Mark Griffin
Page 2
When I profiled the late screenwriter Gavin Lambert for a magazine, I mentioned that I was interested in writing about Minnelli and talking to as many of the director’s surviving colleagues as possible. Although Lambert was encouraging, he had two very succinct words of advice: “Hurry up.” How right he was. Considering that Minnelli’s first feature was released in 1943 and that his Broadway career stretched back to the early 1930s, finding people to talk to postmillennium was not going to be easy. And even if I managed to track people down, how forthcoming would some of these press-savvy Hollywood veterans be if I broached the very personal subject of Vincente’s sexuality? Even though we were living in supposedly less repressive times than Minnelli had, most of his colleagues had graduated from the MGM School of Public Relations and they were masters at deflecting uncomfortable questions.
Apprehensive yet insatiably curious, I began to move forward. During a three-year odyssey, I contacted as many Minnelli coworkers, friends, former neighbors, and true believers as I could find. Armed with an antique tape recorder and aided by an enterprising though overworked research assistant, I ended up talking to hundreds of people who were exceptionally generous in terms of sharing their memories, insights, private correspondence, and photographs with me. Amazingly, many of the people I spoke with had never gone on record before.
There were also plenty of surprises along the way. An elderly interview subject in Delaware, Ohio (where Vincente had spent his formative years), casually mentioned Minnelli’s brother to me. Vincente Minnelli had a brother? The detail-obsessed director had overlooked his sibling in his autobiography. Why? Another person I talked to was curious to know what I had discovered about that terrible tragedy involving Vincente’s adored Uncle Frank. The terrible tragedy. Yes, of course. What terrible tragedy? Early on, a fellow biographer had advised me to play dumb when talking to people, but it quickly became clear that no playing would be necessary. Just because I had seen The Sandpiper more times than was psychologically advisable didn’t mean that I really knew anything about the man who had created it.
Some people were dying to tell me Minnelli stories, having saved up revealing anecdotes for nearly seventy years. Others played it close to the vest, choosing their words with almost excruciating caution. And more than a few people attempted to steer the conversation away from Minnelli, preferring to discuss Judy Garland, the weather, or their own careers (one veteran actress took the opportunity to pitch me the story of what she hoped would be her comeback vehicle—the saga of a centerfold-turned-mafia-wife).
In conducting research, I asked a thousand different questions, though virtually everyone I spoke to had the same one for me: “So, have you talked to Liza?” The answer, unfortunately, was no—though an attempt was made. After all, many of my interview subjects had stressed how unique and endearing the bond had been between father and daughter. If anyone really knew Vincente Minnelli, they knew his bond was his pride and joy. And over the years, the high-octane headliner has done an admirable job in terms of celebrating her father’s cinematic legacy (including two helpings of Minnelli on Minnelli, a televised tribute in 1987 and a Palace Theater stage show in 1999). Nevertheless, I wasn’t at all surprised that she did not consent to be interviewed. Although Liza obviously adored her father—and she remains one of his most devoted champions—she has been unwilling to either acknowledge or explore some of the complexities of his life. Despite several efforts, I was unable to contact Vincente’s other daughter, Tina Nina Minnelli. This was another disappointment as I’m sure she has a compelling story to tell, and one very different from her famous sister. Thankfully, many people were willing to talk.
I found that often the most challenging interviews proved to be the most rewarding. Nina Foch, who appeared in Minnelli’s classic An American in Paris, bristled at some of my questions about the film, but she turned quietly reflective and almost melancholy when I asked what her director was like as a human being:
I don’t really know where his private life was but I think it was very complicated. He was not at all the kind of person to be very forthcoming about his private life but I remember I was in his study one day and I spotted this set of drawings that Vincente had done. One of them really caught my eye. I said, “I love that. Give that to me.” It was just something that came off his sketch pad but it was really beautiful. But also, if you looked at it long enough, you could see that he was a very complicated soul. I remember thinking, we may be friends but I really don’t know Vincente at all… . I wonder if anybody really did.7
Taking everything into account—the enigma of Vincente Minnelli as both an individual and an artist, his unconventional upbringing, an ambiguous sexuality, a show-business career that afforded him the opportunity to work with everyone from Josephine Baker to Jack Nicholson, long-concealed family secrets, and no less than Judy Garland and Liza Minnelli as supporting players—it’s truly astounding that Minnelli’s story has received so little attention.
