by David Bret
Rock took Phyllis to inspect the house before signing the deeds, and promptly asked her to move in with him. This was unthinkable at the time in Hollywood, though the brouhaha evoked by him “living in sin” with a woman, Henry Willson truthfully observed, would be preferable to the public finding out that he had been “screwing his room-mates” since arriving in Hollywood.
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Phyllis did not deliberate. “I was thunderstruck,” she recalled. “I had never contemplated the possibility of living with a man to whom I wasn’t married. And I certainly couldn’t consider it now, even though I felt a growing affection—call it love—for Rock.”
Though it is now inconceivable that Phyllis did not know that Rock was gay, it is not impossible for her to have naïvely believed that living with her might “turn him straight”. Such was his charm and irascibility that, throughout his life he would have an infallible propensity for seducing even the most die-hard heterosexual males—men who, after having sex with him, would return to their wives and girlfriends and probably never think of having sex with another man again. He certainly lavished Phyllis with affection over the coming weeks, giving her the impression, or so she claims in her book, that he really had mended his ways. She was Rock’s legitimate date for the premiere of Captain Lightfoot in February 1955, and regularly visited the sets of his next two films, Never Say Goodbye and Four Girls In Town—the latter also co-starring George Nader.
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The interiors of Giant began shooting in Los Angeles in May 1955 once George Stevens had assembled what was the most perfectly matched cast for a big budget saga since Gone With The Wind, in 1939. 24-year-old newcomer Carroll Baker would soon achieve notoriety with Baby Doll. Mercedes McCambridge had just triumphed as Joan Crawford’s adversary in Johnny Guitar, the high-camp, bitch-fest western. Sal Mineo and Dennis Hopper were lifted straight out of the yet-to-be-released Rebel Without A Cause, as was Stevens’ biggest scoop, James Dean.
Montgomery Clift, almost perennially on the skids with his sexuality-linked drugs and drink dependency, had been pencilled
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in for the role of Jett Rink, only to be deemed too much of a risk by the studio’s insurance company. As his replacement, Jimmy Dean was no less of an enigma whose own reputation left much to be desired. Though only one of his films—East of Eden—had been released and the public at large were yet to be captivated by his spellbinding talent, he was already being variously hailed as a lost cause, a cock-hungry schizophrenic, a pre-Brat Pack prima donna whose only happy but not entirely sane moments occurred when he was creating merry hell. He was the archetypal control-freak, whose every photogenic gesture had to be meticulously rehearsed and perfected. He was a self-confessed neurotic, impossible to work with unless getting his own way, and he had a way of exacting his revenge on what he termed “third-rate lumps”—such as he considered Rock—by improvising carefully plotted scenes with alien gestures. Above all, he was not easy to socialise with if one was not positioned on his decidedly precarious side of the fence. Unlike Rock and his closeted gay contemporaries, Jimmy had never given a damn about his public image. When the MGM moguls had tried to prevent him from cruising for frequently rough gay trade by fixing him up with studio dates, Jimmy had begun finding his own heterosexual conquests, such as Maila Nurmi (1922-2008), popular with television audiences as Vampira and—according to his lover, Jonathan Gilmore, with a one-legged woman with whom Jimmy had liked to watch him having sex, but only after he had drawn a face on her stump. Yet Dean’s single-handed championing of the rebellious youth of America, at a time when the country was living down the ravages of McCarthyism—with many parents failing to provide their offspring with suitable role models, and with most youngsters in any case interested only in teenage independence—made him an icon of an entire generation. There was little doubting from Jimmy’s peers and critics, once shooting
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got under way—regardless of the fact that his total screen time would comprise less than twenty minutes of a three-hours-plus production, that Giant would be his film, never Rock’s or even Elizabeth Taylor’s.
As with Douglas Sirk, though he worked with him just once, Rock placed George Stevens on a pedestal. He told Ron Davis:
George Stevens, he’s another one I fell in love with. He was like a god to me. I followed him around like a puppy. Stevens had a richness to him. He read everything, digested everything. He so inundated himself in Texas and Texanism that whatever decision he made was absolutely right. He did all the directing with me before the picture began, and hardly a word during shooting. He had me so right and bigoted. I was Bick Benedict before we even shot Frame One. And you didn’t dare lie to the man because he could just see right to your core. He gave me such power that I felt I could run the studio!
