by Lorna Luft
Vicki Lester receives her Academy Award.
More than halfway through the picture, Nyberg stormed off the production, unhappy with her treatment and her nerves frayed by the demands of the production. Nevertheless, most of Mama’s wardrobe was designed by Nyberg, with the balance by Jean Louis and Irene Sharaff. Some observers credit Nyberg, some Jean Louis, for the Vicki Lester Academy Awards gown, which replaced an initial white design. The dramatic dress we see is midnight blue with long sleeves and a stand-up collar. It has a sculpted train heavily beaded in a peacock feather motif. This gown denotes the emergence of a more sophisticated woman, a full-blown celebrity ready to embrace her fame and reap the rewards. But this dual-duty dress is also the gown associated with the humiliation of Esther, as Maine hijacks her big moment. The clothing for Norman Maine is not specifically credited, but was selected carefully and fit superbly, as a matinee idol’s would be. James Mason being a gentleman actor, his Fred Astairian wardrobe of suits and tuxedos is understated and elegant, as are the casual tweed jacket, polo-neck sweater, and charcoal trousers worn when Norman de-glams Esther. At film’s end, Maine is de-glamorized himself, humbled to a plain white terry-cloth robe, shortly to be shed, sullied in wet sand, and then washed away in the tide. Along with James Mason’s costumes came a new wardrobe for my father. Dad, early on in preproduction, had suits custom-tailored for himself at a cost of $75,000. He charged the expense to the movie’s budget, but not without Jack Warner getting wind of it. Warner realized he would have to keep a closer eye on expense sheets and branded my father an opportunist.
Filming the Academy Awards scene in which Vicki Lester wins her Oscar for A World for Two. Cinematographer Sam Leavitt (wearing hat) is behind the camera.
Preproduction absorbed much of 1953. The spring and summer were expended with preproduction duties. As for my father, it was all-consuming to hold my mother together while producing such an elaborate, prestige picture with little experience to his credit beyond two Monogram “B” pictures of no consequence.
In late August 1953, Mama officially began work on A Star Is Born at Warner Bros. studios in Burbank. The mood was upbeat, though a cloud of doubt and resentment still hung over her alma mater in Culver City. Down on the MGM lot, Arthur Freed, slighted for not having been consulted on the ambitious undertaking by his former wunderkind, grumbled about my parents’ project, “Those two alley cats can’t make a picture.”18 But make a picture they did, beginning with a flurry of dance rehearsals, sessions for prerecording of Mama’s songs, wardrobe fittings and tests, and makeup and hair trials. Vern Alves, a friend of my father’s, was hired as the film’s associate producer. He served as gofer to both my parents and helped keep things moving. Second-unit location shooting at various sites was under way.
The first day of filming at Warner Bros. was Monday, October 12, 1953. My father gave my mother a bracelet that day engraved, “Columbus discovered America on October 12, 1492. Judy Garland began principal photography on A Star Is Born on October 12, 1953. With all my love—Sid.” The inaugural scene before the cameras was Esther as an extra, her face unseen as she waves the scarf from the train window. Technical issues forced five takes of the brief scene, covering one-and-a-half script pages and costing $25,000. Shooting continued on the lot and on location through mid-April 1954. Warner studio logs indicate that Mama was often absent or left work early. Illness and fatigue were blamed.
Initially budgeted at $3 million, the final cost was twice that figure, making A Star Is Born the most expensive movie ever shot in Hollywood at that time. Unfortunately, the industry blamed my mother almost entirely. I believe this was unfair. Taking into account her whims and eccentricities, the truth remains that Mama, when on her game, was a prepared professional. She was also lightning fast—one rehearsal and she was ready to roll; one reading of a page and her lines were committed to memory. Her photographic memory was extraordinary. In fact, having a mother with such perfect recall was terrifying when I lied to her on occasion as a young teenager! She possessed a brilliant mind and was a voracious reader. She was a uniquely gifted singer at the height of her vocal prowess, a supple comedienne, and a naturally instinctive actress who withheld nothing. Ina Claire, the actress and friend of Cukor’s, visited the set and observed a difficult, emotion-filled scene. On the set, Cukor was tough with her, but never an instance of directorial overreach. Later, still amazed, she told him, “That girl should work two hours, and then be taken home in an ambulance! How she gives of herself!”19
Initially budgeted at $3 million, the final cost was twice that figure, making A Star Is Born the most expensive movie ever shot in Hollywood at that time.
