Merv Griffin- A Life in the Closet

by Darwin Porter

  “You didn't enjoy it?” Liberace asked. “I sure did. But then I can take a man's arm up my overworked ass. Where are you calling from?”

  “I'm in the hospital about to get stitches!”

  ***

  When his California binge was over, Merv flew back to New York to announce to CBS that he was moving his show's base of operations to Television City in Los Angeles, even though it meant abandoning the network's two-million dollar investment in restoring the Cort Theater. He was convinced he'd attract better and more interesting guests on the West Coast, where he wouldn't have to compete with so many other talking heads like Johnny Carson. “Nearly all guests wanted to go on Carson,” Merv claimed. “But if they couldn't get a spot on Carson, Frost, or Cavett, they'd come to me.”

  “King of Porn”

  John C. Holmes

  (Johnny Wadd)

  Merv's decision to move his show from New York to Los Angeles forced him to re-evaluate the role of Arthur Treacher within the show's revised lineup. For months, CBS had been pressuring Merv to replace Arthur with a younger, betterlooking sidekick. When Merv approached Arthur with the news, he was relieved to hear that he did not want to “move to a place where the earth shakes. Virginia and I want to remain in the East.” He was referring to his wife, Virginia Taylor, whom he had married back in 1940.

  Briefly, Merv supported the idea of naming Desi Arnaz Jr., the theneighteenyearold son of Lucille Ball and her estranged husband, Desi Arnaz, as a replacement. But eventually, the suits at CBS decided that Desi wasn't the right choice. Despite CBS's objections to Desi Jr., he did collaborate temporarily, cohosting a few of Merv's shows.

  From his home back on the East Coast, Arthur watched Desi Jr. in dismay, horrified at the show's new direction. Fortunately, he didn't need the income from Merv any more, as he'd signed to be the spokesman and figurehead for a fastfood chain (Arthur Treacher's Fish and Chips) which by then encompassed at least five hundred locations throughout the United States.

  As Arthur aged, his loyalty and enthusiasm for Merv waned, and a barely controlled bitterness set in. In a final interview, he referred to Merv as “that wretched little man.”

  Merv's second choice as a replacement for Arthur Treacher had been Sonny and Cher. The proposal, like many that had preceded it, elicited strenuous objections from CBS, but this time Merv persisted, and eventually won.

  Ironically, CBS was so impressed that eventually, they hired Sonny and Cher as hosts of their own variety show. “They became the hottest act on TV,” Merv said. “My judgment prevailed once again over CBS.”

  Merv was disappointed when his longtime producer, Bob Shanks, announced that he preferred to remain in the East. As a result, Merv hired a new producing team, Ernest Chambers and Saul Ilson. Other than that, however, he managed to retain most of his key staff members, paying the expenses of their moves to Los Angeles and helping them find homes there.

  One viewer summed up the aftereffects of Merv's westward migration to California. “When Merv was in New York he brought on people like Norman Mailer and Jimmy Breslin. I also remember a special show that was broadcast from the streets of Harlem when John Lindsay was mayor. ‘Give a Damn’ was the big slogan in the city. Burt Lancaster was there as a guest. But when Merv went Hollywood, boy did he go off the deep end. From Mailer and Breslin to Charo. Wow!”

  In December of 1975, Bob Shanks called Merv from New York to tell him that Arthur had died of a heart attack. Merv later recalled, “It was the saddest day of my life. I cried and cried some more and then made a decision. No one could replace Arthur. I'll just go out there at the beginning of every show and introduce myself to the audience.”

  And so he did for the run of the show.

  ***

  Merv's stint with CBS lasted for thirty tortuous months, and Merv's move to the West Coast, in clear opposition to the objections of the network suits, marked what Merv called “the beginning of the end.”

  Public reaction to Merv's move to Los Angeles evolved rapidly. Merv rented a house temporarily on North Bedford Drive in Beverly Hills. On his first morning there, some tourist buses stopped in front of the house. “My God,” he said, “they've already found out where I live.”

  That afternoon, however, he discovered that he wasn't the main attraction. He'd rented the house where the boyfriend of Lana Turner, gangster Johnny Stompanato, had been stabbed to death. Cheryl Crane, Lana's daughter—a teenager at the time — was blamed for the stabbing, but Hollywood insiders such as Howard Hughes and Frank Sinatra knew that it was Lana herself who killed Stompanato, with Cheryl being blamed because she'd get off with a lighter sentence.

