Hollywood Madonna (4 page)

The shoot was Loretta’s trial by fire. Brenon found her exasperating. Loretta had not yet learned the difference between performing and
acting.
The Magnificent Flirt
made no demands on her; she only had to play an ingénue. Loretta had never been thrown into a part where genuine emotion was required. Brenon berated her before the entire company calling her “
stupid and useless
.” Reportedly, he even threw a chair at her. Chaney intervened, and from then on Brenon treated Loretta respectfully. Throughout the shoot, Chaney was as compassionate toward Loretta on the set as Tito was to Simonetta. Nils Asther was similarly helpful. When Loretta was having difficulty expressing her attraction to the count, Asther told her to imagine him as something she truly desired, like a
hot fudge sundae
. The scene worked. Asther taught Loretta the essence of acting: truth transformed by the imagination into a special form of reality that audiences will accept as the equivalent of life as they know it. If yearning for a sundae can translate into longing, so be it—the audience will see only longing. Tragically, Simonetta’s longing was not for Tito, as Chaney acknowledges with one of his many faces.

Loretta’s stay at MGM was brief, perhaps because of Brenon’s low opinion of her acting, but more likely because the studio was not yet interested in targeting the teenage market. That changed in the thirties when Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, Freddie Bartholomew, Virginia Weidler, and others became contract players. But by that time, Loretta would have been in her twenties and far too advanced for kid stuff.

Colleen Moore knew the right studio for Loretta: It was her own, First National, where Loretta made six films in 1929 alone.
First National, then Associated First National
, was founded as a consortium of exhibitors, with production facilities at Burbank, California—an enviable piece of property that did not escape the attention of Warner Bros., particularly after First National’s theater chain became the country’s largest. Warner’s gained control of First National in 1928, moved into the Burbank facility, and released its feature films under the First National banner until the mid 1930s; by then, moviegoers knew the difference between the studio and the label, the latter being no longer necessary. What mattered was appearance of the logo with the WB heraldic design, introduced by a musical fanfare.

Logos meant nothing to Loretta, who may not have been aware that she was being exploited. At sixteen, she was subsisting on a diet of milk shakes to maintain her slender figure. Determined not to gain weight, she took up smoking—a habit that she did not break until well after her career was over. Her day was supposed to end at 5:30 p.m., when she would be driven home. But she would merely go through the front door, exit from the back, and step into another car that would bring her back
to the studio, where she would resume filming—
often until 3:30 a.m.
Inevitably, she had a nervous collapse and was briefly hospitalized, but that eventuality did not deter her; in fact, it spurred her on. Aware of the health problems that could sidetrack a career, she paced herself accordingly. Her salary kept up with the pace: In 1933, Loretta was able to buy a white brick colonial, with hollyhocks and lemon verbena, in Westwood Hills. The home had a curving staircase, ideal for a dramatic descent accompanied by a rustle of taffeta. But Gladys, the interior decorator, envisioned something else, something on the traditional side—perhaps the kind that she yearned for when she married John Earle Young, with four-poster beds, old china, and porcelain. Loretta brought in the money, and Gladys took care of the rest.

CHAPTER 3
LORETTA TALKS!

In 1928, Loretta had only a vague awareness of Joseph P. Kennedy. She might have heard rumors about his relationship with Gloria Swanson (confirmed) or that he was a bootlegger (unproven), but it is hard to imagine that she knew he was the husband of Rose Kennedy, whose father was the colorful and, to some, notorious—Boston mayor, John Fitzgerald, better known as “Honey” Fitz. For Loretta, all that mattered was that she was a contract player at a real studio. What she did not know was that she remained on the studio roster because of Joseph P. Kennedy.

Although remembered primarily as the father of President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert Kennedy (both assassinated—John in 1963, Robert in 1968), in the post–World War I era Joseph P. Kennedy was
a major player in the growing movie business
. Always eager to corner the newest market, he set his sights on movies in 1919, when he decided to feature a comic he liked, Fred Stone, in movies that would be distributed through Robertson-Cole (R-C), where he was a board member. But that wasn’t enough; his goal was to own a studio, and then to own several studios that he would merge into a conglomerate. Kennedy was thinking of conglomerization long before Hollywood started going corporate in the 1960s.

He began by distributing Universal’s films in New England and then “
created his own
Motion Picture Finance Corporation, a broad umbrella organization to funnel his buying, selling, and producing.” When R-C’s distribution unit became known as the Film Booking Office (FBO), Kennedy took that over, too. Next, production—and a theater circuit.

