Merv Griffin- A Life in the Closet

by Darwin Porter

  “Those gals looked like jailbait,” Merv said.

  “They are,” Steve said, smiling mischievously. “The way I like them.”

  “Aren't you afraid of getting caught?”

  “It's a risk worth taking,” Steve said. “I have a lust inside me that must be satisfied at all costs.”

  At last Merv was allowed to meet David Butler, the director of By the Light of the Silvery Moon, which he called “oldfashioned corn.” Merv was surprised that the director hadn't summoned him before.

  Butler was a rugged Californian of the old school, although he still lived with his father and had never married. There were rumors. He'd even survived the San Francisco earthquake when he was eleven years old.

  Merv wanted to talk about his role in the movie, but David deflected that, telling about his early days in silent films, including when he'd been hired to work as an extra for five dollars a day in The Birth of a Nation (1915). He told Merv that it beat “scooping up camel dung.” His first job on films was shoveling up shit dropped by camels appearing in desert pictures. “I've directed everybody from Rin-Tin-Tin to Errol Flynn and Bob Hope,” David boasted.

  Finally, Merv got up enough nerve to ask the big question. “Well, do you think you can make a star out of me?”

  At that point David was called back to the set. Before leaving, he looked Merv up and down. “I'm still debating exactly what to do with you in the picture.”

  The next afternoon Steve seemed very agitated. “Some god damn bitch stood me up.” He took Merv's arm and directed him toward their dressing room. “Count today as your lucky day,” he said, once he'd entered the dressing room and locked the door.“I've got to have it real bad. Think you can handle it?”

  Merv said nothing but was enthralled as Steve stripped down for him. He'd later tell Roddy, “Maybe Mae West or Joan Crawford could swallow that log, but I couldn't. I did my best and I got him off. From now on, I'll be begging for it every chance I can get.”

  “You are one lucky guy,” Roddy said. “Every homo in Hollywood dreams of seducing Steve Cochran. If not Steve, then John Payne.”

  “He's available?” Merv asked.

  “In Hollywood, if you didn't know it by now, all the handsome studs are available. It depends on how you approach them.”

  One day Merv returned to his shared dressing room and noticed that the yellow ribbon was not on the doorknob. Thinking he might get lucky again, he entered the room and walked in on Steve, who was standing completely nude searching for his underwear.

  Joan Crawford in a robe emerged from the rear where she'd obviously taken a shower. She remembered Merv from Pebble Beach and greeted him warmly, not seeming in the least embarrassed that he'd caught her with Steve. As Merv later said, she was not Nancy Davis running and hiding at Robert Walker's house.

  Joan was also not shy about exposing her own body, as she got dressed. After putting on his clothes, Steve wetkissed Joan good-bye, as the diva continued to chat with Merv. She asked him if he'd escort her to a party Friday night, and he eagerly accepted. “Do you own a tux?”

  “Do I ever!” he said. “I have two. Left over from all those years of singing with Freddy Martin's band.”

  After Joan made arrangements for him to pick her up, she kissed him lightly on the lips. Before departing, she turned and smiled at him. “Don't you think Steve is the best lay in Hollywood? What talent that guy has.” And then she was gone.

  Merv got lucky time and time again with Steve. He became better with practice and bonded with the actor. It was a sad day when Steve told him good-bye. He was leaving Warners to form his own production company, and he promised Merv he would get good roles for him when he started producing his own movies. In the weeks and months ahead, Merv waited and waited for the call that never came.

  Encountering Doris Day on the lot of Warners, Merv confronted her about his role in the picture. He demanded to know from her when he was going to be called to appear on camera with her. She politely but firmly brushed him aside, assuring him that his big break would come soon. “I'll have a talk with Jack Warner,” she promised. “Everything will be fine, you'll see.”

  By now Merv was growing leery of any promise from Doris. Then his luck changed, or at least he thought it had when he was summoned to Jack Warner's office. Perhaps Doris had come through for him after all.

  In Jack's office, Merv was greeted warmly. “Griff, your time has come. I want you to play the male lead in By the Light of the Silvery Moon. Gordon MacRae's off the picture. We'll have to reshoot his scenes with you.”

