Merv Griffin- A Life in the Closet

by Darwin Porter

  After Kennedy retired for the evening, an aide in white gloves escorted Merv down the steps toward the door. At the foot of the steps, Merv encountered Jacqueline Kennedy. She kissed him on the cheek. “Truman tells me you're a delight.” She was referring to her friend, Truman Capote. “Let's lunch. I'll call you.”

  “And then she just seemed to disappear,” Merv said. “At first I thought I'd just dreamed her appearance. She was one of the most beautiful and enchanting creatures I'd ever met. She moved with the grace of a summer butterfly. Of course, I didn't really expect her to call me. I thought it was just a polite thing to say. I was wrong about that. Jackie Kennedy, or so I learned, always meant what she said.”

  ***

  After their joint appearance in Washington, Merv did a complete “about face” as regards his opinion of Barbra Streisand. He was so impressed at how she'd gone over at the White House that he called Liberace and suggested that he hire Barbra for his opening act at the Riviera in Las Vegas.

  Taking Merv's suggestion, Liberace signed the young star as an extraadded attraction, granting her a salary of $7,500 a week.

  Regrettably, on opening night and on the two following nights as well, Barbra bombed in front of Liberace's older bluehaired ladies. His fans seemed startled by her innovative belting style and didn't get her act at all.

  A critic for the Hollywood Reporter wrote, “Her makeup made her look like something that just climbed off a broom. When she sang, it was like the wailing of a banshee bouncing up and down on marionette strings. Her outrageous grooming almost nullifies her talent.”

  At this point Liberace intervened, showing the same overthetop flair he'd used in salvaging Elvis's act after his first appearance in Las Vegas. In Barbra's dressing room, Liberace tossed out her dull gray wardrobe and replaced it with an almost electric gold lamé gown with dangling earrings. Remembering what Shirley Temple's mother had told her moppet star, Liberace said, “Sparkle, Barbra, sparkle! This is Vegas.”

  The gimmick worked. When Barbra made her fourth and most stunning appearance, her act ended with thunderous applause.

  Liberace called Merv the next day and thanked him for hooking him up with Barbra. “The gal is gonna go far,” Liberace predicted. “Maybe even become a bigger name than both of us.”

  “No one in show business will ever become as big as you, Sadie,” Merv assured him.

  “That's true, Fannie Mae,” Liberace said. “Now let's get down to some serious gal talk. I want to know who's fucking you now—and don't leave out a single detail, regardless of how sordid. After you've spilled the beans, I'll tell you who I had last night. You won't believe it!”

  “You don't mean….”Merv said.

  “Yes, I do mean that one,” Liberace said. “The straightest man in show business. Mr. Skirt-Chaser himself. And we're not talking Sinatra either. I'll leave that conquest for you. After having that man of my dreams, I can only say those Vegas showgals didn't lie. It's a whopper.”

  “I bet he left you singing ‘That's Amore.’”

  “Not only that,” Liberace said. “I won't be able to sit down at my piano for a month.”

  ***

  During her next trip to New York, Jackie Kennedy called Merv and arranged a luncheon meeting. She preferred the bar of the Carlyle Hotel because she was assured of more privacy there. Watched over by the Secret Service, she greeted Merv warmly. When he appeared reluctant to kiss her on the cheek, she said. “You can touch me. After all, I'm not the Queen of England.”

  Throughout their rendezvous that afternoon, he wanted to look into her eyes, but she kept them hidden behind large dark glasses.

  Unlike the serene princess she evoked in front of TV cameras, in person, she was warm and rather earthy. She obviously had a love of gossip, and she pumped Merv for scandalous revelations in the movie industry. She was particularly interested in who was sleeping with whom. Merv filled her in on some shocking details, carefully avoiding speaking of his friend Marilyn Monroe. Actually, he'd wanted to ask her about her own affairs with various movie stars, notably Marlon Brando and William Holden, but he didn't dare.

  Jackie spoke candidly about their mutual friends, especially Truman Capote and Peter Lawford. “I know that Truman befriends me to my face,” she said, “then spreads the vilest gossip about me behind my back. But I still adore him. He tells me more about what's really going on in the world of celebrities than any other person. As for Peter…” She hesitated, putting down her glass. “I don't know how to say this. He's confided to me about your own involvement with him, so we can speak frankly. Peter's in love with me, and I don't know how to handle it.” She didn't say anything for a long moment, perhaps realizing she'd revealed too much.

