Elizabeth and Michael

by Donald Bogle

  Still, Elizabeth and Sara knew something had to be done to ensure better roles, to ensure indeed that her career would not fizzle out, as was the case with other child stars. Shrewdly, mother and daughter took their complaints to Hedda Hopper. They let Hopper know that Elizabeth was threatening to break her contract. As dramatic as any of the actresses she covered, Hedda was up in arms over the studio’s treatment of Elizabeth. Hopper sprang into action. “Metro may lose Elizabeth Taylor, one of its greatest potential artists,” Hopper announced in her July 22, 1948, column. “She won’t play second leads in any more ‘B’ pictures. Elizabeth proved in National Velvet that she can act. The studio has bought story after story for her, then promptly shelved them. One was Green Mansions. Elizabeth was rushed through a test for Young Bess under Vincente Minnelli’s direction as though she were a newcomer. Her manager can take advantage of California’s ruling that a minor has the privilege of disavowing a contract if reasons warrant it. I hope this won’t happen.”

  But Hopper did not stop there. The next month she wrote a column entirely about Elizabeth, titled “Girl Star Shines On in Teens.” “When Elizabeth Taylor last visited my home I wrote: ‘Hollywood’s newest moppet star is a 12-year-old girl who can say more with a flash of her wondrous eyes than most veteran actors can put over with a page of dialogue,’ ” was the way the article opened. “That was about four and a half years ago, but what a metamorphosis. It is breath-taking. Her eyes still have it, but the fellows in her youthful set today describe her with a whistle that is sweet and low and soft. Her delicate expressiveness, together with the beauty that has matured her into a thoroughly ravishing young lady, makes her—in my mind—a potential young [Ingrid] Bergman. In fact, I will go far enough out on the limb to predict that she one day may likely be the No. 1 lady of the screen.” Hopper’s comparison of Taylor with Bergman was more prophetic than she could have then imagined. Both would become embroiled in major scandals that many predicted would permanently destroy their careers. Both would prove the naysayers wrong.

  In her article, Hopper also reported on the teen star’s early dates. MGM’s juvenile lead Marshall Thompson had escorted her out—to the premiere of The Yearling. Arthur Loew Jr., son of the powerful movie chain owner, also dated her. Among the public, as Hopper shrewdly understood, there was now a growing curiosity—that would intensify in the years to come—about the young beauty’s boyfriends and romantic life. The truth of the matter, however, was that most boys her age were afraid to approach her. How do you talk to so beautiful and famous a girl? In fact, Sara was actually relieved when Thompson had asked for a date.

  Taylor herself wanted a boyfriend—badly. She recalled that her first crush was on an extremely handsome dark-haired boy named Derek Harris, later to be known as John Derek. But the great crush was on her costar Peter Lawford. Born in London in 1923, Lawford had an aristocratic background, had spent his childhood in France, and was educated by private tutors. In the late 1930s, he began his Hollywood career. Under contract to MGM, he had already appeared in The White Cliffs of Dover with Elizabeth, but they had no scenes together. The dark-haired, gentlemanly Lawford, who was a favorite of the ladies, had had well-publicized romances with Lana Turner, Judy Garland, and later a deeply felt but secret romance with African American actress Dorothy Dandridge. “Peter to me,” said Taylor, “was the last word in sophistication, and he was so terribly handsome.” “She was incredible,” said Lawford. “You just couldn’t believe it. . . . The nose was perfect, the eyes, everything. I’d be awfully dumb if I said I wasn’t attracted to her sexually.” He also recalled: “She was coming on strong, batting those beautiful eyes and saying things like ‘You love the beach and I love the beach, so why don’t we go together one day?’ ”

  His breeding, his looks, his relaxed manner appealed also to Sara, who thought he was a real catch. But Lawford kept his distance. “He was frightened to death,” recalled Lillian Burns, the acting coach at MGM, “because she was sixteen years old, and he was afraid of any involvement. He really cared about Elizabeth as a friend, and he was aware that at that age she was really just in love with the idea of love.” Lawford himself said: “The word around the studio was that anybody who touched the girl would be banished forever. They didn’t want anything to befoul their investment.” But another story also made the rounds—that Lawford was more serious than anyone imagined. Interestingly enough, Lawford was also known as being bisexual, something Elizabeth herself was probably aware of, even at so young an age.

  Nevertheless, the truth was Elizabeth had no boyfriend. That also bothered the studio, which believed that Elizabeth Taylor’s image as a young goddess demanded she should have a proper escort. Now the studio publicists stepped in.