Other celebrities stopped by the Warner lot to have a look and congratulate Mama on her return. Louella O. Parsons kept the newspapers buzzing about her comeback, filling many column inches with report and speculation, some negative, some positive. Hedda Hopper did the same, although she was not invited to the studio as Parsons was, because my mother loathed Hopper. But old and new friends with no agenda also dropped in, like Elizabeth Taylor, Guy Madison, Ginger Rogers, Mervyn LeRoy, Clifton Webb, Sarah Churchill, Teresa Wright, and Jean Simmons. Mama also welcomed Doris Day and Leslie Caron, all three ladies perhaps exchanging “war stories” about working in the trenches of the Hollywood musical comedy factory. Kay Thompson, my mother’s mentor and vocal coach in the Arthur Freed unit at MGM, visited the set and offered moral support. There is something about the first number, “Gotta Have Me Go With You,” and its lady/chorus boy patter and step that recalls Kay’s famous nightclub act, “Kay Thompson and the Williams Brothers,” including Andy, the youngest, that toured the country in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Kay may have offered some input to Mama and her choreographer, Richard Barstow. Kay was always around, as my mother’s close friend and Liza’s godmother. She is perhaps best remembered as the author of the Eloise series of children’s books (the first was published in 1955). We stayed close for the next forty years.
Leslie Caron (center) and Elizabeth Taylor (right) visit Mama during production of the “Born in a Trunk” sequence.
Liza and myself—ages seven and one, respectively, during this period—did not have our mother at hand; we were cared for by nannies. Tucked away in the manicured, peaceful enclave of Holmby Hills, we were far from the soundstages of the movie business. But we did sometimes visit. I still have photographs of us with Mama on the set of A Star Is Born. She was shooting scenes and posing for pictures. She was being fitted for costumes. She was rehearsing dance steps and recording songs. She was doing publicity interviews. Amid the frenzied whirl of starring in her comeback film, she was trying to be a wife, and doing her best to be a loving mother. And all this was done under the influence, in a cloud or on a high. When she came home every evening, exhausted from the day, my mother somehow mustered the energy to give at least two more performances before bed—a lullaby for Liza, and one for me.
Mama with Liza and me during production of the “Born in a Trunk” sequence. Photo by Bob Willoughby.
Mama was an extrovert and enjoyed being social. If there was a dinner party, an opportunity to play cards, or sing around the piano, she would find the energy for that as well. Mama was part of the original “Rat Pack,” a group of neighbors in Holmby Hills that included Frank Sinatra (pack master), Mama (first vice president), my father (cage master), Humphrey Bogart (rat in charge of public relations), Lauren Bacall (den mother), and Irving “Swifty” Lazar (treasurer). Mike and Gloria Romanoff and David and Hjördis Niven were also part of the pack. They were all night owls who lived close to one another, and loved to drink and laugh. If a light was on, any member might knock on the door for a game of cards, a nightcap, or conversation. Gossip columnist Sheilah Graham referred to the tight-knit Holmby Hills group as a “rat pack.” Lazar thought the label hilarious, and encouraged the nickname by creating little stickpins, shaped like rats, with rubies for eyes and gave them to all the original members.
After wrapping
principal photography, my parents both became convinced that the film lacked a crucial element. A substantial, even lengthy, production number needed to be inserted as part of the sneak preview of Vicki Lester’s first motion picture. It should be a movie within the movie, a literal tale of a rising star, lavishly appointed, a number to top all numbers. (Maybe they had a point. A Star Is Born has no other monumental moment of song and dance.) Mama’s ambition for her picture had been super-charged by the grand success of her ex-husband Vincente Minnelli’s An American in Paris (1951) which, in its broad scope and arty pretensions, had been named Best Picture by the Academy at its 1952 ceremony, and was the first musical in quite some time to be so honored. The closing seventeen-minute ballet, built around George Gershwin’s symphonic tone poem, almost seemed to be the reason the film was made in the first place. Every scene and song prepared the way for the big finish. For her movie, Mama wanted something comparable, preferably even to outshine it. Arlen and Gershwin had written three numbers to consider. The duo wrote “I’m Off the Downbeat,” “Green Light Ahead,” and “Dancing Partner” for the crucial sequence. All three disappointed Mama and underwhelmed Dad. The two agreed they wanted something more grandly scaled, something that boldly declared in words and music, “I’m back!”
