Dark History of Hollywood: A Century of Greed, Corruption and Scandal behind the Movies (Dark Histories)

by Kieron Connolly

  Read the Label

  Why did Olive Thomas drink poison? Was it suicide? Was it accidental? And what was that ‘poison’ doing in her hotel suite anyway?

  One of the chorus girls in the Ziegfeld Follies, as well as appearing in Ziegfeld’s more risqué Midnight Frolic show, Olive Thomas was also a model, being the first of Alberto Vargas’s pin-ups. Moving to Hollywood in 1915, she met actor Jack Pickford, Mary Pickford’s younger brother. Though they eloped in 1916, she kept their marriage quiet because she wanted to succeed on her own terms, not as the girlfriend of a famous Pickford. ‘Two innocent-looking children, they were the gayest, wildest brats who ever stirred the stardust on Broadway,’ wrote screenwriter Frances Marion. Unfortunately, ‘they were much more interested in playing the roulette of life than in concentrating on their careers.’

  CHAPLIN’S FAMILY

  IN ALL, CHARLIE Chaplin married four times. His third marriage was to Paulette Goddard (below with Chaplin in Modern Times – 1936), who, when they married, was 26 to his 47; his fourth was to Oona O’Neill, who was 18 to his 54. Apart from his marriages, Chaplin also had numerous lovers, including the actresses Pola Negri and Louise Brooks. Brooks would later say that he would always apply iodine before having sex, in the hope that it would protect him against syphilis. Chaplin may have had better understanding than others of the effects of syphilis: his mother had performed on the music hall circuit in England before suffering headaches and a mental breakdown. Chaplin sent her to a mental asylum and in 1921 had her brought out to Hollywood, where she was looked after. It is thought likely that her mental ill health may have been the effects of syphilis.

  Chaplin also brought his elder half-brother Sydney out to Hollywood, where he worked as an actor and the star’s business manager. In 1929, Sydney, back in Britain, was accused of biting off the nipple of actress Molly Wright in a sexual assault. His British studio settled out of court, conceding the truth of Wright’s claims. Following the scandal, Sydney’s contract in England was curtailed and he moved on.

  Olive Thomas, who died aged 25 in 1920, was one of Hollywood’s first celebrity deaths. She had accidentally ingested a topical treatment for her husband’s chronic syphilis.

  While husband Pickford was more of a B-movie actor, Olive Thomas was a star, playing the lead in The Flapper (1920), among other films. With work keeping them apart, their marriage suffered and in August 1920 they set off for Paris on a second honeymoon. On the night of 5 September, they returned to their room at the Hotel Ritz having had a lot to drink. Pickford went to bed, while Thomas, according to Pickford, ‘fussed around’ before drinking liquid mercury bichloride, which had been prescribed as a topical treatment for Pickford’s chronic syphilis. When she screamed, Pickford said he jumped out of bed and quickly realized his wife’s error. Perhaps in a drunken haze, Thomas had thought the bottle contained water or sleeping pills. Pickford rushed Thomas to hospital but she died five days later of kidney failure.

  Suicide or Accident?

  The rumours spread quickly and Olive Thomas’s death became one of the first major Hollywood scandals. Was it suicide in response to Pickford’s adultery? Had he infected her with syphilis? Or had he tricked her into taking the poison? Pickford gave an account of the evening of her death to the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, denying that they’d rowed. He described the bottle as labelled ‘Poison’, calling it a ‘toilet solution’ when later explaining its chemical contents. The coroner ruled Thomas’s death accidental and Pickford returned with the body by ship to New York.

  The wedding of Jack Pickford to actress Marilyn Miller in 1922. An alcoholic like her husband, Miller also suffered from sinus infections and died after complications from nasal surgery in 1936. She was 37.

  Little Brother

  Jack Pickford’s life hadn’t been without previous scandal. After the US entered World War I, he joined the US Navy, but used his name to become involved in a scheme that allowed young men to pay bribes to avoid military service, as well as reportedly procuring young women for officers. For his involvement, Pickford came close to being dishonourably discharged.

