The Hollywood Book of Death: The Bizarre, Often Sordid, Passings of More than 125 American Movie and TV Idols

by Parish, James Robert

  Her screen career blossomed, especially on loan to other studios: MGM’s Susan and God (1940), Warner Bros.’ The Strawberry Blonde (1941), and Twentieth Century-Fox’s Blood and Sand (1941). On the home lot, Hayworth costarred with Fred Astaire in two well-crafted musicals; her star status was guaranteed, especially once she was promoted as a luscious pinup beauty. By now, Rita had grown tired of the demanding, temperamental, and parasitic Judson. They divorced in 1943. Her romance with hunky actor Victor Mature didn’t lead to marriage, but her affair with ex-wunderkind Orson Welles did include matrimony, in 1943. Their daughter Rebecca was born in 1944.

  The genius filmmaker Welles, already an egotistical, profligate bother to the major studios, couldn’t resist tampering with his wife’s career. On her own, Rita made the hugely successful musical Cover Girl (1944) and the sexy drama Gilda (1946). Then, to appease her husband and to salvage their dying marriage, she agreed to cut her famous tresses and to dye the remaining hair a blond color. He cast her in his confused drama The Lady from Shanghai, which wasn’t released until 1948 (and then to disastrous results). By that time, she and Orson were divorced.

  Rita fell back into the domestic frying pan when she met Prince Aly Khan, the playboy son of an enormously rich Indian potentate, Aga Khan III. In May 1949, the enthralled world looked on breathlessly as the couple were married in a town hall in Vallauris, France. Until the next decade’s Grace Kelly-Prince Rainier nuptials, it was the wedding of the century. Five months after the wedding, Princess Yasmin was born.

  By the early 1950s, the doomed-from-the-start royal marriage had fallen apart; the prodigal daughter, Rita Hayworth, returned to Tinseltown. Columbia Pictures hastily starred her in Affair in Trinidad (1952). By the time of the 3-D musical Miss Sadie Thompson (1953), Hayworth, now in her mid-30s, was looking ragged around the edges; by the release of Pal Joey (1957), she came across as shopworn. In between these two films, she had a short and stormy marriage to the equally unstable singer Dick Haymes. Getting divorced from Haymes cost her a fortune and a good deal of her remaining self-respect. By the time of Separate Tables (1958), Hayworth had matured into character leads; that year, she wed British producer James Hill. Their union lasted three years. In 1961, Rita turned up in Spain with Bette Davis’s ex-husband, actor Gary Merrill. Later, the couple returned to New York, where Rita was to costar with Merrill on Broadway. But instead, she retreated to Hollywood without Gary, in noticeably poor physical and mental shape.

  Glamorous Rita Hayworth posing for the camera in the late 1930s.

  Courtesy of JC Archives

  Rita’s final years of moviemaking were an embarrassing trek. She almost took over the lead in the musical Applause! from Lauren Bacall in 1971, but left the project before her opening. She admitted to having a facelift in the mid-1970s, and then received awful publicity when she disembarked “drunk” at London’s Heathrow Airport in early 1976. Several movie projects were announced and fell apart; thereafter, Rita’s only public appearances seemed to be at European film retrospectives.

  In 1977, the fading star became distraught at an art-gallery opening in Newport Beach, California, and had to be hospitalized. The attending physician concluded that Hayworth was “gravely disabled as a result of mental disorder or impairment by chronic alcoholism.” Consequently, a petition was filed to have her estate and personal matters supervised by a conservator. Her lawyer flew her out-of-state, and the public next learned that she was at a Connecticut “drying-out” hospital, with her daughter Yasmin appointed her guardian.

  Weeks later, Rita reemerged in Hollywood for a revival theater showing of Miss Sadie Thompson. That November she was the tribute subject for the annual Thalians charity bash. Hayworth kept insisting that she had given up drinking. But her strange public behavior—incoherent outbursts, paranoia, and forgetfulness—led onlookers to think otherwise. It was not until 1980 that doctors finally determined Rita’s medical problems might not be alcoholism, but rather a poorly understood brain disorder, Alzheimer’s disease. Yasmin would say later, “So much embarrassment and heartache could have been saved, if at that time it had been known that Rita Hayworth was ill and not guilty of any misconduct.” It was not until mÍd-1981 that the world was told the true nature of Hayworth’s plight. By then, the former glamour goddess could no longer take care of even her simplest basic needs.

