Mother had only made one film in the last year and a half. She would not do another one until after daddy died, but she had no way of knowing that yet. She was on the Pepsi trail with him most of the time. They covered every part of the United States with public appearances. No occasion was too insignificant to warrant a whistle-stop visit. It was during these hectic days that mother had to start flying. Up until now she had insisted on taking the train. But with the schedule daddy had mapped out for the two of them, it would have taken a year to do what they normally did in several months. Besides, Alfred Steele was now chairman of the board of the company and he had a business to run from the offices in New York.
Though mother complained the usual about being so busy I knew she loved every minute of it. For the ten years previous to marrying Alfred Steele, she had barely left the state of California. She hadn’t been to Europe since her honeymoon with Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. and she’d only made a couple of trips to New York. She’d struggled alone with a faltering career, four children and mounting debts. By the time they were married, she’d had to sell the apartment house she owned in Beverly Hills, she’d taken a second mortgage on her house, she’d borrowed against her insurance policies and she didn’t have a job. After the marriage, someone else paid the bills, bought her jewelry, paid the rent and took her anywhere she wanted to go. Her own income barely got the insurance policies paid and the back debts cleared up. Now she didn’t have to worry about where her next job was coming from, because she considered the work for Pepsi just like a continuing performance, which it was. She knew the people were coming to see her and she gave them a show befitting the queen of celluloid. She always made a little speech and signed endless autographs. She changed her clothes two and three times a day so that all the photographs taken at different events wouldn’t show her in the same outfit. She was every inch the visiting movie star and the media covered the glamorous couple wherever they went. Mother made sure that the Pepsi name was either in the photograph or in its caption. She was always a perfectionist.
In April they went to Ottawa, Kansas and from there to Tulsa, Oklahoma and Joplin, Missouri – hardly the major metropolitan areas of the country.
They were going to be on the road for part of my Easter vacation, so once again I went to Brooklyn with Mickey. This time we managed to get a ride with some other students who were driving to New York so I told mother I didn’t need the plane fare. She had promised me some money and the day before vacation started, this handwritten, special delivery letter arrived.
Tina darling -
Enclosed is $110.00 one hundred and ten dollars - and honey please don’t go back to school broke - try and keep an accounting so I’ll have an idea where it goes - it would be helpful to both of us - as I’m rather low on cash with your hospital and the two doctors bills - I’m sure you understand -
Love always -
“Mommie”
This check I received on April 14th was the first money I’d gotten from her since semester vacation in February. Somehow during her busy schedule, she’d forgotten to send the March allowance. It seems so petty after all these years, but it was much more than a nuisance at the time.
Mickey and I had a wonderful time during the short Easter vacation. We spent most of the time around her neighborhood in Brooklyn, going into the little stores and meeting her family friends. There were family dinners and long talks with Aunt Min while she prepared the meals. I had sort of envied Mickey at school because she seemed so close to her parents. They sent her boxes of homemade goodies about once a month and we’d all gather in her room to share the bounty. Her parents gave her $50 a month in allowance with which she was very careful, but she never was totally broke. It seemed ironic to me and peculiar to Mickey that she received double the money I did. Better still, her parents didn’t forget to send it. After all, her father was a CPA in Brooklyn and my mother was a movie star! It didn’t make much sense to her or anyone else that I never went home and I didn’t get enough money for normal college activities.
When we returned from the Easter holiday, I think I got a chronic case of spring fever. The winter had been so cold and dreary that spring seemed too beautiful for studies and the normal routine. I did my best to keep up in all the classes but the only one that continued to hold my full attention was acting. I began skipping some of the lecture classes and copying other people’s notes. I met a rock ’n roll singer and started going out with him. I had to laugh when all the girls stared at his shiny new white Cadillac sitting in the driveway outside the dorm. Sam was a little flamboyant, but he was also great fun and very good to me. I enjoyed going to the clubs and meeting the other guys he worked with in the group. We just had a good time, that’s all. It was spring, the countryside was lush green, everything was in bloom and it was far too pretty to be stuck indoors. I came very close to flunking one lecture course. For the first time in my life I had to stay up all night cramming for a final exam.
In my acting class, however it was an entirely different story. I was one of the only two females single-cast in our final projects! It was an enormous honor to be singled out like that. I was going to play the part of Luba in Darkness at Noon directed by Allen Fletcher. I could hardly believe my good fortune. The only thing that marred the entire end of my first year at college was the news that Allen was leaving Carnegie. At first, no one could believe it. Then Allen himself confirmed the rumor and we were all terribly dismayed. But I figured if I only had this one opportunity to work with him, I’d put everything I had into it.
Final projects were open to the entire department. It was a very exciting time, because word had gotten around that Darkness at Noon was one of the projects to see that year. The little theater was packed-standing room only. By performance time, even the aisles were jammed.
