Judy and I Page 16

  Competition had accelerated in the business, as there were many movie actresses around who were no longer on studio contracts and were ready to work independently. In Lynn’s case, it was a bit of a disaster. Lynn felt insecure. In her view, I was just betting on horses; I didn’t have closure on any one deal. She began talking about a separation.

  I continued to fly on weekends, short runs to Santa Barbara or to San Diego, to the desert. I met Jackie Coogan around the hangar at Clover Field and we became friendly. Coogan had been a glider pilot in the air force. He was currently building up time instrument flying. He mentioned he was interested in returning to the entertainment business. In 1939 the former child star had been responsible for the passage of the Coogan Act, which protected child actors; up to that point, they had been miserably exploited.

  I’d also been reading about another Jackie, who mustered out of the navy: Jackie Cooper. He had been a familiar figure around town before the war. I got the notion to put the two former child actors, the two Jackies, in a film. Then it was called exploitation, now it’s simply commercial. I spoke with sportswriter Dick Hyland, who agreed it was a good idea. Like all writers in Hollywood, he had a script treatment ready he thought was appropriate. Kilroy Was Here was an eighteen-page college story he and another writer hoped to sell to the studios.

  The expression “Kilroy was here” was popular nationwide, originally a “Yank” signature during World War II. Kilroy was a cartoon drawing of a guy with a big nose, small eyes, and two hands, peeking over a wall. Wherever that was drawn, the enemy knew the US Army had been there.

  When Dick Hyland and I shook hands and formed a production company, Lynn really got nervous. I put my plans for Man o’ War on hold, and Dick and I set up a meeting with Steve Broidy, the president of Monogram Pictures.

  Many independent producers got their start at Monogram—people like myself who could not step into a major studio situation. The budget was never more than $100,000 to $125,000 per film. Monogram producers included 007’s Cubby Broccoli (a relative of the controversial Pat DiCicco), Walter Mirisch, the King brothers, Blake Edwards, and his partner, John Champion. Also Jack Wrather, who married child star Bonita Granville. Wrather went on to own the Wrather Corporation. Close friends of the Reagans, Jack and Bonita were the left and right arm of California Republicanism.

  Jack Dietz, who financed many of producer Mike Todd’s projects, also had helped finance Monogram. Jack had a deal with the mob to hold all of the films of the world champion boxing fights at Madison Square Garden. He was a good family man with a hospitable household. Todd, who was a mover and shaker, was having a tough time with his wife, Joan Blondell. They were famous for their outrageous arguments. I was not alone in my marital hell.

  I thought Lynn and my basic attraction for one another would carry us through this rough domestic terrain. But Lynn did not have the confidence I could pull off the Kilroy deal. We temporarily separated over this issue. While apart I saw other women. I was never one to sit alone and bash my head against the wall. Although I was still very much in love with Lynn and our little family, jerking off was never in my heart. Lynn was seen about town with her drinking buddy Doug Whitney. She had flounced out of Ciro’s one night when I showed up with a date, and I had quietly burned on learning that she was going out with Whitney. We were pushing all the wrong buttons in one another.

  I heard there was to be a poker game at the apartment of a friend of mine, composer/arranger Axel Stordahl. Whitney was expected to be in the game. I arranged to get invited and showed up just after they started playing cards. Slightly drunk and in a jealous frame of mind, I decided to scare my estranged wife’s suitor. I went up behind Whitney and stuck a gun to his head. It was empty, and it was stupidly irrational on my part, but I accomplished my mission: Whitney was terrified. I was subdued, and I left laughing.

  My wild temper got me noticed by all three of Hollywood’s dynamite columnists from hell: Harrison Carroll, Hedda Hopper, and Louella Parsons. If a name appeared in any of their columns, the individual became an instant celebrity-about-town. These people wrote exclusively about the industry. Carroll wrote for William Randolph Hearst’s Los Angeles Herald-Express. Hedda Hopper wrote for the Los Angeles Times; her famous rivalry with Louella Parsons has been well documented. Parsons was the most powerful of the three; her column was syndicated in the Hearst newspapers and read around the world. Louella’s husband, “Doc,” was an older man who worked as a doctor at 20th-Fox. She probably said, “Darryl, the doc wants to practice.”

