David Niven

by Michael Munn

  ‘I knew I had to save the marriage somehow, if not for my sake then for the boys. I don’t think they thanked me for saving the marriage. They didn’t like their stepmother too much. When we separated, I reached the point where I really missed her. I tried the old fashioned way of sending her flowers. But I didn’t think it would work and I found someone I felt I could be happy with.’

  I asked him who that someone was, and all he would say was, ‘She was a beautiful English model.’ He is known to have fallen for a model from a good English family at the time. Her name was Caroline Kirkwood. I asked him why he didn’t divorce Hjördis and marry his girlfriend. He said, ‘She was very young. I didn’t want to be an old man with a young wife.’ Caroline was 27. David was 49. He always liked the younger women, but he seemed to think that he couldn’t be married to one.

  David took the two boys on a holiday to Honolulu to stay in a house owned by Frank Sinatra. According to Ava Gardner, David wasted no time bedding every girl who was willing, ‘and they were all willing’, she said.

  Back in California, Hjördis continued her affair with the doctor. ‘I’m drawn to doctors,’ she told me. ‘Almost all my lovers have been doctors.’

  I asked her why she thought that was. She said, ‘I suppose it was because I think I need someone who can help me be well again. I spent much of my life trying to be well again.’

  Patricia Medina remembered visiting Hjördis during the time she was separated from David. ‘She had friends round who were all drinking heavily. I didn’t like the look of them at all.’

  Hjördis admitted that, having lost so many friends who were really David’s friends, she was looking for friends of her own. ‘But sadly the people I thought were my friends were just like me. They drank too much. They were destructive for me, but I didn’t know that at the time.

  ‘I was friends with Pat Medina, but we had some rows. She saw what a mess I was in, and when I was living apart from David she came to my house, and she saw all these people I thought were my friends, and she hated them, and she told me she wanted to leave.’

  Back in Hollywood, David made Please Don’t Eat The Daises, a comedy in which he played a professor who decides to become a theatre critic in New York. Doris Day played his wife who convinces him to give up reviewing plays and write them instead. It received a critical lashing at the time but it is actually a very funny film today. Maybe the film critics of the time didn’t like the way Niven portrayed theatre critics as the ‘butchers of Broadway’.

  After three months apart, David and Hjördis got back together. Patricia Medina said that she only went back to him because he was making a lot of money from Four Star and she wanted some of it.

  Hjördis denied that. She said,

  When I went back to David I had an argument with Pat. I didn’t explain myself at all well, but I made it seem like all I was interested in was his money. I was trying to say a joke – that I missed him and his money.

  I knew that if our marriage was to work the second time he had to stop sleeping with women, and he promised he would. I promised not to sleep with other men, but I said, ‘I can’t promise not to flirt because my eyes just flirt on their own,’ and that made him laugh.

  The biggest problem, though, was my drinking. I was getting drunk too much, too often. David said to me, ‘You’re damaged, and I don’t know how to mend you.’

  I said, ‘Just love me and we’ll try and find a way.’

  Many of David’s friends disapproved of the reunion, but he had come to realise how sick she was, and I think that is partly why he tried to mend the marriage. He said, ‘I tried to protect her when we got back together. I tried to be gentle with her because she had become very fragile. Some of our friends were a bit rough on her because they didn’t understand what was really going on inside of her head. And they were always my pals and so they tolerated her, but they didn’t like her much. Peter Ustinov, a great pal, told me that he was very sorry but he didn’t like her at all. I said, “You have to understand, Peter, that she’s been through hell, and she’s very ill.” He said, “If she’s ill have her committed.” I never heard Peter say such a cruel thing before.’

  David believed their marriage stood a better chance of survival if they got away from Hollywood. He was also considering how he could keep more of the money he earned instead of giving so much of it away to the IRS. He was making around $200,000 a film and making good money from Four Star, but he was landed with a huge tax bill and that helped him make up his mind to move to Europe.

  Deborah Kerr and her husband Peter Vietrel encouraged him to live in Switzerland where they were living and where tax was much lighter. Early in 1960 David and Hjördis flew to Switzerland to house hunt and to search for a new future.