Rock got on famously with Elizabeth Taylor, then and for the rest of her life the champion of the oppressed gay man. Over the ensuing years and with undying loyalty she befriended, comforted and defended Rock, James Dean and Monty Clift, wayward souls who regarded her as an indefatigable ally and surrogate mother figure, even though she was younger than all three. Rock and Phyllis Gates spent many contented hours with Elizabeth and her second husband, Michael Wilding, at their home. Her theory was that she and Rock needed to apply Method before shooting any scenes together. In other words, in order to find out how they would get on as Mr. and Mrs. Benedict, they would have to spend as much time together as possible, “through
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thick and thin”. This involved “Bessie” and “Rockabye”—their pet names for each other—living life to the full, getting drunk a lot and throwing up a lot on the set. It also involved Rock being third-party to the rows between the fiery actress and Wilding, now reaching the end of their marriage—rows that were exacerbated when Confidential published a shattering exposé on Wilding who, it was claimed, had arranged a noisy pool party, to which he had invited strippers, whilst his wife had been away filming. Rock added to the drama by giving every impression that he loathed James Dean, whilst a later comment made by Elizabeth Taylor confirms that the much-publicised brooding looks and on-set dissention between the two actors was little more than a charade to camouflage their true feelings for one another. Speaking to Star magazine in 1987, she observed:
After I found out the truth about Rock, I began to feel a strong affection for Jimmy. But my feminine intuition told me that a mysterious understanding was being born between the two actors, and at times I felt like an uncomfortable third party.
The shooting schedule for Giant was well under way by the time James Dean joined the unit early in June—catching the train out of Hollywood just thirty minutes after completing the post-recording of Rebel Without A Cause. The production had by now transferred to Marfa, Texas, for the locations, taking with it the huge, $200,000 Gothic Benedict mansion. This was re-erected to rise spookily out of the blistering desert sands and, once the film was finished, allowed to decay and crumble back into them.
Shooting was hampered by frayed tempers, aggravated by the scorching heat and a severe water shortage which led to an over-consumption of alcohol. Worse still were the personality clashes,
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instigated by George Stevens and stage-managed by James Dean whose Method training had taught him that if two characters were supposed to hate each other on the screen, then they must also do so away from the set or during rehearsals to make their scenes truly authentic. Professionally, Rock and Jimmy were worlds apart. Jimmy had been schooled by the same team that had produced Brando, Clift, Lee J Cobb, and a few other distinguished thespians who had also scored fantastic hits on the stage. For most of these actors, hard-work and self-sacrifice had preceded triumph whereas in Rock’s case, in common most of the graduates from the so-called “Henry Willson Academy of Glamour”, sex had been the motivating factor towards fame, and acting ability had been picked up along the way—or in cases such as Guy Madison and several others, not at all.
Jimmy, by
far the better actor, resented this. With his complex psyche, he was obviously attracted to Rock Hudson the superbly packaged slab of beefcake, yet he would have easily been capable of separating sexual desire from professional opinion: it was not difficult for Jimmy to walk out of a room ten minutes after having sex with a co-star and immediately begin attacking him, both verbally and physically. Compared to Rock he was diminutive, but he was wiry, immensely strong and agile, wholly capable of taking on any man on in a fight, even if he came off the loser. Again, this mirrored his Method training: to stay in character between takes, even with the man he was currently involved with. It must have been unnerving for someone of Rock’s laid-back, still shy approach to witness Jimmy “psyching up” for a take as was witnessed several times by visitors to the set of Giant: sitting on a chair he would slowly draw his knees up to his chin, then bring them down sharply—stamping his feet on the ground dozens of times before leaping high into the air and finally tearing around the set, screeching like a banshee!
