H O L L Y W O O D M A D O N N A HOLLYWOOD LEGENDS SERIES CARL ROLLYSON, GENERAL EDITOR This page intentionally left blank H O L L Y W O O D M A D O N N A Loretta Young Bernard F. Dick (cid:49)(cid:32)(cid:22)(cid:54)(cid:13)(cid:44)(cid:45)(cid:22)(cid:47)(cid:57)(cid:202)(cid:42)(cid:44)(cid:13)(cid:45)(cid:45)(cid:202)(cid:34)(cid:19)(cid:202)(cid:31)(cid:22)(cid:45)(cid:45)(cid:22)(cid:45)(cid:45)(cid:22)(cid:42)(cid:42)(cid:22)(cid:202)(cid:85)(cid:202)(cid:27)(cid:1)(cid:10)(cid:28)(cid:45)(cid:34)(cid:32) www.upress.state.ms.us The University Press of Mississippi is a member of the Association of American University Presses. Copyright © 2011 by University Press of Mississippi All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America First printing 2011 ∞ Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Dick, Bernard F. Hollywood Madonna : Loretta Young / Bernard F. Dick. p. cm. — (Hollywood legends series) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-61703-079-6 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-61703-080-2 (ebook) 1. Young, Loretta, 1913–2000. 2. Motion picture actors and actresses— United States—Biography. I. Title. PN2287.Y6D53 2011 791.4302’8092—dc22 [B] 2010053734 British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available For Ned Comstock S This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Preface ix 1. Life without Father 3 2. The Creation of Loretta Young 10 3. LORETTA TALKS! 18 4. Sacrificial Wives, Shop Girls, and Proud Proletarians 26 5. Loaned Out 39 6. Last Days at Warner’s 48 7. Darryl Zanuck’s Costume Queen 53 8. The Men in Her Life 65 9. Heeding the Call of the Wild 71 10. The Great Lie 79 11. Return from the Ashes 88 12. Addio, Darryl 103 13. The Price of Freedom 112 14. Loretta Goes to War 125 15. “Age cannot wither”(but Hollywood Can) 132 16. Thrice Blessed: A Reunion, a Replacement, and an Oscar 139 17. The Return to Fox—and Zanuck 154 18. Slow Fade to Small Screen 163 19. Radio Days 170 20. Another Medium, Another Conquest 186 21. The Road to Retirement 207 22. A New Life 218 23. The Last Reel 230 VIII CONTENTS Notes 245 Filmography 256 Major Radio Appearances 259 Major Television Appearances 261 Index 262 PREFACE My family entered the television age in February 1954, when The Loretta Young Show was in its first season. Then, my only interest was live tele- vision. I delighted in Studio One and Robert Montgomery Presents, which brought theatre into our parlor, along with missed cues, flubbed lines, and camera gaffes that actually enhanced the immediacy of the experi- ence. Filmed television was movies; live television, even variety shows, like The Ed Sullivan Show and The Perry Como Show, were theatre. My mother watched I Love Lucy andThe Loretta Young Show. I did not—then. I knew who Loretta Young was. I probably saw her before 1944, but my earliest memory of Loretta Young is a scene from And Now Tomorrow (1944) that lodged itself in my memory. (Little did I know at the time that I would be writing her biography.) It is the scene when Loretta, now hearing-impaired, awakens to the sight of a rain-streaked window. But there is no sound. She knows she should hear the impact of the rain against the glass, but cannot. I had no idea what a subjective camera or a POV shot were, but I shared Loretta’s fear, reflected in a face that, still beautiful, had taken on a kind of delicately expressed alarm, devoid of histrionics and panic—the sort of expression one would expect from a well-bred woman facing the first crisis in her life. I also had fond memo- ries of The Farmer’s Daughter, and, as the product of a Catholic grade school education, of Come to the Stable, in which Loretta’s Sister Margaret corresponded to the kind of nun with whom I was familiar: the nun who uses her gentle, and often wily, powers of persuasion to accomplish her end—always, of course, for the greater glory of God. Because my mother rhapsodized about The Loretta Young Show, I decid- ed to watch it with her, but just once—or so I thought. I was mesmerized by Loretta’s much touted entrance, in which she executed a 180-degree turn while closing the door—her dress seeming to rotate with her—and then breezed into the living room where she purred her welcome. My first thought was, “How phony!” But after I saw a few more episodes, IX
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