My Life as a Mankiewicz

by Tom Mankiewicz

  “The sheriffs told me at the roadblock on the highway. Can Tasha and I stay with you for a while?”

  “Sure.”

  “Thanks. Okay, I'd better go over to the pharmacy and get some stuff. Oh, can I go through your phone book and copy some numbers? I left my book at home.”

  I couldn't believe her attitude, facing such a devastating loss. Here was a young woman who'd made her first suicide attempt at twelve. She'd try again later. But at this particular time she was such a determined pillar of strength for herself and her daughter. Tuesday never knew her father. She had a treasured portrait of him on the wall of her living room. It went up in flames along with the rest.

  Tuesday didn't rebuild. I suppose the memory was too bitter. Later on she lived in an apartment just below the Sunset Strip where she attempted suicide. She would have died had Luther not howled incessantly behind the door, causing the building “super” to open it and discover her with no time to spare. Most child actresses have one unfortunate thing in common: a determined, sometimes ruthless mother who pushes and drives them mercilessly so she can live in her daughter's reflected glory. I've met at least half a dozen, but far and away the most unpleasant example was Tuesday's mother. I'd come to visit her in the hospital the day after her suicide attempt. She was lying in bed with various tubes stuck in her. They'd pumped her stomach. She'd been sedated and spoke softly, haltingly. The door opened behind us. Mrs. Weld entered, holding some papers in her hand.

  “Hey, Ma,” Tuesday mumbled. I don't think I've ever heard anyone else call their mother “Ma.”

  Mrs. Weld crossed to the bed, raising the papers: “Listen, your business manager says they won't pay these bills without your okay. I told them you couldn't talk right now, so just sign them.”

  Tuesday blinked. “Oh, Ma…”

  “This is important. I've got to get these paid, understand?”

  I couldn't believe it. “Mrs. Weld, why don't you get the hell out of here?”

  She suddenly exploded, pointing her finger at me. “You're next, you know! You're the next one she'll betray! Don't worry, you'll see!”

  I've never hit a woman in my life, but I swear I was fully capable of it at that moment. With every mother-child star relationship there comes a moment when the girl becomes a woman and the balance of power changes forever. And boy, can it get ugly.

  But it's the upbeat Tuesday I remember best, the one who made you grin and shake your head in disbelief. We had lunch in town one day. She was shooting a film called I'll Take Sweden, starring Bob Hope. She was running late and sped back to Goldwyn Studios in her little red Porsche convertible. She tore down Formosa Avenue, heading for Goldwyn, when a motorcycle cop pulled her over. The conversation went this way:

  “I'm sorry, Officer, was I speeding?”

  “Yeah, about forty miles an hour over the limit. License and registration?”

  “Listen, I don't have time, I'm late for shooting, the studio's right across the street, I have to go, so just write out whatever you want and I'll sign it, okay?”

  “It's not that easy. You don't have any license plates on your car.”

  “Oh, right, they're still in the glove compartment. Here, look, here they are, and here's my license, so just add that on too and I'll sign it. I have to go back to work.”

  “Miss Weld, this driver's license has expired.”

  “Like I said, add it on, I have to leave.”

  “You're not going anywhere.”

  “I have to, I'm late.”

  “I don't want to take you in for resisting arrest, but…”

  “You can't take me in for resisting arrest because I won't go with you.” Tuesday started her car and crossed Santa Monica Boulevard. The dazed motorcycle officer followed, red lights flashing, siren wailing. Tuesday rolled past the studio gate guards, pointing behind her: “Don't let him in.” Good luck with that. The officer followed her all the way onto the sound stage, where Tuesday ran inside her trailer, locked the door, and called me. As we talked, the motorcycle officer outside was intercepted by none other than Bob Hope. The situation was explained to him. Hope told the officer Tuesday had been under enormous strain lately. He'd personally make sure her plates got on her car and her license was renewed. He'd also take it as a personal favor if they could just forget about the whole thing. I can't explain adequately today the unbelievable respect with which Bob Hope was held at that time by anyone wearing any kind of uniform. The officer agreed and left, but not before getting an autographed photo. As for Tuesday: “You can't take me in for resisting arrest because I won't go with you”? Try that on a cop someday and see how far you get.