It went wonderfully well. Afterwards I cried and everyone congratulated me. Allen was wonderful when I asked if I’d disappointed him in any way … he was supportive and kind to the young actress who hung on his every word.
I had asked mother several months before if I could apply as a summer apprentice at the Westport Country Playhouse in Connecticut. Mother’s friend, Bob Shear, had assured her that Westport was one of the very best summer stock theaters and was helpful in making the arrangements for me. A lot of theaters made the apprentices pay to work the summer, but Westport didn’t. We didn’t get any salary, either, but that wasn’t so important at the moment. Mother and Daddy were going to be away on business most of the summer, so I guess my suggestion was as good as any others. It was decided that I’d come into New York for a couple days, stay with them and go on to Connecticut as soon as possible.
CHAPTER 21
I was in New York on June 11, 1957 which was my eighteenth birthday. Totally unexpectedly, mother and Daddy gave me a car as my birthday present. They also gave me the portable typewriter I’d specially requested. I had absolutely no idea about the car, though it came as a total shock. I couldn’t even drive a car … I had no license! After I hugged and kissed them, we went down to the street in front of their apartment on Sutton Place and there it was, parked at the curb all shiny unbelievable. It was a 1957 Thunderbird, painted turquoise blue and had the spare tire mounted in the back. It had been daddy’s car, but mother wouldn’t let him drive it any more. It was a sports car and she preferred the limousines. It was gorgeous! I couldn’t believe that it was really mine. The whole thing was so unexpected that it didn’t really sink in until the next day when daddy got someone to drive me up to Westport in it and left me with the car keys at an Inn called the General Putnam.
Daddy had arranged for a policeman in Westport to give me driving lessons, get me a learner’s permit immediately and make sure I got my license before the theater opened for the season. That meant I had about ten days to learn to drive and pass the test. I was scared to death I’d make a mistake and wreck daddy’s car … my car. I applied myself with diligence, however, and everything went fine.
Mother was p
aying my weekly rent at the General Putnam Inn in Norwalk which was about five miles from the theater but my allowance was to pay for everything else. I had carefully figured out what I thought I would need, since I’d never had to pay for all my meals before nor ever had the responsibility of a car. I labored over the amount for hours and tried to check around the local places to see what representative prices for food might be. But in response to my carefully calculated request, I received this handwritten note from mother on “Mrs. Alfred N. Steele” stationery.
Tina darling
You say you need $43 dollars a week. Your father has figured $26 a week for food - $6.00 gas and oil - and $5.00 for incidentals - which would make $117.00 a month -
Enclosed is $117.00 which should last till the 12th of July - if you find it doesn’t stretch that far - let me know - I should be back in New York around that time but of course we will be talking before I leave for Calif - and during our stay on the coast -
Love
Always
“Mommie”
Now, I knew I wasn’t very good at math, but it came as a shock to me that “your father” was a lot worse! Maybe it wasn’t daddy at all … maybe that was just an excuse. I was quite sure that daddy couldn’t run a multi-million dollar company on that kind of accounting.
First of all … I was going to starve to death! Twenty-eight dollars a week for food is only $4.00 a day. I wasn’t sitting around on my ass at the beach either. I was working a minimum of ten hours a day at the theater … doing whatever had to be done to get the place ready for opening. We swept the grounds, painted the lobby, cleaned out the johns, ran all over the county looking for props, loading them into the pickup truck. It was fun because we were all young and foolish, but it was damn hard work. Okay, so it was going to be donuts, coffee and hamburgers for the summer, but what about the rest? No matter how I tried to add the amounts up, they didn’t come out to $117. The $6.00 apparently was supposed to be for gas and oil for an entire month and the $5.00 just didn’t exist. Four weeks of food alone at $28 a week was $112. That only left $5.00 for everything else. Obviously I had to drive my car for transportation to and from the theater and it was about as far from being an economy car as you could get. That only meant one thing … fewer hamburgers. It really pissed me off this time. What the hell was I supposed to do? I’d already told them the minimum I had to have to stay alive on my own and it wasn’t a staggering amount by any means. Then mother pulls a cheap shot like this and expects me to smile and say “Thank you mommie dearest for your great generosity.” They’d given me a beautiful car. Big deal … I couldn’t afford the goddamn gasoline for it!
I had to get over being furious with both of them, because it didn’t do me any good. I just threw myself into the work at the theater, making new friends and getting as much experience as I could. I started to loose weight and tried not to eat any more than was absolutely necessary. After a few weeks, my stomach began to shrink and I didn’t notice being hungry so much.
Westport Country Playhouse was a class act among summer stock theaters. It was the special project of Lawrence Langner and Armina Marshall who ran the prestigious Theatre Guild in New York. The “green room” was filled with Theatre Guild posters going back thirty years or more, a chronicle of Broadway success. The Langners had an estate in Westport and spent many weekends there, generally overseeing the theater’s operations and coming to most opening nights. They worked on the star system. The shows were packaged in New York, rehearsing in the city and then opening in Westport before going on to other theaters for their six week run in other parts of New England. Sometimes the theater would book other packages already on tour, but most of our shows opened in Westport. Because it was so accessible to New York City, Westport Country Playhouse got the best shows of the summer stock season. Everyone wanted to play Westport because of the reviewers and the civilized atmosphere of the quaint town.
