Merv Griffin- A Life in the Closet

by Darwin Porter

  The silly song became such a pop culture reference that the apes are seen singing the ditty in the Walt Disney film, The Jungle Book, and it appeared again in another Disney film, The Lion King, when Zazu is forced to sing it for the amusement of Scar.

  Merv sang “Coconuts” with a Cockney accent, and it was such a big show stopper that fan clubs formed across America from New York to Los Angeles. He heard that a fan club had even been organized in Cleveland.

  When Freddy Martin's Band returned to Los Angeles, the Cocoanut Grove could not meet the demand for reservations. Consequently, Freddy booked Merv and his band into the much larger Hollywood Palladium, a soldout ballroom that accommodated 6,000 fans.

  “Thousands of screaming girls chanting ‘We Want Coconuts!’ greeted me,” Merv remembered. “It's an image I'll never forget.”

  President of her local

  Merv Griffin fan club,

  a then-unknown

  Carol Burnett

  After his first show, an usher told Merv that the president of the recently created Hollywood High School Merv Griffin Fan Club had arrived and wanted to meet him. He'd never personally met even one member of his fan clubs, so he told the usher to bring her backstage. He decided to stand outside the door to his dressing room to greet her. He expected some shy little girl with an autograph book and was surprised instead to encounter a rather ugly duckling in pigtails—“all skin and bones”—wearing glasses and a dress obviously purchased at the five-and-dime. Years later he would recall her “big voice and marvelous laugh.”

  “Hi, Merv,” the perky girl said to him, extending her hand. She didn't seem shy at all, but bold and brassy. “I'm Carol Burnett, the prexy of your fan club.” He liked her at once, finding her enthusiasm and spirit contagious. But he could hardly have known he was shaking the hand of one of the brightest stars of television in the future.

  “My God,” she said standing back and appraising Merv's figure, but not in a seductive way. “Wait till I tell the gals back at school. You're just a kid like us. They'll be so excited. From the sound of your voice on ‘Coconuts,’ we thought you were an old man like Bing Crosby.”

  The show was such a hit with fans at the Palladium that its organizers invited Merv and Freddy's band back for repeat performances. Carol promised to show up for every event. “Somewhere I'll find the money,” she told him. “My Nanny and I are living on relief.”

  “You'll do nothing of the sort,” he said. “I'm giving you a free pass to all the shows and ten tickets each night to distribute among my fans. I want to meet them, and I want you to keep me abreast of what you gals are up to. I'm not sure what a fan club really does. I assume the club is all girls.”

  “Well,” she said, flashing a big-toothed smile. “A couple of guys. They're … you know.”

  “We're all God's children, and I welcome all fans wherever I find ‘em.”

  “I couldn't agree with you more, but it makes it much harder for a gal like me to get a date.”

  True to her word, Carol and other members of Merv's fan club showed up for every performance. In time, he got to know her better, welcoming her bubbly personality and merry smile, which he later learned was a mere cover-up for the private tragedies in her life.

  Living on welfare in a tiny one-room apartment with her grandmother, Carol was a spunky kid, bright and alert and always ready to make a joke about the bitter sweetness of life. Both of her parents were alcoholics. To escape that painful reality, Carol went to the movies at the rate of eight per week. One week, attending double features, she managed to sit through a dozen films, including two Tarzan flicks. Back at her small apartment, she practiced the Tarzan yell, which almost got Carol and her grandmother evicted.

  Sleeping on Nanny's sofa at night, she dared dream the impossible dream, that she could become the next Betty Grable, her favorite star at the time. If not that, then at least Rita Hayworth. Sometimes her attractive grandmother tried to force Carol to face reality. “With that overbite of yours, you'll be lucky to get any boy to go out with you.”

  Carol wished she was as pretty as her Nanny, who was a Southern belle, a flirtatious and self-confident woman who, at the time of her death at the age of eighty-two, had a forty-year-old boyfriend.

  As Merv got to know Carol better, she confessed to him that in addition to being the president of his fan club, she had “this crush” on Linda Darnell.

