West of Eden

by Jean Stein

  So, Dr. Marmor explained a little more about the case. It involved a young woman in her late twenties who had a curious form of schizophrenia. Normally she was the sort of person who would be institutionalized, and in fact she had already been a patient at Menninger’s clinic in May 1955. But one of the things about her particular syndrome, for reasons Dr. Marmor didn’t go into, was that nurses or anyone of institutional mien put her in an even more serious state. He explained there was a danger with this patient that, well, let’s put it this way: an institutional setting with attendants who behaved like they were in a hospital would put her into an involutional state. He further explained that she was the daughter of a very wealthy family. It’s a real Hollywood story. William Garland, a railroad builder and owner of real estate in L.A., encountered a young woman named Grace, who I heard had been Miss Cleveland of 1912. It seems she had major Hollywood aspirations. She was supposedly brought west by Sam Goldwyn. Garland married her, and they had a daughter named Jane.

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  ED MOSES: Grace Garland was a looker. From what I gathered, she hoped to be in the movies, to be famous, to be rich. Those girls who came out west dreamt of being famous like Lana Turner or like Ava Gardner, the most fantastic of them all. Grace might even have had a screen test, since she’d been Miss Cleveland. It’s hard to know how happy she was. The guys those women find are difficult and she was probably neurotic as hell.

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  WALTER HOPPS: Grace, the mother, who was a widow by the time I came to know the Garlands, had the means to do something very unusual. This was an experiment, Dr. Marmor explained to me, to try to construct a semblance or version of what life would be like for someone of Jane’s age and means if she were not so seriously sick. We were told that Jane’s reactions to women, especially young women, were so severe that the people with her needed to be male. They would be given guidance as to how to behave generally and to assure her safety. In the course of this conversation, he explained that all sorts of things might go on—she was very bright, but very crazy, with childlike behavior. The mother lived at home with her daughter, he explained, but she was terrified of her child. One soon learned why.

  As it turned out, Dr. Marmor thought I might be the right sort, and further arrangements were made. But the final hurdle would be to see how Jane would take to me. She might reject me, and, if so, it would be unmanageable to try to continue. That would be discerned fairly quickly.

  I found out that a program had been devised for around-the-clock attendance at the home, divided into four shifts among five or six young male attendants, I eventually being one of them. There needed to be backups for those who had to miss their shifts and substitutions for weekends. There was always to be in effect at least one psychiatric attendant in the house with her. Not only would we be paid well by the hour, but she, Jane, would be expected to live and be entertained more or less in the style commensurate with her means. Any expenses we incurred when we went out with Jane would be covered by Mrs. Garland. Further it was explained that the attendants should, at the conclusion of their shift, collect any writings or drawings that Jane would do and then write up little reports on how she was behaving. We would meet weekly with one of the two psychiatrists on the case. I came to realize that in a way we were under as much direct care as someone who was himself seeing a psychiatrist. That was standard practice in the best of mental hospitals, that all the attendants, nurses, and doctors had their own sessions to check on their mental health. The situation of such unusual emotional and mental stress in these circumstances affects the very persons who are there to help those most affected. It was quite an extraordinary experiment.

  Oh, the important part I forgot—it was explained that I should be on the lookout for the patient developing a variety of relationships with the attendants. There would be a different sort of possibility in her deranged fantasy life with each of the young men who were there. Did I have any qualms about that? Was I willing just to see how it would go? At some point it was explained to me that my own behavior, mores, ethics, and moral standards should guide me as I worked. In other words, in a roundabout way Dr. Marmor was explaining that although you have your job to do, would it be possible to think of her as no different from any other girl one might know? We would be on our own insofar as the rules with her went. It was very clearly said that we had to make our own choices there, even though we were following her lead.

