The Restless Years (1955-63)

by Cecil Beaton

San Francisco: April

  I went to Stockton Street to see Kin. On second acquaintance I liked him more. He is subtle; he never says too much, although he can be talkative, as indeed he was when I arrived and watched him blacking and polishing his enormous shoes. He likes Blake and anything mystical, some of Monet’s paintings, some Grecos and Renoir. He adores Mozart, ‘who makes a tragedy of frivolity’, and plays his music throughout his rooms.

  He becomes a real professional when, with Grunewald curling fingers, he turns the pages of his book on Masaccio and the great Donatello. He showed me pictures of late Botticellis which are not so well-known as the more generally popular, early ones. They are violent in form, line and colour and are wild.

  It was with intense pleasure that I listened to and learnt from my new friend. He gabbles, as if with a marble in his mouth and another in his throat, about his pet subjects, and one is caught up in his boyish enthusiasm. Kin has great physical strength. He is an enthusiastic games player and once represented his country in fencing.

  This new friendship is something I am deeply grateful for; it is rare and profoundly satisfying and compensates for much that I have had to put up with since leaving home.

  Kin had had for dinner last night a loaf of brown bread, cottage-cheese and fruit.

  May 3rd

  Talk never ceased for a moment throughout dinner and all the way back to San Francisco. We had travelled 300 miles since starting off this morning. We talked about sex, marriage, Los Angeles, the difficulties of adolescence, the climate of San Francisco (cultural and physical), about flowers. Kin likes dopey white chrysanthemums and a few simple yellow flowers; he likes green plants and he dislikes more things than he likes. Kin’s taste is very strong and primitive and impressive on all counts. We were both utterly worn out when we got back to the favoured, well-known privacy of Stockton Street.

  Friday

  The evening at Diana Vreeland’s was a joy. Diana’s new wig-like hairdo was unbecoming. But her important responsibilities as Editor-in-Chief of Vogue do not seem to have got her down in the least. In fact she was soaring higher in more fantastic upward spirals than before. Truman brilliantly related his latest experiences with the two murderers he had been to see in ‘Death Row’.

  Truman is quite changed in appearance. No longer is he the elfin waif; he has become a solid man of parts. It has always amazed me how much at home he is in the world, able to talk with anyone on his own terms, with no reserves or apologies. He told us how he had come to possess the grimmest document that one could imagine. As his horrifying saga unfolded, he unconsciously revealed the magnitude of his development as a story-teller, the wealth of his experience and the strength of his imagination.

  In the terrible prison Truman had not been able to summon up the courage to ask Perry if he could be present at his hanging. He felt that although Dick was not as good a friend, he could ask him. He produced his fountain pen; Dick wrote the appalling sentence, then put the pen in his sock and refused to give it back. Dick then started to taunt Truman. ‘I’ve never liked you. Perry was your friend and I’ve hated you for the five years you’ve been around and if I give you your pen it will be through your heart.’ ‘What good would that do you?’ ‘Justification! Do you realise that before you could call the guard, with that pen I could put out both your eyes?’ ‘And what good would that do?’ ‘Satisfaction!’ By showing no sign of panic, by telling Dick that it would not help his last appeal, Truman proved his supremacy and Dick threw back the pen at him. ‘I Dick ... hereby in respect of $250 being paid to my mother, appoint Truman Capote to be my official witness at my hanging.’

  Truman asked us, ‘Do you think I was justified in getting that permission from him for such a small amount of money?’ He had explained that a well-known lawyer had said it would be impossible for him to be present at the hanging as the leading magistrate did not like him.

  Truman also told of other murderers he had come across in this prison — two very beautiful young men who had gone through five states murdering for kicks as they went; both strangling respectable housewives with bull whips while performing the sexual act.

  EDIE’S DINNER

  June

  After dinner at Edie Goetz’s, Fellini’s 8½ was shown. I did not understand one word of it, since there were no subtitles and the plot is not indicated. Nevertheless, I am not at all ‘literal-minded’ and seldom pay any attention to the mechanics of a plot, and I found this film visually rhythmic. It was like a wonderful ballet, with extraordinary types, and such daring wit that it was never one moment too long. Billy Wilder has the usual Hollywood complex about hating anything non-commercial. ‘It’s such impertinence indulging his esoteric, snobbish pretensions. It’s an insult to the public.’ Edie did not like it much.

