had brought me there and, just as the first rays of the sun were beginning to peek through the darkness, was deposited at my proper (and far less ornate) place of lodging.

  After finally getting checked into my rightful room, with no ocean view or offer to just use the phone for any need I may have, I placed my head on the pillow of the single bed. I was bone tired, but for a few minutes before I fell asleep for a few hours, the memory of those crowds who used to groan when I would step out of limos at the Paramount premieres came flooding back into my mind. Oh my, I remember thinking with an embarrassed grimace. I just know that once those people over at the Hilton realized a mistake had been made, someone asked, “Well, then, who is i
t that is in that room?” and someone else said, “She’s nobody.”

  If my first few hours in Puerto Rico made me feel like I was a nobody, that feeling continued as the days went by and we began shooting. My role was small, and so I really didn’t have much to do. Perceiving my frustration, the film’s director, George Seaton, who was a very kind man, would always tell me that my part was an important one. That made me feel a bit better, but it didn’t stop me from padding my part when, during one day of filming, the assistant director, Frank Baur, asked if any of the actors were able to drive a jeep. I had never driven a jeep in my life, but I did not give that even an iota of consideration before my hand shot up.

  “Good!” said Baur. “Let’s get you in the driver’s seat for this next scene.”

  The scene called for me to drive Kerr through this double file of marines. We did a few takes of the scene, including one that was a long master shot with the camera crew in the back of the jeep. I didn’t take out any marines or lose Kerr or the cameraman, so it all turned out well, giving me a bit more screen time and the opportunity to add “jeep driver” to my résumé.

  While I had the opportunity to work closely with the film’s stars at times, I never developed any relationship with them. Even when I was doing the jeep scene, Kerr pretty much ignored me. She was having a romance with William Holden during the filming, and if it was supposed to be a clandestine affair, it was the worst-kept secret of all time. They were, seemingly, rather open about expressing affection for one another and appeared to use any downtime to indulge in one another and banana daiquiris.

  I remember at one point during the filming, Kerr’s husband, Anthony Bartley, visited the set. Bartley had been a squadron leader and Spitfire fighter ace in the Royal Air Force and had been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross after he scored eight victories against enemy aircraft during the Battle of Britain. From the moment he arrived, the atmosphere within the production became tense. It was palpable to everyone, but I ignored the glances and whispers, knowing it was best to keep out of anything that wasn’t any of my business.