  I don’t think Dr. Marmor worried that anything would be initiated by one of us. Of course he warned about what in the trade they call “sharps”—that is, dangerous items: knives, scissors, ice picks, broken glass, everything she could hurt herself with would have to be locked up. As a matter of fact, these “sharps” were routinely brought up, but in a way that wouldn’t scare you off right away unless you were a nervous type. I’m sure it did scare off some. The terms of the work interested me; it was compelling to think about what one might discover.

  By that time, Ed Kienholz and I had opened the Ferus Gallery and Ed was pretty much running it. I was dropping in and out of school trying to earn some money. Whatever I might be up to as far as jobs were concerned didn’t seem to worry me too much, so this was the job I took to survive. Thus began what was an extraordinary year of my life.

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  ED MOSES: When I first met Jane Garland, she was still in the lockup on the top floor of the UCLA psychiatric ward. I would go over there to pick her up around eleven thirty in the morning to take her out to lunch and then bring her back around four. They’d bring her out and she’d see me coming and she’d say, “Hi,” and have her hair all twisted and sort of standing up. She could have been a redhead, but I think she was a brunette. I suspect she was no more than twenty-four or twenty-five. She had a vocabulary of behavior and a lot of body language. She had different walks for different things: she took tiny little quick steps; she walked on the toes of her feet, slightly tilted forward, and at other times with a kind of stumpiness. She wasn’t hideous, not at all, but she didn’t take care of herself either. There were a lot of pore openings around her nose. She had very coarse skin and a ruddy, slightly blotchy complexion, but with a little primping and stuff she’d have been okay. Her nose wasn’t perfect, but everything else was pretty okay about her. She was a little bit thick in the ankles, but she was slender, robust, and strong. She didn’t like to bathe. Her mother would take her to a salon and get ’em ripped open and waxed. She’d come back and her legs would be riddled with little teeny red dots.

  Later on, she was permitted to stay at her mother’s house in Malibu on weekends. It was right there on the Pacific Coast Highway. I’d stay out there every other weekend on Friday and Saturday night and come home on Sunday. At first it was fun. Sometimes we’d go someplace and dance. Sometimes we’d go to the movies. Sometimes I’d take her by to see certain of my friends. I’d warn them ahead of time. Craig Kauffman was totally fascinated with Jane, totally fascinated. I would bring different guys in to sort of mix it up a little bit. I didn’t want the full burden of this job and I wanted to see what would happen with the other guys. I explicitly said what was going on, but I was slightly embarrassed by it. These guys just didn’t know how I could do anything like that. They said, “Man, you are out there—taking care of that girl!” Walter, of course, loved it.

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  WALTER HOPPS: It’s strange that my memory of my first encounter with the Garland house is almost as vague as remembering the first encounter you might have had with some cousin your own age when you were a teenager. Later there might be a friendship or some kind of relationship that’s quite vivid, but that first meeting somehow remains vague. So even under these circumstances—the setting, the mother, the girl—they are all at first more than overshadowed by what followed. I don’t recall having any special nervousness going there. I was really intrigued. This I can remember: the long drive up the coast from Santa Monica to just below the Malibu Colony. It was a weekend, undoubtedly, I think that was arranged. There was a large
California Spanish beach house, sitting like others in that sector that hug against the Pacific Coast Highway and face the ocean. Spanish tiles, clean plaster walls, bougainvillea coming over walled gardens. Arched doorways, heavy wooden doors, and wrought-iron fittings. Inside the walled gardens of the house, there was something immediately quiet. There always is in the beach houses in that section during the day, a very deep silence between the crash of waves. Another quality that all Californians who have spent any time on the edge of the Pacific are aware of is that the light is different. There’s a pressure on the eyes from the light. I’ve never felt it on the other coast.