There were about ten of us apprentices that summer. We were a varied group, mostly from New York. None of us started out with many useful talents, so the first few weeks were devoted to sorting out the total incompetents and training the rest of us in a crash course of practical theater before the season opened.
The person basically responsible for assigning apprentice jobs and making sure the jobs were completed was the property mistress, Mickey Mackay. There was also a master carpenter, gruff old Bill McGraw and a master electrician from the city, but the job of theater mother fell to Mickey. Her prop room became the general gathering place for all of us who reported to her every morning for our assignments. She was the fountain of information, assistance, consolation and generally our guardian angel. She trained and molded us into a crew … she advised us on problems and she interceded with management when the shit hit the fan. She worked like a Trojan and we followed suit. She was also a terrific woman. She’d been around theater most of her life and knew just about everyone. She’d learned to pace herself without ever getting lazy and she’d managed to deal with the temperament of stars, directors and summer stock with good humor and professionalism. She was a good friend to all of us.
At first I was an anomaly to the rest of the group. I had a flashy sports car and no money. I was a movie star’s daughter who didn’t complain about having to pick up cigarette butts from the theater grounds or clean out the johns. I knew hard work and I worked hard but I was essentially shy which translated initially into snobbery. People just couldn’t figure me out.
Fortunately, that only lasted a week or so. After that everybody had too much work to do to spend any extra energy worrying about someone else. We ate at the little hamburger stand within walking distance from the theater and most of the time we slept on couches in the prop room. In the morning, I would stop at a donut shop out on the road from Norwalk to Westport and pick up fresh glazed donuts and several containers of coffee. Once at the theater we had about a half hour to talk before the days work began. From then until late at night, we worked.
I liked it. Each week there was a new show with different people and different problems. Inevitably there were proper changes once the show arrived for dress rehearsal, and everybody scurried in ten different directions until opening night. Closing nights, which were always Saturday, we worked until the old set was taken down and the new one up. Many was the weekend we worked two days straight without any more sleep than a brief nap on one of the old prop room couches. Then you could walk into the prop room and find bodies wall to wall.
If we had a relatively slow week, Mickey would get permission to use the Langner’s pool and we’d all troop over there for a swim. The grounds of the estate were beautiful and the pool was built like a natural pond with an island in the middle of it. Once in a while Armina would come out on the lawn to inquire about how we were all holding up, but that was the most we saw of her.
A few weeks into the season I met Frank Perry. Frank worked for the Theatre Guild in New York, but he was from Westport and had been on staff at the theater in years past. He and Mickey were friends for years, so when I first met him it was because he came by the prop room to see Mickey.
Frank (who was to direct the film version of Mommie Dearest twenty-three years later) had the nickname of “Big Daddy” in those days, partly because he was somewhat overweight but mostly because of his way of taking people under his wing and becoming their mentor. We took to one another immediately and Frank became an important influence in my emerging life. He took the time to talk with me about the world that I aspired to work in, he helped me through the ups and downs of that entire summer. I looked forward to his weekend visits to the theater and our long talks sitting in the darkened theater wings before the evening performance. For me it was a romantic relationship but much more like having a wonderful older brother rather than a boyfriend. We didn’t go out, we didn’t date. We talked and talked and talked. Frank sort of guided me through the maze of my initiation into adulthood, having to make decisions about real life for the first time. I was in a terr
ific hurry that summer and Frank talked some sense into my scattered plans for the future.
June 29, 1957
Christina dear,
I am enclosing your passport. Please take it to the State Motor Vehicle Department to verify your date of birth for your driver’s license. Please, under no circumstances, leave this around. Send it to Faith Harrison in the enclosed addressed envelope. Take it to the post office, dear, and send it by registered mail. Buy some brown tape to seal it, as the post office will not accept it with Scotch tape on it.
Yesterday I sent you several of your dresses and some of your costume jewelry that was left here. You can have the skirt shortened on your graduation dress – then you can get some use out of it.
It would be nice if you would let us hear from you from time to time, and tell us whether you are still at Westport. We are twice as busy as you are. So get with it, gal.
Love,
Mommie
P.S. Tina, dear, I’m enclosing tape for you.
Aunt Betty
Mother and daddy were in Los Angeles, and mother was going through the house at 426 North Bristol getting it ready to be put up for sale later in the summer. I was terribly sad about the house being sold because it sort of signaled the end of my own ties to California. I liked the East and I particularly liked what I had seen of New England. It was lush and green. The old houses fascinated me and I felt very comfortable in my new surroundings. But I was still sad that the place of my childhood was going to strangers now.
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