  To rescue her from her embarrassment, he immediately changed the subject. He urged her to come onto his show. “Talk about ratings. We'd blow everybody else off the air.”

  He could only imagine the mischief reflected in her eyes when she came up with an idea for one of his shows. “I could list all the men in the world I'd like to seduce—that is, if I haven't gotten around to some of them already.”

  “Name names,” he said. “I'm all ears.”

  “Henry Kissinger.”

  “But he's so ugly,” he said.

  “Beautiful women down through the ages have not always sought out equally beautiful men,” she said. “Perhaps just the opposite. A woman can be attracted to a man's brain. Or his power. Look at all those silly German housewives throwing themselves in the path of Hitler.”

  “I think beautiful women should bed ugly men, and only for their money,” he said.

  Later in her life when Jackie married Aristotle Onassis, Merv told Hadley, “I think I planted the idea in her head.”

  Jacqueline Kennedy

  as First Lady

  Back at the Carlyle, Jackie seemed to be enjoying their game. She continued to name names. “Prince Philip, of course. He's so handsome, so stately. John Glenn, most definitely. Andrè Malraux. Dr. Christiaan Barnard. Robert McNamara. General Maxwell Taylor. If they weren't gay, I'd add Cary Grant and Rudolph Nureyev to the list. Did you know that Jack often calls Cary Grant because he likes to hear the sound of his voice? I could go on and on. Alistair Cooke. Franklin Roosevelt Jr., Gianni Agnelli. And out of deference to your opinion, Eugene R. Black. If you want money, who better than the president of the World Bank?”

  Months later, shocked and horrified at the assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Merv sent his condolences to Jackie. A few weeks later he received a warm reply, thanking him.

  At the beginning of her marriage to Aristotle Onassis, Merv received another call from Jackie. She was seriously tempted to go on nationwide television to counterattack headlines around the world calling her a golddigger. Such rumors had existed since she was first seen with Onassis. But these rumors exploded when a steward on the shipping tycoon's yacht wrote a tellall book.

  In it, he claimed that he'd personally witnessed Jackie sign a 170clause marriage contract that stipulated, among other agreements, that man and wife would occupy separate bedrooms throughout the marriage. According to the steward, the contract also called for her getting an allowance of $585,000 a year. In case of a divorce, she was to be given $20 million in cash.

  “Such lies!” Jackie said to Merv. “The day I married Ari, my annuity from the Kennedy Estate was cut off. I also lost my widow's pension from the government, which I'd been drawing since Jack died. There was no prenuptial agreement with Ari. Right now I have less than five thousand dollars in my bank account. To manage, I have to charge everything to Olympic Airlines.”

  Merv was elated at the prospect of such an appearance on his show by Jackie, knowing it would be one of the most watched interviews in the history of television. But two weeks later she phoned him again. “You must forgive me,” she said. “I called you in a fit of madness. I can't go on your show and make a public spectacle of myself.”

  “But you are a spectacle, Jackie.” he said. “
Through no fault of your own, of course.”

  “Such an appearance would be too personal,” she said. “Only make more unwelcome headlines.” She seemed near tears as she put down the phone.

  ***

  In the summer of 1964, Merv decided to go back onto the strawhat circuit, contracting to appear in a revival of the George Abbott and Philip Dunning play, Broadway, which had originally opened in 1926.

  Over the years since then, the play had been presented in many different productions across America and Europe. The chanteuse Greta Keller had starred in the Viennese production of the play, with a young Marlene Dietrich in the chorus line. Backstage and in various boudoirs, she entertained Greta and the other showgirls by playing her saw. Later Marlene entertained Greta in a more intimate way.

