by Sid Luft
I met a guy who also drove a Packard 12 Roadster. (I’d traded in my Hudson Terraplane for a Packard 12.) One night we attended a fancy Glendale party filled with valley debutantes, and the local dudes were not happy with our presence, particularly our flashy cars. A fight broke out and it spread onto the street. I was in the middle of the street fighting, and as I was picking one of the boys off the road someone came from out of nowhere and whacked me in the face. I never knew where that blow came from. He hit me so hard I was forced into a backflip. In the distance I could hear the sound of police sirens headed in our direction. We somehow managed to hop in our cars and speed off. I had a healthy mouse within minutes. It was around eleven at night, and my left eye was closed in such a way I thought I might have lost it—the area was swollen up like a tennis ball. We went looking for leeches. I was used to them from my days in the ring at the Eastchester Police Department. The pro boxers in the gyms would get treated with these rather disgusting-looking creatures, dark brown with a rough texture. I knew you could buy them at a drugstore, but there wasn’t one open in Glendale at that hour. We found our way to an all-night pharmacy, Horton & Converse, in Beverly Hills—and this was my introduction to Tinseltown. I purchased a cobalt blue jar filled with four unattractive slugs. The boys watched in horror as I threw my head back and attached one bloodsucker to the damaged area. My eyelid was still hammered shut. I explained how they work, sucking the blood out of your skin, and how the inflammation disappears within a few hours. When the leech filled with blood it fell off and I applied another.
Horton & Converse was located on Wilshire Boulevard near Rodeo Drive. Cruising around, I took in the streets and the shops and decided I was not living in the right neighborhood. I got back to Glendale at around five o’clock in the morning, packed up, and drove right back to Beverly Hills. On the way, I stopped at a drive-in restaurant with my top down, and there were two guys with a girl between them sitting in a convertible eating hamburgers. They looked at me and one of the fellows said, “Should’ve ducked.”
“You’re so right” was my reply. The boys were the multitalented Heasley twins, Bob and Jack. They were actors and also professional ice skaters. For a long time, they had their own act on the roof of the St. Regis Hotel in New York, and I was soon to be working with them on Eleanor Powell’s movie Rosalie. Bobby would later become my second assistant producer on A Star Is Born. We all became pilots as well, and the Heasleys even had a flying school. They went on to manufacture sophisticated metal components for the aircraft industry.
In the all-night drive-in we began to talk back and forth from our cars. They were currently working on a film with Sonja Henie, the star on ice. After winning the ’28, ’32 and ’36 Olympics she’d become a movie star, and she was now under contract at 20th Century Fox.
Eleanor was finishing her first MGM film, Broadway Melody of 1938, when I looked her up. She and her mother had always been warm and receptive to me, but we hadn’t seen one another for three years. I didn’t anticipate I’d have an affair with her. I was not sophisticated enough to make a pass when we’d known one another in New York. But by now I’d slept with women older than myself. I enjoyed experienced women, and they appreciated a young man, which worked out well for both parties.
I began to spend time at the Powell house, at 727 North Bedford Drive in Beverly Hills. I noticed Eleanor expended her energy avoiding men who were chasing her, men like Roy Del Ruth, the director of Broadway Melody of 1938. Another suitor was an important art director at MGM, another a film executive who daily sent her roses and costly presents.
I was impressed by Eleanor’s discipline. She had a portable dance floor with a special veneer on which she practiced for hours every day. Later, when we traveled together, Eleanor would always bring the board along.
Eleanor’s interest in me was flattering, and I was infatuated. However, I continued to date many girls, and Eleanor encouraged me to do so. She preferred that our relationship appear to be casual.
Through Eleanor and the Heasley twins I was introduced to the younger Hollywood actors. We hung out at the popular clubs: the Mocambo, Victor Hugo’s, and the Trocadero. Mickey Rooney was going with Ava Gardner, at the time a pretty unknown MGM starlet. Mickey was the star. We’d double date, and Mickey told funny stories about himself and his little costar, Judy Garland. Of course Mickey married Ava, his first of eight wives.