  From his new base in “the murder house,” Merv had more time to go swimming, boating, and to play tennis, as he'd done in his youth. He was still battling “the suits” at CBS whose roster of complaints had expanded to include the way Eva Gabor exposed so much of her bosom, and Merv's bringing the outspoken cast of All in the Family onto one of his shows. Right before that sitcom shot to number one, the executives at CBS informed Merv that it was about to be removed from the airwaves.

  Merv's ratings continued to fall, and as a result, he lost stations. Behind the scenes, CBS plotted to replace his show with other contenders, one proposal which focused coverage, instead, on current artsindustry news. In a format evocative of Broadway Open House, it would have featured a theatrical program of breezy chitchat and musical numbers.

  As his relationship with CBS deteriorated, Merv began secret negotiations with Metromedia for syndicated, nationwide broadcasting of The Merv Griffin Show, with less censorship and with less programrelated interference from “the suits” upstairs. The president of the company told Merv, “You're welcome aboard at any time.”

  Meanhile, after months of private debates among management, CBS lowered the boom on Merv, firing him. By ending his contract in February of 1972, prior to its expiration, CBS was forced to pay him $250,000 in severance pay. That was in the dollars of the early 70s, which would be equivalent to about a million dollars today

  CBS's management team was shocked to learn that Merv had already negotiated a deal with Metromedia, where The Merv Griffin Show would remain as a staple fixture for the next thirteen years. “I'd no sooner left CBS than I was popping up on TV screens everywhere, based on the syndication successes of Metromedia. I won that round with CBS.”

  His newly reconfigured show made its debut for Metromedia on March 13, 1972 at the old Hollywood Palace Theater. Because of its ongoing direction by Dick Carson, Johnny Carson's brother, it seemed to carry an automatic, inbuilt form of oneupmanship for Merv against Johnny. Merv's producer was Bob Murphy, with Mort Lindsey once again conducting an eighteenpiece orchestra. A thinner, more visibly happy Merv greeted his guests, who on that important day included Milton Berle, Dinah Shore, Dom DeLuise, Angie Dickinson, and Dionne Warwick.

  As one of the many regrettable administrative policies in the history of television, nearly all of Merv's film archives from the thirty months of shows and interviews he did in association with CBS were erased.

  The “suits” decided to erase the tapes and use them again to record other shows. “Some of the great moments in television were lost forever,” Merv lamented when he heard about CBS's “tragic mistake, an action that showed CBS's utter contempt for what I'd done.”

  “CBS could have made a fortune on those old tapes,” Merv claimed. “I'll give you just one example—there are so many more. One of my greatest shows was when I reassembled, on air, the stars of all those Road movies. Bob Hope, Dorothy Lamour, and Bing Crosby were wonderful. It was a moment lost to TV history unless somewhere, some place out there in America, somebody recorded our show.”

  In 1973, following Merv's example, Johnny Carson also moved his show westward, in his case to “beautiful downtown Burbank.” Merv didn't feel the competition with Carson as intensely as he had before. Carson still went on weeknights at 11:30pm, with Merv taking the afternoon slot.

  Once, perha
ps as a means of stirring up a bit of drama, Dick Carson arranged for his brother, Johnny Carson, to appear on Merv's show as an unannounced surprise guest. After Merv recovered from his shock, he sat down and did a friendly hourlong interview with Carson.

  ***

  In spite of its failure under the CBS umbrella, Merv Griffin Productions continued to grow, with nearly fourhundred employees plus an annual gross that, in 1970, came close to ten million dollars. The company's assets included not only TV game shows, but radio stations, real estate (some of it platinum and within Rockefeller Center), and a hightech outfit known as Racing Patrol, Inc., developers of a closedcircuit TV system used at racetracks throughout the country.

  Merv's drinking sometimes led to bizarre behavior on the air. On one show with Vincent Price that focused on the actor's talents as a gourmet cook, Eva Gabor and Merv drank wine until Merv got bombed. “Quite accidentally, I spilled wine on Eva's décolletage,” he said. “On another night I was singing with the microphone over my head.”