Film historian and Minnelli disciple George Feltenstein has made some attempts to rectify this. Feltenstein has long wanted to produce a documentary that would explore the director’s life and career. But when he presented his ideas to some documentarians, he found that his enthusiasm was met with an inexplicable indifference: “I remember that the filmmakers’ objection was, ‘Well, there’s no story there.’ I said, ‘What do you mean there’s no story there? There’s an amazing story there… . The story of his life is in his films.’ You know, Judy Garland had that lyric that Roger Edens wrote for her, ‘The history of my life is in my songs… .’ Well, the history of Minnelli’s life is in his films. And when you look at all those films, you see the pained artist, the passionate romantic. All of those things. How is it people cannot see this?”8 Looking too fast, yet again.
In some ways, this project is a thank-you note that’s been twenty-five years in the making. So many summers ago, Vincente Minnelli’s message of hope and encouragement managed to find a restless teenager stashed away in Lewiston, Maine. And the inspirational effects of Minnelli’s movies helped an unconfident young man return to St. Dominic Regional High School with head held high. I’d like to believe that in seeking the truth about my subject and attempting to present him as a complete person, that I’m belatedly returning the favor. For as I had been told many years ago, to see yourself is to see forever.
Lester Minnelli’s yearbook photo, Willis High School, 1921. PHOTO COURTESY OF BRENT CARSON (PHOTOGRAPHER UNKNOWN)
1
Delaware Days
THERE WAS SOMETHING ABOUT THAT YEAR … 1903. It seemed too turn-of-the-century and antiquated, so later on, he would tell people that he was born in 1907, which sounded more modern and Jazz Age. In the best show-business tradition, shaving a few years off his age would make his talents seem all the more remarkable, coming from one “so young.”
The name on the Chicago birth certificate read “Lester Anthony Minnelli,” though that would change, too. Just as 1903 would be abandoned in favor of 1907, the name Lester would eventually give way to “Vincente,” which had a more artistic ring to it. Right from the start, reality needed to be improved upon. Painted over. “The biographer of his early years is hard put to sift fact from legend,” S. J. Perelman would write of Minnelli in 1937. Though who needed facts when you could slap a couple of coats of illusion over the unvarnished truth and create a little magic? Doing so seemed perfectly natural, as everybody in Lester Minnelli’s life was in the business of make-believe. “Vincente grew up in an atmosphere of grease paint and foot-lights,” his father once told a reporter. At least this much was true.1
In either 1900 or 1902—depending on who was doing the remembering—Lester’s father, Vincent Charles (better known as V.C.), and Uncle Frank (better known as F.P.) formed what was originally called the Minnelli Brothers Mighty Dramatic Company Under Canvas. Despite the epically proportioned name, it was a modestly budgeted traveling theater company with ten actors and about twenty crew members. “We demand a
bility, wardrobe, appearance and sobriety,” the Minnelli Brothers announced to prospective performers. In return, actors were guaranteed respectable treatment, a long season, and “tickets from Hong Kong, if you are what we want.”2 While it wasn’t the Ziegfeld Follies, it wasn’t peddling snake oil either.
