by Anne Edwards
Cast as a character modelled after extreme right-wing gossip columnist, Hedda Hopper, was former child star Marcia Mae Jones (These Three, Heidi, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Little Princess), now in her fifties and considering a comeback. When she came on the set everyone, including Pollack, was kind to her. ‘It was curious,’ she recalled, ‘at first I felt like I was home again. It was great. I was wearing this marvellous hat in the scene. Hopper was famous for her outrageous hats. She was also bitchy, dangerously so. It was a good bit, nothing more – although I received sixth billing even after being cut from the film. Streisand never came over to speak to me – the usual courtesy when an older performer is in a film. Nor did she ever speak to me. Very cold. The set had a chilling feeling. I had never experienced anything quite like it. I was relieved when it was over.’
Sometimes the set was like that, usually not when Redford was on hand. Streisand was serious about her work and did not waste time with niceties. As Redford said, ‘Working with Barbra was just that – work.’ Pollack added, ‘Barbra wanted precision; Redford, spontaneity. Barbra likes lengthy rehearsals and multiple takes, Redford is better in his early takes. After that, he just gets bored,’ Pollack added.
The film is filled with illogical plot devices, a confusing chronology and blatant tear-jerking emotion. Yet it not only works, it has a life of its own, not unlike Casablanca, where the chemistry that exists between two charismatic stars sustains a familiar story. Not only does The Way We Were have a memorable, lushly romantic title song by Marvin Hamlisch, it is a three-handkerchief love story. Sentimental tales, such as An Affair to Remember, SeventhHeaven, A Star Is Born, are never highly regarded by the critics, although they are the movies that often survive as classics.
The Way We Were would become one of Streisand’s most memorable films. Something about it reaches out and touches you. ‘It flows like velvet,’ Rex Reed, one of a minority of critics who liked the movie, wrote. ‘That’s why the movie is so likeable. We lost a lot of innocence in the dark movie palace of our youth. The Way We Were reclaims it for us. Years from now, in some futuristic movie museum, it just might be one of the movies we’ll be looking at and remembering with fondness.’ He turned out to be prophetic.
Although there was every reason for the film – ‘a torpedoed ship full of gaping holes’ – to be a disaster, the chemistry between the two stars, so seemingly mismatched, kept it mystically afloat. ‘Redford’s the best leading man she’s ever had,’ Marilyn Bergman recalled, ‘and she knew it. Alan [Bergman, her husband and co-lyric writer] and I sat with her when she first saw the movie. She kept nudging me and saying how great he was.’
A tremendous bonding had occurred between Streisand and the Bergmans during the work on The Way We Were. Thirteen years Streisand’s senior, Marilyn Bergman had become the older sister she had never had. Calm, intelligent, her soft voice persuasive, sure, Bergman was a woman of uncommon good sense, supremely talented, able smoothly to handle her creative partnership with her husband, motherhood (the Bergmans were the parents of a teenage daughter), political activism and friendship with even-handed intensity. Streisand admired her talent, her opinions and felt easy in her company.
In 1968 the Bergmans had won the Oscar for their lyrics to ‘The Windmills of Your Mind’ from the Steve McQueen–Faye Dunaway film, The Thomas Crown Affair. They were now contracted to collaborate with Hamlisch on the title song for The Way We Were. Hamlisch, who scored the background music as well, had employed the melody as a love theme throughout the film, musical advice that had contributed much to the picture’s mood and cohesion. The first concept of the song was written in the minor mode. Hamlisch quickly shifted it into the major. ‘If I’d left it in the minor mode, it might have told you too much in advance that Streisand and Redford were never going to get together,’ he said. ‘So I wrote a melody that was sad, but also had a great deal of hope in it.’ The song was originally to be sung by Streisand over the last scene where Hubbell and Katie run into each other in front of the Plaza Hotel in New York and realise that they have no future only the past. Believing the lyrics would dilute the impact, it was not recorded over the scene and titles.