  Pickford became involved in a scheme that allowed men to pay bribes to avoid military service, as well as reportedly procuring young women for officers.

  An alcoholic like his father, Pickford was never a star like his sister Mary or his wife Olive Thomas, and squandered what film career he had. Living recklessly and frivolously, he repeatedly borrowed money from Mary. After Olive Thomas, he married twice more, both times to former Ziegfeld girls. He was physically abusive towards his second wife Marilyn Miller, and by 1923, his acting career was on the wane. His drinking and drug-taking took their toll and he died in 1933, aged 36.

  Arbuckle’s Weekend Party

  Perhaps the most famous Hollywood scandal is that of Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle. One of the most popular early comedy stars, in 1921 Arbuckle signed a contract with Paramount Pictures for $1 million, the highest of its time, but that was also the year of his downfall.

  But was he really a sexual predator? Did he rape, sexually assault and fatally injure Virginia Rappe? Or was he the victim of people exploiting his celebrity over a death for which he wasn’t responsible?

  In September 1921, Roscoe Arbuckle held a party at the St Francis Hotel in San Francisco. Thirty-year-old Virginia Rappe, an actress known to Arbuckle, joined the party and later that night fell ill. The hotel doctor was called, said she was only drunk, and gave her morphine to calm her. Forty-eight hours later she was admitted to hospital and died the following day from peritonitis caused by a ruptured bladder.

  PROHIBITION

  FOR MOST AMERICANS, the 1920s was legally the decade of Prohibition (1919–33), but for Hollywood that meant not a time of abstinence but of high living. While the Prohibition laws were sluggishly enforced across the country and came down far more harshly on the working classes than the elites, Hollywood was well accustomed to living on its own terms. Press agents were expected to stockpile booze for their clients, and secretaries were honoured if they were asked to handle their boss’s alcohol supply. The studios even charmed journalists by laying on trains full of alcohol to bring the Press from the East Coast to Hollywood for junkets. The frequent crossing of state lines made it easier to bypass Prohibition laws without having to bribe the police.

  Bambina Maude Delmont, who’d attended the party with Rappe, informed the hospital doctor that Arbuckle had raped her friend. The doctor examined Rappe but found no evidence of rape. When Rappe died, Delmont repeated the rape story to police, who believed it and concluded that Arbuckle’s immense weight on Rappe’s body had caused the internal injury. Delmont, it should be noted, had previous convictions for extortion, racketeering, fraud and bigamy. It was also alleged that she made a living luring men into compromising positions where they would be photographed as evidence in later divorce proceedings.

  Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle was at the height of his fame as a comedy star when his career fell apart in what is perhaps Hollywood’s most notorious sex scandal. He was acquitted of the spurious charges but his career, and his spirit, never recovered.

  Virginia Rappe died of a ruptured bladder and secondary peritonitis two days after falling ill at Arbuckle’s party. ‘He hurt me,’ a witness had heard Rappe say of Arbuckle, but the actress made no complaint about the star to the doctor who examined her.

  Delmont repeated the rape story to police, who believed it and concluded that Arbuckle’s immense weight on Rappe’s body had caused the internal injury.

  At a press conference, Rappe’s manager Al Semnacker stated that Arbuckle used a piece of ice to simulate sex with her, which had caused her injuries. By the time this story was reported in the Press, the ice had become a Coca-Cola or champagne bottle. When it came to the trial, witnesses testified that Arbuckle had indeed taken a piece of ice, but had merely rubbed it on Rappe’s stomach in an attempt to soothe her pain when she’d already fallen ill. However, William Randolph Hearst’s newspapers
had a field day running speculative stories about the case before and during the trial. Hearst himself later said that the Arbuckle scandal ‘sold more newspapers than any event since the sinking of the RMS Lusitania’. At first, the judge found no evidence of rape and dismissed that charge, but, on the strength of Zey Prevon, a party witness, who stated that Rappe had said ‘He hurt me’ regarding Arbuckle, he then allowed a murder charge to proceed, although it was later reduced to manslaughter.

  Guilty until proved innocent – this newspaper reports that within days of Virginia Rappe’s death – but months before the trial – cinemas across the country had agreed to withdraw Arbuckle’s films until he was cleared of manslaughter charges.

