by Tony Curtis
Billy, George, and I walked into the Rodeo Room of the Beverly Hills Hotel at five forty-five. We could hear the snarls.
“Curtis looks like he’s gonna play a trombone player in The Music Man,” somebody whispered.
“I’ve been here since five. When is Monroe going to show up?”
“She’s always very late,” said someone else. “It’s because she’s afraid. She has to convince herself to do this.”
“I’ll bet you even money she doesn’t walk through that door before seven fifteen,” said a woman editor.
“You’re on,” said a photographer as he dug into his wallet.
Billy, George, and I took our places behind a table. “I’ve been working on pictures for thirty years now,” Billy began. “There’s nothing tougher or more challenging than farce. It’s like juggling eleven meringue pies at once. Let one drop and you’re dead. This whole picture is farce, in the manner of the Twenties. Besides Tony and Jack and Marilyn, I am getting together as many great gangsters of the period as I can—Pat O’Brien, George, and, for a one-scene finish, Eddie Robinson.” A reporter asked Billy why he was using Marilyn in a period film; she was a modern personality. Billy answered that Marilyn could play any era. “It’s that little-girl quality she has. She’s not resented by men’s wives the way her imitators are.” There were chuckles and murmurs of Jayne Mansfield and Diana Dors.
At six, there was a stir from the hallway. Then a rumble. Footsteps. Voices. Urgency. Marilyn was coming. I’d been mobbed by fans. I’d had my clothes torn. You expected that. But to see members of the press go wild was something else again. You could tell how agitated they were by how hard they tried to conceal it. And by the tone of their articles. “Marilyn Monroe is back, looking like a glorious caricature of herself,” wrote Philip K. Scheuer in the Times. “In the grandest movie-queen tradition she swept into the Rodeo Room, swinging that celebrated torso, now more legendary than factual.” Gene Sherman was equally tart. He wrote:She wore long white gloves, a dress she later told someone was a braless, girdleless sheath, no stockings, and black spike shoes. She paused and poked at her platinum locks as she wobbled inside. (The word is not meant to be uncomplimentary—she just walks funny.) The photographers clustered around her immediately and thereafter moved with her as an entity. She opened her eyes wide and worked her mouth strangely in unison with the flash guns. She was piloted around the room by a small cordon of young men, greeting people she recognized and smiling at others. When she wasn’t smiling she was working her mouth and batting her eyes. Occasionally she lifted one leg slightly and rubbed its calf against the other.
With all that was going on that day, Marilyn barely said hello to me. I was a little disappointed. I’d hoped for a few words at least. But the reception was a success. We’d alerted the world. Now all we had to do was make the picture.
9
Our preproduction work began on July 21, after Jack returned from Connecticut and finished his film with Doris Day at Columbia. They played well together. He hoped to work with her again, but it never happened. That’s how it is when you’re an actor; most of the time it’s not up to you. For example, when Jack arrived, we had to pick up our costumes. We’d already had our fittings: Jack’s in Connecticut, and mine at Goldwyn. But when it was time for our wardrobe, they sent us to Western Costume, which was the place that rented second-hand costumes to studios. And we were supposed to be stars! But we took ourselves over there, ready to put up with some odd looks. We weren’t going there for men’s costumes, but for women’s.
In 1958 I was the happiest of fellows. I was a movie star with a string of hits. What more could anyone want? Well, there was something.
I wanted the opportunity to make a superior motion picture. It came to me in the form of an invitation from Billy Wilder. He asked me to play in Some Like It Hot and then hired the gifted Jack Lemmon.
Although Some Like It Hot was an independent film made at the end of the big-studio era, the Mirisch Company had us working on one of the grand old lots, the Samuel Goldwyn studio.
I was getting into character as Josephine as early as the makeup and costume tests. But Billy and I decided that my drag persona should be genteel and reserved. Oh, well.
Jack Lemmon and I posed for lots of photos in character as Josephine and Daphne.
This photo was taken in the commissary at the Samuel Goldwyn studio, where I ate lunch. I’m introducing myself to the manager on my first day of work. I usually had breakfast with Jack at the Formosa Café.
