The First Lady of Hollywood

by Samantha Barbas

  Not surprisingly, the producers drew talent from Broadway and Hollywood. Many of the most popular early radio programs were hosted by stage and screen stars, and, like many movie personalities, Louella had been approached for a possible stint on the air. In 1928, Sunkist Oranges and its ad agency, Lord and Thomas, expressed interest in having Louella host a Hollywood-based gossip show. For unknown reasons the deal never materialized. Then in early 1931, Sunkist returned to Louella, this time with a firm contract for a half-hour celebrity-interview program to be aired at 5:3o Wednesday evenings on CBS.

  Sunkist's plan was cagey. Louella would use her clout in Hollywood to line up the celebrity guests, who would appear on the show without pay, as a favor to Louella. Meanwhile, Louella would be compensated with a salary of a thousand dollars a week. As the nation's first radio gossip program, the Sunkist-sponsored program lay the groundwork for two subsequent NBC gossip programs, a 1932 show called D. W Griffith's Hollywood, hosted by the director, and the long-running Walter Winchell Show, which also originated in 1932.7

  Louella was ready to sign the contract when King Features, the syndication branch of the Hearst empire, heard of the impending deal and reminded her of the commission she owed them. According to the contract she had signed with Hearst in 1926, Louella was required to turn over one-third of the profits she earned from magazine articles, personal appearances, and any other work not commissioned by the Hearst Corporation. Though she was aware of the policy, she thought she could get around it. "I had the whole radio deal with the citrus growers practically completed when King Features stepped in and claimed one-third commission," Louella wrote to Hearst's secretary Joe Willicombe. Insisting that she receive the entire sum, she pointed out that Walter Winchell, who had been writing for the Hearst syndicate since 1929, "talks over the radio without dividing his money." "I want to do what Mr. Hearst thinks is right. If he told me to turn over the whole amount I would think it was right. But I do object to King Features collecting when they did no work."8 The word came back swiftly from San Simeon: play by the rules or expect legal trouble. On February to, 1931, Louella signed a contract with Sunkist that granted King Features its obligatory one-third. "Hope it meets with the Chief's approval," Louella wrote Willicombe. "Tell him his friendship means more to me than a million dollars. Also his good opinion."

  The ink had barely dried when Louella picked up the phone and began lining up guests for the program. Within hours she had called Mary Pickford, Bebe Daniels, Marion Davies, and a handful of MGM stars who were, by virtue of the studio's alliance with Hearst, indebted to Louella. Her request that they perform without pay put the actors in an awkward position. Normally they could command several thousand dollars for a radio appearance, but they feared consequences if they turned down Louella. In the end, fear won out, and by the end of the week Pickford, Constance Bennett, Norma Shearer, and Wally Beery had agreed to appear on the program. Pickford, whose usual radio fee was five thousand dollars, will go on the show for nothing," Louella telegrammed Joe Willicombe. "She is doing it for the Hearst papers." Only Gloria Swanson refused to appear. ("Louella's programs commercially sponsored," Swanson's press agent wrote in a confidential telegram to her manager. "No reason why [Gloria] should work for Sunkist Orange people free.") 10

  Sunkist and Lord and Thomas predicted great success for the program. Before the first broadcast, both Louella and Mary Pickford had received several hundred inquiries "asking what station [their] talk [would] be on." After the program, Louella reported, there were "letters of praise from all over the country and from people I hadn't heard from in years."" But the reviews were lukewarm. The half-hour broadcast had been advertised as an interview program, but in reality, according to Variety, it became little more than a "praise session" in which Louella and the actors threw "verbal bouquets at each other" and congratulated each other on their successful careers. In the episode with Mary Pickford, Variety noted, "both women kept the conversation active if not especially interesting. Outside of talking about the star's next feature, the women spent the rest of their time talking about the old [Essanay] days."" Not far into the show's thirteen-week run, Sunkist lost interest, and the possibility of renewing the contract was never discussed. The last episode aired on May zo, 1931.