  Merv was elated.

  “For three days in a row, MacRae has been too drunk to go before the camera,” Jack said. “I'm not putting up with any more of his shit. I fired him today and ordered him off the lot.”

  Merv was so overjoyed he couldn't sleep that night. He and Monty went out and got drunk — or rather Merv got drunk. Monty had already been drinking before Merv arrived home from work.

  The next day a note from Jack Warner arrived for Merv at Steve's dressing room. “I learned that we're too far into the picture to change stars at this point,” Jack wrote. “We've sobered MacRae up, and we think we can keep him dry until the picture is filmed. Be at my house Sunday night at eight for a big party. Bring a date. Someone with a title. Practically all my guests will be either a big movie star or royalty.”

  At long last David Butler decided how to use Merv in By the Light of the Silvery Moon. To Merv's great disappointment, he learned that he had only one line of dialogue.

  Dressed in a mackinaw, with a large bullhorn, Merv was cast as an announcer near the final reel of the film. “All you figure skaters grab your favorite partner and let's skate to our favorite song.” Naturally that song was “By the Light of the Silvery Moon.”

  Even though his role was small, Merv hoped for billing along with the other supporting players including Billy Gray, Leon Ames, Rosemary DeCamp, and Mary Wickes, the latter cast as a sarcastic maid. Merv's appearance was uncredited.

  When he finally got to see the final cut of By the Light of the Silvery Moon, he found that his one scene was a disaster. He'd used a bullhorn to call out to the figure skaters, including Doris and Gordon, and that instrument practically obscured his face. His dream of movie stardom was growing dimmer by the day.

  ***

  On the days Merv wasn't working, he drove Monty Clift around Hollywood, searching for the right trumpet that would be the mouthpiece of his character Prewitt. He was about to immortalize himself in that role in James Jones's From Here to Eternity, which was to be directed by Fred Zinnemann.

  Merv was mildly disturbed to learn that Frank Sinatra had also been cast in the picture. “If the role calls for a singer, why don't you get Zinnemann to cast me? I'd be great.”

  Monty assured him that “Frankie doesn't get to sing in the picture. It's a war drama. Don't you ever read a fucking book?”

  Monty just had to get the right horn, and Merv drove him to practically every store in Greater Los Angeles that sold musical instruments. Regardless of how many instruments he tried out, Monty could not find “the perfect fit.” Finally, he came across a dusty old store in North Hollywood that had sold instruments to jazz musicians back in the 1920s. After trying out the worn trumpet, Monty claimed he'd found his instrument.

  The role of Prewitt began to consume Monty's life. He virtually worked night and day with his coach, Mira Rostova, when she returned to his life after they'd had a serious disagreement.

  Watching Monty's intensity as he worked with Mira made Merv realize that he'd never be a serious actor. “I just don't have the concentration,” he told Monty. “Hell, you've rehearsed that one scene with Mira a hundred times, and she's still not satisfied. Neither are you. It's only a movie, for Christ's sake. Speaking of movies, I want to go out. Wanna come with me?”

  “No, Mira and I have to rehearse,” Monty said.

  Monty even coerced Merv into going with him to a gym for workouts, something Merv ha
d resisted up to now. In From Here to Eternity, Monty, in spite of his frail frame, was cast as a boxer. He had to get his body in shape for the role. He'd even flown to meet James Jones, the author of the book, who taught Monty how to throw his famous left jab.

  Back in Hollywood at their gym, Monty tried out the punch on Merv and succeeded in loosening a front tooth. Merv had to rush to the dentist for emergency work.

  “Monty is driving me out of the house,” Merv told Johnny Riley in a phone call to San Francisco. He plays that God damn trumpet night and day to bugle sheet music. He's so offkey he's splitting my eardrums.”

  Taking his training seriously, Monty woke Merv at five o'clock in the morning so that Merv would drive him to the Hollywood High School athletic field. The actor's license had either been lost or suspended. Merv didn't know which. Catching up on his sleep, Merv would nod off at the wheel of the parked car, which actually belonged to his agent, Bullets Durgom. Occasionally, he would wake up at some traffic noise only to see Monty still marching around the track pretending to be a G.I. during the weeks before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Monty even wore a soldier's uniform.