The idea had the sharp pull of a challenge. My ambitious mother turned to her “source,” the Freed unit music men, primarily Roger Edens, her mentor and friend from her earliest days at MGM, and his right-hand collaborator Leonard Gershe. Edens was under contract at Metro, so he agreed to a hush-hush arrangement; Gershe would work on a freelance basis. Mama was thinking of the autobiographical opener that Edens had conceived for her engagement at the Palace in New York in 1951 and 1952. Edens proposed that the number “Born in a Trunk” be expanded from that basic opener idea from the Palace to become a framework for an autobiographical musical showstopper: art imitating life as a woman sings her trajectory from vaudeville obscurity to Broadway star. Edens and Mama auditioned the new concept, with Dad as cheerleader, for Jack Warner, who, in a surprising display of full support, approved an additional $250,000 to design, rehearse, and shoot it. The schedule was very tight, as the film was locked into its late September premiere date. When Hedda Hopper got wind that a lavish new number was to be added to an already large-scale production, she couldn’t resist a quip in her Los Angeles Times column. “When I asked why Warners would spend money on a ballet [sic] sequence in Star when the picture already cost $4,500,000 and runs three hours and twenty minutes,” she wrote, “I was told that after that much, why quibble over another $200,000 to make it better?”20
As soon as Warner gave the green light, Leonard Gershe set about finishing the lyrics to “Born in a Trunk,” which would be a stylized facsimile of Mama’s own showbiz-in-the-blood career path. My mother’s first professional billing was in December 1924. At the Grand Theatre, the three Gumm sisters entertained in songs and dances: Baby Frances, two years old, Virginia, seven, and Mary Jane, nine. Francis “Frank” Gumm co-owned the Grand, and was in charge of the box office. On June 10, 1922 (after reconsidering a planned abortion), he and his wife welcomed Frances Ethel Gumm, named for both of them. Ethel was accompanying her daughters on the piano, so it may have been Baby Frances’s grandmother who pushed her out onstage the very first time to sing “Jingle Bells.” She never needed another shove. In fact, according to legend, Frank had to go up onstage and carry her off. But my mother was a master of selectively recalling her past, reinventing the truth in story after story. Mama always did prefer her own versions of reality. How could she remember what happened that night? She was only two years old!
The Gumm Sisters became half-sized vaudevillians, traveling by train and playing the Northeast and the West. One trip took them to Southern California, where stage mother Ethel was taken with the mild weather. In 1927, the Gumms moved to Lancaster, California, in the Antelope Valley, seventy miles northeast of Los Angeles. Frank managed a movie theater, and Ethel kept her eyes and ears open for word of auditions in Hollywood. The Gumm Sisters performed onstage at the Shrine Auditorium, on the radio at KNX and KFWB, and in four short films in which Baby Gumm stole the show. Baby Gumm appeared as a solo act, on occasion, at the Cocoanut Grove’s “Star Night” series (Mama’s history with the nightclub going way back to 1932). The sisters continued to perform together, while Baby, the attention-getter, was catered to, indulged—maybe spoiled a bit. Frank and Ethel began a series of separations, his bisexuality one of their issues. Ethel moved the girls to an L.A. suburb, then to Silver Lake, on the eastern edge of Hollywood. Frank, in declining health, remained alone in Lancaster, joining his family only sporadically. At the Oriental Theatre in Chicago in 1934, vaudeville star George Jessel suggested that since Gumm rhymed with “glum,” the Gumm Sisters should change their name. Jessel suggested “Garland” as a surname after the New York drama critic, Robert Garland. A variant version of this story is that Jessel thought they resembled a garland of flowers when they sang together. Another tale, told by my mother herself, refers to the 1928 song “Judy” with music by Hoagy Carmichael and a lyric by Sammy Lerner, which she loved. She maintained that if she was to change her last name, she could now change her first name as well and become “Judy.” However it happened, Baby Frances Gumm became known as Judy Garland.
