Mommie Dearest

by Christina Crawford

  As it turned out, I needn’t have worried about the car or the garage. Before the time arrived for me to pick up the car, mother called me on the phone. During the course of that conversation, she said that she and Daddy had driven by the apartment building, in their limousine, of course, and that she was shocked beyond belief by the building and the neighborhood. She wanted me to move out of there immediately and into something decent. She said that unless I did make arrangements to move, I was not going to get my car. She was extremely upset. She said how could I expect to get any decent man to take me out when he saw where I lived. Nobody decent would ever come to visit me. She wanted me out of there in a week. I tried to explain to her all over again what I’d told her to begin with when the situation initially arose. I told her that I simply couldn’t afford anything better than this without either a room mate to share expenses or a raise in my allowance.

  Since it was well into the evening by the time she called me, I don’t even know why I persisted in trying to explain all this rationally to her. She didn’t seem to hear a word I said. She just kept repeating that I had to get out of there or I didn’t get to keep the car. Finally I couldn’t take it any longer and told her I simply couldn’t afford to move on the allowance I got. She told me to return the car keys to the doorman at 2 East 70th Street and hung up on me.

  When she wasn’t face to face with you and couldn’t slap you, mother’s next favorite ploy was to hang up on you. It didn’t matter if you were in the middle of a sentence, it didn’t matter if you were trying to explain, or even trying to keep the conversation going until some solution could be reached. Slam … that phone went in your ear without so much as a goodbye. I hated it.

  The next day I put the keys in a sealed envelope without a note of any kind and took the bus across 72nd Street to Fifth Ave. I left the keys with the doorman, saying they were for Mrs. Steele and without further explanation, I left.

  During the last few weeks of school, I had auditioned for a number of non-Equity, non-union off-Broadway plays. To my amazement, I actually got one. It didn’t pay anything, but the rehearsals were going to be at night, so I could look for other work during the day. In the meantime, mother had arranged for me to see Uncle Sonny Werbling who was head of the New York MCA office. They’d arranged for me to get a job as a receptionist for the summer and were going to pay $45 a week. I didn’t really want the job, but mother seemed so intent on having me do it and had seemingly gone to so much trouble to arrange it that I didn’t have the nerve to say no.

  She seemed to think that it was an ideal way for me to meet people in the business and have access to scripts and directors. She said that when she started out in the business, she would do anything to get her hands on the scripts even if she had to steal them. She told me to try and take the scripts to read overnight or to read them on my lunch hour before I delivered them into the back offices. I listened to what she had to say, but I couldn’t help thinking privately that it was a lot different for her when she started. She had no where to go but up. I had a famous, successful mother and there was a natural assumption that I’d already run into numerous times: the assumption was that certainly she would be helping me to get started in a business where she knew practically everyone. The assumption was totally erroneous. Once mother arranged the job as a receptionist on the 10th floor of her own agency, she figured she’d dispensed with her help.

  People continually asked me what I was doing as a receptionist for the summer, when they knew my mother was one of the biggest clients at the agency. They wondered why she hadn’t helped to get me a job as an actress rather than as a receptionist. I couldn’t explain and after a while didn’t bother. I was the 10th floor curiosity. People would come by just to meet me and confirm for themselves the rumor that Joan Crawford’s daughter was a receptionist at the agency. I was continually embarrassed by the notoriety, even though the people I actually worked with on that floor were always very kind and considerate toward me.

  The best thing about working at MCA that summer was that it was air-conditioned. My apartment was like an inferno. I found out after the fact that it was located directly over the coal fueled boilers that produced hot water for the building. Late at night I could hear the superintendent shoveling the coal into the boilers and the heat they generated came right up through the floors. That heat coupled with the external heat and humidity of my first New York City summer made life nearly unbearable.

  We rehearsed the play for two weeks. I didn’t have much experience judging new plays, but it wasn’t hard even for me to realize the play was a turkey long before we actually opened. The final straw was finding out that the producer had posters made, advertising the play starring “Joan Crawford’s daughter”. I flew into a total rage with him and said that if he didn’t remove every single one of those posters that I’d quit before the play ever opened. Not having a union contract worked both ways … I didn’t have written protection about how he used my name or my family but he didn’t have any protection against me quitting at the very last minute and preventing the play from opening at all. He took the posters down, but the damage was done. The play opened to disastrous reviews which let me off the hook, mercifully, saying simply that I’d been caught in a bad play. We closed after three performances.

  Mother, Daddy and the twins were in Europe but sent opening night telegrams from Brussels where they were visiting the fair and doing Pepsi business for the fledgling international operations.

  When mother returned from Europe someone told her about the posters. She had a total fit. Not with the producer … with me! I could understand why she was mad, I’d been furious myself. I’d had nothing to do with the whole shoddy thing and in fact, had threatened to quit if they weren’t removed. I told her the entire story, but she wasn’t in the least bit sympathetic. She continued to blame me.