FBO’s talent roster was hardly first tier, but that didn’t matter. The company specialized in B films, the kind that played in theaters throughout side-street America, not in movie palaces. But with the movie craze,
star quality was not the important factor; product was all. At best, FBO could offer the public cowboy star Fred Thompson and football player Harold “Red” Grange—and later, the better known Evelyn Brent, Viola Davis, and Bob Steele, the western hero and occasional villain (
The Big Sleep
[1946], which may be the film for which Steele is best remembered). Even in black and white, Steele’s eyes photographed as cool grey, capable of alternating between determination and menace.

In 1925 the vaudeville circuit, Keith-Albee-Orpheum (K-A-O), merged with FBO. But that was still not enough. First National had a major theater chain and a roster of popular stars, including Mary Astor, Richard Barthelmess, Colleen Moore, Corinne Griffith, and the German shepherd, Rin-Tin-Tin. Touted as a movie czar, Kennedy dreamed big, imagining a mega conglomerate consisting of Pathé, K-A-O, FBO, and First National. Once Kennedy took control of First National in 1928, he reduced the number of actors by half, from 34 to 17, keeping, among others, Colleen Moore and Loretta.

Why keep Loretta, but not, for example, Mary Astor? Kennedy chose Loretta either because of Moore, whom he had met earlier (and who, no doubt, interceded for her discovery), or because he had seen
Laugh, Clown, Laugh
and was taken with Loretta’s beauty, believing that she had the potential for stardom. Certainly he did not choose Loretta because he was attracted to her. Kennedy knew enough not to rob the cradle. Besides, he had Gloria.

Kennedy’s draconian cost-cutting and autocratic behavior alarmed some board members, who insisted that an executive committee be formed, making Kennedy accountable. Kennedy threatened to pull out unless he was given complete control. The board did not budge, and Kennedy’s reign ended the same year it began, 1928, when Warner Bros. bought First National, acquiring a seventy-acre property in Burbank and a theater circuit. That same year, David Sarnoff, president of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA), which owned the NBC network, began thinking of a way to combine radio, sound film, and live entertainment. His acquisition of FBO and K-A-O—which he found especially attractive because of its theaters—resulted in the formation of RKO Radio Pictures. RKO never acquired its own signature, but was known only for the directors who passed through it, such as Orson Welles (
Citizen Kane
,
The Magnificent Ambersons
), Merrian C. Cooper (
King Kong
), George Cukor (
Morning Glory
), Howard Hawks (
Bringing Up Baby
), and John Ford (
Mary of Scotland
). Sarnoff’s dream of a movie-stage show combination was realized with the opening of Radio City Music Hall right across the
street from the RCA building, where NBC was based. When Radio City officially opened in 1932, movies were not part of the bill. That changed in January 1933, when the Music Hall, beloved by generations of moviegoers, and especially tourists, began offering a first run feature and an elaborate stage show—a policy that continued for forty-five years. Despite its name, Radio City Music Hall was not the exclusive home of RKO films, although a great many did open there. Actually, the first film to be shown was
The Bitter Tea of General Yen
, a Columbia release directed by Frank Capra.

Joseph Kennedy was not the visionary Sarnoff was; to Kennedy, the movies were just another investment, another conquest, another acquisition. He lacked the passion that the great studio heads and independent producers—Louis Mayer, Darryl Zanuck, Harry Cohn, Jack Warner, Sam Goldwyn, Hal Wallis—had for moviemaking. Although the moguls were as ruthlessly capitalistic as Kennedy, their love for the business, which required them to present the best (or more often, the second- or third-best) films their studios could make, while at the same time profiting from the revenues they generated. For Kennedy, the movies were just an interlude between business ventures. Thus, Joseph P. Kennedy does not figure prominently in the history of film.

Loretta was probably unaware of Kennedy’s departure from First National. What mattered was that
she
was there—and at the studio where Sam Warner, the least heralded of the brothers Warner, realized the potential of the sound film. Sam was the Warner who convinced his brothers to adopt the Vitaphone sound-on-disk system, in which recorded sound was synchronized with celluloid image to produce a “talking picture.” The technology, though primitive by contemporary standards, was nonetheless revolutionary. And Loretta was part of the revolution: Her voice was first heard in a film made by the studio that gave birth to the talkies.