  “Whatever happened to Betty Grable?” he asked. “Oh, her. I'm just crazy about Linda, although one of her nostrils is larger than the other. When I grow up, I'm going to become a big movie star like Linda. It'll be a challenge. Movie stars have to look like Marilyn Monroe and Tony Curtis. At the moment I look more like Tony than Marilyn.”

  In the years to come, Merv looked on in amazement as Carol's television career took off, as millions of viewers delighted in her wacky humor and selfeffacing wit. “I always thought Carol was a more brilliant comedienne than Lucille Ball,” Merv once said. “Lucy was broader in her humor, real slapstick, like the Marx Brothers. Carol was more subtle and ultimately more devastating. Take her character of Eunice, a brilliant send-up of a type of American housewife that has never been equaled. And, of course, she also knew talent when she saw it, namely, yours truly and that fan club.”

  For Merv's final performance at the Palladium, Carol presented him with a Christmas poem she'd written. He loved it so much he had it framed and for years carried it from dressing room to dressing room as a good luck omen.

  i wisht i was a xmas star

  perched atop a tree

  folks wood see me from afar

  cuz of how brite I'd be

  i'd shine all nite

  i'd shine all day

  a lovely site to see.

  ***

  In the aftermath of the “Coconuts” success, Freddy Martin incorrectly assumed that he'd discovered, in Merv, “the next big singing star of the 1950s.” He instructed his songwriters to create witty lyrics and music for Merv, beginning with “Back on the Bus,” a clever song that mirrored Merv's own life of riding the bus every night with Freddy's band. Although audiences loved it, it came nowhere near becoming the hit that “Coconuts” was. Although as the years went by he valiantly attempted to duplicate his 1950 sensation, Merv would never have another hit song.

  Ultimately “Coconuts” sold more than three million copies. Merv cut many other records, but only two became what might even be called a hit— “Wilhelmina” and “Never Been Kissed.” Each of those records sold about 500,000 copies each, more or less.

  “Am I in Love?” also enjoyed minor but very brief success. “I'm a onehit wonder,” Merv lamented to Freddy.

  Months after his sudden fame, Merv spoke with bitterness about his success with “Coconuts,” telling Judy Garland and Peter Lawford that, “All I got was a flat fee, a lousy fifty bucks.” He was under contract to Freddy, who pocketed all the money from the royalties generated by the ditty. “Freddy could have written me a check for some of it, but he never did.”

  “I've been there,” Judy chimed in. “The MGM Lion has been fucking me in the ass for years without lubrication.”

  Peter was more optimistic, reminding Merv that because of the song, RCA Victor had given him a recording contract. “You'll knock Sinatra on his ass.”

  “I'm not so sure,” Judy cautioned. “I think Frank will be like me. Both of us will probably make three or four comebacks before we go Over the Rainbow for one final curtain.”

  At that point Peter grew impish. “Tell me, Judy, just how deep is the penetration from Frank? I've seen him nude, even semi-hard, but just what depth can he really reach in a woman?”

  Peter's drunken bluntness embarrassed Merv, but didn't seem to faze Judy at all. She was used to his outrageous behavior. “He's got three inches more than you,” Judy told Peter. “But he's lousy at giving head. In that, Ethel Merman is the world's expert.”

  “But I give great head,” Peter protested. “As you know, it's my favorite thing.�
��

  “Merman has all of you guys beat, although I hear Marlene Dietrich has a certain flickering tongue, like a feather, that drives the girls wild.”

  Realizing she was shocking Merv, she turned to him and gently took his hand. “Forgive us, dear, but that's how show biz folk talk in private. Get used to it if you ever want to be a star.”

  Merv definitely wanted to be a star—“and I definitely got used to it,” as he confided to Johnny Riley on his next trip to San Francisco. “After you've been worked over by the likes of Rock Hudson and Roddy McDowall, there isn't a lot more to learn. Sometime before the Fifties came to an end—and I'm not sure of the exact date—I buried that naïve little boy from San Mateo.”