  Soon the press reported on the first big Taylor romance with Glenn Davis, a West Point graduate well known throughout the country. For MGM, Davis was ideal for Hollywood’s princess. Serving in the military and about to go to battle in Korea, Davis was not only athletic—having excelled at West Point in football (cocaptain of the team), track, baseball, and basketball (captain of the team)—but also good-looking, yet not a pretty boy like John Derek or Lawford, and also admired by the masses as a well-mannered, courtly, all-American type. When Davis was in Los Angeles for a special military game, the two had met on the beach near the Taylors’ Malibu home, and that very day Davis asked Sara if Elizabeth could attend the football game in which he was playing the next day. Sara approved. Thus was the start of their courtship. Afterward photographs of the two turned up in the papers. The columnists were falling all over themselves to report that Elizabeth wore Davis’s small gold football on a chain around her neck. And though Elizabeth was sixteen years old, there were rumors that she and Davis would become engaged. When Davis went off to Korea, Elizabeth was depicted as the typical American girl back home, waiting anxiously for the return of her sweetheart.

  Elizabeth may have liked Davis, but she was hardly swept off her feet by him. “Their romance was largely a studio directive,” said Hedda Hopper. Upon learning that Davis was in town, someone at MGM got word to him, asking if he’d like to meet Elizabeth Taylor. He quickly said yes. In turn, Elizabeth was informed that Davis wanted to meet her. Though it appeared as if they were constantly in each other’s arms in a romantic swoon, the two could count the number of times they were actually alone together without the presence of her parents or studio people or friends always nearby. In truth, MGM “pushed it into an engagement, which Elizabeth never wanted. She liked him. He liked her. And they both knew she was too young to marry,” said Hopper.

  • • •

  With the romantic side of Elizabeth’s life momentarily taken care of, MGM focused again on the right role for her. What the studio came up with surprised everyone. MGM announced plans to shoot a film called Conspirator, which explored post–World War II fears and anxieties about the rise of Communism and its infiltration into the national bloodstream. This was a time—the late 1940s into the 1950s—that saw the rise of blacklisting within the entertainment industry; a time when artists who were thought to be Communists or Communist sympathizers were listed in the publication Red Channels; an era when industry members were called before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) to testify about their political activities or friendships and the way Communists had infiltrated their ideology into films, radio, and the new medium of television. This was also the time when a group of Hollywood personalities, led by Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, and others had gone to Washington, DC, to protest government pressure on the industry and the tactics of the HUAC, which pushed performers “to name names” of fellow entertainment figures with Communist ties or sympathies. Though the rise of McCarthyism had not yet peaked, it had begun. The blacklist itself went into effect on November 25, 1947. Touching on the budding paranoia about Communists, Conspirator would tell the story of a recently married couple living in England. The young wife discovers her British husband is indeed a Communist agent and a trait
or to his country. The role of the husband was to be played by thirty-five-year-old Robert Taylor, who had been in films since the 1930s. The role of the wife was to be played by Elizabeth, age sixteen when filming began. For MGM, Conspirator was probably considered a hard-hitting, provocative film.

  Conspirator promised to be her real foray into celluloid adulthood. But concerns were expressed that she was simply too young for the part. For one, Hedda Hopper, still seeing Elizabeth as her darling surrogate daughter, had reservations. When it was announced that following Conspirator Taylor would do a film called The Tender Hours, Hopper wrote: “And glory be, she’ll play a girl of her own age, 17, at last.” (The Tender Hours was renamed Two Weeks with Love, and Elizabeth’s part went to Jane Powell.) The press commented on the age difference between the Taylors. Robert Taylor also felt uneasy about appearing as her husband on-screen. The last thing he wanted was to look as if he were robbing the cradle. But none of that stopped MGM from going ahead with the picture.

  With the studio’s plans to film Conspirator in England with a mostly British cast under the direction of Victor Saville, Elizabeth had the chance to return again to the beloved country of her birth. Preparations were made by Sara for the big trip. She would accompany Elizabeth. Francis would stay behind at the gallery. Howard would remain with his father. Sara and Elizabeth would spend Christmas in London; Francis and Howard, in Galveston, Texas, with friends. Francis was no less frustrated than before. But following their earlier brief separation, he and Sara seemed to have reached a truce. And Francis appeared to have become more decisive about what he would and would not allow Sara to do. No way would he ever have the relationship with Elizabeth that he wanted. At times he might assert himself and put his foot down, but there was too much career momentum now to stop it. He also understood that with Sara’s awareness of the politics, intrigues, and machinations at MGM, she was in the best position to make the right decisions for their daughter. Still, the situation with Sara could be unbearable, and quiet as it was kept, other separations followed for the couple.