When Greta Garbo made her first sound film,
Anna Christie
(1930), the ads proclaimed, “Garbo Talks!” And when she did, it was in a voice that was achingly slow, rising out of the caverns of consciousness—sometimes registering as dreamy, but revealing the soul of a romantic for whom life was a wearisome journey unless it ended in love. But this love was a special kind of love: movie love, delicately photographed and orchestrated, so that the physical is elevated to the spiritual, bodies transformed into souls, and rumpled sheets replaced by a carefully made-up bed.

The press did not react the same way to Loretta’s first talkie. At the beginning, there was nothing distinctive about her voice. In
The Squall
(1929), she spoke like a typical teenager, whose idea of cadence was accenting the right syllables. To look rustic, she was given a wig with braids, which she tugged self-consciously. The director, Alexander Korda, who went on to make far better films (
The Private Life of Henry VIII
,
Rembrandt
,
That Hamilton Woman
), left Loretta on her own, concentrating almost exclusively on Myrna Loy, who, although she had lesser billing, not only dominated her scenes but also created a character—which was more than the other actors did.

Based on a play by Jean Bart,
for which First National paid
$25,500,
The Squall
is set on a Hungarian farm, with most of the actors, including Loretta (but not Loy) sounding like recruits from Central Casting. Loy played Nubi, a Gypsy who ensnares the males of the household, starting with the servant and moving on to the son and finally the father. Moviegoers who knew Loy only from the
Thin Man
series and
The Best Years of Our Lives
might assume she was cast against type. But anyone familiar with her earlier work (e.g.,
The Black Watch
,
The Great Divide
,
Isle of Escape
) knew that she could play the vamp and project a sensuousness so earthy it was primeval. Stunningly photographed and front lit, her face glowing in close-up, Nubi was a child of nature, as amoral as Bizet’s Carmen. Her philosophy is simple: “What can you do when man love you?” The males in the household behave much like animals in heat, looking for any opportunity to steal a kiss or an embrace, as if her provocative dress concealed a fleshy paradise, and her unwashed hair, stringy and oily, gave off an irresistible scent. When Nubi admits to being fifteen, you can believe it, even though at the time Loy was twenty-three. But her untamed hair, serpentine movements, and incantatory delivery of a gypsy song that the males start humming, suggest a teenage Circe. The males don’t turn into swine, but they come close to the human equivalent.

By contrast, Loretta was sixteen, and she both looked and sounded her age. Her voice was doughy and expressionless. Some of her line readings were embarrassingly bad (“Oh, grandfather, how can you say that?”), delivered as if she had been over-rehearsed for a high school play. The problem with the portrayal was threefold, owing to the role itself, Korda’s fascination with the only character that interested him, and Loretta’s inexperience. But Loretta’s voice would mature, and her roles would improve.

Within a year, a new Loretta had emerged from the cocoon of pubescence.
Loose Ankles
(1930) opened with a shot of a shapely leg adorned with an anklet. (The title derived from a 1930s song that paid tribute to the “dancing, prancing feet” of dance aficionados.) The leg belongs
to Ann (Loretta), and from the way it is being lovingly massaged, it is evident that Ann is one of the idle rich who, in 1930, could afford such pampering. She is also an heiress, who can only come into her legacy if she is free from scandal and finds a respectable husband. Instead, she places a want ad for an “unscrupulous man.” A very callow Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. responds, and the rest is plot.

The star was Fairbanks, who received $5,666 in contrast to Loretta’s $1,125, which was still,
big bucks for a seventeen-year-old
in 1930. Loretta’s career was burgeoning at First National.
The Road to Paradise
(1930) may have been an inconsequential film, but it revealed Loretta’s increasing versatility. She played a dual role: Mary and Margaret. Mary is an orphan (circumstances unexplained) raised by two con men, (Jack Mulhall and Rondo Hatton) who, after discovering that she is a dead ringer for Margaret, a wealthy socialite, recruit her in a plot to burglarize Margaret’s town house. The burglary is interrupted by Margaret’s arrival. When Margaret is shot (not fatally), Mary risks imprisonment and ministers to her look-alike, who is really her long lost twin, endowed with the same psychic powers (Each twin has a medallion enabling her to read minds). Although
The Road to Paradise
merits, at best, a footnote in Loretta’s body of work, her ability to play, even at nineteen, two types of women, embodying the extremes of innocence and experience, attests to growing mastery of her craft. She now knew how to establish a character, react for a close up so that the shot did not look as if it had been edited into the film, and interact with other actors, as if she were not just one of the cast but one of the characters.