  My favorite recollection involving Tuesday actually came from my father. In the mid-sixties he phoned me from New York one day, early in the morning. He rambled on for a while, then came to the real reason for his call. “Listen, Tom. There's an item in Dorothy Kilgallen's column back here saying that you and Tuesday Weld are getting married. Is that true?”

  “Oh, Dad, you're the one who always tells me not to believe what you read in the papers. It's absolutely not true.”

  Brief silence. “Okay, okay, but let me just leave you with a two-word question: Tuesday Mankiewicz?”

  Tuesday later married the wildly talented Dudley Moore. They had a child, Patrick. Dudley introduced me to his ex-wife, the British actress Suzy Kendall. Suzy and I had a brief but wonderful relationship both in L.A. and in London. For a while there, it was change partners and dance. After Dudley, Tuesday improbably married the brilliant viola and violin virtuoso Pinchas Zukerman. They divorced some years later. She lives in Colorado now, near her daughter, Natasha. Her talent lives on. Every year there are Tuesday Weld film festivals, notably in New York, where her wonderful performances in Pretty Poison, Lord Love a Duck, Play It As It Lays, Looking for Mr. Goodbar (Oscar nominated), and others, are shown. We still talk from time to time. A few years ago she told me, “I don't want to live in a world where Tuesday Weld is sixty.” Thank goodness she still does.

  Jack Haley Jr.

  One of the best friends I ever had and the director of my first professional collaboration. The son of Jack Haley, the iconic Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz. When I met him, he was working for David L. Wolper, whose production company made the great documentaries The Race for Space, The Making of the President, and the Jacques Cousteau specials. Jack was in charge of the entertainment division, producing and directing a TV series called Hollywood and the Stars. Everyone knew Jack. His house, overlooking the Sunset Strip, was constantly filled with everybody who was anybody, especially in the younger generation. It seemed each night was a different party. I first met Richard Donner with Jack. Dick was a close friend of his and soon of mine. I would later write Superman, Superman II, and Ladyhawke for Dick. Jack's personality and mine meshed perfectly. Shortly after meeting each other we became almost inseparable.

  Jack was hugely talented and wanted to expand his horizons. Nancy Sinatra was a major singing star at the time (“These Boots Are Made for Walking,” “Sugartown”) and Jack had come up with a different notion of what a TV musical variety show should be. He pictured a filmed hour starring Nancy with nonstop musical numbers performed on exterior locations. No stage, no studio audience, no introductions. Just one continuous musical film. This was before MTV, mind you, and even before music videos. The special, Movin' with Nancy, was broadcast in prime time on two different networks. Jack won the Emmy for it. He'd asked me to write it for him. The guest stars would be Nancy's musical collaborator, the songwriter Lee Hazelwood, and, oh—Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Sammy Davis Jr. (More about the making of the special in the next section.)

  Jack had a brief encounter with almost every young actress in Hollywood, or at least tried to. I was hoping to run him a close second at the time. He was seriously involved with women only twice: with Nancy first, and later with Liza Minnelli, whom he married.

  Nancy Sinatra was and is a sweet, loving person. I've known her off and on for mo
re than forty years. She and Jack fell in love on the show and soon afterward were engaged. Jack asked me to be his best man. There was a prewedding dinner at Chasen's, attended by both families and friends. This had to be the most Catholic dinner ever held outside the Vatican. Jack Haley Sr. was a Knight of Malta. He and his wife, Flo, had donated a small fortune to the church. The Sinatras were Italian, enough said. Even I was Roman Catholic. At the dinner, George Schlatter (the producer of the wildly popular Laugh-In and a close friend of the Sinatras) rose and observed: “Thank goodness these two young people both worship the same God—Frank.”

  The wedding date was rapidly approaching. I was asleep in my beach house one night when the phone rang. It was Jack. He was audibly upset and told me I had to come over right away.

  “Jesus, Jack, that's a forty-five minute drive. What the hell is it?”

  “I can't go through with the wedding.”

  Total silence on both ends. “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah. We could be in a lot of trouble.”

  “What's this we shit? I'm only the best man.”

  “Just get in here, will you?”