  Yasmin was appointed Rita’s conservator in July 1981. Rita was then transferred to New York City, where she was given a suite adjacent to Yasmin’s at the San Remo Apartments overlooking Central Park. Rita spent most days sitting endlessly in an armchair, gazing vacantly ahead, lost to the world. Occasionally, she could be found pacing about her room, rambling in some strange language no one could fathom, or staring at the wall mirror, confused as to the identity of the reflection she saw. As the disease progressed, Hayworth became bedridden, too fearful even to move from the bedroom to her living-room chair. Meanwhile, Yasmin, who had become a spokesperson for the Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Disorders Association, got married. In December 1985, her son, Andrew, was born. Although the marriage quickly ended, Yasmin and Andrew continued to reside at the San Remo. By now the debilitated Rita had retreated so far into her past that she could not understand that the little boy Yasmin placed on her lap was her grandson.

  Rita passed away peacefully on May 14, 1987, while the nurse was changing her. Just after she was turned onto her side, she sighed and then expired. She was buried at Los Angeles’s Holy Cross Cemetery in the hilly area known as the Grotto. Hayworth’s grave is marked with a kneeling angel and a bonsai-type tree. The marker reads “Beloved Mother . . . To yesterday’s companionship and tomorrow’s reunion.”

  Audrey Hepburn

  [Edda van Heemstra Hepburn-Ruston]

  May 4, 1929–January 20, 1993

  The slender, doe-eyed Audrey Hepburn was a unique presence in so many ways. Few actresses have gained success as quickly in Hollywood. With her debut American picture, Roman Holiday (1953), she won an Academy Award and established herself as a major screen presence. Initially, Hepburn was compared to other waifs of the movies such as dancer and actress Leslie Caron. But Audrey had a very special look and personality all to herself. (At five feet, seven inches and 110 pounds, Hepburn contrasted dramatically with the curvaceous screen bombshells of the day such as Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, and Sophia Loren.)

  On-screen, Audrey often played Cinderella roles, repeatedly demonstrating her ability to portray the perfect gamine. Yet Hepburn was far more complex. She had a refined, aristocratic look that, in tandem with her hard-to-place accent, created a sophisticated aura. This elegance was enhanced by her fondness for wearing haute couture (usually designed by Hubert de Givenchy) that frequently established new styling fads.

  Entertainment Weekly would hail Audrey as the “screen’s most enduring symbol of graceful self-possession.” Peter Bogdanovich, who directed her in They All Laughed (1981), would rhapsodize after her death, “Looking back now, we can see clearly that in the last decade and a half of the Golden Age of Hollywood, Audrey Hepburn became the last true innocent of the American screen.”

  In the late 1960s, as she reached an age when substantial screen parts are notoriously difficult for women to win, Audrey retired from movies to make a fresh stab at domesticity with her second husband. She would return to films occasionally, but her grandest role would be as the UNICEF goodwill ambassador who took as a personal cause the plight of malnourished, sickly children around the world. Through her selfless devotion to their welfare, Hepburn gained yet another generation of admirers.

  Audrey Hepburn once remarked, “I could never be cynical [on-screen]. I wouldn’t dare. . . . After all, I’ve been so fortunate in my own life. I feel I’ve been born under a lucky star.” But her growing-up years were quite the opposite. She was born Edda van Heemstra Hepburn-Ruston in 1929 in Brussels, Belgium. Her mother—wealthy Dutch baroness Ella van Heemstra—had two sons from the first of two previous marriages, each of which
had ended in divorce. Edda’s father, Joseph Hepburn-Ruston, was an Irish businessman who managed his wife’s finances through the Brussels branch of the Bank of England. As a youngster, Edda was sickly, as well as unhappy with her gawky looks (and especially her nose). When she was six, her parents separated—they would later divorce. The situation was very traumatic for their daughter.

  One of the stipulations of the divorce decree was that Edda be schooled near London so her father could visit her frequently. In September 1939, she was just adjusting to the girls’ school there when England declared war against Nazi Germany. The Baroness, on holiday at her family’s estate in Arnhem, Holland, thought it would be safer for Edda to live there because Holland was neutral in the growing conflict. With her propensity for languages, the girl quickly learned Dutch so she could converse with her new classmates.