  Arbuckle had many fans in the public gallery, but also enemies outside – his wife was shot at as she entered the courthouse one day.

  Arbuckle was supported in court by his wife Minta Durfree who maintained that he was the ‘nicest man in the world,’ even though they’d privately and amicably separated well before the scandal.

  The trial began in November 1921 with Arbuckle supported by his estranged wife, Minta Durfree. Arbuckle had many fans in the public gallery, but also enemies outside – Durfree even being shot at one day while entering the courthouse. In court, the prosecution’s evidence soon began to fall apart, with Betty Campbell, a party guest, admitting that San Francisco’s District Attorney, Matthew Brady, had threatened to charge her with perjury if she didn’t testify against Arbuckle. Dr Edward Heinrich, a local criminologist, had claimed to have found Arbuckle’s fingerprints in Rappe’s bloodstains on the hotel suite’s bathroom door, but this was disproven when it was revealed that the room had been cleaned before Heinrich had examined it and no blood remained. Dr Beardsee, the hotel doctor who’d first examined Virginia Rappe, said that it appeared an external force seemed to have damaged her bladder, but admitted that when he examined her she hadn’t mentioned being assaulted. Pathologists, however, stated that there didn’t seem to be any external cause for the rupture. Rather, it was noted in court that Rappe had had existing health problems, including chronic cystitis. Arbuckle took the stand and explained that after he’d found Rappe vomiting in his room during the party, he and other guests had tried to help her. After a two-week trial, the jury returned deadlocked with a 10–2 not guilty verdict and a mistrial was declared.

  At the second trial two months later, the defence was permitted to reveal details about Rappe’s character, including her promiscuity and her heavy drinking, which inflamed her chronic cystitis. Another witness, who’d claimed he’d been bribed not to testify about Arbuckle raping Rappe, turned out to be a criminal who was in collusion with the DA in an effort to reduce his own sentence. With his team confident of an acquittal, Arbuckle didn’t take the stand, but some of the jurors interpreted this as an indication of guilt. Again the jury was deadlocked, but this time with a 9–3 verdict to convict. A second mistrial was declared.

  A Six-Minute Verdict

  At the third trial in March 1922, the defence was taking no chances. While Arbuckle testified, his attorney attacked Rappe’s character and in his closing statement described Bambina Maude Delmont as ‘the complaining witness who never witnessed’. Equally, as Zey Prevon was now out of the country, the prosecution lost their witness who had heard Rappe’s ‘He hurt me’ line. While the first two juries had spent 44 hours and 40 hours respectively deliberating over their verdict, the third jury returned within six minutes. They found Arbuckle not guilty. In addition, they offered a statement of apology to Arbuckle. ‘Acquittal is not enough for Roscoe Arbuckle,’ they told the court. ‘We feel that a great injustice has been done to him… there was not the slightest proof adduced to connect him in any way with the commission of a crime. He was manly throughout the case and told a straightforward story which we all believe. We wish him success and hope that the American people will take the judgement of twelve men and women that Roscoe Arbuckle is entirely innocent and free from all blame.’

  Their wish wasn’t granted: Arbuckle was already ruined. Although he left the court with only the $500 fine to pay for breaking the Prohibition laws, six days later he found himself formally shut out of Hollywood. Even before the trial, the studios had ordered their stars not to stand by Arbuckle, with Buster Keaton, who worked independently, a lone voice in making a statement in support of Arbuckle’s innocence. And even before the verdict, the studios had banned his films being screened. No matter what the jury thought, the Press and court hearings had revealed that he’d broken the Prohibition laws and was throwing parties with actresses. This gave the lie to the studio’s image of him as a happy family man (although he and Durfree had already amicably and privately separated). In Hollywood, you could get up to all kinds of things that the studios knew about, as long as the general public didn’t find out. Although the ban on Arbuckle working was lifted after six months, the studios had already washed their hands of him. Or perhaps they judged that the public had turned away from him. Either way, a man who’d signed a million-dollar contract a year earlier now couldn’t get a job.