  I did exactly that. Jack had tracked Nancy down at a movie with friends. No time like the present to let her know. Somehow, she eventually understood. She remained loving and loyal to him. I really think she was his most indispensable friend.

  Movin' with Nancy

  Shot on film—on 16 mm film (the first network show ever to be so)—with a French Éclair camera. There was very little dialogue. For my part, the writing was concentrated on setting the songs to their proper backgrounds and locations, telling the story. Jack and I would stay up nights plotting out the sequences. He had a deep love for and encyclopedic knowledge of movie musicals, plus a genuine knack for shooting inventive visuals to tell the story. He richly deserved his Emmy. “Sugartown” was shot at the base of a waterfall near Santa Barbara; “Who Will Buy This Wonderful Morning,” at a crumbling, abandoned amusement park ride. For “Up, Up and Away” we used a real racing balloon owned by Jay Fiondella, the owner of Chez Jay's, a popular restaurant in Santa Monica. We hung Nancy in a balloon basket off a crane on Mulholland Drive for most of the number, then put Jay in a blond wig to actually fly the balloon. He crash-landed somewhere in Thousand Oaks, to the north, but we got the footage we needed.

  Dean Martin

  Dean Martin worked only one night, at the L.A. County Museum of Art. He played Nancy's “fairy godfather” and brought mannequins to life with a tap of his magic wand as he sang “Just Bummin' Around,” written by Bobby Darin. I found Dean strangely unlike his public image. He was more complicated than I anticipated, full of questions and suggestions. His onscreen nonchalance, which seemed effortless (“I was so drunk last night I had to buy a movie star map to find out where I lived”), was in fact a carefully crafted persona. We worked for six or eight hours that night. He never had a drink.

  Sammy Davis Jr.

  Some great entertainers have a primal need to perform. With Sammy it was nothing less than an utter compulsion. Frank Sinatra once told me: “Sam would have had the greatest act ever seen in a club if he only knew when to get off. Audiences are like women. You want to leave them begging for one more. Sam gives them two more, then more after that till they're exhausted.” Frank also famously said of Sammy: “He gets up in the middle of the night for a glass of water and goes down to the refrigerator. He opens the door—the light goes on—he does twenty minutes.”

  Sidney Korshak (more about him later) was a hugely powerful lawyer with definite ties to organized crime. His impressive client list included the Dodgers, the Hilton Hotels, and Gulf & Western, but it was his position as head legal honcho for the Teamsters union and their pension fund that gave him real clout. Nobody fucked with Sidney, not even Frank. The story everyone supposedly “knew” about him was this: When Sammy was having a major affair with Kim Novak, she was Columbia Pictures' biggest star. Studio head Harry Cohn was beside himself with worry. If word got out, Novak's career would be over and he'd lose his most important leading lady. Sidney was sent to Vegas to visit Sammy, who was performing there at the time. Reportedly, he told Sammy that if he ever saw Novak again, his other eye would be put out. This account was universally accepted by Hollywood “insiders.” Some years later I was writing the James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever in Las Vegas. Sidney was close to the producer, “Cubby” Broccoli, and costar Jill St. John, and therefore close to the movie. Late one night, while I was drinking in a group that included Sidney, someone brought up Sammy's name and I stupidly observed: “If it's about Sammy, maybe you'd better check with Sidney.” What an unnecessary smartass remark. I immediately blushed, realizing I'd made a colossal blunder. Sidney smiled. “You're referring to we'll put your other eye out? Actually, I threatened him with something far worse. I told him if he ever saw her again he'd never play another major nightclub in this country for the rest of his life.” In those days the mob could deliver on that threat. Moreover, Sidney was right. Sammy would rather have gone blind than stopped performing.

  Sammy was whiplash smart. He could sing. He could act. Boy, could he dance (he was Michael Jackson's first hero). He played several musical instruments. Pound for pound, there was no entertainer to match him, but he was still desperate for acceptance. From everyone. Other entertainers, civil rights leaders, politicians, high society, and “the Hood.” He screwed around with and married white women and black women. I'm convinced the principal reason he converted to Judaism was to gain more acceptance in establishment Hollywood. He was one of the most avid and knowledgeable movie fans I ever knew and was always screening films at his home.