  For Louella, the end of the show was in many ways a blessing. Though she had enjoyed the work, the additional responsibility had been overwhelming, and she had repeatedly complained to Harry and Hearst of being "exhausted" and "drained." "Do you think if I arranged my work in advance, I could get away for a vacation?" she asked Hearst in early April 1931. "I am very, very tired and I haven't had a vacation away from writing my column for six years."" When Hearst agreed, Louella began planning a summer vacation, and that June she took the Matson liner to Honolulu, where she spent a month "lounging on the beach all day." Accompanying her were Harry, Bebe Daniels, and Ben Lyon. She returned to Hollywood in July "feeling well and able to do more ... than I have ever done in my life," she told Hearst.14 She threw herself into her work, taking on lengthy feature articles in the Examiner-in 1931, she did weeklong series on Clara Bow and Gloria Swanson-and pieces for Photoplay and Screenland magazines, in addition to her daily and Sunday columns.

  Meanwhile, Harriet was back in town. After a short stint as a screenwriter for MGM in 1929, Harriet had accepted a position in New York as an associate editor for James Quirk's Photoplay magazine. Quirk, who had known Louella and Harriet in Chicago, was glad to have "Parsons Jr." back on the staff-Harriet had actually published her first article in Photoplay in 1919, at the age of thirteen. But the job was short lived. Six months after moving East, Harriet contracted pneumonia, and Quirk sent her back to Hollywood to recuperate with Louella and Harry.

  The recovery was slow and painful, hampered by a case of septic poisoning from an infected tooth, but when Harriet finally healed in the spring of 1931, Quirk rehired her.15 Under the new arrangement, she would continue to live with Louella and Harry in Beverly Hills while serving as Photoplay's West Coast editor. She was eager to have her job back but, at the same time, disappointed. For years she had dreamed of striking out on her own, away from Louella's formidable shadow. But even Harriet had to admit that living with Louella had its advantages. Louella gave her tips for her articles, and when Louella was in Honolulu, Harriet had taken over the column. When Louella returned from the trip, she tried to parlay this into a permanent booth for Harriet on the Hearst papers. "Some time if there is a vacancy on any of the papers that my daughter can fill I'd be glad if you would consider this," she wrote Hearst. "I hesitate to mention her[,] because I thought you might think I was pushing her forward. When I was away on my vacation [,] she wrote my column[;] and I blushingly admit there are some people who thought she did a better job than I do."16 By the end of 1931, Harriet had a regular gossip feature, "Keyhole Portraits," that appeared in the Sunday Hearst papers alongside Louella's column.

  Critics attributed Harriet's success to Louella. But even the most jaded had to admit that Harriet was, in her own right, a talented writer and reporter. In 1931, Harriet scored an important feature story for Photoplay on the private life of Greta Garbo, who had declined Harriet a formal interview. Determined to get the story, Harriet grabbed her notebook, got in her car, and trailed Garbo for an entire day.

  The adventure began at the Olvera Street Theater in downtown Los Angeles, where Harriet caught Garbo strolling with the French director Jacques Feyder. Convinced that the two were having an affair, she trailed the couple back to Garbo's beach house. Determined to catch Feyder as he emerged from his tryst, she waited outside the house all night in her car. It was only when dawn broke that she realized she had followed the wrong vehicle. Later that day, Harriet found Garbo's house, climbed the fence, and photographed her cat. She then interviewed the grocer, newsstand operator, and police in Garbo's neighborhood. The article that resulted, "24 Hours with Garbo," was the envy of every writer in Hollywood.

  "I worked my tail off," Harriet recalled.
"I took it all very seriously."17 Like Louella, Harriet was fiercely devoted to her career-perhaps a little too devoted, Louella feared. Concerned that Harriet's interest in her work might hinder her chances at marriage, in 1931 Louella began seeking a potential husband for her twenty-four-year-old daughter. She found one in Eddie Woods, the son of a prominent Arizona family who had graduated with an acting degree from the University of Southern California. For several years Woods had played bit parts for the First National Studios, but in 1931 Warner Brothers borrowed him to play the leading role in a gangster film, Public Enemy. A relatively unknown actor, James Cagney, had been assigned a supporting part, but at the last minute producer Darryl Zanuck switched the parts and gave Cagney the starring role. According to film historian Robert Sklar, the switch was suggested by the Hays Office. Concerned that reform groups might accuse Hollywood of glorifying crime, Hays wanted screen gangsters to be played by "ethnic types," such as Irish and Italians, rather than Amer icans of Anglo-Saxon stock.'$ Hays believed that Cagney, who had played working-class Irish gangsters in previous films, was perfect for the role.