  CHAPTER 19

  —

  Europ

  David had to leave Hjördis to hunt for houses on her own for a time while he went to Athens to start work on The Guns of Navarone, a huge World War II epic written and produced by Carl Foreman and directed by J. Lee Thompson. David was part of a starry cast – Gregory Peck, Anthony Quinn, Stanley Baker, Anthony Quayle and singer James Darren – playing a group of saboteurs with a mission to destroy the powerful guns on the island of Navarone.

  This has always been the kind of film I’ve loved since I was a kid, and over the years working as a film publicist, journalist, behind the scenes, in the scenes, I’ve always sought out the actors and directors who made those kinds of movies. From The Guns of Navarone I’ve been lucky to interview Stanley Baker in Wales when he was filming How Green Was My Valley in 1975, Gregory Peck when he was making The Omen in London in 1978, Anthony Quinn when he was making The Greek Tycoon at Elstree Studios in 1977, Anthony Quayle on the set of Murder by Decree in 1978 and J. Lee Thompson when he was in London promoting a mediocre Charles Bronson flick called Stives in 1976, as well as talking informally to most of them on film sets, on location, in offices, in their homes or hotel suites and at premieres. And David Niven, of course.

  J. Lee Thompson remembered the tension among the cast when they first all met up in Athens, before they set off for the bulk of the location filming on the island of Rhodes:

  There was a certain amount of rivalry on the set between Gregory Peck, David Niven and Anthony Quinn – friendly rivalry. The first night we all met on the location in Athens, David Niven was very cheery but he felt anxious that he was just going to be left standing around a lot with nothing to do while the other stars got on with the action. It was true that his character was not as well developed as some of the others and he felt, rightly, that all the characters had been written as supermen without much depth to them. He thought he would be forgotten among all those stars like Peck and Quinn. But he had only just won an Oscar and was insecure that Gregory Peck and Anthony Quinn would get all the best acting moments. And there was Peck convinced Tony Quinn would try to out-act him, and Quinn was aware that Niven had won an Oscar, and so they were all eyeing each other warily. Nothing unpleasant, but I felt the tension. Then Tony Quinn brought out little portable chess sets and they all got hooked on playing chess and took out all the rivalry on the chessboards instead of before the cameras.

  Anthony Quinn remembered the chess games: ‘I thought that playing chess would reveal everyone’s character. There was David Niven, the Errol Flynn of the chessboard, charging around with his queen, crying, “Idiotic move, what, eh? Well, never mind, on we go. Charge!” Then there was Peck – calm – like Lincoln – contemplating every move – deep in thought – you couldn’t rush him. Stanley Baker was a competitive spirit who displayed terrible fury when defeated but great joy when victorious. Tony Quayle moved his pieces like a general, planning his strategy, studying the board and knowing what his moves would be way ahead. Carl Foreman played too. When he lost, you could see centuries of persecution in his face. And there was me. When I lost I just threw the board at them!’

  Anthony Quayle told me, ‘Tony Quinn was not always easy to get on with. Because
Gregory Peck was a big Hollywood star you felt he was in charge and you could trust him. But for me the delight of the film was working with David Niven,’ he said. ‘He never failed to say “Hello, old bean, how are you?”’

  Stanley Baker remembered Niven’s story-telling as something everyone else competed with, like the chess games. ‘We were all good story-tellers, and some of us had better stories to tell. That’s what actors do. In the end we were all competing to tell the best stories, but there’s something about David that makes you feel as though you ought to pay attention. He’d tell us about a time he’d supposedly fought of Mexican bandits, and Tony Quinn would huff and say, “I was born under the sound of gunfire in Mexico,” and he talk about Pancho Villa.

  ‘Niv also listened. He wanted to know what it was like to be brought up in the Welsh valleys. He was interested. But no matter what you said, he always managed to say, “That reminds me of a time I…” and he’d launch into another anecdote.’