I met Jack Warner Jr., and with our dates we’d attend private screenings at the Warner family manse. To me it was a big deal. I was sporting a pipe at the time, and Jack Warner Sr., with whom I would one day be partners, sharply requested, “Put the pipe out or get out.” My ears rang red with embarrassment that evening. I was not used to commands, but under the circumstances I was not going to react. Jack Jr. seemed unfazed by his father’s behavior. I’d begun to affect a pipe at the Hun School and kept it up. I thought it made me look mature, important. It seemed to go over good with the girls but aggravate the guys.
Eleanor was now even more glamorous to me now than when I’d first seen her in Atlantic City. She wore luxurious mink coats and expensive jewelry, drove handsome cars—the accoutrements of a Hollywood star. She liked to say she thought of me as her brother, and I’d be dancing with her holding her very close and telling her to forget the brother stuff. I’d press her body into mine and turn her on, just as she had turned me on. Later when we were lovers and our relationship developed, I had my first taste of privilege and fame. I could blame Eleanor for turning me on to a lifestyle I would never be able to kick, even as it kicked me.
I was introduced as her “assistant” or “secretary.” When we were returning from a particular cruise from Los Angeles to Cuba, the press caught up with us as we docked in New York. We’d enjoyed ourselves immensely in Cuba, dancing through the exotic Latin nights, all perfume and stars over Havana, enjoying the elite pre-Castro pleasures. We drank and ate at the lavish casinos with Meyer Lansky and other celebrities. Nobody questioned my presence. And then we hit New York. Eleanor was photographed aboard ship, wrapped in mink, my figure lurking in the background.
Once the story broke Eleanor and her mother immediately returned to Hollywood by train, leaving me on my own. I was put out. I was egotistical—in a sense, I felt equally important. I was not to be pushed under the carpet.
MGM was outraged by the publicity. One of the columnists wrote, “Doesn’t look like any secretary to me.” The press played up the notion of “boy secretaries” as the latest Hollywood fad. Who was Eleanor Powell kidding? The cruise had been romantic. Neither of us were in love; we were, however, very much attracted to one another.
I suffered a momentary feeling of having been used, but I knew MGM feared a scandal, and it was silly of me to expect Eleanor to defy the studio. Despite the fuckups and scandals in Hollywood, the mores of the country were conventional, and the studios tried to cover up anything unsavory. In some instances, MGM stars were protected beyond the law. The Canadian-born actor Walter Pidgeon was accused of raping a fourteen-year-old girl, and MGM kept the incident entirely from the media. Walter’s penchant for pigeon was notorious. MGM was always bailing him out to protect his public image and their investment in a leading man. Young women’s parents were bought off time and time again.
In New York, Jack Jr. introduced me to a lovely starlet, Joanne Dru. A beautiful southern belle, she was temporarily living with her mother on Riverside Drive. She was also the sister of Peter Marshall, an actor who became a successful game show host. Unfortunately, my evening was spent listening to how she was an admirer of Adolf Hitler. Clearly, she was not aware that I was Jewish. I wondered who she thought Jack Warner was.
The Heasley twins persuaded me to bring my date up to the St. Regis roof, where they were working. Their ice skating act, performed in tux and black tie, included Bea, Bobby Heasley’s girlfriend, who skated and sang. She later married the prominent attorney Sidney Korshak but remained friends with the Heasleys. And when they became fliers and owned a sc
hool for flight instructors, Bea also became a pilot. Bob and Jack were intrigued by my date; however, Joanne’s conversation was so limited, filled with such silly prejudices, we wondered how she was going to make it in Hollywood, where she and her mother were headed.
I remained in New York three months before returning to the West Coast. “Hi, Ellie, I’m back.”
“Come over,” came the instant response. But thereafter, as eager as Eleanor was to see me, I was kept under wraps.
I was drawn to Eleanor, but I never considered her my type. She wasn’t the voluptuous fantasy like my next-door neighbor Pat Dane, who lived in the apartment between Desi Arnaz’s and mine. Pat must have been all of seventeen, and I thought she was gorgeous. We went to bed on the second date. She made it clear, however, that I was not going to be her boyfriend. Pat was like so many of the young women who came to Hollywood—exceptional looking, with stardom and/or a famous, rich man as their goal. In this case, Pat wanted both a contract and someone of note. I thought she was perfection except for her little, whiny voice, which I’m certain she tried to change. Pat didn’t need me. She got what she wanted in spades when, after a stint as a contract player with MGM, she married Tommy Dorsey, the bandleader.