This songless version was shown at the first sneak preview and when Hamlisch looked around and saw how unmoved the audience was when the lights came up, he begged Columbia to let him rescore the ending with Streisand singing the Bergmans’ lyrics. The cost of a rerecording session was prohibitive as it involved fifty-five musidans and Columbia was now in a situation where they were approaching insolvency- their stock, due to failed films, high costs and impropriety in management having fallen two-thirds in value since the start of princtpal photography on The Way We Were. Finally, after much discussion, they relented. Then he had to convince Streisand, who thought the song was too sentimental. ‘So is “My Funny Valentine”,’ he told her. ‘I hate “My Funny Valentine”,’ she snapped back.
Hamlisch and the Bergmans wrote a second, more complicated and less romantic number. Streisand made tracks of both songs which were separately scored over the last scene and the final titles. Both versions were shown to Stark, Pollack and the Columbia executives, and a vote was taken. Streisand was the only one who voted against ‘The Way We Were’, one of the few times that her musical judgment was wrong. The song, with its rueful lyrics, longing to replay the past, coupled with Hamlisch’s moving melody, makes a memorably, poignant ending to the film. It is the long moment when Hubbell rushes across the street to hold Katie, seemingly for ever – oblivious to his fiancée waiting nearby – breaking our hearts as his own is so obviously shattered. Katie’s we know has been broken long ago. And although we feel each of these two lovers goes on with their lives, it is the way they were that they – and we – will remember.
The Way We Were placed Streisand in her own romantic time warp. Elliott was now married to Jenny. His finances shaky, he had moved back to the small Village apartment on Morton Street and Jason now had a half-brother. Pierre and Margaret Trudeau were the parents of two children. Streisand was that loathsome cliché – the great star who came home to an empty bed. She turned her concentration, as she always did, to work. Five years had passed since her last television special, and in the spring of 1972, CBS insisted she honour her final commitment to them. Ken and Mitzie Welch, who had been responsible for her classic rendition of ‘Happy Days Are Here Again’, contributed the concept of the show – Barbra Streisand ... and Other Musical Instruments – and would supply the special material and musical arrangements. The original design had been to team Streisand with some of the world’s greatest musicians – Pablo Casals, Isaac Stem, James Galway. CBS rejected this idea but agreed to a format that would include musicians and music from various countries. The network also demanded that Streisand have either one guest from what they submitted as List A, or two from List B, or three from List C – ‘Like a Chinese menu’, Mitzie Welch quipped. Streisand and the Welches quickly agreed on Ray Charles, so there was no need to go any further.
Streisand first rehearsed some of her solos in the living room of the Carol-wood Drive house. Mitzie Welch remembered ‘an antiques dealer who kept calling her and coming over and showing her things. Right in the middle of a phrase she would jump up and go look at things and come right back to the exact place where she had left off. It was amazing. When you work with Barbra you work with a true artist. She has ears like nobody else has. She seems to hear sounds more acutely. Nothing slips past her.
‘One day she came down to the beach [where the Welches had a home]. Jason was friends with our daughter. Barbra had a bathing suit on and I stood and watched her as she ran across the sand. She moved in almost a poetic rhythm, not of this world, unbelievably sexual, not like other people. Her physical presence was tremendous. I said to Ken, “She’s really beautiful,” and he agreed.’
They recorded and scored a few numbers in Los Angeles before going to London where the show was to be televised. ‘We hired all kinds of ethnic musicians – Ghanaian,
Indian, Irish bagpipers, Turks and an eleven-year-old British pianist [Dominic Savage]. It was really wild,’ Ken remembered. ‘Some of them didn’t speak English but it was wonderful how we managed to communicate. The two numbers that stand out in my memory was “I Got Rhythm” with the Irish bagpipers – their beats are not the same. It’s not 4/4 time! and a symphony of household appliances – washing machines, sewing machines, orange juicers, vacuum cleaners and Barbra with an electric toothbrush. Very hard. You had to dial a note and if you had it once you might never get it again. We went an inch at a time. Barbra, dressed as a Turkish belly dancer, sang “People” with a group of Turkish musicians playing their national instruments. Ray Charles did a magnificent job of “Look What They’ve Done to My Song” and he and Barbra sang “Cryin’ Time Again” together. Larry Gelbart, Mitzie and I wrote the continuity.’