  Niven told me, ‘I had no problem with any of the cast. They were all professional, all very likeable. Tony Quinn was the only one who could throw a tantrum. He got very angry one time and I said, “What on earth’s the problem?” and he said, “I have to shoot all these Germans with one gun and I would run out of bullets if this were for real.”

  ‘I said, “But, Tony, this is only pretend. There’s nothing real about this film. It’s a big cartoon.” He said, “Don’t you need to find what your motivation is?” I said, “Yes, indeed, my motivation is the big fat fee they’re paying me.” So he laughed and shouted to the director, “Okay, let’s shoot the scene and I’ll kill ‘em all with my one gun.”’

  Out of the production grew a friendship between Gregory Peck and Niven that lasted for the rest of David’s life. Peck told me, ‘David was always so incredibly cheerful that when you asked him why he was, he’d just say, “Well, old bean, life is really so bloody awful that I feel it’s my absolute duty to be chirpy and try and make everybody else happy too.”’

  While David was on Rhodes, Hjördis found a chalet, complete with tennis court and spectacular views, in the Alpine valley village Château d’Oex near Gstaad. When David saw it, he agreed it was perfect for them and they bought it. When location work on Guns of Navarone was finished, and while waiting to shoot interiors at Shepperton Studios in England, David and Hjördis moved into their new home.

  He quickly discovered a nearby hotel he liked, the Olden, where he would lunch and dine often. Many other famous people dined there including Princess Grace and Prince Rainier. Later, Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor would become regulars, as would Peter Sellers.

  David might have hoped the new home in a new land would solve his and Hjördis’s problems, but her problems were not easily fixable. ‘I got worse, and drank more,’ she said. ‘I’d drink all morning and was drunk by lunch time. We used to have lunch at the Olden Hotel almost every day, but I was always drunk by lunch time, and whenever we saw our friends coming in, I gave them loud greetings which embarrassed David.’

  It might seem that David would have done better to have left Hjördis at home and gone to the Olden alone, but he had good reason to get her out of the house. She was suffering from agoraphobia and it was becoming increasingly hard for her just to step outside. There were those who thought she was just being difficult and obstinate but agoraphobia is a terrifying disease. Indoors she was also suffering severe anxiety and panic attacks, and she numbed it all with alcohol.

  Not all of David’s and Hjördis’s friends turned against her. A regular visitor to Château d’Oex was Noël Coward who Hjördis dearly loved. She told me,

  He was a dear, dear man. I liked him because he didn’t judge me, and he made me feel welcome in his company and made me laugh. I think I felt more comfortable with him than with any of David’s other friends. I said to him, ‘You actually like me, and that makes me very happy.’

  He said, ‘Of course I like you, Hjördis. You see, men – straight men – find you threatening because they think you are going to get in their pants, and women find you threatening because they think you’re going to seduce their men. But your flirty eyes have no effect on me, and Cole isn’t afraid I’m going to jump into bed with you.’ [Cole Lesley was Coward’s partner.]

  I asked him how I can stop having what he called ‘flirty eyes’, and he said, ‘Stop taking all those pills, don’t wear so much make-up and for God’s sake laugh at David’s stories.’

  I took his advice, but it was hard to go without sedatives because I was having panic attacks, so I started taking them again. And I tried laughing at David’s jokes, but when I was back on the pills, they were made worse by the booze, and I was back to the way I was.

  There were times I just wanted to die. I told David I wanted to die, and he begged, ‘Please don’t die.’ He said, ‘Primmie died. I couldn’t bear it if you died too.’ I think that was the sweetest thing he ever said to me.

  She was right about the way many felt about her. Richard Burton once told me, ‘Hjördis was the worst kind of wife, I would imagine. She and David would have lunch at the Olden, and she would be drunk every time, but David never complained. And she seemed to try it on with all the men. Even me, even when I was with Elizabeth [Taylor]. I told David he should leave her at home but he said it was good for her to get out.’

  I suspect Burton was experiencing those ‘flirty eyes’ Coward told Hjördis the sedatives gave her.