Aspiring actresses were plucked off immediately by the local agencies. Most often the young women wouldn’t get much further than a stock contract player. The Ava Gardners headed for MGM, the favored studio for the would-be stars streaming into Hollywood seeking fame and fortune. MGM made the best pictures—Gone with the Wind, The Wizard of Oz. MGM had the best directors. MGM was it! Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, the Barrymores, Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland—their list of superstars went on and on.
MGM starlets were all rather gorgeous showgirls. They’d be under contract for fifty to seventy-five dollars a week, going to school, getting coached in drama, dance, and singing, and out of the whole group might come a star or two. Generally they remained in secondary and bit parts, locked into seven-year contracts with agents watching their every move. It was not uncommon for one starlet to say to another, “Don’t go in his office, he’ll chase you,” or “Better bring your agent along if you don’t want to be jumped.” The casting couch was infamous—but then there was Billy Grady, the head of casting at MGM, who was not a woman chaser. He was considered a tough number, and not one to seduce or be seduced. I was impressed by MGM when I became an agent and had access to the studios. Metro, a world unto itself, had a private police force, as well as security connected to the Los Angeles Police Department and national law enforcement agencies.
MGM had tremendous power. Actors were treated like inmates. Louis B. Mayer, for all his authority, was just another employee. The boss of bosses, Nick Schenck, lived in New York. His brother, Joe Schenck, was head of 20th Century Fox and one of Pat DiCicco’s closest friends and sponsors.
DiCicco was Gloria Vanderbilt’s first husband. His local credibility was based in large measure on his association with Joe, which is well documented in Vanderbilt’s book Black Knight, White Knight. In fact, Lynn Bari, my second wife, had been a contract player from age thirteen at Fox, and she’d complained that DiCicco had tried to rape her when she was fifteen.
MGM was to ruin Clark Gable and Robert Taylor. These stars were let go in a cruel way, after having been their greatest draws. Louis B. Mayer himself came to fear he’d also be axed. “I’m afraid for my own job,” he’d say. Sure enough, when Dore Schary became production head at MGM, he fired Mayer.
On a Sunday night Victor Hugo’s was the in place to bring a date. Eleanor naturally wasn’t going out to the popular clubs with me. One Sunday I left her house and, dateless, went to Victor Hugo’s.
There was some element of karma that night. Judy Garland was at the club with Louis B. Mayer and her sisters Jimmie and Susie. I’d heard Judy sing earlier in the year at the Trocadero, also a popular supper club. I’d run into Lester Linsk, an agent and acquaintance of mine and close friend of Bette Davis, at one of Joe Pasternak’s afternoon parties. Lester, Bette, and I went on to the Trocadero. Billy Wilkerson was the proprietor; later he became the publisher of the entertainment trade paper the Hollywood Reporter. It was a Sunday night, and Judy gave a spontaneous performance. She brought the house down.
Now, at Victor Hugo’s, Judy was introduced by the orchestra leader. She belted out a song for the customers. The little plump charmer again captivated everyone with her amazing voice.
In the men’s room, I bumped into Lee Siegel, a physician with whom I’d struck up a casual friendship after having seen him around the club. We were both pretty stoned that night and decided it might be a kick to continue on to Tony Cornero’s gambling boat, the Rex, docked three miles off the Santa Monica pier. The Rex featured slot machines and craps and roulette tables. Small motor launches waited to swoosh you from land to sea and back. The croupiers dressed in tuxedos. Customers were served whiskey whether they gambled or not. Lee was without cash, so I advanced him $500.
Before World War II broke out, Lee went into the army as a captain in the medical corps. He was an attractive person, and he returned from the war to what was essentially a celebrity practice in Los Angeles, with patients who included Franchot Tone and Orson Welles, among others. He would be one of Judy’s doctors, and I would be one of her husbands. He never sent me a bill. But that particular night we were all strangers.