  But the switch infuriated Louella. By the time Zanuck made his decision, Woods and Harriet were engaged, and Louella was astonished that her old friend Zanuck would betray her. Public Enemy made Cagney a star, and Woods's career languished. In her column, Louella criticized both Zanuck and Warner Brothers for sabotaging Woods's chances at success. "If Eddie Woods had been given the role Cagney had, would Eddie today be in Cagney's place? I happen to know the Cagney role was originally written for Eddie, but through the friendship of someone in the studio the big part was handed the other boy," she 19

  It seemed that neither stardom nor marriage was meant for Woods that year. In the summer of 1931, a few months after he and Harriet announced their engagement, Harriet called off the wedding.20 She explained to Louella that it was a problem of incompatibility, but Louella knew the real reason. Harriet was a lesbian.

  In the movie colony, Harriet's sexual preference caused few ripples. Particularly after the transition to sound, when hundreds of gay and lesbian stage actors came to work in film, Hollywood had a thriving homosexual community. According to historian William J. Mann, Louella's attitude toward gays was "schizophrenic." Many of Louella's actor friends were openly gay, and knowing that revelations of their homosexuality would almost certainly destroy their careers, she often covered up for them and portrayed them in her column as heterosexual. But Louella wasn't "above gay-bashing when the situation arose," according to Mann.21

  For many years, Louella had been a supporter of gay actor William "Billy" Haines, who had worked with Davies at MGM and was a frequent guest at San Simeon. In the column, Louella assured fans that he was as "innocent as a high schooler," and that he had been on dates with several young actresses and was actively seeking a wife. When Haines was caught in a raid at a Hollywood speakeasy in the early 193os, Louella suppressed the story, but not without giving him a scare. Actress Constance Talmadge had been with Haines at the club, and according to Anita Loos, Louella "badgered" Talmadge's mother, Peg, for the details. Peg Talmadge waited for "all hell to break loose," but the story never appeared.12

  Later, however, implications in Louella's column that Haines was gay "helped to do him in," Loos recalled. His personal life was "getting out of hand, and vague hints of misdemeanor began cropping up in Lolly's col umn." These hints were most likely coy innuendo; most Hollywood columnists implied homosexuality with references to actors' same-sex "friendships" or "fear of marriage." Savvy consumers of Hollywood gossip knew the codes and were adept at reading between the lines. Haines was summoned to Louis B. Mayer's office and given an ultimatum. "I'm going to give you a choice," Mayer said. "You're either to give up that boyfriend or I'll cancel your contract." According to Loos, Haines "opted for love and told L. B. to tear up his contract."23

  But this was atypical. In most cases Louella colluded with the studios and concealed actors' indiscretions. When actress Clara Bow's heavy gambling made national press in 1931, Louella explained to her readers that Bow's problems stemmed not from underlying psychological problems, as other writers had speculated, but from "overwork at the studio." Clara was retreating to a "ranch," Louella assured fans, "where she will ride horseback, play tennis, and try to restore [herself]."24

  One of Louella's more notable cover-up jobs in the early 1930s involved the MGM producer Paul Bern, who on September 5, 1932, was found dead in his Beverly Hills home. The death appeared to be a suicide, but the motives were unknown. Bern had a successful career and a new house, and had recently married the blonde "bombshell" Jean Harlow, considered by many fans to be one of the sexiest women on the screen.

  MGM's investigation uncovered disturbing rumors, among them that Bern had been impotent and that after unsuccessfully experimenting with a number of mail-order stimulants and prosthetics, he shot himself. MGM also discovered that, before moving to Hollywood from New York, Bern had married a woman named Dorothy Millette. Not long into their marriage, Millette suffered a nervous breakdown and was committed to an asylum. When Bern moved to California, he never mentioned Millette, though the two were legally married. It was rumored that on the night of Bern's death, Millette, recently released from the sanitarium, caught up with Bern in Hollywood. Terrified that she would press bigamy charges, Bern killed himself.