Helen Morgan’s “Bill” (from the great 1927 Oscar Hammerstein II and Jerome Kern musical Show Boat) was just one of the mature-themed torch songs Mama sang in the act. When she let loose with her trumpery belt, she could be heard in the back of the balcony, without a microphone, at age twelve. The Garland Sisters, on Ethel’s improvised tour, performed in Detroit, Milwaukee, Kansas City, Denver, all over Los Angeles, San Francisco, and at Lake Tahoe until August 1935. Frank, feeling more and more isolated in Lancaster, moved into the Silver Lake residence. Midsummer 1935 was a pivotal time. Ethel, through a chain of contacts, scheduled an audition for Mama at MGM with Louis B. Mayer, for whom she sang “Zing! Went the Strings of My Heart.” After three auditions for MGM, a screen test was arranged, directed by musician Roger Edens. Mayer, encouraging but not enthusiastic, offered a studio contract at $100 per week. It was now October; my mother was just thirteen.
Within weeks, Frank Gumm passed away, victim to the spinal meningitis that had been present in his system for years. Mama later noted that her father made her feel emotionally safe and protected. Indeed, much of her makeup as a person came from her father. He was her champion, her safety net, and he made it clear that he didn’t care if she chose to continue singing or not. He loved her unconditionally. It was her mother who kept pushing. When my grandfather died, when my mother was so young, her primary parental emotional support was taken away from her. In her mind, she lost the one person who was on her side. Proving herself at MGM and grieving for her father mingled prematurely and uneasily in the teenager’s fragile psyche. Success in Hollywood would be used—precariously—as the basis for validation of her worth as a person.
Mama reminisced happily about her vaudeville years, a time she wanted to reference, as the pieces of “Born in a Trunk” were assembled.
A woman-child stepped through the mighty gates of MGM in late 1935. She had been working since age two, maturing professionally, but not personally. Her clarion voice, with all its color and brass, was her calling card, but a strong inner sense of identity had yet to be acquired, and she blamed her mother for that. From there, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, home of Garbo and Gable and Harlow, took over. Ethel Gumm was left behind, in the stir of stardust, and in her daughter’s selective memory. Mama reminisced happily about her vaudeville years, a time she wanted to reference, as the pieces of “Born in a Trunk” were assembled. She was part of a family of troupers, scraping for a living, split weeks from Poughkeepsie to Pocatello, Idaho, “dressing rooms and hotel rooms and waiting rooms and rooms behind-the-scenes.” It was a hardscrabble life, but Mama did well with traveling, with suitcases, with strangers, and with uncertainty. She toddled onto the stage like a litt
le pro, blessed with a big voice and a star presence to back it up. The audience was as eager to applaud her as she was to receive their applause.
Dance director Richard Barstow and Mama rehearsing.
Roger Edens and Leonard Gershe, my mother’s two miracle men, shaped her personal past into “Born in a Trunk,” an intimate panorama of song, dance, and comedy, an all-American pastiche of entertainment nostalgia. This was the moment for Vicki Lester to wow the sneak-previewers, and for Judy Garland to electrify the critics, the moviegoers, and maybe the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, too. “Born in a Trunk” was crafted as the framing device to feature some classic American Songbook tunes: “I’ll Get By,” “You Took Advantage of Me,” “Black Bottom,” “The Peanut Vendor,” “Melancholy Baby,” and “Swanee.” The goal was to capture the essence of MGM Freed Unit complexity—hokey, arty, and slangy all at once. An American in Paris was the impetus, but Singin’ in the Rain (1952) and The Band Wagon (1953) were other inspiring benchmarks of craft and creativity, each offering an appealing and sexy song-and-dance sequence, a musical climax. “Born in a Trunk” has no sexual overtones, and the girl is neither Leslie Caron nor Cyd Charisse. But it does have Mama, the girl-next-door who can clown like Chaplin, and sing like… well, like no one else but Judy Garland.
The production team differed greatly from the movie itself. George Cukor had moved on to his next project. (He couldn’t endorse the high-concept extravagance, anyway.) Dance director Richard Barstow and Roger Edens replaced him in the director’s chair. Irene Sharaff served as art director, but Gene Allen took on the scene design, leaving the costumes to Sharaff. The new cinematographer was Harold Rosson (The Wizard of Oz and Singin’ in the Rain) who already had a relationship with Mama and with Technicolor. Richard Barstow would continue as choreographer. My father came up with the very efficient plan to shoot at night, citing to Jack Warner the distinct advantages. It was summer, and the soundstages would easily rise above ninety degrees during the day; my mother could pre-record and have her costumes fitted at Western Costume during the day while the dancers rehearsed; and, Mama, being a self-confessed “nighthawk,” would respond positively to the nocturnal schedule.