  The house, which had a curious kind of configuration, was at least three stories high, oddly staggered so that they tapered off—one story moving towards the beach, and the higher stories moving towards the highway. There was a little court with bougainvillea off to the left and an outdoor fireplace where you could have dinner, but the mother didn’t use it. On the ground floor was a sitting room with big windows that looked out over the beach to the ocean. There was also a little sort of library sitting room and then a more interior sitting room with a baby grand piano. There was a dining room, too. The house was filled with stuff ranging from the late twenties on, so it had that “in the past” look to it with big green vases sitting in corners, strange wrought iron, and what have you. You could’ve gone through that house and found all sorts of collectibles that would’ve been in the shops on Melrose Avenue. We’re not talking antiques or fancy interior decorating, but it had a retro look and enough money had been spent so that it was well appointed. Yes, you could say it was gloomy, except that the sun came in and there were windows that looked out on the ocean. Gloomy was the vibe in the house, not so much the look. The family was very Catholic—there was also a strange chapel in that house where I sometimes saw Jane on her knees, praying.

  The Garland house in Malibu.

  The mother lived her life in the bedroom suite up on the very top floor. She had her own sitting room and bedroom and bath up there. It had some windows with an ocean view. When she turned in at night, she locked it like a vault and you were alone in the house with Jane. Where I slept, and Jane slept [and so on], was on the second floor. Jane’s bedroom had a fluffy double bed, overflowing closets, and a bathroom that the housekeeper was always at pains to try and put back together.

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  ED MOSES: There was a little tower at the top of the house, like in a Spanish castle. It was a money type place but it was very plain and old-fashioned, and Mrs. Garland had tried to jazz it up a little à la Beverly Hills renaissance with a lot of froufrou in that sort of chickenshit way people decorated those places. They had this horrible painting in the living room above the mantel, a mother holding her child, a sentimental snuggling mother-loves-daughter-and-daughter-adores-mama thing. Walter and I hated that sappy romantic Gainsboroughesque painting.

  There was a little store on Wilshire Boulevard called Taffy’s—did you ever know that store? It had all these kooky clothes in it, and it was sort of like powder puffs. Mrs. Garland had powder-puffed Jane’s bedroom. It was mostly pink, ginghamy. It wasn’t Jane’s room at all. There wasn’t anything personal in it like old dolls or dresses or anything like that—it was empty, very sterile. It was like going into a hotel room, as I remember.

  Mrs. Garland had a caretaker who drove her around in a station wagon, probably a Pontiac or an Oldsmobile, something like that. I had to drive Jane in my own car, an old wreck. I had so many cars over the years. I had an old Chrysler convertible at one time, I had a ’36 Ford, and then I had a ’41 Chevy. It might have been the Chevy I had at that time.

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  WALTER HOPPS: Grace Garland was a glamour girl and just a hopeless person; she’d leave Jane in the care of the houseman and the cook. The mother didn’t cook anything—I don’t think she could even boil water for coffee. The cook and the houseman, who was the cook’s husband, were there quite a bit of the time, and I think they had some quarters down on the ground floor somewhere. Sometimes they stayed overnight, but I think they were happy to get out of there if they could. They did all the shopping and cooking, and we had to do the driving for Jane in terms of taking her around for appointments, especially doctor’s appointments, and outings. Jane would have to go to the psychiatrist like twice a week. Sometimes the doctors would come over.

  We were supposed to take her out as though she were one of us—here we were, young men her age, so it was like going out on benign dates. For heaven’s sakes, we would take her bowling, and that was insane. Crazy things would go on. The first time we took her we were not even worrying about keeping score or anything, it was just R & R, and Jane would watch us and occasionally she’d get up to do her thing. She wouldn’t roll the ball down the court. She’d get ahold of it and swing her arm and let it go way up in the air and come smashing back down. Whack! The manager of the bowling alley got very upset. I learned early on that when things got out of hand like that I just had to slip the poor person the twenty bucks I’d been given by the mother for the quote “date,” and we’d get her out of there. You know, “What’s going on here? Is she crazy?” We’d say, “Look, she’s not quite herself today. Here—sorry we’ve created a disturbance.” And then we’d leave. We’d go out for dinner or lunch, hamburgers or whatnot, and suddenly she’d put the plate in her right hand and slam the whole plate of food down hard on the floor. And I’m saying, “Oh god, we gotta leave and try it again at another place.”

