(My Travels with) Agnes Moorehead – The Lavender Lady (19 page)

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

FAREWELL TO THE LAVENDER LADY

It took several months to accept in my own mind that my close friendship and working relationship that I had experienced with the Lavender Lady was actually and really over. I was busy at the hospital and, knowing that something was going on, but since I was not around to get a pulse on the situation, I had to rely on news of Agnes through another one of my clients that I had managed, Wade Crookham. He was a young actor/singer that I had discovered while on tour with Agnes when she did her one woman show in Eugene, Oregon. Wade was on the reception committee for Agnes’ college appearance and Agnes and I both found him to be a highly intelligent boy. He was really loaded with talent and had the ability to make it in the entertainment world. In addition to all his personality, intelligence and other marvelous assets, Agnes informed me he was rich, and boy did she like that.

Wade was a very polite and well-mannered boy and Agnes liked this, too. Upon his graduation, I told Wade if he ever wanted to try the big time, to look me up and I would be glad to manage him and groom him for a professorial career. Wade did get in touch with me and came to Hollywood. I started him on a program to begin his grooming. When he got settled in Hollywood, he called Agnes and, since he was one of her most devoted and loyal fans, respecting her great talent, he spent several visits with Agnes at her home. This was during the period that Agnes had ended her relating to me. So it was Wade who kept me appraised of Agnes’ well-being (this is all that I was concerned with) and everything from this time on I know or learned about Agnes was through hearsay. I cautioned Wade to soft-pedal the fact when he visited with Agnes that I had signed him to a personal contract for management. I didn’t want it to interfere with his relationship to Agnes. He respected my request and I don’t think she ever knew that I was managing Wade.

When the “Don Juan” tour was over, the workhorse that she was, she went right into the stage musical version of “Gigi” which in my opinion would never have gotten off the ground at all without Agnes. Her ten-minute scene “The Contract” was worth the price of admission, but even Agnes couldn’t save a turkey. And “Gigi” was a real turkey.

I went to one of the first performances of “Gigi” in L.A. at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Aside from the news of Agnes I received through Freddie and Wade, I had a friend who was also in the cast of “Gigi.” They told me that Tanya was backstage giving shots not only to Agnes but to half of the cast, but they didn’t want Agnes to know Tanya was doing this. Why, I could never imagine unless it was they thought Agnes wanted to be special and be the only one receiving any attention from Tanya. Agnes could be very envious of attention her employees showed to others.

When I saw Agnes on the stage that day, it was the first time I had seen her since leaving the farm almost a year and a half before. My eyes were filled with tears. To hear this friend, my heroine, the great lady and to see her in all her glory—for she looked radiant as Aunt Alicia, in those sumptuous costumes—and to think she didn’t want to talk to me or see me. I must have died a million times at that performance.

The show played in Los Angeles ten or twelve weeks and I went to see it one more time the week it closed. I went just to be close to Agnes again, never realizing that this would be the last time I would ever see her alive again. I was choked up and devastated by this thought, but it was a reality that I had to face. I wanted so much to go backstage and say hello, but my gut, my feeler, my intuition or whatever you wish to call it, said no, let it be. That’s just what I did. The show closed in L.A. and went on the road and finally opened on Broadway.

The gossip columns began printing stories that Agnes Moorehead was ill. Yet, Agnes was still in the play. I learned from Wade that the last few weeks of the run, they had to pre-tape her dialogue because she was starting to blank out. My, what a pity. What a tragedy to happen to such a fine artist. I was so sad.

Then the news came that she was leaving “Gigi” and was being replaced by Arlene Francis, due to illness. I knew it was really serious, for Agnes would never be replaced by anyone if it were really up to her.

The news of her death was a shock to lovers of the theatre and television, but I was numb . . . but I knew it was the end of a chapter which had to end and the Lavender Lady’s demise was my rebirth.

Was my relationship with Agnes Moorehead worthwhile? Of course! Yes, there was destruction, frustration, but I remember what President Kennedy once suggested. He said, “Be involved.” And a psychiatrist said, “Always risk.” The fact is she added zest and knowledge to my life. Yes, the association was a good one for me.

Agnes Moorehead was a real lady. She was very talented, very religious, avariousous, a lover of nature, a phony, a perfectionist, had a distorted but unique sense of humor, a tightwad, a disciplinarian, a frustrated mother, an animal lover, etc. But I will always remember and love her for just being THE LAVENDER LADY.