  In early 1940, the 11-year-old Edda announced that she wished to become a dancer, and was allowed to start classes at the Arnhem Conservatory of Music. But a few weeks later, in May 1940, the Germans invaded and occupied the Netherlands. During the subsequent four years of occupation, Edda had little chance to practice dancing—or even attend school. Because there was hardly any food, and insufficient vitamins in what little they could obtain, she developed anemia. During the occupation, one of Edda’s half-brothers was taken away to a German labor camp, while an uncle and a cousin were executed as enemies of the Third Reich. Meanwhile, the van Heemstra estate and much of the family’s funds were confiscated. The Baroness, who had a part-Jewish heritage, joined the underground resistance and staged amateur talent shows as fund-raisers for the cause. Edda sometimes carried messages for the Resistance hidden in her shoes.

  At the time of the liberation of the Netherlands in 1945, the 16-year-old Edda suffered from acute anemia, respiratory problems, and edema (swelling of the limbs). She received emergency rations of food and medicine from the newly formed United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), a debt she vowed to repay one day.

  Following World War II, Edda studied ballet diligently for three years in Amsterdam. In 1948, she made her film debut in a documentary-style travelogue (Nederland in 7 Lessen). Also that year, she and her mother returned to England. By then, her father was residing in Ireland—he and his daughter would never reestablish a relationship. To fund her London dancing classes, Edda became a part-time model and sought movie work. Because of her wartime deprivations, however, she would always lack the stamina necessary to be a successful ballerina. Instead, she turned to dance jobs in West End revues and nightclubs. By now, she had anglicized her first name to Audrey and had taken as her last name part of her father’s hyphenated surname.

  In 1951, Associated British Films signed Audrey to a contract. That summer Hepburn traveled to the French Riviera to film Nous Irons a Monte Carlo [Monte Carlo Baby).

  Audrey Hepburn and her constant companion, Robert Wolders, at a film-industry function.

  © 1992 by Albert L. Ortega

  While on location there, she met famed novelist Colette, who decided Hepburn was the right person to play the lead in an upcoming Broadway version of her novel Gigi. The play debuted in November 1951, and the young actress became the toast of New York City.

  Just before Audrey’s departure for New York, she had tested for director William Wyler, who was planning to shoot his next movie in Italy. He was so delighted with Hepburn’s charisma that he convinced Paramount Pictures to sign her to a four-picture deal. The first of these was Roman Holiday, in which she played an incognito European princess who falls in love with a newspaper correspondent (played by Gregory Peck). At a party celebrating the London premiere of the hit film, Audrey met Mel Ferrer, an actor 12 years her senior. It was love at first sight. Hepburn and Ferrer agreed that they would like to do a play together at the first opportunity.

  Meanwhile, Paramount cast Audrey in Sabrina (1954). During the course of the filming, her costar William Holden, who was then married, fell madly in love with her, while she was just flattered. It was for this romantic comedy that Hepburn convinced a young couturier, Hubert de Givenchy, to design her wardrobe—it was the beginning of a long-lasting and mutually beneficial relationship. In the spring of 1954, Audrey won an Academy Award for Roman Holiday. Days later, she was given a Tony Award for the Broadway production of Ondine, in which she was costarring with Mel Ferrer. Hepburn and Ferrer were married on September 24, 1954, in Switzerland. The following February she suffered the first of several miscarriages.

  She and Ferrer labored for months in the poorly paced War and Peace (1956), and then she teamed with the much-older Fred Astaire for the chic musical Funny Face (1957). After several hits and misses, Audrey got back in stride in 1959 with The Nun’s Story, for which she earned another Academy Award nomination.

  Hepburn had already agreed (for $300,000) to star in the Western The Unforgiven (1960) when she learned she was again pregnant. During the shoot, she was thrown from a horse, fracturing four vertebrae. Filming had to be halted for three weeks. After the movie was completed, Audrey and Ferrer returned to Switzerland, where she had another miscarriage in July 1959. That December, she found herself pregnant again, and this time remained in seclusion at the couple’s Swiss villa in Tolochenaz. In July 1960 she gave birth to a son, Sean.

  Playing the free-spirited Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961) reestablished Hepburn with filmgoers, and today is perhaps her most famous role. But her lesbian-themed The Children’s Hour (1961) met with public apathy. Much more popular was the modish thriller Charade (1963), costarring her with the dapper Cary Grant.