  To make matters worse that muggy, hot summer, my cat Eloise died. I felt terrible. Eloise was the first pet I’d ever had. Of course we’d had dogs all during the time I was growing up, but they weren’t really ours. The Daschund mother had when I was a baby got so old he finally had to be put to sleep. I cried but I wasn’t all that sad to see him go. After that there was a succession of dogs. Two black standard poodles mother named “Gin” and “Tonic”. They were wonderful but they dug giant holes in the flower bed, so they went after about a year. A boxer who’s name I forget also dug holes and didn’t last. For a very short time we had a Dalmatian and then a lovely female cocker spaniel named Honey. Mother found something wrong with all of them until finally she got a little champagne poodle named Cliquot. He lasted for years until he too got very old. Mother didn’t like cats so we never had one. But I’d found Eloise as a kitten at the theater in Westport and brought her into the city with me. When she died I was really heartbroken. I couldn’t even think about her being thrown into one of the sanitation department trash bins, so I asked the veterinarian if there was any alternative. He looked at me a little funny, but gave me the name and number of a pet cemetery in Long Island. I called them and spoke to a very nice lady who understood my feelings immediately. She asked for the name of the vet and said they’d handle everything from that point on. All I had to do was come out to Long Island on Saturday between nine and noon to sign the papers and see the pet properly buried. I thanked her profusely and my conscience was much relieved.

  The next problem facing me was … how to get to Long Island. The train didn’t stop in the little town. I called a couple friends in the city to find out if anyone had a car I might borrow for the morning and my friend Jim Frawley said he could borrow his dad’s car and would drive me out. He really came to my rescue. I called Eddie to tell him about all the plans and he said he’d come with me too. I was really touched by the response of my new friends. I thought it was enormously considerate of them to accompany me to Long Island in this terrible heat.

  Early Saturday morning, Jim picked me up and we drove downtown to get Eddie. As it turned out, Eddie had
told Al and he’d decided to come along for the ride. So there we were … the four of us on the Long Island expressway headed for a cat funeral! Jim was nervous about driving his dad’s car, Eddie had a hangover, Ali was in great spirits as usual and I was on the verge of tears the entire time.

  The directions were perfect and at just nine o’clock we pulled into the long driveway leading to the cemetery office. All along both sides of the drive there were burial grounds. Interspersed among the small markers were some huge marble headstones commemorating the heroic feats of many war dogs and lesser known beloved pets. I was very impressed with the beautiful park setting and the peaceful, quiet atmosphere.

  In the office, everyone spoke softly and was very polite. I signed the papers and then a gentleman took me into see my poor Eloise. She was in a little metal box and looked like she was asleep. I, of course, started crying. Then the man closed the lid and I followed him out of the room and through the main office. My three friends fell into line behind me and we all marched out to the cemetery itself. The man gave the little box to an attendant who put it in the ground and started to cover it with earth. Eddie whispered from behind me. “Any last words?” I turned and gave him a dirty look through my tears. Fortunately, through my own concern with myself and Eloise I never noticed that Al was nearly doubled over with laughter. He never made a sound, although later he told me he had nearly choked to death trying to contain himself.

  I thanked everyone for their kindness, took out a Kleenex and sniffled all the way back to the car.

  The four of us sat in silence most of the way back to the city. It wasn’t until we got to Al’s apartment and he offered all of us a drink that I began to appreciate the lunacy of our journey.

  After a couple of bloody Mary’s, my three stalwart friends had me convinced that I had just provided one of the most bizarre events of their entire life … a story that would go down in all our personal histories … Evelyn Waugh would have been proud! As they each recounted their version of that morning, I started to laugh until I really cried. My knees felt weak, I laughed so hard. But that was nothing compared to what happened to them. Eddie rolled off the couch into the floor, holding his stomach. Jim was shaking his head in disbelief so vigorously he nearly gave himself a crick in the neck. Al said he was finished for the day, if not the weekend. I declined to come to the next day’s Sunday gathering for fearing for my life! I knew there was no way on earth I’d ever live the story down, so there was nothing to be done but go along with the hilarity. It didn’t matter a bit though, because I was relieved to know that Eloise wasn’t in the sanitation trash bin and my conscience was clear.

  I paid the annual maintenance fee on the numbered plot for the next ten years. By that time I figured Eloise wouldn’t know the difference and I let it go.

  August 11, 1958

  Christina dear,

  I’m sending your check to you now, but it’s only for $200 for this month’s allowance. I know I’m early with it, but I will be in Bermuda for three days on this week end.

  I hope you will understand why the check is only for $200, but with all my expenses and practically no salary coming in, and Daddy not on his salary yet, I just can’t make it any more. Then, too, since you have a job, I thought maybe you could get along on this.

  I’m trying to save a little for “Neighborhood”, and unless I cut down with you now, I can’t see “Neighborhood” this fall. The expense of Christopher has been so unbelievably exorbitant. If you can’t make out on this, let me know. I’m so hoping it is possible for you as it would be helpful for me.