  On the day that Elizabeth boarded the ocean liner to sail for England, she had seventeen trunks of luggage with clothes created for her by MGM’s Helen Rose. Along with Sara, Elizabeth was accompanied by a publicist and by Melinda Hudgins of the Los Angeles school system, who was her tutor.

  • • •

  Working on Conspirator with Robert Taylor at a studio outside London, Elizabeth felt that indeed her career—now as an adult star—was moving forward. An incident occurred, however—another of those freak accidents to which Elizabeth was prone—that caused alarm for everyone. In a scene in which Robert Taylor’s character attempted to kill Elizabeth, he shook her so violently that she suddenly doubled up in pain. Immediately, the startled director, Victor Saville, stopped the cameras. As it turned out, Robert Taylor had thrown out a couple of Elizabeth’s vertebrae. For months to come, Elizabeth was under the care of an osteopath. Despite the ongoing pain—and it was serious—she kept working.

  Like Elizabeth’s previous directors, Saville learned to contend with Sara, who directed Elizabeth as much as he did. Out of camera range, Sara still had her system of hand maneuvers to signal to Elizabeth how a scene should be played. Sara might put a hand to her mouth to indicate more of a smile or a hand to her eyes to indicate more heartfelt emotion. In the evenings, Sara went over lines with her daughter, and the two discussed interpretations of her character. During filming, there also had to be those daily breaks so Elizabeth could study with her tutor. One minute she was in Robert Taylor’s arms. The next minute, she was studying math. So professionally did Elizabeth handle it all that no one ever seemed to consider the psychological effects it might have on her.

  In England, Elizabeth celebrated her seventeenth birthday. Mother and daughter also saw old family friends, and just as Sara wanted, they socialized with the British upper crust—luncheons, dinners, parties. Elizabeth even presented to Princess Elizabeth, now wed to Prince Philip and the mother of a baby boy, Charles, a baby silver spoon with a rattle on it. For Americans back home reading about the presentation, it looked as if England had its Princess Elizabeth and America had its Princess Elizabeth, too. Constantly meeting new people, always at the center of attention, Elizabeth was impressed with a sophisticated older actor named Michael Wilding. Before long, she had a schoolgirl crush on him. But there was no time for anything serious to develop.

  Upon completion of Conspirator, Sara and Elizabeth traveled to Paris, where they shopped, saw the sights, and dined at the city’s top restaurants. This was Elizabeth’s first trip to the city. Her movies had not been shown there, as far as Sara knew, but she saw the effects and power of her daughter’s beauty when the two entered a restaurant. “I saw that everyone had stopped eating and was staring at her. It was so embarrassing. Just at that moment the headwaiter approached us and escorted us into another room. As we came in the new room, the same thing happened. People just looked, speechless, unmoving,” Sara recalled. “They sat us at a table against the wall. There was a French couple sitting across from us. The man kept staring and staring. Finally, his wife said in French, ‘Stop staring at that girl. It is very rude.’ The man retorted, ‘My dear, it is no more rude to stare at that beautiful creature than it is to stare at the Mona Lisa. It is like looking at a picture.’ ”

  The same happened when the two went shopping while in Paris. People appeared dumbstruck whenever Elizabeth was in their presence. “They would walk right in front of her and argue among themselves about her eyelashes. They would leave and then return and walk around her once more, still staring.” Rattled by the attention, Sara led Elizabeth out of the store without buying anything. “I couldn’t stand it,” said Sara, who turned to her daughter. “It must have made you nervous having those people staring at you,” she said. “Elizabeth, however, didn’t take it that way at all. She was absolutely calm. She said, ‘No, it’s just that they wanted to be friendly.’ I’ve always been so delighted Elizabeth could take her beauty so for granted.”

  But this was just the beginning of the worldwide attention her daughter’s looks would draw. As producer Sam Marx had said: “She’s like an eclipse of the sun, blotting out everyone.” “In person her beauty was even more breathtaking than on screen. It was not uncustomary to gasp a little when you first saw her,” recalled Dominick Dunne. “I didn’t want to stop staring at her.” Elizabeth herself had already managed to disregard it all, to accept reactions to her beauty and especially her fame itself simply as a part of her being. “I can’t remember when I wasn’t famous,” she once told Dunne. He and so many others believed she wore her fame like a second skin. That would enable her to survive. But her beauty and her fame would be disconcerting to others around her, especially to the men who would soon be in and out of her life.