  Perhaps the most controversial Hollywood movie casting of the 1960s was in the movie-musical version of the hit Broadway show My Fair Lady (1964). Rex Harrison was signed to recreate his role of Professor Henry Higgins, and Audrey grabbed the part that had been played onstage so winningly by Julie Andrews. My Fair Lady proved to be a large moneymaker; it also garnered several Oscars. But Audrey, whose voice was dubbed for the movie, lost the Best Actress Oscar race that year to Julie Andrews in Mary Poppins.

  While making the urbane Two for the Road (1967), Hepburn and costar Albert Finney became the talk of the French Riviera for their unabashed togetherness. When that affair cooled, she returned to Hollywood for the thriller Wait Until Dark (1967). It was produced by Ferrer; he and his wife fought openly on the set.

  Audrey gained her fifth Oscar nomination for Wait Until Dark, but in the process lost her marriage. In late 1967 she filed for divorce. The next summer she became enamored with wealthy Italian psychiatrist Andrea Dotti, nine years her junior. They wed on January 18, 1969. Her second son, Luca, was born in February 1970.

  Having drifted away from filmmaking as she reached middle age, Audrey did occasional TV commercials and sought to make her marriage work. Her screen comeback was in Robin and Marian (1976) as a mature Maid Marian to a middle-aged Robin Hood (Sean Connery). The movie failed to win over critics or the public. On the set of the trashy thriller Bloodline (1979), and later on They All Laughed (1981), Hepburn sought a romance with her costar Ben Gazzara. But he was married to actress Janice Rule at the time.

  Admitting defeat with Gazzara, Audrey finally terminated her tattered marriage to Dotti. At a dinner party in 1981, she met Dutch actor Robert Wolders, age 46, who was the widower of movie star Merle Oberon. Hepburn found herself attracted to the eight-years-younger Wolders. They became constant companions, but never wed.

  By this time, except for a few TV appearances, Hepburn had nearly abandoned her career. Instead, she devoted increasing amounts of time and energy to UNICEF charity work. By 1988, she had taken on a full-time job as a UNICEF volunteer, jetting from Ethiopia to Ireland, Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador.

  Based at her Swiss villa in Tolochenaz, the extremely shy, private Audrey made only occasional forays to the United States. In the summer of 1992, UNICEF had scheduled her to visit the country of Somalia. During the trek, Audrey began to experience excruciating stomach pains, but would not deal with
the matter until after her duties in Somalia had been completed. In late September, Hepburn had diagnostic testing at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. It was discovered that she had a cancerous tumor, necessitating a hysterectomy and a partial colostomy (removal of part of the colon). The next day Audrey was told that the cancer had spread throughout her stomach and that, at best, she had three months to live.

  Refusing to surrender to the grim news, she announced, “The thousands of starving children need me. I’ve got to get back on my feet for them—even if it takes a miracle!” The medical team implanted a Hichman catheter in her chest for easy administration of chemotherapy and painkillers. She left the hospital, but returned for new exploratory surgery, which only confirmed that nothing further could be done.

  Audrey told Wolders that she wished to return to her villa—called La Plaisance—her home for the last 26 years. Putting on a brave face, she insisted to well-wishers, “It’s not that bad,” but her pain was horrific. Toward the end, she could only speak in barely audible whispers. Meanwhile, President George Bush announced on December 11 that he had awarded Audrey the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, for her ongoing UNICEF work. The Screen Actors Guild extended the Lifetime Achievement Award to Audrey; it was to be presented at a tribute on January 10, 1993.

  On the weekend of December 19, Hepburn and Wolders returned to Switzerland aboard a private jet, courtesy of Gregory Peck. She now weighed only 83 pounds and was unable to keep down any solid foods. She was receiving morphine intravenously. One of her last outings was on January 10, 1993, to pay a final visit to the flower garden she had tended for years. She was now down to 75 pounds. Audrey said, “I want to feel alive one more time before I die.” Supported by two nurses, she agonizingly endured a 15-minute trek outside and then returned to her bedroom, exhausted. There, her bed was positioned so that she could look out her window and view the snowcapped mountains in the distance. Unable to attend the Screen Actors Guild festivities in her honor in Los Angeles, she sent a message thanking all her directors and costars for their kind thoughts.