Lester’s father, Vincent Charles (V.C.) Minnelli in 1938. Along with his brother Frank, V.C. managed the Minnelli Brothers. Mighty Dramatic Company Under Canvas, which brought musicals and melodramas to Midwestern towns. PHOTO COURTESY OF LYNN RAMEY (PHOTOGRAPHER UNKNOWN)
Barnstorming across central and northern Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, the Minnelli Brothers brought musicals, melodramas, and the occasional minstrel show to towns with names like Sandusky, Chillicothe, and Zanesville. They performed under canvas, usually in vacant lots, promising patrons that “the big tent will positively not leak, so a performance will be given, rain or shine.”3
A Minnelli Brothers production was billed as “a good, clean attraction with so small an admission that it will never be missed.”4 In fact, for as little as a dime, one could see the Minnellis’ “suburbanized versions” of such venerable stage melodramas as Saintly Hypocrites and Honest Sinners or Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch (though all of the characters were renamed and some of the plot elements camouflaged so that the Minnelli Brothers could avoid paying hefty royalties to the playwrights).
The stately V.C. would serve as the company’s musical director, accompanist, and composer of original songs.b Though it was Lester’s beloved Uncle Frank who handled the logistics and hit upon the idea of creating what was essentially a “portable theatre.” With their equipment in tow, the Minnelli Brothers could pitch their tent in any town, even if it didn’t offer a venue spacious enough to accommodate the large audience needed to turn a profit. Ever the industrious impresarios, the Minnelli boys came equipped with their own electric-light plant, folding chairs (for reserved seats), and bleachers (for general admission). If all that wasn’t enough, the Mighty Dramatic Company could even deliver a vivacious star who had once graced the Broadway stage.
Lester’s mother, Mina Le Beau, in 1938. In her touring days, she performed under the stage name Mina Gennell and the press dubbed her “The Dresden China Doll.” PHOTO COURTESY OF BRENT CARSON (PHOTOGRAPHER UNKNOWN)
Lester’s mother, Mina Le Beau, had adopted the stage name Mina Gennell and had won acclaim as an actress in productions in Chicago (where her family had settled).c While appearing on the bill of a Charles A. Loder revue, Mina met V. C. Minnelli. It was anything but love at first sight, as almost immediately, the star and her musical director clashed over her accompaniment. Eventually the smoke cleared and the leading lady found herself attracted to this ambitious, obstinate Italian American, who knew his way around a tune and how to charm everyone into doing things his way.
In November 1894, V.C. and Mina were married in Chicago. To those who followed her career as a high-spirited soubrette, Mina seemed to be sacrificing a bright future on the Broadway stage in favor of marriage. Though she didn’t seem to mind. “Mother definitely lacked an emotional affinity for the theatre,” Vincente Minnelli would observe. “Though she was well on her way to becoming a star—acting was just a living to her.”5
Despite her ambivalence to the theatrical profession, “The Dresden China Doll” (as Mina had been dubbed by the press) would appear in countless Minnelli Brothers specialties, including A Tom Boy Girl, Tess of the Storm Country, and The Girl of the Golden West.6 Though legitimately talented, Mina harbored few illusions about the theater, having survived the inhumane demands of performing fifteen shows a day at one point in her career. By the time she became the leading light of her husband’s company, “The Dainty Star” had seen it all.
A publicity photograph of Mina as Lady Babbie in The Little Minister speaks volumes.7 The image reveals a diminutive woman with unusually large, haunting eyes. There is no attempt to “turn on” for the camera. The absence of personality is all the more surprising when one remembers that this is the grandmother of the most animated performer of all time, Liza Minnelli. In later years, Lester would remember his mother as a “simple” woman who “blossomed” on stage. Though, as Lady Babbie, Mina is decidedly unglamorous, and her slight look of peeve suggests that she might find greater fulfillment scrubbing the pantry than stealing an extra bow. I’d rather be anywhere but here, her expression seems to be saying.
A year after their marriage, the Minnellis prepared to welcome their first child, but what should have been a joyous occasion would have a tragic outcome. “Before I was born, twin brothers had been carried off by mysterious childhood diseases endemic to the times,” Vincente Minnelli would write in his ironically titled memoir, I Remember It Well. “Another brother named Willie … died when I was an infant. Little wonder that mother was overprotective of me, her last surviving son.”8 While it makes for a poignant story (in the best melodramatic tradition), Vincente’s version of events is incorrect.
