Front Row Dress Circle

In modern day Hollywood it is more the norm for the stars to get together, live together and have babies without getting married. While couples like Brad and Angelina are admired and loved by the fans today for being such a solid unmarried family unit, they would not have gotten away with it a few decades ago. In fact, there were quite a few babies born to stars who were unmarried, or married but to someone else, and these were nearly always hushed up. Even hidden. Here’s a few examples…

* Clark Gable and Loretta Young enjoyed a passionate affair whilst filming Call of the Wild in 1935. Problem was Gable was married to another woman at the time and Loretta Young was a strict catholic meaning he was technically off limits. Young fell pregnant to Gable and the strict moral code of the day prevented them becoming a couple, or revealing their secret child. Loretta Young went away for a year and returned to Hollywood with a baby girl she claimed she had adopted. The child was named Judy Young but later became better known as Judy Lewis.  Many quietly commented over the years on her striking resemblance to Clark Gable and when she grew up she penned a book about her life. She was an adult before her mother admitted the truth about her birth.

* Ingrid Bergman was publically vilified after she left her husband and young daughter for the director Roberto Rossellini; she bore him three children and for quite a long time her name was effectively mud in Hollywood…and this was the 50′s!

Many abortions were secretly dealt with too…

* Lana Turner and Tyrone Power had an affair during the late 1940′s which resulted in her falling pregnant. He got cold feet and left the terrible decision to her as to whether or not to have the baby. If she decided to terminate they had decided on a secret code phrase ‘I found the house today’ that she would say on telephoning him; if she decided not to terminate she would say ‘I did not find the house today’. Power took the phone call whereby Lana told him…’I found the house today’. Very sad really. Power quickly dumped her for unknown actress Linda Christian in 1948.

* Judy Garland was forced to terminate her first pregnancy to new husband, composer, David Rose on account that it would jeopardise her ‘good girl’ image. Despite the fact that she and Rose were married makes it even more tragic – and her husband was the one who sided with the studio bosses on the issue!

* Ava Gardner ( the most stunning woman of her era ) and husband Frank Sinatra were going through a rocky patch in their marriage whilst she was in Africa filming Mogambo with Clark Gable. She discovered she was pregnant and, against his wishes, terminated. He was reportedly devastated when she informed him. They divorced soon after but he loved her until the day she died over 30 years later.

* Going back even further – queen of the silent films Gloria Swanson had a well hushed up affair with Joseph Kennedy, father of JFK.  Kennedy was very much a married man at the time, staunch catholic, and rather a hypocrite when you look at it. However, Swanson fell pregnant to him and as it was during the 1920′s there was absolutely no question of proceeding with the pregnancy. She terminated and almost lost her life with the resulting infection.

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One of the juicier scandals to ever hit Hollywood happened in the early years when the industry was still young.  Whilst the actors and actresses of the screen were promoted to the general public as icons of goodness and morality, the reality could not have been more different!

Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle was a chubby comic actor during the silent movie era and was a favourite with families everywhere. At his peak he was in the same league as Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton. But remember that in those times morality was the thing and many movie idols were promoted as clean-living yet in private were hopeless drug addicts and drunks; the public placed their idols on pedestals but could quickly knock them down as became the case for poor Fatty.

Fatty and a large group of Hollywood friends hopped in his new car one weekend and drove to San Francisco and checked in at the St Francis Hotel for a weekend long party. Booze and cocaine (the drug in Hollywood circles) was the order with many there indulging. One actress, Virginia Rappe, disappeared into a bedroom with Arbuckle for a short time. The party stopped when her screams rang out and she was found in a very dishevelled state on the bed. One witness, Maude Delmont, claimed she accused Arbuckle of violating her with a bottle.

She was admitted to hospital but died from peritonitis after 3 days. The papers went wild with the story and rumours grew taking on all sorts of gruesome ‘details’ about what Arbuckle had done to the young actress.  It did not take long for the public to turn on Fatty and soon all his films were shelved, his contract with the studio cancelled and his name effectively became mud. No-one wanted to know him bar a small number of loyal friends who knew the truth…that he was completely innocent of the charges against him. The public called for him to be executed, womens, church and morality groups called for him to be lynched. The papers had a field day, the public were suitably shocked but lapped up every morbid detail. Stories circulated everywhere about the lurid sexual practices of Hollywood’s stars and a complete clean up of the industry was called for.

The whole saga became a complete farce with lawyers bribing witnesses to lie in court in order to convict Arbuckle. Three trials were held – the first two were declared mistrials and the third led to his acquittal. But mud sticks and Fatty’s career was destroyed. In later years Buster Keaton remained a loyal friend and told him to change his name to Will B Goode (William Goodriche) and try his hand at writing scripts, but to no avail. Fatty wanted to act and make people laugh again. It was never to be.

He descended into depression and alcoholism and died at the age of 46 in 1933 – perhaps the first real victim of celebrity in Hollywood and an example of how powerful the media was to become.

Suggested reading on this topic: ‘The Day the Laughter Stopped’ – author David Yallop.

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If there is one thing that has always been associated with the movie industry it has to be the scandal and Hollywood has been dishing them up since the very start. If you thought that the stars of today got up to some mischief then think again – the stars of the very early years, the 1920′s for example, got up to stuff that today’s elite would never think of!

I used to collect books on this topic especially and my favourite book, just for the sheer shocking-ness of the stories, was called Hollywood Babylon written by ex-child actor Kenneth Anger.  You can still buy it, the sequel was not as great as the original, but if you can get a copy then do so! the first publication from the early 80′s was the best.

It caused a sensation when it was first released and many readers were offended by the graphic and shocking images, particularly the photographs showing the body of actress Carole Landis after her suicide; Bugsy Siegel’s bullet-ridden corpse, Lupe Vélez in her coffin, Thelma Todd’s body after her mysterious death and the scene of the traffic accident which killed Jayne Mansfield. But you cannot deny the fact that it sold extremely well and has a cult following now.

It’s one of those books that you cannot put down.

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