Some Like It Hot was a period picture, but they didn’t give us dresses from the twenties. They gave us dresses that looked like they’d been made in the forties for movies that took place in the twenties. I don’t know who wore them. Maybe Eve Arden or Loretta Young. Who knows? But they didn’t do a thing for me. They didn’t fit right. They puckered up. I knew this. My father was a tailor. I didn’t like the idea that they were passing this shit off as wardrobe on a $2 million picture. I drove back to the studio and marched into Billy’s office. “Uh, Billy,” I said. “Who’s designing Marilyn’s gowns?
“Orry-Kelly.”
“He’s really good. Why can’t he design the dresses for me and Jack? I don’t want these hand-me-downs. Can’t you have Orry-Kelly make our dresses?”
“All right,” said Billy. “We’ll have him make yours, too.”
I felt that Billy handled it well. I’m not sure what Orry-Kelly thought when he got the news.
While the gowns were being made, Jack and I had special training. And I do mean special. Billy remembered a man from his wild young days in Europe. The man’s name was Barbette. Once I heard the name, I had a clue. Barbette was a famous female impersonator. He was originally from Texas but had made a name for himself on the Continent. Billy’s plan was to have Barbette instruct Jack and me in the fine art—or was it science—of transvestism. We dutifully reported for lessons with Barbette on a stage at Goldwyn. Billy told Barbette that he shouldn’t make us too convincing. The guys in the story are doing drag out of necessity, not preference. Billy wanted us to look like we were trying hard but not quite getting it, at least from our point of view. Then the audience could sympathize with us. And laugh at us. If we took to it too quickly, we’d be suspect, not funny.
Barbette showed us things we’d never heard of. Or thought of. And we were trained actors. I mean, in the navy they taught us to keep our butts tight, but I never did hear of sitting with the palms of your hands down so that you don’t flex your biceps. And then there was this business of walking with your legs slightly crossed in front. “Always cross one foot in front of the other,” said Barbette. “That makes your hips do something special.” No kidding. They might as well have had neon signs on them, saying “Look here!”
“When you walk forward,” Barbette persisted, “cross one foot over the other. You’ll walk like a lady. You’ll swivel your hips. It’s feminine.”
I managed it because it was kind of like dancing, an athletic discipline. And there was nothing athletic I couldn’t do. But Jack wasn’t getting it. In fact, he was resisting. “I don’t want to do that,” he said. “Nobody really does that. Man or woman. And besides, Jerry and Joe should each get into this drag thing differently. You’re trying to make us do it exactly the same, like we’re in formation.” Jack was not going along with the program. Barbette was not pleased.
One afternoon, Jack and I reported for our lessons as usual. Barbette was nowhere in sight. We waited. Jack’s expression lightened a bit. Then he suggested we go to Billy’s office. When we got there, Billy had a wry look on his face.
“Where’s Barbette?” I asked.
“I booked him passage on the Ile de France.”
“What?”
“He came to me and said, ‘Tony is wonderful, Billy. He’ll be perfect. But this Lemmon! He is totally impossible. He refuses to do what I tell him. I wash my hands of it.’ And he left.”
Jack maintained that he was right. “Billy,” he said, “yo
u don’t want both of us doing the same shtick. Tony’s character should be like Tony. Skillful. Successful at the imitation. I’m clumsy. The shoes are killing me. My ankles are turning. I’m scared shit-less. But Tony can carry it off. He puts his head up in the air and purses his lips.”
By this time, our characters had female names. My Joe was to become Josephine. Jerry was to become Geraldine, except that in a moment of brilliantly insightful writing, Billy and Izzy had Jerry taken over by the character he’s playing. Instead of mechanically saying his name is Geraldine, the obvious feminization of his own name, Jerry blurts out: “I’m Daphne!” He becomes not merely a man playing a woman, but a willful persona. Pretty amazing for 1958.