  Love,

  “Mommie”

  I had gotten over being so angry every time one of these “I can’t afford your allowance” letters arrived. There was a time when the letters coming from England, Mexico, Belgium and now a three-day weekend in Bermuda would have made me furious. There was a time when the $100 lunches and the new mink coats and the specially designed sets of diamonds made me feel sick to my stomach, knowing the entire time I spent complimenting her on the beautiful jewelry or the lovely new coat or the spacious new apartment, that I returned to poverty as soon as I left her. But after all the years, I had come to expect those differences as just a part of my strange, incongruous life.9

  What hurt more than mother’s oblivious display of wealth was the public’s delusion. I could almost predict the result of telling people the truth about my penniless situation. They just couldn’t put together the fact of my parents living in opulence on Fifth Avenue and me living in poverty in a cold water flat. It didn’t make any sense. Their fantasy created by all the publicity about movie stars simply didn’t allow room for the truth. It was even exaggerated, I think, in my case because of the years of publicity in movie magazines featuring the story about us being adopted. No one I ever met could understand how a woman could adopt four children and then not provide decently for them. I didn’t understand either, but that wasn’t the point now. My primary concern was getting a career going without the assumed assistance of my family.

  I knew the job at MCA was only a temporary replacement for the summer and the regular receptionist was returning mid-September. I found out that, once again, most of my best friends were not returning to Neighborhood Playhouse, among them Jim Frawley and Ted Bessel. I didn’t know what mother would say if I told her I didn’t want to go back either, but that time was approaching.

  As for the reference in this letter to neither mother or daddy having any salary, a peculiar thing had happened with them. The apartment mother had daddy build for her had over run it’s original cost estimate in both time and money. I guess mother had used some of the money she’d gotten from the sale of the Brentwood house, but it had been under a second mortgage and she told me she just didn’t get that much from the $150,000 sale price after the existing loans against it had been paid off.

  Alfred Steele made a lot of money but he had no inherited wealth. Then too, he was paying alimony and child support to his first wife who had custody of their boy, Sonny. So, when the building costs exceeded their combined funds, Daddy had to borrow against his future salary from Pepsi. That meant he borrowed against money he hadn’t yet earned. That also meant that he didn’t get the majority of his salary at the present time. I think it was a pretty well-kept secret, because it wouldn’t have looked very good publicly for the Chairman of the Board of a “family” company like Pepsi to be so in debt that he had to borrow against money he hadn’t yet earned. It just wasn’t the kind of thing you wanted all those “family” bottlers and stockholders and consumers to get a hold of because there was no telling what they might think about that kind of financial arrangements within the company. He was only about 53 years old at the time, but what if something should happen to Alfred. Steele? After all, there wasn’t any collateral for the sizable loan other than his own physical being. His health was generally good, although mother said he was overweight; his reputation was impeccable; what he had done for the company in the last five years was extraordinary and undeniable. The private loan went through.

  On the surface, mother and daddy continued to live as they always had. However in August 1958, nearly eight months after moving into their new apartment, Daddy was still “not on his salary yet.”

  9 In the mid 1990’s, information came to me about mother’s jewelry which was a closely guarded secret for years.

  Mother persuaded Alfred Steele to use her jeweler friend of many years when purchasing jewelry for her because it always had to be one-of-a-kind specially designed. She particularly delighted in colored gemstones such as sapphires, rubies, and emeralds, although diamonds were the standard.

  Alfred Steele bought mother a lot of new jewelry through her jeweler friend from California. How he paid for it is a mystery since he “wasn’t on salary” for almost a year, but that’s not the point.

  Apparently, soon after mother received the new set of necklace, earrings, and ring, she insured it for full value and supposedly put it in the vault for
safekeeping. However, on the way to the vault, the jewelry took a secretive detour to the backroom of the jeweler’s office at night. There, one man, and one man only, made copies of the stones, took out the precious gem and replaced it with an excellent fake. The real gemstones were given back to mother surreptitiously and the piece of jewelry put in the vault fully insured at its original value.

  The fake stones were so well done that only another jeweler could tell the difference.

  The subterfuge provided her with tens of thousands of dollars to spend without anyone else’s knowledge. Basically, only she and one other person knew the secret process which had been going on for many years. She was a cunning woman and she took Alfred Steele to the cleaners in the brief three years of their marriage.

  CHAPTER 23

  I hadn’t seen much of my brother during this time. I’d heard that he’d had a bad time of it at his last several schools and been transferred to an eastern boarding school. I knew Chris didn’t particularly like the military academies mother had insisted he go to for their strict discipline. He’d either run away or been expelled from the last two and I wasn’t sure of the exact details. Coincidentally, I’d met a black actor named Rupert Crosse at a party and he’d told me that he knew my brother because he supervised the athletics part time at the school Chris was currently attending. Small world! Because Rupert went up almost every weekend, I asked him to take messages and some small gifts to my brother. It was indirectly through my brother that Rupert and I became friends.

  What I didn’t know until years later, thank heavens, was that after the trouble at Chris’s last school in the west, mother was so disgusted that she tried to find someone who would take Chris to Switzerland and leave him there without a passport. She was going to send him to some school in Switzerland and then, by removing his passport, prevent him from re-entering the United States. Chris was fourteen.