  Chapter Three

  When Freddy Martin told Merv that “I've booked my boys” into the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco, Merv was elated. It meant he'd have time to reunite with family and friends, especially his three best pals, Johnny Riley, Paul Schone, and Bill Robbins. He'd spoken to all his buddies over the phone, especially Johnny, but he was particularly anxious to see firsthand how their dancing careers were going in post-war San Francisco.

  His family welcomed him with their usual love and devotion but treated him differently. During his first evening home, he deciphered the subtle change: They were treating him like a big-time star, even though he was a long way from achieving that lofty ambition. What impressed his family the most was that he was “dating” Judy Garland and planned to marry her. Merv later wrote in his autobiography, “I always thought one day I would go to Hollywood and marry her.” Later he confessed that he “misspoke” when describing the specific nature of his relationship with Judy.

  “I had to say something,” he later told Johnny. “What was I going to say to my family? That Rock Hudson fucks me up the ass or that I gag trying to go all the way down on Roddy McDowall's whopper?” He just hoped that word didn't travel from San Francisco back to Judy in Los Angeles that he was planning to marry her.

  At this point he'd gone to bed with her, not just on that one night when he'd held her in his arms, but on other occasions when she'd been drunk, sobbing, and suicidal. There had been no sex. He'd never had sex with any woman, but was seriously thinking about it. If he had to do the dirty deed, he wanted Judy to be his first conquest. He instinctively felt she'd be understanding and compassionate even if he failed. After all, she'd had a long track record of sleeping with homosexual men.

  His biggest disappointment came as a result of hanging out with his friends. Johnny got an occasional job in the theater as a chorus boy, but supported himself as a waiter. Bill too, had become a waiter and had found no work in the theater at all. Through a contact of his father's, Paul had found a job selling hardware in a store run by what he called a “tyrannical Jew.” All three of the young men hated their jobs.

  On the third night of going out with “the boys,” it became apparent to Merv that all of his friends were genuinely excited by his “stardom.” He also realized the degree to which their motives were selfish. Although none of them admitted it, each seemed to expect that when he became a really big star, he'd get them work in the theater. After two or three drinks, Merv more or less went along with this, making promises that he really couldn't keep, at least not at this point in his life.

  Before he left San Francisco that month, Merv was acutely aware that the balance of power had shifted in his relationship with both his family and friends. He was no longer the fat, pudgy kid from San Mateo, but a romantic singing star who'd had one big hit record. He even had fan clubs, including one that had formed in the Bay area.

  Before leaving his best pals and his family, he told his second biggest lie, one that topped the one about his romance with Judy Garland. He said that he'd been offered movie contracts at MGM,Warner Brothers, and Paramount, but had not as yet decided which studio he was going to sign with.

  “I owe it to Freddy and the boys to keep singing with them for a few more months,” Merv claimed. “After all, Freddy made me a star. At the right time, I'll split, especially when I get offered a really big musical.”

  In every reunion with family and friends, there is always an embarrassing moment you'd rather forgot, something that happens that makes you want to squirm later when you think about it. For Merv, that occurred when he invited Paul, Bill, and Johnny for a nightcap at his suite at the St. Francis.

  Merv had promised to stay on for another few days and take a motor trip north with his pals, but he told them he'd been called back to Hollywood. Freddy had booked his orchestra, with Merv as the lead singer, to perform at a spectacular party for the columnist, Louella Parsons, celebrating her fiftieth anniversary as a Hollywood writer. Freddy had told Merv that “every big star in Hollywood will turn out to honor that witch, but not because they like her, but because she has the power to destroy most of their careers.”

  After kissing Paul and Johnny good night, he turned to Bill, who asked to stay behind. Bill had had too much to drink, and at first Merv thought he just wanted to sleep over, since he wasn't sober enough to drive home. He lived outside the city.

  It took Bill another hour and two more drinks before he worked up enough courage to tell Merv what was on his mind. “I know you were always attracted to me, and I deliberately didn't pick up on the signals you were sending out.”

  Merv was flabbergasted. He'd never been attracted to Bill sexually, finding him far too effeminate for his tastes. He had a crush on Johnny, not on Bill. Still, he listened politely to Bill's pitch.