  Merv met the playwright, who'd journeyed from New York to New Hope in Pennsylvania to see the latest production of his play. Born in 1887, George Abbott was still going strong. Merv mistakenly assumed that Abbott was on his last legs. As the years went by Merv was amazed that the playwright “was the man who refused to die.” Merv heard that at the age of ninetynine, Abbott was revising and directing a production of Damn Yankees. In 1995, when Abbott died three weeks short of his 108th birthday, Merv was astonished to read that a week and a half before his death, he was dictating revisions to the second act of Pajama Game. Merv told friends that he wanted to be like Abbott, plotting his new game show as he neared birthday number 110.

  ***

  Working night after night at the dining table of his New York apartment, Merv slowly developed a new TV quiz show concept. Initially calling it What's The Question?, he later changed the title to the more dramatic Jeopardy!

  TV quiz shows had enjoyed tremendous popularity in the 1950s until headlinemaking scandals broke in the latter part of the decade. Contestants came forth to testify that they were often supplied with the answers by producers desperate to make the shows more entertaining. “We got around that problem by openly supplying the answers to our contestants, and then letting them figure out what the question was,” Merv said.

  Contestants faced such dilemmas as:

  ANSWER: JOHN BILLINGTON, WHO ARRIVED ON THIS BOAT, IS GENERALLY CONSIDERED AMERICA's FIRST MURDERER.

  QUESTION: WHAT WAS THE MAYFLOWER?

  OR

  ANSWER: HE COMMANDED AT THE SECOND BULL RUN AND IS SAID TO HAVE DEVISED A SPORT THAT LATER USED A BULLPEN.

  QUESTION: WHO WAS ABNER DOUBLEDAY?

  To make the show livelier, Merv interjected such concepts as the “Daily Double,” which was inspired by his love of horse racing. This would lead to objections from the network. Executives felt the term was too suggestive of gambling. But Merv stood his ground and the feature was retained.

  When he first presented the show to Mort Werner, head of NBC, he didn't like it, finding the “answers” to the questions too hard. His assistant, Grant Tinker, however, urged him to buy it. Tinker later became producer of such programs as The Mary Tyler Moore Show and later, president of NBC.

  Although reluctant, Werner bought Jeopardy! for NBC early in 1964. Remembering a longago promise, Merv called Bob Murphy, his schoolmate in San Mateo, hiring him to interview potential contestants. In time, Bob would climb Merv's corporate ladder to producer status of The Merv Griffin Show.

  Until Jeopardy! found its voice and its audience, its history was shaky. Basically, it was a quiz show based on trivia about such topics as literature, music, pop culture, history, and science, among other topics. The show first aired on NBC on March 30, 1964. Eventually it found an audience, running until January 3, 1975.

  As the emcee of the show, Merv hired Art Fleming, an actor who'd made his Broadway debut at the age of four. Standing 6’ 4”, he was a former carnival barker and naval hero. When he signed on, Art thought it was a temporary gig that might pay his rent for a few months, hardly realizing that he'd be the host of 2,858 shows before his eventual termination.

  Merv later claimed that Jeopardy! wasn't canceled because of bad ratings, but because eleven years after its debut, NBC wanted to “redecorate” its daytime lineup of programming. “That time period has never since duplicated the ratings strength of Jeopardy! ” Merv said. “Chalk it up to a bad roll of the dice.”

  Three years after its cancellation, between October 2, 1978 and March 2, 1979, Jeopardy! was temporarily revived, with Art Fleming functioning as host. But the second time around, the show was not particularly successful, and once again it was canceled.

  But like the beast that wouldn't die, Jeopardy! was brought back for an encore, going on TV again in September 10, 1984—and still running until this day. Various foreignlanguage versions of Jeopardy! were adapted for international audiences as well.

  Lin Bolen, in charge of programming, conflicted with Merv on many an occasion. She activated her plan to fire Art Fleming, preferring to jettison old men and bring in “young studs” like Alex Trebek. Reportedly, Faye Dunaway based her character of the takenoprisoners executive in the movie, Network, on Bolen.

  Trebek was well known to Merv, having filled in as a substitute host on Merv's other show, Wheel of Fortune, when its regular emcee, Chuck Woolery, became sick. Under Trebek, Jeopardy! became the secondmost watched game show in the history of syndicated television, the first spot being occupied by Merv's own Wheel of Fortune.

  Art was bitterly disappointed when his contract wasn't renewed, claiming that his emcee gig on Jeopardy! “was the high point of my life.” He ended up hosting a trivia show Sunday nights in St. Louis. With his glory days on Jeopardy! long behind him, he died in Florida in 1995.