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Jimmy loathed the way George Stevens expected everyone to be on the lot, in full costume, at the crack of dawn even if they were not going to be called to do a scene until much later in the day. On one occasion when the director kept him sitting around a whole day for nothing, Jimmy did not show up next morning, and when Stevens finally caught up with him and bawled him out in front of the entire set, Jimmy got his own back by summoning his friend Hedda Hopper and getting her to denounce Stevens in her column for his “lack of professional ethics”. Like everyone else involved with the film he also complained about Steven’s annoying habit of shooting scenes dozens of times—from every possible angle and utilising over a thousand feet of film just for a few seconds of screen time. In all, Stevens would use up 700,000 feet of film, of which only 20,000 feet would form the 198 minutes of the final print of Giant.
Edna Ferber had based her novel on the real-life rags-to-riches story of Texan oil magnate Glenn McCarthy. The film is also said to have inspired the glossy television soap Dallas (1978-91), and its resident tyrant, J R Ewing—the latter taking his initials from those over Jett Rink’s podium in the film’s closing scene. Complimented by Dimitri Tiomkin’s superb score, the story opens in 1923 with Bick on the train to Maryland to purchase a black stallion being exercised by the lovey Lesley Lyntonn (Taylor). “That sure is a beautiful animal,” he drawls, not referring to the horse. Later he faces a barrage of questions at the dinner table, with Lesley posing one that got Henry Willson hot under the collar, “Why aren’t you married, Bick?”—a problem easily rectified on the screen, for a few days later Bick leaves for Reata, his massive ranch in Texas, with Lesley as his bride.
Here, in a mansion stuck in the middle of nowhere, the new Mrs. Benedict struggles to adapt to an environment where everything belongs to Bick—including her. Luz (McCambridge),
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her butch, domineering sister-in-law, dislikes Lesley as much as she dotes on her wayward hired hand, Jett Rink, who she has taken in as a boy. McCambridge, another of Jimmy’s surrogate mothers, affectionately called him as “the runt in a litter of thoroughbreds”. His arrogance stems from Bick’s jealousy of him, and Jett’s hatred of the way Bick controls everyone. “Ain’t nobody king in this country,” he mutters under his breath shortly after making his first appearance. When Luz dies following a fall from the horse which brought Bick and Lesley together, Jett inherits ten acres of land which he refuses to sell to the grasping Bick because it holds fond memories of the woman he revered. Initially he struggles to make ends meet, whilst Lesley is kept busy helping the ranch’s poverty-stricken Mexican neighbours, and raising twins she has given birth to. She visits him secretly, sees pictures of herself on the wall of his shack and, realising that he has developed a crush on her asks, “When are you going to get married, Jett”—a repeat of her earlier, allegedly unscripted question to Bick. Jett responds with his eyes, and in the film’s most touching moment serves her tea and, again unscripted, sneaks a slug of whisky to give him courage.
Jimmy was so nervous about filming this first scene with Elizabeth Taylor—the highlight of which sees him standing in his famous mock-Crucifixion pose, with his rifle threaded between his outstretched arms behind his lowered head, whilst she emulates Mary Magdalene by crouching at his feet—that before the camera began rolling for Giant’s only single take, he strolled out of its range to face the huge crowd of onlookers that George Stevens had allowed on to the lot. Smiling coyly, he unzipped his “shit-kicker” denims, urinated, then shook his penis at the astonished throng. Later he told Dennis Hopper, “I figured that if I could pee in front of four-thousand people, then I could do anything on film.”
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The drama intensifies when Jett strikes oil and becomes one of the wealthiest men in Texas, richer even than Bick, whose jealousy of his rival and loathing of Lesley’s involvement with the Mexican’s puts a strain on their marriage. Jett turns up at their mansion, drunk and drenched in oil. “I’m gonna have more money than you ever thought you could have, you stinking sons of Benedict,” he levels, before making a pass at Lesley. Bick hits him, but gets more than he bargained for when Jett lays into him—a scene within which the punches were reputedly for real.