Between 1895 and mid-1900, Mina reportedly gave birth to five children, but only one survived to greet the new era. In August 1895, a set of twins was delivered: William Francis Minnelli and an unnamed sibling (referred to only as “Baby Minnelli” in interment records) who either arrived stillborn or succumbed shortly after birth. At the age of two years and five months, William would die of diphtheria in January 1898, some five years before Lester was born. In April 1897, one-month-old Vincent C. Minnelli died of “cholera infantum.” Other than a scrawled number on the 1900 Federal Census report, no information has emerged about another Minnelli infant, more than likely stillborn or surviving only a few hours.
Lester Minnelli’s brother, Paul (right), with his Delaware neighbors Lynn (left) and Marcia Ramey. In later years, whenever interviewers broached the subject of siblings with Hollywood’s Vincente Minnelli, elder brother Paul would vanish from the family tree. PHOTO COURTESY OF LYNN RAMEY (PHOTOGRAPHER UNKNOWN)
In later years, Vincente Minnelli would freely admit that he was “notoriously poor” at recalling names, dates, and details. Though in the case of his own siblings, the forgetfulness seems rather deliberate. For Lester was not, in fact, his mother’s “last surviving son.” There was an older brother, born in September 1899 in Chicago, who not only survived infancy but lived to the age of sixty, and his name was Paul.
After contracting meningitis as an infant, Paul Felix Minnelli would struggle with what would now be termed developmental disabilities. “Mrs. Minnelli told my mother that Paul was seven years old before he could say, ‘Mama.’ That was the first word,” recalled the Reverend Lynn Ramey, who grew up next door to the Minnellis.9 Paul was living with his disability in an era that was less than enlightened about his condition. When he was twenty, the Minnellis’ eldest son would be certified as “feeble-minded” by state authorities.d
In later years, whenever interviewers broached the subject of siblings with Hollywood’s Vincente Minnelli, elder brother Paul would vanish from the family tree.e With rare exceptions: In 1937, Alice Hughes wrote a New York American profile of Vincente and observed, “He makes no attempt to entice his younger brother to the big city, away from his home town, which is Delaware, Ohio.”10 While Hughes misidentified Paul as a younger brother, it is one of the few instances where an article about Vincente Minnelli makes some reference to his otherwise unacknowledged sibling.
As Paul turned three and a half and his disabilities were becoming more apparent, Mina discovered that she was expecting again. The baby would arrive in February. In the theater, the winter months were known as the “lean season,” as engagements were harder to come by, especially for traveling players. Sure enough, as they awaited the arrival of their fifth child, Mina and V.C. found themselves engaged by different theater companies. Mina continued performing—as a visibly pregnant ingénue—until the latest possible moment. When she could hold out no longer, she retreated to her mother’s house. On February 28, 1903, Lester Minnelli made his debut in Chicago. Years later, there would be
an enormously successful return engagement.
AS SOON AS LESTER WAS OLD ENOUGH, his parents worked him into the act. “I played the children’s parts whenever there were any to play,” he recalled. It was Lester’s unforgettable performance in the Minnelli Brothers’ production of the creaky melodrama East Lynne that sealed his fate as an actor. Five-year-old Lester was playing “Little Willie,” who dies in his mother’s arms during the play’s overwrought climax. Mina, in character as the distraught mother, clutched her son’s “lifeless” body and exclaimed, “Gone! And never called me mother!” Mistaking his mother’s dramatically charged portrayal for real life anguish, Lester suddenly sprang back to life and did his best to reassure a thoroughly embarrassed Mina that he was still among the living. “No Mama. I’m not dead. I was acting,” Lester announced as the audience roared.11
“Acting never appealed to him,” V. C. Minnelli would later say of his son’s early retirement from the spotlight. “He was a quiet boy and [he] would sit in the dressing tent and watch the men make up. Before the season was over, the cast would not go on without Vincente’s o.k. of their make-up. If he said, ‘Eyebrows too black’ or ‘Not enough red,’ the change was made to suit him.”12