  Though I’d made some previous appearances in these columns thanks to my social life, it was now my brawling that garnered the most coverage. I continued to carry my marital tensions into public life. I got in a fight with Bobby Jordan, who was one of the Dead End Kids and later the Bowery Boys, when he called Lynn a hooker. We were at Ciro’s on the Strip. He was piss drunk and I asked him to apologize, and he said, “Fuck you.” That’s all I needed to hear. I belted him. Naturally the incident was written up in the columns the next day.

  I remained on edge even after Lynn and I separated. I was at the Mocambo alone when Jimmy Starr, a columnist who had a reputation for not holding his whiskey, approached me. He was short, mustachioed, and, that night, very drunk. He said something about my being the villain in my relationship with Lynn. I said, “Jimmy, don’t start anything here.” I warned him not to provoke me, but he invited me outside. I towered over the guy. He poked me in the face a couple of times before I broke his nose. I had to help him to the public phone in the parking lot. He called his wife and was taken to an emergency ward. The following day he apologized to me in print. The sidebar was framed by a wide black border. Years later I saw him in New York, and he said, “Sid, you know I owe you a debt of gratitude. After that fight I went on the wagon. I got Arlene pregnant. We have a great son. You did me a good thing, hitting me in the nose.” I thought, what a nice twist for a nightclub brawl. It never occurred to Jimmy that I could have been the one to walk away.

  Lynn and I reconciled, but it didn’t last. She persisted in telling me I was unprepared for what I was embarking on. It came down to her judgment versus my ambition. When she asked for a divorce, I didn’t fight it. I wasn’t interested in divorce as a way to renegotiate our relationship; I’ve always considered it terminal. Once the divorce action was put in motion, as far as I was concerned, there was no turning back. I was inflexible.

  Although the divorce was Lynn’s idea, I came to understand that she’d acted on impulse, and that once we were legally separated she had second thoughts, while I accepted the finality of the split. Still, I was able to see our son on my terms, and Lynn was friendly to me, even seductive at times, until I fell in love with Judy Garland.

  I threw all my energies into developing Kilroy. A deal was struck: Monogram put up 80 percent of the financing; we would put up 20 percent and own half. I signed Coogan and then approached Cooper, who also signed with us.

  Hyland moved quickly from sportswriter to his idea of a Hollywood mogul. He thought he was an intellectual and behaved in an arrogant manner. The Jackies told me, “We can’t stand this guy.” He was always criticizing them for what appeared to be no reason, just lording it over them. I was not working for him, so he didn’t bother me.

  Bud Moss, one of the investors from the Monogram side, proposed that we open the film in Odessa, Texas, his hometown. I suggested a personal appearance by Hollywood star Jackie Cooper. Odessa was an oil town and Bud’s family was influential. I rented a single-engine, four-passenger navy airplane from Jon Hall, the actor. Cooper, my friend Kenny Morgan, who was now married to Lucille Ball’s cousin, and I flew directly to Odessa. By the time we arrived it was clear that Moss, who received associate producer credit, was the one getting the star treatment.

  The theater was packed, and after the show Cooper took a bow. The audience loved it. Moss had set up a late-night party at a popular roadhouse. It was a rowdy bash; people were enjoying themselves to the hilt. I
excused myself from the table and went outside to make a call from the telephone booth. I’d gotten the idea to stop off in Colorado Springs on our way back to Los Angeles to see an attractive woman I’d met while she was vacationing in California, and I had the urge to talk to her. Just as I finished our conversation and hung up the receiver, the phone booth exploded around me. Shards of glass hit the right side of my face. I didn’t know what happened! It came from nowhere. I was stunned. I spun around to face a young man I recognized as the son of the rival theater owner. He was enraged: our premiere had taken away all their business. I didn’t have time to see how badly cut I was. He threw himself on top of me and soon we were fighting on the ground. I rolled over and got him wedged under a parked car, his head under the bumper, when a leather boot kicked me in the side and told me to get up. My eye traveled from the ground to the boot, to the pistols, to the Texas ranger hat. Local law, no doubt about that! The man looked ominous. Red faced and with guns definitely pointed at me.