  One night Mira Rostova waited with Merv at his rented house until Monty showed up. Monty's invitation for drinks was at seven o'clock. By nine o'clock there was still no sign of Monty.

  Suddenly, Merv heard him roar into the driveway. As Merv rushed out, Monty was crashing into the garage door. He slammed the gears into reverse. The car lurched across the lawn and crashed into a hedge concealing the mailbox. Finally, Monty came to a stop.

  Merv and Mira rushed to his side, finding that he was not injured. The car was still in running order, but it had been badly damaged. Merv dreaded confronting his agent, Bullets, about the damaged car. While Monty's vehicle was being repaired, Merv had foolishly lent him Bullets' vehicle.

  “Get in,” Monty said. Mira refused and so did Merv. In his drunken state, Monty screamed, “You're nothing but shitheads. Shitheads.” He backed the car up and pulled away, hitting the road again, with tires screeching.

  From Here to Eternity: Wartime passion on and off the screen:

  Left: Donna Reed with Frank Sinatra; Right Burt Lancaster with Deborah Kerr

  Mira predicted that Monty would die in an automobile accident one day.

  Two days later Bullets learned what had happened to his car and garage. Barely concealing his anger, he showed up at Merv's doorstep. He'd already inspected the damage to the mailbox, yard, and garage. Monty had sent the borrowed car to a garage for repairs.

  After looking around at the debris and the wreck of his house, Bullets went into the kitchen where it looked as if the dishes hadn't been washed since Merv and Monty moved in. Politely but firmly, Bullets suggested that Merv and Monty should move out “sooner than later.”

  The next day Merv set out to find a modest rental since money was tight. He finally found a place called the Commodore Garden Apartments behind Grauman's Chinese Theater off Hollywood Boulevard.

  Two days after moving in, Merv had seen most of his fellow tenants coming and going. “There's not an ugly among them,” he told Roddy. “The most gorgeous guys and dolls I've ever seen in Hollywood. Or seen anywhere in one bunch for that matter.”

  Roddy was familiar with the Commodore. “No wonder they're so hot: that building contains the most highpriced hookers in town and the most expensive hustlers. Movie stars go there to fuck them on offtherecord nights.”

  Merv began to evaluate his fellow tenants. He kept an eye on two handsome young men who lived next door to him, but he'd never see them during the day. He agreed with Roddy that the male tenants at the Commodore were the most well built he'd seen in town. He suspected that all of them had come to Hollywood dreaming of becoming the next Rock Hudson, but had to hustle homosexuals as a means of supporting themselves.

  Monty refused to move into the Commodore with Merv, but returned to his studio at the Château Marmont. Merv had heard that he was still seeing Greta Garbo, but Monty neither confirmed nor denied it.

  Bullets called Merv to tell him that he'd found his second car in the garage, and all damages had been repaired, including those to his garage door, front yard, and mailbox. Monty had paid for all the harm he'd caused.

  One night Monty arrived at Merv's door at the Commodore. He was drunk, and Merv showed him in. It took two hours of heavy drinking before Monty finally told him why he was here.

  “I was getting too close to you and Mira, and I need my own space,” Monty told him. “I know you love me, and, believe me, I don't get off on breaking someone's heart. I want us to remain friends. But one part of our life has to end. The sexual thing. I've met someone I've fallen in love with.”

  Merv appeared to be heartbroken, but never really was. He was Monty's friend but had never enjoyed one minute of their lovemaking. Monty slept over that night, and Merv put him to bed as he had so many times in their past. But when he went to sleep beside Monty, he felt relieved that their socalled romance was over. After his first intimate night with Monty, he never wanted to repeat the experience, finding it completely unsatisfactory.

  Before leaving late the following morning, Monty told Merv that he was going to fly to Honolulu with the cast of From Here to Eternity in a month or so, and that he wanted Merv to fly down to join him for a holiday. “I'll send you the tickets.”