My introduction to “little” Judy Garland came soon after, while visiting Eleanor on the set of Broadway Melody of 1938. The Broadway Melody series of musical films was a big hit for MGM, and a way to introduce new talent. Eleanor costarred with Robert Taylor, and Judy had a scene-stealing role. She would make an indelible impression on the public when she sang “Dear Mr. Gable: You Made Me Love You” to his photograph. The routine had been created for her by Roger Edens.
Though Judy was celebrating her fifteenth birthday on the day of my visit, she looked closer to twelve. She was thrilled with the gold charm bracelet given to her by the “King,” Clark Gable, and she went around the set displaying the cherished birthday present to everyone, including me. So I actually met Judy Garland the year I arrived in Los Angeles.
Eleanor arranged for me to be an extra in the film Rosalie. The musical had been a Broadway hit. This time, she costarred with Nelson Eddy, who lived in a small apartment with his mother and a big police dog, which Nelson took everywhere.
Our production number required cumbersome uniforms resembling Britain’s Coldstream Guards. Happily, the Heasley twins were part of the cast. The choreographer had designed an unusual number: our shoes were nailed to the floor to facilitate a kind of Raggedy Ann–doll movement as we bent in different directions; the rifles we carried remained stationary; all this while Eleanor, high up on a platform, stood on a drum tapping her heart out for America in her sequined halter, bare legs, and top hat.
Nelson Eddy drove Eleanor crazy. Eddy was plagued by nervous stomach gas all through shooting. He was a humorless person. Filming is boring, tedious work, so Eleanor and I would find ways to amuse ourselves. Not Nelson. One of his bad habits was to belch and blame it on his big police dog. He seriously believed we bought it. Eleanor got to the point where she’d imitate him and shout to an imaginary dog, “Stop it!”
Eleanor had been born with gorgeous legs and the gift to use them. A vivacious presence on screen, her compelling smile sparkled from the screen into your heart—not unlike Judy’s.
Eleanor and her mother encouraged me to learn camera work, thinking I had an eye for it. Eleanor thought this was the road up in the industry, as moviemaking was such an inside business. But I had this idea that I might go to war, and furthermore I didn’t see myself working for a weekly salary.
I may have been the quintessential entertainee, but I also had a burning desire to fly, to become a professional pilot. I spent a good deal of time receiving private flight instructions. Once out of the Santa Monica airport I’d get up to a thousand feet and look over Los Angeles and Pasadena—both natural dust bowls for the p
revailing winds coming off the desert—and think what a charming, marvelous town Hollywood was.
No matter how much Eleanor and her mother tried to shape my interests, I turned to other vistas. I hit on the idea of Custom Motors. I enjoyed engines, and customizing automobiles was a Hollywood fad. It was right up my alley. Eleanor invested $5,000. I found a well-located storefront to work out of, and within the year I was able to buy the property.
Custom Motors flourished. I hired a man away from the Cadillac agency who was a good metalworker. A skillful, well-known body designer, Alex Tremulis, came in one day to see what the hell I was doing. He was out of work. I fell in love with his sketches of futuristic cars, which look like our sports cars of today. He loved speed and so did I. Alex was a rather intellectual-looking individual, prematurely balding, slender, sporting a mustache, and wearing glasses. Duesenberg had folded, so he came to work for Custom Motors.
I wasn’t a big operator, but I had an unusual little business going. It was creative, and that was what appealed to Tremulis. I gave him a little American Austin to redesign. Roy Evans, who owned the Palm Bay Club in Florida, thought the American Austin was going to be the car of the future. It was small, not as sturdy as the Volkswagen bug but in that category.
Alex redesigned the Bantam, a small car we transformed from a coupe into a convertible. Alex was driving one back from the company in Pennsylvania when he was blown off the New Jersey turnpike in a storm. We were anxious, but he delivered it in time for us to repaint it and sell it to the customer. Alex went on to become a top designer. I ran into him much later, when he was retired and living in Ventura. Ironically, he is best known for designing Evel Knievel’s motorcycle.