  “I’m placing you under arrest.”

  “Hey, I want to file a complaint. I’m full of glass.”

  “Get in the car!” he commanded, his service pistol now pointed at my stomach.

  The party was going on inside the roadhouse and I’m getting in the front seat of a cop car, picking glass out of my face and ears. “Isn’t there any justice in Texas?” I complained.

  “I think you better keep your mouth shut.”

  “I sure wish you weren’t in that uniform with a gun pointed at me. I’d take you on.”

  “I told you to keep your mouth shut.”

  “You shouldn’t arrest me.” Bang! Slam! He punched me in the mouth with the back of his hand without taking an eye off the road. I thought, This son of a bitch is going to kill me.

  We got to the jailhouse and he booked me. He took my wallet and watch, checked them with another sheriff wearing a straggly-looking beard, and together they threw me in the pokey. At four o’clock in the morning Jackie Cooper and Kenny Morgan showed up with the theater owner to bail me out for a few dollars.

  Kilroy did tremendous business over the weekend. It had been my idea to bring Jackie Cooper down to Odessa, and it had paid off. Kilroy was booked throughout the country as the second film on the bill, like the Bowery Boys movies, also shot at Monogram. These pictures were prebooked and very popular. At Monogram, if you were lucky or a miracle happened, you might see a percentage if the project went into profit, and Kilroy Was Here did make some money.

  As a result of Kilroy’s success, Monogram’s New York office was interested in more deals. Cooper and Coogan got on very well, but again they told me they would not work with Dick Hyland. I had it out with Hyland, who was not willing to change his ways; in fact, he couldn’t understand the problem. So I hooked up with Bobby Neal, a friend whose family owned Maxwell House Coffee. Bobby agreed to invest in the second film.

  One afternoon he called me at the office. “Sid,” he warned, “All I’m going to say is, beware. I can’t tell you any more, but beware!”

  I didn’t know what he meant, but I told Bobby, “I’ll heed.” I appreciated the tip-off and wondered what was happening. I found out later that Bobby had attended a party where he overheard a conversation in which Bud Moss said he was going to pay each of the Jackies $20,000 as an enticement to sign with him.

  A few days following Bobby’s warning, Coogan came to my office. I’d had no contract with Cooper, but Coogan and I had a five-picture deal. “Sid, I’m not going to make any more pictures for you,” he said. He explained that his wife didn’t feel he should work for anyone. “We’re going to Australia on a personal appearance tour. Please tear up our contract.”

  The next day I read in the trades that Coogan, with Jackie Cooper and Bud Moss, had formed a company and were working again with Monogram. Hyland had brought in Moss and I had brought in Coogan. Now Hyland had lost Moss, and I had lost Coogan.

  Steve Broidy called me and explained that Monogram was forced to make the deal even though I had originated the concept. He offered 5 percent of the profits. I called Brynie Foy, who advised me not to touch the offer.

  The next day, Coogan came storming into my office. “You son of a bitch.” I explained that we could have settled it ourselves and that, in fact, legally he wasn’t able to get out of our contract. The meeting ended on a hostile note.

  Fortunately, not long afterward we shook hands. I’d discovered Moss was the culprit; he orchestrated the entire situation. So Coogan, Cooper, and I made French Leave at Monogram, shooting it in nine days on one stage. The writer was a good friend of Coogan’s, and he wrote a funny story about two sailors and a little boy who looked like Coogan as a child.

  I was looking ahead to bigger horizons. Ted Law had finally put up the money needed for the development of a script based on the life of Man o’ War. I was no longer thinking Monogram.

  PART IV

  The Black Irish Witch

  17

  Dear, when you smiled at me, I heard a melody

  It haunted me from the start

  Something inside of me started a symphony

  Zing, went the strings of my heart . . .

  —James Hanley, “Zing! Went the Strings of My Heart,” 1935

  IT WAS THE SORT OF affair that usually blows up, doesn’t work out. Judy and I had enjoyed our short time together in New York in September 1950, but once I was back in Los Angeles I kept waiting for things to swerve in another direction or dissolve. That didn’t happen.