  Although the ban on Arbuckle working was lifted after six months, the studios had already washed their hands of him.

  Even before the third trial, Bambina Maude Delmont had been touring the country with a one-woman show called ‘The woman who signed the murder charge against Arbuckle’ and lecturing on the evils of Hollywood. This tour would have made her some money, but had she hoped to extort money from Arbuckle with a rape claim that had escalated beyond her control?

  Arbuckle had to sell his house and his cars to pay legal fees in excess of $700,000. Buster Keaton found him some writing and directing work, but Arbuckle fell into alcoholism. ‘Roscoe only seemed to find solace and comfort in a bottle,’ said Durfree, who’d now divorced him, but always maintained that he was the nicest man in the world and that they were still friends.

  In the later 1920s and early 1930s, Arbuckle began directing under the pseudonym William Goodrich. But his heart wasn’t in it. ‘He made no attempt to direct this picture,’ said Louise Brooks, who appeared in one of these films. ‘He sat in his chair like a man dead. He had been very nice and sweetly dead ever since the scandal that ruined his career.’

  In 1932, Arbuckle signed a contract with Warner Bros. to appear in six short films under his own name again. They were successful, but he died the following year of heart failure, aged 46. It seems likely that Arbuckle was an innocent man whose career was ruined by a corrupt DA, by Bambina Maude Delmont’s attempt to extort money from him, by a Press willing to print unfounded scandal, and by a scared film industry that treated him like a gangrenous limb. It couldn’t allow itself to be infected any more.

  Reel Trouble

  Even before the third Arbuckle trial had taken place, another huge scandal had rocked Tinseltown. One morning in February 1922, the houseboy of director William Desmond Taylor arrived at Taylor’s LA home to find his employer dead. A doctor soon appeared on the scene, examined the body and declared that the director had died of a ruptured stomach ulcer. So it was odd then that when people turned Taylor’s body over, it was revealed that he’d been shot in the back. Perhaps not so odd was that the doctor was never identified and never seen again. If he wasn’t a complete fraud, he certainly wouldn’t want to own up to such incompetence.

  Despite the gunshot wound, a doctor examined the body and declared that the director had died of a ruptured stomach ulcer.

  BUSTER KEATON

  THROUGHOUT THE 1920S, Buster Keaton enjoyed his greatest run of success making his films independently and with no studio interference. So what went wrong? In simple terms, a mixture of professional and personal disaster. Keaton’s run of hits stumbled with The General (1927). Although it’s now regarded as his greatest film, audiences were uncomfortable with a comic story set against the American Civil War. Ambitious to make, the film was a misfire at the box office and United Artists, who distributed Keaton’s movies, demanded greater supervision over his budgets.
Two films later, Keaton, never a businessman, gave up his independence and went to work under contract at MGM. He’d lost the artistic freedom he’d had in the 1920s and would never be as successful again. Although he kept working solidly for the rest of his life, his peak had passed with the arrival of the talkies.

  But his private life was difficult, too. A womanizer before he’d married, his wife, actress Natalie Talmadge, sister-in-law of his boss, Joseph Schenck, was a virgin on their wedding night. While they had courted briefly some time earlier, they hadn’t seen each other for two years when she wrote to Keaton: ‘If you still care for me, just send for me.’ Keaton went East to see her and they married. After the birth of their second child in 1924, however, Talmadge announced that she was no longer interested in sex and turned him out of their bedroom. Keaton replied that in that case he’d take other lovers, which he did.

  He also became more of a drinker, his marriage finally collapsing after Keaton invited one of his mistresses to their home, telling her to help herself to his wife’s huge wardrobe – it being alleged that Talmadge spent a third of their money on clothes. Talmadge finally divorced Keaton in 1932, taking much of his fortune and refusing to allow any contact between Keaton and his sons for a decade. With the failure of his marriage, and the loss of his independence as a film-maker, by the mid-1930s Keaton had gone bust and was a hopeless alcoholic.

  Buster Keaton with his wife Natalie Talmadge in Our Hospitality. Keaton’s own hospitality extended to bringing one of his lovers home and inviting her to choose from his wife’s extensive wardrobe.