  Under the Canadianborn Trebek's hosting, Jeopardy! achieved its greatest success. He won two Emmy Awards for his role in the show, and the show itself has won eleven Emmys, a record for a quiz show. In January of 2001, TV Guide ranked Jeopardy! as Number 2 among the 50 Greatest Game Shows of All Time.

  ***

  During the early months of 1965, despite the success of Jeopardy!, Merv was restless. He still yearned to be a bigtime talk show host, and a deal was slow in coming. He had, however, received a number of offers to sing on variety shows or to emcee other game shows.

  The biggest offer involved his hosting of a TV series that would travel around the world, introducing international circus acts. He instructed his agent to turn it down, the job subsequently going to a fallen movie star, Don Ameche, instead.

  Merv eagerly wanted to return The Merv Griffin Show to television. Each night as he watched Johnny Carson on latenight TV, he bit his nails. “I was always a nail biter,” he told friends. “To me, nothing relieves anxiety as much as biting your nails. It also cuts down on manicure bills.”

  Early in 1965, Chester H. (Chet) Collier—at the time, VP of Group W, the Westinghouse Broadcasting company—made an appearance in Merv's life. Two years younger than Merv, Chet with his balding head, waist bulge, and double chin looked fifteen years older.

  Merv had been impressed with how Chet had launched The Mike Douglas Show in Cleveland in 1961, later transferring its base to Philadelphia. Thanks to its syndication of original programs, that show had signaled the debut of a new era in television. No longer did a successful show have to be created by teams affiliated with CBS, ABC, or NBC.

  Chet also had a formative hand in returning Steve Allen to television with his own show and jumpstarting the career of Regis Philbin. Still active in the mid1990s, Chet joined Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes in the launching the Fox News Channel.

  Chet convinced Merv to sign with Westinghouse, an organization best known at the time for its manufacture of washing machines. “You could be the master of your own show,” Chet promised Merv, “and you wouldn't be censored by NBC or CBS, as you were in the past.” Merv interpreted that argument as a powerful lure.

  Trusting Chet's vision, Merv signed with Westinghouse in February of 1965, calling Chet a “oneman think tank.” There was only one significant drawback. At the time, the company's broadcast division was active in only f
ive regional markets: Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, and Merv's native San Francisco. Chet promised Merv that he would soon be broadcasting coast to coast, including Canada.

  As headquarters for his efforts, Merv was assigned the intimate Little Theater (later renamed the Helen Hayes Theater) on 44th Street in New York City, close to Sardi's. Originally the show was slated for a daytime slot, with Merv's faithful Bob Shanks functioning as producer and with Kirk Alexander directing.

  Over strong objections from almost all of his associates, Merv kept his promise to hire Arthur Treacher as his sidekick. Chet referred to the selection of Arthur as “Merv Griffin's folly.” The executive producer finally gave in, however, since he'd promised Merv creative control. Every objection involved the Englishman's age. “Wasn't Treacher born back when Queen Victoria sat on the throne?” Bob Shanks asked Merv.

  Left photo : “Let ‘em eat cake!” Merv's trenchant sidekick, Arthur Treacher,

  faces another birthday bash.

  Right photo : Merv with his role model Steve Allen, creator of the TV talk show.

  Arthur signed with Merv and thanked him. “I knew you'd come through for me one day, you dear little man,” Arthur told Merv.

  Long of face and tall in stature, Arthur stood before Merv's TV audience using crisp diction and what appeared to be a snobby disdain for almost everybody except Merv himself. “Look sharp!” he told the audience. “Here's the dear boy himself. Merrrrvyn!” At the ripe age of seventyone, Arthur would deliver that same introduction countless times.

  What Merv's producers didn't realize was that Arthur had previously developed a fan base of young people who'd seen him play the constable in the hit film Mary Poppins, which had been released a year before Merv's new show went on the air. These teenagers referred to Arthur as “granddaddy” and followed him down 44th Street every night after the show, clamoring for autographs and demanding that he sign his name as “Constable Jones,” the character he played in the Poppins film, instead of Arthur Treacher.