The show took eleven gruelling weeks to film. Midway through Streisand entered into an intense affair with a wealthy American, married and the father of two children, who was in Britain promoting his business interests there. They had met through one of her financial advisors. Vital, Jewish, about fifteen years older than Streisand, he had no connection with the entertainment industry. He visited the television set several times but the press were kept from knowing his name and their liaison was conducted in an otherwise secret fashion.
One of Streisand’s English friends recalls that she was so in love ‘she glowed with it. I think he was very important to her. He was a strong personality, a take-charge sort of man, extremely intelligent. He owned a chain of stores, masses of real estate, sat on the boards of several large companies – very impressive. He had a painful family situation that made divorce unconscionable – at least for him. I think Barbra admired that trait in him although it was not easy for her to accept. She spent almost all of her free time with him while she was shooting in London and I know they rendezvoused often when she first returned to the States. I understood her attraction. He was a charismatic personality, very, very sexy. But she was really in love and that could only have been self-destructive because he had no wish to leave his family and it seemed sheer madness for Barbra to be in a relationship where she could not even be seen in public with the man she loved.
’We were quite friendly at that time, went shopping together – things like that. She was truly in love. But as the time came for both of them to leave Britain, she was – well – troubled. She was afraid that once they were back in the States where his wife and children lived and where her celebrity would be more inhibiting than abroad, it would be difficult for them to continue their affair. I felt great sympathy for her. At times, she possesses this great vulnerability. There’s something – wistful – about her, and you think here is one of the most famous, richest women in the world and underneath there is such sadness. Through the years she has renewed this affair but nothing changed – he remains married and Barbra – her fame has never diminished.’
Work was the answer to a broken heart and what better than to be engaged in a comedy? She began filming For Pete’s Sake shortly after her return to Los Angeles. The film, written by Stanley Shapiro and Maurice Richlin was produced by Shapiro and Marty Erlichman for Ray Stark and Columbia, and directed by Englishman Peter Yates (Bullitt, 1968; Murphy’s War, 1971; The Hot Rock, 19724; The Friends of Eddie Coyle, 1973). Streisand’s role was that of a hard-up Brooklyn housewife who falls into the clutches of a loan shark and finds herself involved with a call-girl racket, the Mafia, and urban cattle rustling, all enacted with farcical humour: outrageous disguises, pratfalls, wisecracks and corny, old-time comedic set-ups (hiding a man in a closet when a husband returns home unexpectedly). Since What’s Up, Doc? was proving to be one of Streisand’s top money-makers, Columbia and Erlichman believed another madcap comedy was in order. However, For Pete’s Sake turned out not to have the same winning elements of humour.
For her role as Henry (short for Henrietta), Streisand wanted a short, gamine hairdo that would also be comfortable under the many wigs she had to wear. Just before the picture went before the camera, she attended a games party at the Welches, who both loved puzzles, charades and word play. ‘Julie Andrews, Blake Edwards, Carol Burnett, Tony Perkins – all good games players were there,’ Mitzie recalled. ‘I would have had Stephen Sondheim if he was in town! And there was Harvey Corman [not related to Cis] and his wife Donna. Well, before the party I had had my hair done at a chic beauty salon in Beverly Hills owned and run by Jon Peters. So had Donna Corman. When Jon did my hair he said, “I know you work with Barbra. I have to meet her. I want to know where her head’s at.” I laughed at that and he said, “I mean it. Fix me up. Let me do her hair or something.”
‘I told him I didn’t have anything to do with her personal life. So a few days later she comes to our house for the party and she sees Donna with this very short wonderful haircut and she said, “Who did that?” to me. Barbra sometimes speaks in staccato sentences not explaining a lot. I said, “Did what?”