From this point in the story, whilst the protagonists become more vengeful, Giant starts to lose its power. The major source of irritation comes with the ageing of the characters. James Dean had a say in his own appearance—telling George Stevens how “wrinkles come only with good acting.” With his shades, greying temples and receding hairline he looks authentic, whereas Rock and Elizabeth look ridiculous—little more than crude caricatures of themselves with absolutely no facial lines and blue hair.
Halfway through shooting, Phyllis Gates arrived in Marfa, amidst conflicting reports as to why she was there. One stated that Rock, distressed because James Dean was stealing every scene they appeared in together, had called Henry Willson and begged him to send Phyllis to comfort him. Another declared that Phyllis was so angry over the rumour that Rock was having an affair with Elizabeth Taylor that she wanted to sort out the pair of them. Michael Wilding, whose visit to the set with their two children preceded Phyllis’ by a few days, seems to have been thinking along the same lines. Elizabeth later confessed that she had been attracted to Rock, but that she was well aware that, like Montgomery Clift before him, he would never be hers. After his death she recalled, “I looked at Rock, so handsome and so apparently masculine. But I soon realised that no woman would succeed in igniting his enthusiasm.”
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Phyllis claimed that Rock had marched into her hotel room, quipped, “Hi, Bunting, welcome to Texas!” then carried her to the bed and frantically made love to her. “He was overwhelming, passionate as ever,” she wrote in her memoirs—adding how she had got along with James Dean, who had taken her to breakfast on her first morning in Marfa, and afterwards taught her how to spin a lariat—as he had 68-year-old Edna Ferber during her visit to the set. Phyllis also recalled a caustic quip from former child-star Jane Withers, who played the curiously named Vashti Snythe in the film, “I can’t understand what Rock is going to do with her here,” from which she deduced there must have been something going on between Rock and Elizabeth Taylor:
He devoted so much time to Elizabeth. They were almost childish with each other, talking a kind of baby talk and playing pranks like throwing water at each other…When I saw Rock and Elizabeth together, I understood the reason for Jane Withers’ crack…Was I jealous? Not really. I realised that no normal male could resist the fabulous charms of Elizabeth Taylor. I had no claim on Rock, no reason to be possessive. If there had been an affair, I doubted that it would last. I was content that Rock had, with his passionate welcome to Texas, demonstrated his feelings to me.
The real reason for Phyllis’ sudden appearance is that someone at Warner Brothers had been tipped off that Rock and Jimmy, sharing a house in Marfa with cast member Chill Wills, were on their way towards evoking a scand
al that might easily have shut down the production—particularly when Jimmy boasted not just to friends but to studio executives, “I’ve had my cock sucked my five of the biggest names in Hollywood—all of them guys!”
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Tempers cooled towards the end of August 1955, when George Stevens moved everyone back to Hollywood. Elizabeth Taylor joined her family, though the death-knoll had long since sounded on her marriage to Michael Wilding. According to Phyllis, Rock spent much of the long journey in a foul mood, away from the rest of the company. “We did manage some lovemaking,” she remembered. “My first time on a train. It was wonderful.” He was thrilled to be interviewed by Life—until he learned that James Dean had already made the cover of America’s most prestigious magazine, with the bonus that no one had made any snide remarks about his single status. Life subsequently made amends by putting Rock on the cover of its 3 October issue. He looks resplendent and wholesome with the sleeves of his twill shirt rolled up, wearing a cravat, and with his thumbs hooked into the waistband of his denims. The accompanying editorial told another story, however, and he was soon wishing that he had never spoken to the journaist for the implications were positively dynamite:
THE SIMPLE LIFE OF A BUSY BACHELOR: ROCK HUDSON GETS RICH ALONE!
Since 1949, movie fanclubs and fan magazines have parleyed a $75-a-week ex-truck driver named Rock Fitzgerald into a $3,000-a-week movie hero NAMED Rock Hudson…But now they are beginning to grumble. Their complaints, expressed in fan magazine articles, range from a shrill SCARED OF MARRIAGE? to a more understanding DON’T RUSH ROCK! Fans are urging 29-year-old Hudson to get married, or explain WHY NOT?