  He loved the James Bond movies. While I was writing them, he would pepper me with questions about everyone involved and ask how every stunt scene and chase was shot. No detail was too small. When I went to see him in a club, he would introduce me from the stage as “the James Bond screenwriter” and then say: “You'd let me live next door to you, wouldn't you, Mank?” I'd always answer back, “I can't afford your neighborhood, Sam,” and he'd roar with laughter as if hearing it for the first time.

  One night in New York, Sean Connery came to see him at the Copa and went backstage afterward to pay his respects. Sammy reacted like a kid with his hero. Sean, for whom golf was a religion, was playing the next morning at Forest Hills Country Club, the home of the U.S. Tennis Open. He asked Sammy to join him. Sammy used to joke that his golfing handicap was being “an extremely short, one-eyed black Jew.” Little did he know how prophetic that description would turn out to be. The following morning they went to Forest Hills and were sitting in the bar, waiting for their time to tee off, when a flustered and visibly embarrassed club manager approached. He explained apologetically to Sean that a terrible mistake had been made, that they'd had no idea Mr. Connery would be bringing Mr. Davis with him. Quite simply, Mr. Davis wasn't allowed to play at Forest Hills. Those were the club rules. Sean exploded angrily: “Do you mean to tell me that in this day and age at supposedly one of the finest clubs in the country a black man can't…”

  “No, no, Mr. Connery, that's not it. We have several black members. Mr. Davis is Jewish.”

  Everyone forgets how shabbily the Rap Browns, Eldridge Cleavers, and Stokely Carmichaels who took over the civil rights movement during the sixties treated the African Americans who paved the way for equality. Even Martin Luther King Jr. wasn't exempt from their disapproval. Hell, he wanted laws passed by white people that gave civil rights to blacks. Those rights weren't theirs to give, they had to be taken. I saw their point, but the dismissal of the contributions of a Sammy Davis Jr. and yes, even a Sidney Poitier, was totally inexcusable. Sammy sold out nightclubs where black people weren't even allowed to sit down. Why didn't Sammy refuse to play them? Why didn't Willie Mays quit baseball when he couldn't stay in the same hotel as his white teammates? Why wasn't Willie Mays angry? Why wasn't Joe Louis angry? During their lives they underwent discrimination the younger generation could barely c
onceive of, and they prevailed. Unfortunately, when Sammy hugged Richard Nixon after receiving a national honor from him, his reputation among the militants was sealed.

  It's all come full circle by now. When Sidney received his Lifetime Achievement Award from the Academy not that long ago, the standing ovation was endless and deafening. Every black actor was visibly tearing up while applauding, and rightly so. Sammy's reputation was almost fully restored by Michael Jackson and others shortly before Sammy's death from cancer. He was finally being recognized and honored as he always should have been. Hell, Sammy just wanted everyone to love him. He just wanted everyone to love everyone. He meant it when he sang “I Wanna Be Me.” He just didn't know who that person was.

  Frank Sinatra

  Gee, no one's ever written about Frank before. I'd met him as a kid, but I first got to know him during Movin' with Nancy. He'd never quite forgiven Dad for not casting him as Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls, but thank goodness they struck up a genuine friendship after that. Frank wanted to sing a song directly to Nancy on the show. We'd film it in a recording studio with a full orchestra. Frank, who'd started in the big band era, only sang with all the musicians right there. He had an incredible ear. He could hear the second trombone hit a tiny “clam” while thirty instruments were playing and he was singing. Sometimes even the audio engineer thought he was wrong, but when they played back the tape—there it was.

  Frank wanted to sing “Younger Than Springtime” to Nancy: “It's such a pretty song and no one really sings it anymore.” Guess what? We decided on “Younger Than Springtime.” On the day of shooting I was absent-mindedly leafing through the song sheets while we waited for Frank to arrive. Something odd about some of the lyrics caught my eye: “Warmer than winds of June are the gentle lips you gave me.” And later: “Angel and lover, heaven and earth…” This was clearly a man/woman song, not a father/daughter one. I pointed it out to Jack. It sounded a bit like incest to him too. “You're right,” said Jack. “Tell Frank…”