  Hitchcock, whom I’ve always loathed, was a fellow guest and said to David Selznick (apropos of the Profumo case) that it had cut England down to size. The English were so arrogant — didn’t this serve them right? Didn’t I think the British were arrogant? Without knowing why, I have been gunning for Hitchcock for many years. There is nothing more unattractive than a man decrying his own country in another one. He did not know what had hit him when I burst out at him, ‘Of course the English are arrogant, and with good reason! I love them for it. I love arrogance!’

  Hitchcock said that films should be made to give pleasure to people who weren’t interested in films as an art form. ‘The films are not an art form. It’s selfish of people who make films for their own pleasure and interest.’

  Then we started to fight about artists in films — like Fellini. Hitchcock brought the subject round to himself. He said he was the father of the avant-garde in France; that all these young people were doing very badly. They all called on him for help. ‘I hope you give them money,’ I remarked.

  ‘That’s very rude,’ said Mrs Goldwyn on my right.

  ‘Aren’t fathers there to do just that?’ I answered. The evening was nightmarish, but good to laugh about afterwards.

  NUREYEV

  June 27th

  The evening was interesting in that it was spent at a party given for Rudi Nureyev. I never know in what mood he is going to be and was quite expecting him to be cold and disdainful. But, no, he was slightly drunk and very coy. I made a great play of flattery and he fell for it with every dimple in his thin cheeks. We hugged and kissed and displayed a great love for one another and I proposed that he should come and live with me. It was all very agreeable and an amusing comedy. But in between the lines he threw me a few home truths. People have been very mean with him; he will continue with them, but they must pay him. He will do TV work here in New York, but the US Government takes all in taxes. I felt sorry for him. He is, for all his fame, a lone wolf.

  The party was one of Hollywood’s most select but, like all Hollywood parties, it had no homogeneity, no atmosphere, and an awkward wait before any food was served.

  On my way out I went to find Nureyev in his bedroom. ‘Rudi? Rudi?’ I found him sitting in his great bedroom dangling a loose shoe. ‘What are you doing here? Are you sad?’

  ‘Yes, and very lonely — this awful house — you suffer so. Maybe I have five days in Paris with my friend, but we have been travelling a month without meeting; and when you love you are apt to be sad and there’s no hope for us. We can’t work together. It is always travelling for me; always on the road — without a window.’

  ‘You see ballet people are so silly. They do as they’re told. They never think. Nobody understands me, perhaps Margot a little from time to time, and Freddy’s nice, but he offers me nothing, and they hate me. But I don’t care.’

  I tried to cajole him, to make jokes; I told him of the beauties of being in love if one did not suffer too much; and how lucky when it happened painlessly. But Rudi is a Russian and I don’t expect he loves painlessly. He came out to the car. ‘Would you like to go for a ride with me?’

  ‘No, I must stay here. The others will be arriving from the ballet.�
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  June 29th

  The ballet (Giselle) was badly lit, terrible décor and costume. But the evening was lifted to greatness and poetry by Nureyev. He seemed to have become even more at home in the first act of this old barnstormer and smiled and reacted with genuine simplicity; but in the second tragic act the ‘bigness’ of his pride, his arrogance, was something we don’t see in the theatre nowadays. I was transported. The Los Angeles audience, who were really knowledgeable and appreciated the difficulty of every feat, applauded ecstatically.

  It was a revelation to discover how wide the appeal of ballet has become. Although the setting was frowzy, and the theatre hideous and unworthy (one could hardly hear the orchestra), the quality of genius gave the evening excitement that is unforgettable. Margot was superb.

  July 3rd

  My feelings about the ballet Marguerite and Armand, on which I had worked so hard, were mixed. The auditorium dwarfed the set, the curtain did not stretch to the sides and the lighting was very rough. The orchestra played an introduction with chiming bells that I thought poor in quality, but once the ballet started I was carried along in a transport of emotion. It is a remarkable work despite what the critics said. It is packed with drama and one sits tingling, on edge in case one misses a nuance.