  The day I returned home from the Man o’ War shoot in Saratoga, my lawyer friend Bob Agins called: apparently, Judy had been calling his office while I was away. She was interested in the date of my return. I remarked to Agins, “I’m back.”

  And he said, “That’s right, you’re back.”

  We both understood the implications behind someone like Judy Garland tracking me down. I knew I was not going to play hard to get, as I was too smitten. I couldn’t help but wonder how the continued affections of someone as famous as Judy would affect me. A woman who resembled a made-up little girl, who could not go out in public without creating a traffic jam, could not drop into Schwab’s for toiletries, for whom a department store was out of the question and a walk was near impossible. And it had been this way for her for many years. An ordinary life was out of the question for Judy Garland. Where would I swim in the fishbowl?

  The paradox of her appearance was profound. She may have looked like a youngster, but she was not. If people treated her as though they were dealing with a little girl, Judy was hostile to them. She might employ the little-girl role with nurses, maids, accountants, but should they be taken off guard, respond too familiarly to her, Judy would quickly let them know they were out of line. She suffered strangers’ familiarity. It was, “Hey, Judy you know we love you,” like she was the girl next door. But she wasn’t. And it was not until many years later that, like the Tennessee Williams character Blanche DuBois, Judy would be forced to rely on the kindness of strangers.

  That night Judy’s personal assistant Tully rang me to inquire if I was free to meet Judy. The star evidently did not want to taste the least possibility of rejection—she was not going to deal with me directly. The contact would once again have to be set up by someone else, filtered. Dottie did her hair and makeup, someone would get the gloves, the perfume, and Tully would send her out for the conquest. This time our rendezvous was to be at the Villa Nova, a café on the Sunset Strip. The bar was conveniently near Evanview, where Judy and Vincente and Liza lived in a charming three-tier house hanging off the hill.

  The chauffeur dutifully delivered Judy to the dark, comfortable saloon on an evening that was heavy with night-blooming jasmine. Judy made her entrance in slacks, Capezio slippers, a fresh gardenia tucked behind her tiny ear, looking all of sixteen. I was immediately warmed by her presence. “La Vie en Rose” melted out of the jukebox. She greeted me with a solid kiss on the mouth, plus a hug.

  We ordered spaghetti and a Caesar sala
d. She sipped a Canadian Club with ginger ale and I drank a bourbon and water. It was definitely the age of the martini, but I preferred bourbon for the long haul. Judy sipped. I drank.

  Right away she asked me about Saratoga. I told her how the jockeys had argued over what horse to ride and I couldn’t get it through their heads that it didn’t matter, that this wasn’t an actual race. The entire shoot cost $18,000. The horse representing Man o’ War looked good. I was encouraged, confident that I was right about this project.

  On our second meeting, I waited for her on a corner in Evanview in my black teardrop job, the Cadillac I had bought from Carlton Alsop, lightly tapping the horn to signal her. Once more we were having a wonderful lark together at the expense of Vincente. Judy would tell him, “Don’t ask me where I’m going, I’m just leaving.” That was her attitude: “Go fuck yourself.’”

  As the days went on, our relationship blossomed; Judy and I got closer and closer. We were developing an ease of communication. Tully would reach me by phone, and then Judy would come on the line. “What are you doing?” “Where are you going, are you all right? I got a joke, a new one . . .” And she would tell me a joke, something Jack Benny had told her, or Frank Sinatra, or Ethel Merman.

  Part of me didn’t like myself for those secret night rendezvous. I was conventional, egotistical. In New York it had been all in the open, but now I felt I didn’t need a sub rosa affair with a married woman. But they continued. My pleasure at going into dark bars with Judy Garland surprised even me. I listened to her playful, witty words, falling with expert timing over gobs of marinara sauce and cigarettes. I began to think I’d never been so amused by a woman in my life. I could hardly wait to go up the hill and honk the horn.

  One night she flew out of the house into the car on the run from Vincente. He’d had a few extra martinis, and he was violent. “I can’t take it anymore.”