  In November 1960 David returned to England to film interiors of The Guns of Navarone at Shepperton. Hjördis went with him to London and began to suspect him of having an affair. She told me, ‘David had a “new friend” called Sally [Croker Poole, then married to Lord James Crichton-Stuart]. He took me to her house [in Cromwell Gardens] and she was young and very pretty and that made me think that David would rather have her than me. I wouldn’t blame him now, but I did blame him at the time. She laughed at his stories. I never laughed at them. I had heard them so many times before, and always they were different versions. I was having medication at the time and I felt separate from everything. People thought I was strange. Well, I was strange, but it was due to the medication, the alcohol, the depression. I was afraid of going anywhere. So I took sedatives to calm me down.’

  David admitted to me in 1982 that he did have an affair when in London at that time, but never revealed who it was with. He said, ‘I wrecked the marriage. I broke my promise not to have any flings. I think I wanted to wreck the marriage, so I had an affair in England when I was making Guns of Navarone and I was so happy that I started thinking about divorcing Hjördis.’

  He didn’t divorce her because, he said, ‘I was desperate not to ever divorce. Call it an insane quirk, but that’s how I felt about divorce.’

  Despite Hjördis’s agoraphobia, David was able to get her sedated enough so they could go to the horse races at Ascot with Greg Peck and his wife Véronique.

  Filming the shipwreck scene in Shepperton’s large tank was a miserable experience for the whole cast. ‘The water was freezing,’ said David, ‘so Lee Thompson allowed us to drink copious amounts of brandy so we were all slightly pissed except for Greg Peck. He could match us drink for drink, yet he never so much as staggered or slurred his words. It was really quite disgusting to see a man able to handle his liquor like that.’

  The scene proved hazardous to film as the actors were thrown about the tank in water stirred up by a wave machine. Peck received a head injury and, worse, Niven cut his lip which turned septic and landed him in hospital. He was gravely ill for two weeks.

  The only scene still to be shot was of Niven and Peck rigging the guns to explode. ‘While I was dying in hospital,’ David told me, ‘some Columbia executives flew in from the States to meet Carl Foreman and Lee Thompson to discuss what they would do if and when I died. When I heard this I discharged myself against doctor’s orders and we shot the scene in three days. I just about made it through and then I was ill for another seven weeks. The studio brass didn�
�t so much as send me a grape.’

  Way down in the cast list of The Guns of Navarone was Michael Trubshawe who had one scene but not with Niven. Trubshawe recalled, ‘When David saw me on the set, he ignored me. I couldn’t understand it. He seemed embarrassed by my presence. He only wanted to be with the bigger stars.’ I don’t believe David cold-shouldered Trubshawe for that reason. And I was never convinced by Trubshawe’s theory that it was because he reminded Niven too much of the past, because Niven was always talking about the past. I think it had more to do with the way Trubshawe helped David’s marriage to Hjördis get off to a bad start; perhaps he somehow blamed Trubshawe for setting off the almost immediate deterioration.

  The Guns of Navarone was a smashing success, the biggest David had since Around the World in 80 Days. It would be his last really massive box office hit.

  When he finished his final scene, he hastily returned to Château d’Oex to convalesce from his infection. By this time Hjördis was completely incapable of taking care of him. ‘When David had been ill and we got home, I didn’t sleep with him because he needed to convalesce,’ said Hjördis. ‘I slept in another room. When he wanted to come to my room, I wouldn’t let him in. By then I had lost interest in being intimate.’

  David spoke about that time to me:

  It was such a difficult time because I had been ill and then I recovered, but Hjördis was ill all the time. People thought she was a hypochondriac – that she only thought she was ill. But she was very sick. I’m afraid I got very frustrated and before long I lost patience with her, which was terrible of me. She couldn’t help the way she was.

  She became ever more crazy, I’m afraid to say. Her behaviour was most erratic. I kept thinking she was a manic depressive, and I had visions of Vivien [Leigh].

  I loved the outdoors and went cross country skiing, but she preferred to stay indoors because she was afraid to go out. She liked to sit in the Palace Hotel with some of her friends and play cards all afternoon.