  I was very pleased with my contribution and considered that it hit exactly the right note. The ballet conveyed, in fact, just the atmosphere that we had hoped that it should. Margot’s performance is her best and she shows herself to be another Duse. The taste she displays is amazing and she is made a beauty through the quality of her spirit. Nureyev, too, is the quintessence of all romantic passion; smiling in the early scenes and like a tragic clown (even to the red nose and pale eyes) at the last. Fred Ashton’s work is inspired, and it is everything that I like in ballet.

  It was a thrill to see that the result of our labours had turned out as we had hoped. The audience screamed. But it was good to hear George Cukor yelling himself hoarse. He said, ‘I never remember shouting in a theatre before, and the thought is painful for me, but your work is beautiful!’ My mind was in a state of elation. This should have been a happy evening.

  AUDREY’S TRIAL

  July 11th

  Audrey Hepburn’s Ascot hat was tried on. She looked incongruous under this enormous confection of lace, striped ribbon, ostrich feathers, lilac, wheat and rosebuds, wearing a print dress, ballet shoes and with her Yorkshire terrier on her lap.

  This week has been music week; and tomorrow Audrey does her flower girl in a separate cubicle while the orchestra plays outside under Previn’s baton; it is an ordeal, but if her voice is not up to standard, Audrey will be the first to admit it. She will have done her best. No one worked harder than she, and the improvement in her voice is extraordinary.

  Audrey has a marvellous wish to be as authentic as possible, and not to cheat in the way most stars would. Her face is wide and her head flat; by building the coiffures wider we have made her head look flatter. She is willing to be as ugly as anyone wishes in the early sequences, but she feels that when the time comes, she should be allowed to be beautiful.

  July 25th

  ‘They’re testing the Covent Garden set with the rain machine and there are some men and women lined up for you on 9.’ The women were appalling, not beautiful Hollywood showgirls as I’d hoped.

  Buck was rattled when I said they wouldn’t do. It seems a question of money is involved, but really beautiful girls are expensive and, in a film costing millions, I should have thought an acceptable charge. As for the set, it was an enchantment, a Gustave Doré of London to the life. The tall proportions of the buildings, with the personages small in scale in comparison, are very satisfactory. The signs, the gas lamps and every detail of this sort are extraordinarily exact.

  I was almost in tears (of nostalgia) when the rainstorm fell and the place was flooded. I almost felt I was back in London — a very beautiful beginning to any story.

  This is the beginning of the end of a very happy phase of this picture. My experience in the wardrobe has been inspiring, exciting and easy-going. It is never anything but a pleasure to work there, even when difficulties have to be overcome.

  Then the delightful event of Kin arriving from San Francisco. I met him at the airport, and played hookey all afternoon, deciding on the spur of the moment to go to Forest Lawn. This extraordinary piece of commercialism has to be seen to be believed. We gasped at the Last Supper being recreated for posterity. We saw the mausoleum with the names of all the dead on marble slabs with torpedo vases placed ready for flowers. We saw the museum and the souvenir shop. We laughed secretly at the appalling bad taste and the hidden music. I realised that this was for real.

  ALBUQUERQUE

  July 27th

  Early start in smog. Los Angeles in a peasouper and the freeway to Santa Anna so ugly, but by being courageous Kin and I were rewarded. At last we came out into citrus groves and sunshine, and in spite of bad traffic on the holiday roads arrived in San Diego in time to take the ferry for Coronado. Lunch at the huge white modern hotel in a huge brown wooden dining room. The clientele, somewhat understandably, very respectable older people. Thence to the Zoo. The flamingos, brilliant pink-orange, the first delight and wonder. Real enthusiasm here, followed by such joys as the patterned snakes (thousands of years ago they were being made in 1920 futuristic designs!) and the birds are always my delight — cockatoos, brilliant parrots, ibis, osprey; but this time we were thrilled by the ‘walk-through’ aviary. Here the cage is so large that birds can fly into the tallest trees; they have space to lead their lives unconcerned by the gaping hordes who pass through to wonder at the doves and Chinese pheasants, or the ducks getting splashed at the waterfalls. There were lemurs to remind one of Madagascar, and tapirs to remind one of André Previn.

  The iguanas were a special treat, some silvery and orange, as if they were out of Midsummer Night’s Dream. I envied the seals their swimming fun.