‘“That haircut. That’s what I want for For Pete’s Sake.” Actually, it then had the awful title July Pork Bellies. “I want that kind of hair.” “Oh well, the guy that did that wants to meet you,” I told her. And I gave her his number. The next thing I know they call us from Mexico – “Hi. We’re here together.” I said, “I guess you liked the haircut!” She laughed. The next time I saw her she looked marvellous, hair cropped short, very gamine – and she was head-over-heels in love.’
Footnotes
1 Arthur Laurents had been blacklisted during the early years of the hearings of the Hollywood Un-American Activity Committee.
2 Virginia Jigee Viertel, Peter Viertel’s wife, previously married to Budd Schulberg, who was active in Hollywood political life during the 1940s.
3 Redford had recently co-starred with Paul Newman in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), and had starred in Downhill Racer (1969), Tell Them Willie Boy is Here (1969), Little Fauss and Big Halsey (1970). He was soon to make The Candidate (1972) and would be nominated in 1974 for his performance in The Sting, in which he also co-starred with Newman.
4In the UK called How To Steal a Diamond In Four Easy Lessons.
23
SHE HAD NEVER met anyone quite like Jon Peters. Forget any stereotypic ideas of a hairdresser. Peters, with his wolfish smile, sharp eyes concealed behind dark shades and a stallion’s mane of thick, black hair, looked more like a young mafioso. He drove through the imposing front gates of her Carolwood Drive house in a flashy red Ferrari. The car was well known in the high-priced hills above Sunset Boulevard. His fee for a haircut and styling ran into the hundreds, but he seldom made a house call to a first-time client. Streisand was different. She was important to him. He could have more women than he wanted. He was rich enough – worth several million dollars with his three salons and the beauty products that bore his name. What he wanted was class A entry into the film industry. Once he had that, he planned to make important pictures. He saw his future as a contemporary Darryl Zanuck – a movie-maker with power and pzzazz. He never doubted his ability to take the precarious jump from hair impresario to movie mogul. All he needed was the right connection.
He left the car on the curved driveway just below the front doorway of Streisand’s house and slung a Gucci bag with his equipment over his shoulder. He wore tight designer jeans which left little doubt about his attributes. When she joined him in the living room twenty minutes later, he was about to leave. She apologised for being late. ‘Don’t ever do it again,’ he grinned and removed his sunglasses. She noted that his dark, quick eyes took full inventory of the measurements of her body. ‘You know you’re a cute little thing with a very foxy body and a great ass,’ he said as she turned to lead him to her dressing room where he was to cut her hair.
He was testing. She could throw him out. She did not.
Five years younger than Streisand, Peters had dropped the h in John as she had cut the middle a in Barbara. He was smart, quick and charismatic. Women
were drawn to him and he used his hormonal appeal on them to his advantage. In and out of trouble in his youth, he was streetwise and at the same time possessed an arrogant charm. Born twenty-six years earlier in Van Nuys, California to a Cherokee Indian father, a short-order cook who died when he was a child, and an Italian mother, a hairdresser whose family owned Pagano’s, a well-known Beverly Hills beauty salon, Peters did time in a reform school for petty larceny before he was twelve, the youngest juvenile in his group. During the day he had done road work – dug ditches, helped lay pipes, cleared out fallen branches and trees – under armed supervision. At night he was shackled to his bed. None of his youthful trials had broken his spirit, instead they had powered his drive to show the world he was someone to be reckoned with. Upon his release, his uncles gave him a job in their beauty salon, washing hair and sweeping up the cuttings. ‘I’d come in and see all these women,’ he recalled, ‘and I thought, “Wow! this is it”’ A year later, in 1961, at fourteen, he borrowed $120 from his mother, dropped out of school and made his way by Greyhound bus across the country to New York.
His macho manner and dark, good looks made him appear older. With some fast talking (his special talent) he got a job in a sleazy all-night hair salon where his speciality became dyeing the hair of whores to match their poodles. He learned quickly how important hair is to a woman, how intimate and reliant her relationship can be to a person who can make her look better than even she thought possible. He studied styling, paying for his lessons by boxing quasi-professionally, married ‘an older woman’ of fifteen and then began salon climbing from good to ‘in’ to tony to top.