The whole thing was so amazing that it scared me. Part of it was the process. We had to have our legs and chests shaved and our eyebrows plucked a bit. We had to be padded, of course, and some things had to be hidden. The makeup artists were two consummate pros, Emile LaVigne and Harry Ray. They’d done every picture from The Wizard of Oz to Friendly Persuasion. Wonderful, patient guys. They took us through a series of tests: wigs, eyelashes, lipsticks, foundations. When they put the ensemble together for the first time, I was surprised how I felt. Uncomfortable. Awkward. Self-conscious. But Jack was, all of a sudden, enjoying himself, laughing and carrying on. I froze when Billy came into the makeup department.
“What’s the matter, Tony?”
“I’m not going out there.”
“Come on, come on.”
But I was petrified. Maybe it said something about the years I’d put up with guys coming on to me and saying things about me. Or maybe it was some kind of strange thing I felt about my mother. I don’t know. I felt like my manhood was being threatened at a very deep level. It was difficult. But I’m proud of the way I finally got past it. I took some deep breaths and reminded myself of the challenges I’d met on the streets of New York and in the navy and in the picture business. I’d gotten through those. By comparison this was nothing. I grabbed a purse and took the first step outside.
There were about fifty people standing in the studio street, waiting to see what I looked like as Josephine. Oh, no. I blushed under the makeup and let the actor in me take over. I launched into a little routine. I was coy. I was reluctant. I put my hand over my face, using the postures Barbette had shown me.
When Jack came out, he did it in a big way. He was in character as Daphne. He flew out, twirling and pirouetting. He danced. He shrieked. He pranced. I just stared. How the fuck could he do that? I was envious, but it was the first and last time. I loved the guy.
Back in the makeup department the next day, something came over me. I turned to Jack and said, “Listen, Jack. I’m sorry, but you don’t make a good-looking woman.” I didn’t want to hurt his feelings but I felt that he should know. He was ugly as a woman. I was more attractive, but that’s genetics, I guess. Then I had an idea.
“We may look good on the set. And we may not. But how do we look in real life?”
“You mean out in the world? Not in front of a camera? I don’t know.”
“Why don’t we test it?” I asked.
“Test it? Where?”
“Let’s go to the ladies’ room.”
“I don’t think I want to do that.”
“Come on,” I said, getting up and pulling him by the arm. “Let’s just try it out.”
We walked out of the makeup department and down the studio street. Gaining momentum, we marched past the commissary, into the ladies’ room, and up to the mirrors. There were a couple of women there, adjusting their makeup. I took out my lipstick. Women were walking in and out. They’d come out of the stalls, walk up behind us, wash their hands, and then start freshening their makeup in the mirror next to us. It was strange. No one gave me or Jack a second look. After a bit, we nodded to each other and left the ladies’ room.
“We made it,” said Jack.
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “It isn’t that. It’s that we’re so ugly. They don’t even see us.”
“No!”
We went back to Emile and Harry. “Guys,” I said, “you gotta make us a little better looking. Figure something out.”
So they tried putting on more mascara and darker eye shadow. Larger falsies. Three-inch heels instead of two-inch. Tighter waistlines. We went back to the ladies’ room. Right in the doorway, a girl stopped and looked at me.
“Hi, Tony!” she said cheerfully.
“Let’s go,” I said to Jack.
So much for the “better-looking” makeup. Billy didn’t agree. He saw us and was thrilled. He knew we’d gotten it. “That’s it,” he exclaimed. “Keep it! Lock it! Boom!”
So we did. I tried to think of my Josephine as a combination of that gorgeous silent-movie actress Dolores Costello, the elegant Grace Kelly, and, last but not least, my mother. A funny thing happened when Jack’s mother came to see him and he was dressed as Daphne. They took a picture together. When he saw the picture he thought that the two of them looked like sisters. It was strange. And at the same time reassuring. You never wander too far from your roots.
10
It all comes down to your roots. Jack had a fairly happy childhood. He had respect and encouragement. I didn’t. I had to fight for everything I wanted, whether at home or on the street. My roots were tangled and twisted. I had to go far and struggle hard to get away from that tangle. But at least I had roots. What about Marilyn? I don’t want to sound like an armchair psychologist, but I think her problems came from the fact that she had no roots. The articles about her at the time talked about her “homecoming.” Homecoming? To what home? She had no home. She never felt like she belonged anywhere. She was always trying to survive in somebody else’s space. She had none of her own.