  Seeking treatment, it was revealed that he had hypoglycemia. “I had to give up booze,” he said. “And whereas I could live with that, my having to give up Rocky Road ice cream was more than I could bear.”

  In Los Angeles, Merv began to relish life as a bachelor, enjoying the privacy the sprawling city afforded. George Cukor, who lived near Merv, became a close friend. Merv got invited to the director's allmale parties. George was something of a procurer, introducing Merv to a steady supply of some of the most handsome young men in Hollywood.

  Merv often took his choice for the night, perhaps an actor or model, back to the small cottage in the hills above the Sunset Strip. The house had once been occupied by Susan Hayward, who had died of cancer in 1975, no doubt from making the John Wayne film, The Conqueror, on locations that were very close to a highly radioactive site, a former atomic test site in Nevada.

  In October of 1974, Merv knew that he'd “arrived” when his name became a permanent part of the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He was number 1601, and his star still shines there today.

  ***

  Merv made it a point, after his return to Los Angeles, to visit Rock Hudson. Accompanied by his pal Roddy McDowall, he found Rock “in a panic” about having turned fifty. “Can you believe that?”Rock asked Merv. “Me, fifty? Rock Hudson stands for youthful virility.”

  Rock and Roddy shared memories of a birthday bash that had recently been staged for Rock at his house. The band hired for the night struck up “You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby” as Rock made his entrance at the top of the stairs. He strutted down the grand staircase in a diaper as friends who included Carol Burnett and Buddy Hackett howled with laughter.

  After an evening of memories and drinking, Rock invited Roddy and Merv to join him upstairs in bed. “Let's find out if we middleaged old farts can still cut the mustard.”

  ***

  It was a sad day when Merv was reunited with his old friend, Henry Willson, who had been moved into the Motion Picture Country Home for Indigent Show People at Woodland Hills. “I'm reduced to charity,” he told Merv. “It's all gone now.”

  They talked nostalgically of the beautiful hunks they'd shared in common. But there was bitterness associated with Henry's memories of Rock Hudson. He'd never forgiven Rock for deserting him.

  As Henry confided to Merv, he'd continued to live for a few years as richly as he had during his heyday by selling off his silverware, antiques, and other valuables.

  Before driving away, Merv left Henry five hundred dollars as a nostringsattached gift. On November 2, 1978, he was saddened to learn about Henry's death at the age of 67 from cirrhosis of the liver.

  Rock sent flowers to Henry's funeral. Merv did too, but did not identify where they had come from, as it was still considered dangerous for one's career to be associated too closely with Henry Willson.

  ***

  Merv was particularly enchanted by athlete Jim Palmer, whom he invited onto his show. Palmer had built a worldwide fan base thanks partly to his ads for Jockey underwear, especially the tightfitting bikini kind. Merv said that the sight of Palmer in his bikini underwear “gives new meaning to the term ‘pitcher's mound.’”

  Before the camera, within the context of his show, Merv urged Palmer to take off his pants and reveal to the studio audience what underwear he was wearing that day. Palmer refused but did admit that he filled out his jockey pouch with no padding from wardrobe. Merv looked disappointed when the star pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles wouldn't perform a striptease.

  Merv continued his fascination with underwear models, sometimes bringing young men onto the show who looked like they didn't really know why they were there. Jeff Aquilon, a Bruce Weber model and one of the most famous male images of the 70s and early 80s, was Merv's alltime fantasy male. “His rear end is classic,” Merv told Hadley. “There's nothing wrong with his front part either.”

  In the late 1970s, Merv had first seen a fashion spread of the handsome beefy model in GQ. He was modeling a pair of Speedo briefs. “Daddy, buy me some of that,” he said to Hadley. Merv was also shown a flagrantly erotic photo of Jeff reclining on a bed, wearing seductively unbuttoned long johns.

  Merv tried, perhaps a bit too strenuously, to attach social significance to Jeff's appearance on his show. Merv had been told about how fashion photographer Bruce Weber, in GQ 's own words, had discovered a college water polo player from California and in the pages of GQ redefined the American man. “We changed forever the look of magazines, photography, and advertising,” Weber said. He claimed that Jeff became “the most famous face—and body—of the modern GQ. Ah yes, I seem to recall his physical splendor—in intimate detail!”