  It was a most unusual situation. Jane had obviously been a very attractive young lady but she’d put on quite a bit of weight. Occasionally she would slip down to the kitchen and eat a whole loaf of bread or an entire pie. They should’ve locked the icebox. Locked the entire kitchen. But they were trying to get her off all that, trying to get her to live a normal life at home. She was flabby and out of shape. Physically she looked a wreck, older than her years. If you saw her on the street you would have said, “Jesus, that forty-year-old woman is out of shape.” Like she must have had a hard life. She had large, full brown eyes. I think her hair was brown, but she had this amazing mop of unkempt dyed blond hair, we’re talking brassy blond, bleach blond. She would’ve been five foot eight at least—she was a big girl. She’d try and dress herself, it’d be kind of eccentric, but she was trying, she was trying. Like she’d be wearing a sundress but then she’d put on black high-heeled shoes that were a little too tight—Jane loved to wear high-heeled shoes for some damned reason. She didn’t in the normal way look attractive—she looked like Anna Magnani without the style. Somebody described Magnani once as a big sack of oranges. Something was always off with Jane. You knew when she was agitated. She would slap her hands down on her legs, not hard, but sort of whack herself, or stomp in some way. Sometimes when she’d put on makeup and she was not in a great mood she’d smear the lipstick way beyond her lips and, poor thing, she’d cry and we’d encourage her to wash her face and give it another shot. You’re trying to be like a sympathetic friend. One of the women who worked there had the dubious distinction of having to help her bathe, and that was tough—her personal hygiene was not something wonderful, but it didn’t bother me that much, you sort of got used to it.

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  ED MOSES: I thought I was ready for anything, but Jane would do more and more outrageous things and it got heavier and heavier. She liked to play around and then she’d get very seductive. She was very serious about that, and if I rejected her, she’d get upset.

  She’d taken a pair of scissors one day and cut all her hair off, so her mother had this wig person make this hairpiece so that she could clip it to the back of her head like a little pigtail. One time she was mad at me and she went into the ladies’ room and when she came back she had this big shitty smile on her face. She had clipped the ponytail to the front of her head, hanging down over her eyes, and she was just proud as punch. Another time she came out of the bathroom with lips painted on her forehead. With her lipstick she’d painted her mouth on h
er forehead. I wasn’t going along with the gag, and the gag was that she was obsessed with sex. And obsessed with me. If she was mad at me she might throw a nice little wad of ice cream across the room and paste somebody with it. You know, hit them with a little ice cream ball, flinging it across the room and whack them with it. And then she’d look the other way and sort of smile. If you weren’t responsive at that point, she’d stand on her head in the restaurant in her little summer dress with no undergarments on. She’d get up, look at me, and say, “Well, what did you think of this one?” The person at the front desk and the waiters would walk by and she’d be standing on her head with no panties on, sort of doing scissor kicks to keep her balance. The waiters didn’t say anything, and I’d say, “Wow! That’s pretty impressive, Jane, that you could stand on your head without any drawers on!” She’d just sort of smirk. Sometimes she’d get that smirk on her face like she’d just cut a good one. Jane had these wonderful enigmatic smiles. She had her own kind of mirth.

  Credit 3.2

  Ed Moses.

  Walter was always very low-key but intrigued about the whole Garland thing, whereas I was jumping around like a cat on this rubber band, just jumping all over the place. The first comment Jane made when she met Walter was, “Are you a cock, or do you need someone to take care of you, too?” Of course that really whetted Walter’s appetite. He was fascinated by her—are you kidding? He was just a half step away himself. Not even half. Jane was really interesting to people like us who like the irrational and who don’t place a lot of importance on conventional achievement and rationality. Everybody wants to be reasonable, but Walter didn’t like that idea and neither did I. Walter had a real appreciation for the other zones, so Jane was just perfect. He was very consistent and very thoughtful with her. He genuinely wanted to make contact.