  Merv thought that was a graceful exit line and never expected Monty to carry through on his promise. To his surprise, tickets for a roundtrip flight to Honolulu did arrive on his doorstep. Merv cabled Monty he'd be arriving there in just ten days.

  “Monty's a rotten lover,” Merv told Roddy, “but I suspect he'll be a great friend.”

  Roddy agreed with that, but added an ominous comment. “He'll be a great friend until he kills himself.”

  ***

  When Merv got his next paycheck, he planned to sample some of the betterlooking hustlers at the Commodore Garden Apartments. He'd already staked out the object of his desire, a handsome, lanternjawed young man with a sculpted physique.

  No doubt he was an actor, at least in Merv's mind, and probably hustled on the side to earn a living. Early every afternoon, he appeared on the roof lying on a chaise longue. A lot of the hustlers did that to keep their bodies tanned and ready for the next customer. Every actor wore a bathing suit except the young man who intrigued Merv. He wore the skimpiest of posing straps crafted from a gray velour that clearly outlined his genitalia.

  On his first payday, Merv in baggy swimming trunks got up enough courage to make his move. Only problem was, he didn't know how much money to offer the actor. He finally decided that a twentydollar bill would do just fine.

  “Hi,” he said moving in as close as he could to the posing strap. “I'm Merv Griffin.”

  “Hi, yourself,” said the young man, shading his eyes from the sun to get a good look at Merv. “I'm Charlton Heston.”

  Merv didn't feel comfortable initiating a dialogue, and felt nervous coming on to this handsome, athleticlooking man. Rather awkwardly, he said, “That swimming suit you're wearing is a bit brief. I would never be seen in that even in the privacy of my bedroom.”

  Charlton laughed. “It's not a swimming suit. In New York I posed for art classes for $1.25 an hour. They didn't want me to show my dick, so I had to wear this strap. During all the days I spent posing nude, I got an erection only once. I had this problem. It gets pretty crowded down there.”

  After that remark, Merv's suspicion was confirmed. Charlton Heston was definitely a hustler.

  “My wife sewed on the velour,” Charlton said.

  “Oh, I didn't know you were married,” Merv said.

  “My wife, Lydia, is an actress. She's out of town on a job.”

  On hearing this, Merv did not immediately abandon pursuing Charlton. He'd been in Hollywood long enough to conclude that all actors were at least bisexual.

  Charlton did confirm that he was an actor and was actually appearing in a movie that was presently being
screened at a nearby theater. He invited Merv to come and see it with him. “I've seen it ten times already. Each time by myself. It'd be good to get another opinion. “Are you an actor too?”

  “Yes,” Merv said rather proudly. “Jack Warner is grooming me to become Doris Day's next leading man.”

  After both men had dressed separately within their respective apartments, they met in front of the Commodore to stroll down Hollywood Boulevard together. At the movie house, Merv learned the film was Dark City, and was startled to see that Charlton was the actual star.

  Noting his surprise, Charlton said, “I didn't get all that much money for it. That's why I'm still living at the Commodore Garden Apartments.”

  During the screening of Dark City, which was first released in 1950, Merv was impressed with Charlton's performance. He'd been cast as a war veteran opposite the sultry blonde, Lizabeth Scott, who was hailed in the press as a combination of Lauren Bacall and Veronica Lake. The press often referred to Lizabeth as “one of the baritone babes of Hollywood,” hoping the reading public would draw their own conclusions from that.

  In Dark City, Lizabeth played a nightclub singer, and Merv sat through five songs, later claiming that the movie was the only musical film noir he'd ever seen. “If this keeps up,” he whispered to Charlton, “Humphrey Bogart will be singing in his next film.”

  The man who said “no.”

  Charlton Heston

  At one tense moment in the film, Merv decided to go for it. He slowly placed his hand on Charlton's left knee and let it gradually move upward to his target, which had been so recently encased in a posing strap.

  With his own firm hand, Charlton took Merv's hand and slowly placed it back in Merv's lap. The actor leaned over and whispered into Merv's ear, “I'm not that kind of actor.”

  When the movie was over, Merv complimented Charlton on his performance. On the walk back to the Commodore, no mention was made of the groping.