  • • •

  In the States, Metro’s publicity department fed the press stories about Conspirator as well as future movies for Elizabeth. Already MGM was touting the epic Quo Vadis as her next film, which would costar Gregory Peck and be directed by John Huston in Italy. In this ancient Rome drama about the persecution of early Christians—which would cost the then huge sum of $6 million, the equivalent today would be well over $58 million—she would play Lygia, a woman who is loved by a Roman soldier but will not renounce her Christianity. Afterward, she would film Father of the Bride back at Metro. Studio publicists kept the publicity rolling. She was selected honorary queen of the Miss Junior America Pageant. New York’s Fashion Academy had named Elizabeth the best-dressed teenager in America. Throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, she was a young style icon who was dazzling in evening wear—the low-cut, full-skirted gowns that emphasized her small waist and ample bosom, showcasing a voluptuousness few could match. Ongoing items appeared in the columns about her romance with Glenn Davis. When Elizabeth had turned seventeen in London, Davis had sent her a set of pearls, and he hired Philip Paval to create a necklace and earring set for her. By now the fan magazines P
hotoplay and Modern Screen were covering her every move. Having watched Taylor grow up, the public, much like the studio, was impatient to see her reach adulthood. Elizabeth herself was beginning to feel the same way.

  • • •

  Returning to the States after seven months, Elizabeth and her mother were joined by Francis for a trip to the Miami home of Howard Young. Visiting Elizabeth there was Glenn Davis. As much as Elizabeth, he must have felt himself caught up in a publicized non-romance over which he had no real control. But the attention excited him, and soon there were stories that he would give her an engagement ring. By late March 1949, he accompanied Elizabeth to the Academy Awards ceremony, where photographers had a field day. But by the next month, Elizabeth, apparently weary of the charade, declared her romance with Davis was over. Briefly, the focus shifted to Elizabeth’s new escort Lawrence Sheerin. Then talk of that non-relationship fizzled out.

  In 1949, Little Women was released to mostly good reviews. Though nothing of Quo Vadis had been shot, the talk again was about the forthcoming epic. No less than Time magazine interviewed Elizabeth with the tantalizing prospect that she’d be put on the cover, apparently in anticipation of Quo Vadis. Because of plans for Quo Vadis, MGM even announced that Elizabeth would not be in Father of the Bride. Instead, the role of the daughter would be played by Jane Powell, and the role of the father by Jack Benny. Elizabeth was set to fly to Rome on June 6 to start filming Quo Vadis. Then something happened that the studio had not expected. During another visit to Miami, her uncle Howard introduced her to William Pawley Jr., the son of the wealthy former ambassador to Brazil. Sparks flew. In no time, Elizabeth and Pawley were a couple.

  Elizabeth seemed to have really fallen under the sway of the well-bred tall, darkly handsome, blue-eyed Pawley. In the minds of Uncle Howard, Sara, and the press, his family’s background and great wealth made Pawley a picture-perfect boyfriend. He had also been a decorated US Army pilot. Photographs ran in one newspaper after another of the two glamorously decked out in swimsuits as they were about to take a dip in the Pawley family pool. Francis may have watched the proceedings with exasperation, keenly aware of a basic fact that everyone else chose to overlook or ignore: Bill Pawley was twenty-eight years old. Elizabeth was seventeen. Still a schoolgirl, she was relieved that she didn’t have to take her tutor with her when she visited Pawley in Miami—because school was out for the summer! The romance blossomed all the more when Quo Vadis was postponed after Gregory Peck became ill. Word of the film’s postponement apparently led Time to back off from putting Elizabeth on its cover. Then Hedda Hopper broke the really big news: Elizabeth and William Pawley were formally engaged. The wedding, however, couldn’t be planned right away because Elizabeth would not graduate from high school until the next February. In fact, once she had returned from Miami, Elizabeth went back to school for the rest of the summer, making up for time she had lost while in England. If she got in those courses now, she wouldn’t have to wait until the following June to finish high school. MGM changed its plans, too, and Elizabeth was put back into Father of the Bride with Spencer Tracy and Joan Bennett. The studio shrewdly understood that Father of the Bride might benefit from all the possible future coverage of a Taylor-Pawley wedding.