  We drove on to the border of Mexico. A hundred yards over the line at Tiahuana all was dirty, rundown and vulgar. We were appalled by the poverty of the country, the scenery grey and arid, the people living in broken-down tin shelters and altered buses. We drove till late evening to arrive at Encenada, and looked in vain for a hotel. All motels advertised ‘no vacancy’. We found one disused hotel and garden quite attractive but barbed wire across the door. Where to go? We continued along the coast in the gloaming to a motel and camping site. Here was a city of trailers situated on some mud flats. Never have I seen anything so awful, so depressing; yet here too we were unwelcome — no vacancy. We returned to Encenada and went to a horrible-looking Spanish motel that we had scorned before. With what relief we were told we were lucky — one room left.

  Tourist attractions galore and a cabaret of incredible ineptitude at the Balia where we dined (carefully!). Thence to visit the tourist junk shops where a Venus de Milo, sadly squat, was painted bright shiny black. Mexican peons in plaster squatted asleep under large hats. Hideous! Hideous! Nothing to do but laugh, and in each other’s company we laughed.

  After our night of sightseeing (a dreary strip joint), we were set upon by the local tarts. We returned to our beds but not long after losing consciousness we were treated to a Tennessee Williams drama of the utmost squalor and fascination. In the next-door room a man and wife carried out at full volume a tremendous row.

  The husband had been out whoring. ‘When I married you I didn’t think you’d do this to me.’ ‘Now you know!’ ‘My best friend said you were a lousy son of a bitch, but I loved you. How I hope you die and hope you’ll suffer for all you’ve done.’ The woman taunted the man more and more, calling him names and defying him to hit her. The language used was vile and horrid and the taunts were fulfilled. ‘Go on, throw that thing at me. You’ve done it before and I had to have twenty-seven stitches put in. Do it again, I’m not afraid.’ Eventually the glass bottle was dropped crashing to the ground. Soon the blows fell, the woman screamed. ‘Help! Help!�
�� The fat proprietress of the motel rushed out and yelled: ‘You bum, you lay off.’ The wife continued to scream. Any moment the woman could have been murdered, but no one stirred. The last thing the proprietress wanted was to call the police. None of us would get mixed up, for that would have meant going to jail and God knows what protection we would have had. That is a terrible feeling and one that makes one shudder and long for the safety of honesty.

  Suddenly the wife ran out of the room chased by her husband, and got into her car. She backed it; crashed into another; drove off and into another car. She paid no heed to the shouts of ‘Hold it! Hold it!’ from the neighbours who had not moved to help her from being murdered, but were on the spot when it came to a question of damage to their cars. The proprietress took up her role of admonishment with resumed force. ‘You lousy son of a bitch, treating this place as if it were a no-good brothel.’

  BACK TO FILMING

  August 3rd

  The week started well with an early fitting of Audrey wearing her dress for the last scene. It is important that this strikes the right mood of romantic individualism. It is a pale pastel-mauve muslin confection and Barbara has made it to look as if it had no seams. It is like a froth built on Audrey.

  It is the custom of theatre and film people to swoon at the sight of anything that is newly made. Joe Hyatt is a big, rugged man, and he telephoned to say he had been hanging around just to see Audrey in the dress which had been on the stand on Friday afternoon and he had gazed at it for fifteen minutes. He said it was a ‘Poom’, and he cracked, ‘Yer know I’m generally taken only by how much a dress costs — this time I’m hypnotised by the dress itself. It’s great!’

  August 9th

  Vignettes were taken showing the ‘grand life’ leaving the opera hurrying past the desolated Covent Garden market. The rain was pouring through the arc-lights onto a hackney carriage drawn by a black, shiny, wet horse which descended a ramp, slipping and falling with the carriage on top of it. No time to bother about slipped horses! In the distance I saw some of the women in the waterproof capes, and to my horror saw their heads were twice the size they should be. George Cukor said this would not show in the distance as the figures were so small in this shot, and that in the next one the crepe hair covering their coiffures could be removed; this was just to prevent the ladies’ heads getting soaked. My spirits were dampened also at the many incorrect sights. But then my fever was raging. I felt red hot, my throat was very sore. I was suddenly stricken with this bug that has lowered my resistance for five days now.