  ***

  Merv had stayed in constant touch with the porn star, Cal Culver, and when he landed in California, he often spent nights with Merv. Cal had continued to arrange introductions, hooking Merv up with handsome young actors and models. “A lot of studs back then wanted to meet THE Merv Griffin,” Cal said. “And Merv continued to be generous with me for the work I did for him.”

  After Rock Hudson and Liberace tired of Cal, he went through the predictable conquests in Hollywood, including Peter Lawford, George Cukor, and “the usual suspects.” He'd even received a call from Sammy Davis Jr. who informed Cal that “I'm partial to blonds of any sex.”

  Cal related to Merv some of the details associated with his seduction by George Cukor. “I managed to get through a night with old liver lips. He was repulsive but I kept my hardon.”

  “It's unbelievable some of the calls I get from stars,” Cal told Merv. “I didn't know some of these guys were secretly gay. Orson Welles, Richard Harris. Even Christopher Reeve. Who'd have thought it? Someday I'll tell you what Steve McQueen wanted me to do.”

  Cal's greatest dream was to play the runner, Billy Siuve, in The Front Runner, a bestselling novel by Patricia Nell Warren. Paul Newman had acquired the screen rights and had announced that he was going to play the gay coach. “Paul and I have been going at it like gangbusters,” Cal said. “You know, of course, that he's bi. All those rumors are true.”

  According to Merv,

  “Jim Palmer in bikini briefs gives

  new meaning to the term

  ‘pitcher's mound.’”

  The movie, regrettably, was never made. And although he'd seriously considered the project, Newman, in Cal's words, “chickened out.”

  There were high hopes at the time that Cal would get the leading part in the movie adaptation of Mary Renault's novel, The King Must Die. “This Greek gentleman, who's really interested in me, has purchased the rights. He's agreed to star me in spite of my background in porn.” Regrettably, this became just another impossible dream that never came true for Cal.

  In 1976, Cal told Merv that it was almost certain that he'd be awarded the protagonist's role of Numie, the male hustler, in the Key Westbased film, The Last Resort, starring, among others, Eartha Kitt. The film was based on a steamy, widely publicized novel by Darwin Port
er, Butterflies in Heat, which Manor Reviews had described as:

  “THE MOST SCORCHING NOVEL OF THE BIZARRE, THE FLAMBOYANT, AND THE CORRUPT SINCE MIDNIGHT COWBOY. THE STRIKINGLY BEAUTIFUL BLOND HUSTLER, NUMIE CHASE, HAS COME TO THE END OF THE LINE. HERE, IN THE SEARING HEAT OF TROPICAL TORTUGA KEY, HE AROUSES PASSIONS IN SIX FLAMBOYANT BUT VULNERABLE PEOPLE THAT EXPLODE UNDER THE BLOODRED SUN.”

  After several “casting couch” auditions with Cal, the film's producer, Jerry Wheeler, decided to cast another blond male, supermodel Matt (“The Marlboro Man”) Collins, into the role instead. His reasoning? “Having a reallife porno star playing the romantic lead in Butterflies would send the wrong signal—after all, we're not making that kind of movie.”

  Resentful that another chance for legitimate film success had eluded him, Cal briefly toyed with the idea of writing an autobiographical memoir. He had noted the fame and success of such roughly equivalent tell-all books as Michael Kearns' The Happy Hustler and Marc Stevens' aptly named confessional, 10½. Cal wanted to produce a memoir, too, but in a style radically different from the others.

  Cal Culver After Dark

  “I want to depict two different personas in the book,” he told Darwin Porter. “I want to write from the viewpoint of both Casey Donovan and Cal Culver. Casey will be the hustler, who will do anything, either on screen or at private parties, as long as he gets paid. Cal, however, will represent the serious side of me, a legitimate actor who became corrupted. A man who wanted to lead a quiet, respectable life with his lover, Tom Tryon.”

  Cal was referring to his older companion, the handsome Yaleeducated actor and bestselling novelist, Tom Tryon. He had played important roles in Darryl F. Zanuck's The Longest Day (1962) and in Otto Preminger's The Cardinal (1963).