She was living with Arthur Miller in an apartment near Sutton Place in New York, but she felt like she was leasing a tiny corner of his world. None of it belonged to her, even though she was famous and rich. She felt powerless, at the mercy of other people. That’s why she had to retreat every once in a while, just to preserve a sense of herself. That’s why she would hide out in her dressing room. She was trying to put down roots somewhere, anywhere, so she’d have some feeling of security, however temporary it might be. Anyway, this so-called homecoming meant that she was back in Los Angeles, but nowhere she’d lived before. While she worked on Some Like It Hot, she would be staying in a suite at the Bel Air Hotel.
The suite was modern and airy, but not very homey. It cost $65 a day. It had a living room, a den, a full kitchen, a small patio, and a large bedroom. There was a piano in the living room because she had to learn songs for the picture. She bought a parakeet not long after she arrived because she was lonesome for the dog she had in New York. His name was Hugo. He was a huge beagle. I visited Marilyn at her hotel room with Billy one day. I could see how she might be lonesome. She had to sneak in and out through a back entrance. She had few visitors. No calls were put through except from Billy or Arthur Miller. It was a luxurious prison.
Marilyn didn’t have female friends, but she always had a woman around her. When she came out to California this time, the woman was May Reis. She was a nice lady in her fifties. She’d been Marilyn’s secretary for three years. Before that she’d worked for Elia Kazan and Arthur Miller. Marilyn needed older people around her to stabilize her, I guess, but then, every so often, she’d rebel against them. I can understand it. You need them, and then you don’t need them. As I said, it’s all about your roots—or lack of them. I’d been seeing a psychiatrist for two years, trying to figure it out. It was expensive and it was difficult.
My home life at this point was strained. It had been for some time. Being married is not easy. Of course being single isn’t easy, either. You don’t have a lot of choices in life, do you? I don’t like to disappoint people. From my earliest consciousness, I always felt that more than anything else, I wanted people to like me. That was the most important thing. I tried to say things that would make them like me. But al
most anything you say can be used as a weapon against you. In Hollywood everybody is trying to make the next deal. If you help them, they act like they like you. If you’re not part of that equation, they don’t know your name. It’s a very stressful way to live. It breeds insecurity. And if you’re not sure of yourself, of who you are, it’s dangerous. Trying to be liked and at the same time trying to make your way in a competitive environment—the real danger is to your family life.
I had no preparation for getting married and being a father. How could I? My parents acted like every day was a punishment for marrying. They had a miserable life. They were always blaming each other for every damned thing. No sense of responsibility. Just blame somebody else for what you don’t like. At one point they were saying that all their problems came from being in the United States. As if they would have prospered in Hungary. The foolishness. The self-deception. The pettiness. It was awful. No wonder I spent so much time on the street, getting into trouble. It was all I could do to get out of there with my mind intact. You hear about role models. I had none. I never saw a happy couple. How could I expect to have a happy life with Janet Leigh?
She was a sweet woman. She was educated. She was cultured. She cared about people. But we were young, and as I say, we were ambitious. You can’t go so far so fast without being ambitious. She’d been in Hollywood several years longer than I had, and she’d risen quickly. Being a movie star means that you carry a picture. The audience is there to see you, not the supporting cast or the extras. It’s a responsibility, believe me. When Janet married me in 1951, I had just begun carrying my own pictures. She, on the other hand, had been around since 1947, was in demand as a leading lady, but was not quite a star. I didn’t see it that way. To me she was an MGM star. And that was the best there was. MGM was the Tiffany of the studios. So I was in awe of Janet, even though I was catching up fast. I thought of myself as an outsider, kind of rough around the edges, and a long way from stardom. Our marriage changed that. The explosion of publicity pushed both of us much farther than we would have gone in the same amount of time if we hadn’t gotten married.