  “I've been thinking it over,” Bill said. “I know you're going back to Hollywood and you're going to become a big star. I want to go with you. I want to become your boy.” He slammed down his drink. “Now I've said it!”

  At first Merv didn't know what to say. Finally, he blurted out, “But I told you, I'm going to marry Judy Garland.”

  Bill stood up on wobbly legs. “No you're not. Your family fell for that line, but me and Johnny don't buy that. Paul thinks you will but we don't. Let's face it: Judy can't do it for you. I can!”

  As Bill moved toward Merv to kiss him, Merv stepped out of the way. “C'mon, buddy, I'm putting you to bed. We're not going to have sex. We're going to sleep. In the morning, let's forget this moment ever happened.”

  When morning came, Bill seemed embarrassed and did not press his case again. At the door, Merv kissed Bill good-bye after room service had served their breakfast. “We're friends, okay?”

  “Okay,” Bill said demurely, looking dejected.

  “Bonded at the hip, right?” Merv asked.

  “You got it,” Bill said, hugging him one final time. “You'll call me when you get back to L.A. and tell me how that big party went.”

  “It's a promise.”

  Merv kept that promise and Bill never mentioned that night at the St. Francis ever again.

  * * *

  It was a night to remember as tout Hollywood gathered to pay homage to the self-styled “Gay Illiterate,” Miss Louella Parsons. Merv had sung to movie stars before at the Cocoanut Grove, but never to such an assemblage. There “were more stars at the party than there are in heaven,” press reports the next day proclaimed, parodying the words of Louis B. Mayer.

  The gala was a private, invitation-only party held at the Grove. Merv had never met Louella and was terrified of her, knowing that a bad review of his singing tonight could jeopardize his hopes for a career in movie musicals. He was shocked to learn that one of the waiters had been instructed to place a rubber cushion under Louella's seat. When she got excited or agitated, she was known to wet her panties.

  From behind the curtains Merv peeked out when word spread that Louella had entered the ballroom on the arm of the press baron, William Randolph Hearst, who was accompanied by his mistress, Marion Davies. For the occasion, Louella had swathed her corpulent body in black silk, whereas Marion was in white satin and sable. As for Hearst, he looked at least eighty-five years old and near the grave.

  Freddy Martin had told
Merv that Marion and Louella used to be “as close as sisters.” But that was a long time ago. Somewhere along the way, Louella and Marion decided that they didn't like each other, but were forced into a position of keeping up appearances.

  Marion had turned on Louella long ago when she learned that the columnist was a spy, reporting on her nocturnal activities with the likes of Charlie Chaplin or Clark Gable.

  As the guest of honor, Louella sent word backstage to Freddy and Merv that she wanted to hear the song that was playing when she first arrived at the Cocoanut Grove in the 1920s. The band was playing “Yes, Sir, That's My Baby.” Both men knew the song well and were glad to oblige.

  Merv sang all his hits that night, including the Coconuts song, and each number was met with appreciative—not wild—applause. The biggest disapproval came from Hearst himself. One of the waiters overheard him telling Marion and Louella that Sinatra, not Merv, should have been booked for such an august occasion.

  Marion shot back. “Frank's a has-been! World War II is over, duckie.”

  Even so, after his numbers, Merv went to their table to greet the honored guests. Hearst shook his hand firmly; Marion told him he “sang really nice,” and Louella gushed that “you're going to be the biggest musical star in pictures.”

  Every evening has its embarrassments, and this gala was marred by Marion herself, who had obviously had too much champagne, thereby incurring the wrath of Hearst.

  When Earl Warren, then governor of California (later U.S. Supreme Court Justice), rose to speak, he heaped more praise on Louella than she'd ever heard in her life. On and on he went, until Marion screamed at the stage. “Oh, sit down Earl and shut up! Enough ass-kissing for one evening.” When Warren ignored her and kept on speaking, she cat-called to him again. “Bring on Freddy Martin,” she shouted. “For God's sake, Earl, Willie and I made you the governor of California, and we can unmake you too.”