  According to the MGM screenwriter Samuel Marx, Irving Thalberg, notified of Bern's death by the gardener, arrived at Bern's home six or seven hours before the police.25 The lead time gave the studio ample opportunity to begin the cover-up. MGM contacted Louella shortly after Thalberg found the body and within hours Louella began writing her story, which appeared in nearly four hundred papers worldwide. In Louella's account, "artistic tendencies" and "brooding depression" caused Bern's death.

  Films Will Have Difficult Time Replacing Bern

  Producer Cultured Brilliant, and Charming, Declares Louella O. Parsons

  The shock of hearing that Paul Bern, one of the sweetest and most loved characters in Hollywood, has taken his life, is especially tragic at this time. Just two months ago, in his office, he told me that he had never expected to find such happiness.

  What prompted him then to cut short his brilliant career just at the time that he should have been the happiest? I believe it was a suicidal mania that he could not overcome. Paul, in his way, was a genius. He was cultured, he was well-read, he was charming, but he was often erratic, as people of his temperament are apt to be."

  When Louella assisted with the Bern cover-up, she and Harry were on the way to New York for a monthlong trip to Europe. The trip was both a vacation and fact-finding mission for Hearst, who was in the midst of negotiations with film producers in Europe. Although Hollywood had dominated world film markets since World War I, at the end of the 192os its hold over the European market had weakened, due in large part to the rise of nationalist governments in Germany, France, and Italy, which developed their own national film industries and imposed import quotas.27 Hoping to get his foot in the now-closing door, in 1931 Hearst had attempted to broker a deal with the European companies that would allow him to continue exporting his newsreels. He was also negotiating an agreement with Germany's major studio, Ufa, in which the theaters Hearst owned under his Cosmopolitan company would exhibit Ufa's films.21

  In late September and October 1932, Louella conducted a detailed survey of the European studios and reported back to Hearst. "Since both Germany and France passed a law forbidding our American producers to dub foreign voices in their films and to give German or French dialogue to our favorites, the situation abroad has been serious," Louella wrote. "Little doubt in my mind that [Germany] has ambitions to control the film product of the world."29 The situation at Britain's Gaumont Studios was no better. "England is going about building up a quota system that will sooner or later be of serious concern to America," she explained. "The legal quota of British films, that each American producer must realize, is 12 and a half percent. I s
hould not be surprised to see that increased, as the product of England im- proves."30 After stops in Budapest and Vienna, where she reported that di rectors were making films in "crude, small studios," she returned to Hollywood in late October 1932.

  By then, she no longer worked out of the Examiner office. Instead, she built two rooms onto her Maple Drive home-an inner office and an outer office, the latter a kind of "sun parlor" with red-and-green patio furniturewhere she spent most mornings. Louella usually woke up at eight in the morning, ate a breakfast of grapefruit, toast, and coffee, and read the morning papers. At nine, she met her staff in her office; at ten, the phones began to ring with calls from press agents, studio heads, actors, and other informants. Between ten and noon she wrote, and by one in the afternoon, the column had been "whipped into shape," as she described it, and a messenger from the Examiner came to pick it up.31 Each Wednesday at noon, she held her staff meeting at the Brown Derby with her assistants-Dorothy Manners and the former fan magazine writer Ruth Waterbury-her legman Neil Rau, and Sara Hamilton, a former teacher from Virginia who helped Louella with the Sunday feature stories.

  Louella was frenetic, obsessive, and fiercely driven. "I have no secret of work-unless it is work," she told a fan magazine reporter. "Daytime and nighttime and all the time work. My phone rings at all hours of the night. Someone calls to tell me he's been in an automobile accident. Someone else calls to say he is shopping for a divorce in the morning. I never go to a party and have a merely social time. Someone is sure to do or say something that should go to press at once-and does."32 Echoing sentiments held by many of Louella's colleagues, Hearst reporter Mac St. Johns believed that "Parsons was the best reporter that was ever alive in the city of Hollywood.... From the standpoint of the ... ability to report news and get exclusives, there was never anyone before or since to compare with Louella." She "would wander around [parties] and you would think the woman was in a complete daze and she was paying no attention to what you were saying. And the next day everything that was said at the party was in the column. "33 "Louella Parsons will make you squirm until she has found out what she wants to know. She [has] that kind of determination and instinct for news," recalled another col- league.34