Movie Anecdotes

331 Pages·1991·12.66 MB·English

by  Peter Hay

Movie Anecdotes
Praise for Movie Anecdotes
"Hay is a generous storyteller. . .he has gathered the oral tradition of
the Hollywood tribe with both love and cunning."
The Los Angeles Times
"Amusing, critieal tales—tall and true. Hay is a pro at unearthing
acerbie or outrageous sayings or events; his topical arrangement is
smooth and his delivery fluid."
Booklist
"Enjoyable. . . .Light, browse-able entertainment."
Kirkus Reviews
Born in Budapest and educated at Oxford, Peter Hay has taught at
several universities in Canada and the United States. He is founding
artistic director of First Stage in Hollywood and is the author of seven
books including Theatrical Anecdotes, Broadway Anecdotes, and the
forthcoming MGM: When the Lion Roared.
KEY TO ILLUSTRATION
1. John Huston 7. Katharine Hepburn 13. Jack Nicholson
2. Humphrey Bogart 8. Bette Davis 14. Meryl Streep
3. Lauren Bacall 9. Clark Gable 15. Robert De Niro
4. Alfred Hitchcock 10. Joan Crawford 16. Dustin Hoffman
5. Marlon Brando 11.E11.Bonzo 17. Sidney Poitier
6. Spencer Tracy 12. Ronald Reagan 18. Orson Welles
Cover illustration by Victor Juhasz
Cover design by Lenny Levitslty
MOVIE
ANECDOTES
Peter Hay
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
New York Oxford
Oxford University Press
Oxford New York Toronto
Delhi Bombay Calcutta Madras Karachi
Petaling Jaya Singapore Hong Kong Tokyo
Nairobi Dar es Salaam Cape Town
Melbourne Auckland
and associated companies in
Berlin Ibadan
Copyright © 1990 by Peter Hay
First published in 1990 by Oxford University Press, Inc.,
200 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016
First issued as an Oxford University Press paperback, 1991
Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any mean:
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without the prior permission of Oxford University Press, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Hay, Peter.
Movie anecdotes / Peter Hay.
p. cm. Includes bibliographical references.
1. Motion picture industry—California—Los Angeles-—Anecdotes.
2. Hollywood (Los Angeles, Calif.)
—Social life and customs—Anecdotes.
I. Title. PN1993.5. U651138 1990
384'. 8'0979494—dczo 89-49252
ISBN 0-19-504594-7
ISBN 0-19-504595-5 (PBK.)
2 4 6 8 1 0 9 7 5 31i
Printed in the United States of America
For David Ambrose and Paul Jarrico,
good writers on and off the screen,
and my good friends in and out of Hollywood:
with constant admiration and my lasting affection.
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Acknowledgments
s
A compiler of anecdote books has almost as many people to thank as a
winner on Oscar night. Some of you may not remember even how you
have helped—by an encouraging word, lending or mentioning a book, giv-
ing a lead—or just by being a friend at a time when I really needed one:
Laurence and David Ambrose, Polly and Janos Bak, Lia Benedetti,
Dennis Boutsikaris, Yurek Bogajewicz, Alan Brock, Raphael Bunuel, Didi
Conn, Michael Donaldson, Marris and Rudi Fehr, Sidney Field, Syd Field,
Hermine Fuerst-Garcia, Jacqueline Green, Nick de Grunwald, Richard
Hatton, Leonora and David Hays, Patricia and Richard Herd, Jeffrey Hen-
derson, Endre Hiiles, Paul Jarrico, John and Donna Wong Juliani, Charles
Kahlenberg, Joshua Karton, Barbara Keegan, Eva and Paul Kolozsvary,
Kitty and Steve Kovacs, Dana Kraft, Miles Kreuger, Robert Lewin, Edward
Maeder, Jenny Magid, Marcella Meharg, Elizabeth and Alan Mandell, Elisa-
beth Marton, Simon Mayo, Peter Medak, Julia Johnson Migenes, Virginia
Morris, Hilda Mortimer, Cora and Oliver Muirhead, John Neshi, Eva
Nemeth, Margaret Oberman, Ed O'Neill, Ethan (John) Phillips, Susan
Roether, Deac Rossell, Don Rubin, Catherine Rusoff, John Sarantos, Marsie
v i i i Acknowledgments
Sharlatt, Roberta Sherry, David Shire, Howard Suber, Eve Siegel Tettemer,
James F. Skaggs, Carol Sorgenfrei, Barbara Steele, Loren Stephens, June and
Michael Szasz, Adam Szocs, Alex Uttermann, April Webster, John York,
Vilmos Zsigmond.
My special thanks to Richard Kahlenberg for several suggestions and
constant support; to Carol Channing, Judith Crist, and Sir John Gielgud
for kind comments on my previous collections of theatrical anecdotes; to
many friends and associates over the years at First Stage, the Sundance
Institute, and the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. I owe a great deal to
conversations with knowledgeable bookstore owners, and to libraries, in par-
ticular: University of Southern California (especially Anthony Anderson),
University of California at Los Angeles, the Los Angeles City Public Li-
brary (the Central branch and the Frances Howard Goldwyn Hollywood
branch), the Glendalc and Pasadena Library System, and the American
Film Institute Library.
It is a pleasure to acknowledge—the third time around—the essential
guidance of the staff of Oxford University Press in New York, especially
my editor Sheldon Meyer, and Leona Capeless, Stephanie Sakson-Ford,
Joellyn Ausanka, Vera Plummer, Laura Brown, Jeffrey Seroy, David Sartory,
and others responsible for turning out such fine books. Richard Sansom at
OUP in Oxford has also been most helpful.
Finally, my heartfelt thanks to my wife Dorthea Atwater, for her love
and support—and for her expertise in preparing the index; and to my
mother Eva Hay, for her lifelong encouragement, and for giving me the
feeling that life is like an epic movie.
Every reasonable effort has been made to contact copyright holders to se-
cure permission to include in this volume passages from works not in the
public domain, and any omission brought to the publisher's attention will
be remedied in subsequent editions. Grateful acknowledgment is hereby
made for permission to reprint excerpts from the following works:
Bardot, Deneuve and Fonda by Roger Vadim; reprinted by permission of
Simon & Schuster. Copyright © 1986 by Roger Vadim.
Blessings in Disguise by Alec Guinness; reprinted by permission of Alfred
A. Knopf Inc. Copyright © 1985 by Alec Guinness.
A Child of the Century by Ben Hecht; reprinted by kind permission of
Donald I. Fine, Inc.; special thanks to Roger Vergnes. Copyright ©
1954 Ben Hecht.
Don't Get Me Wrong—I Love Hollywood by Sidney Skolsky; reprinted by
Acknowledgments i x
permission of Arthur Pine Associates. Copyright © 1975 by Sidney
Skolsky.
Hello Hollywood! by Allen Rivkin and Laura Kerr. Reprinted by permis-
sion of Doubleday, a division of Bantam, Doubleday, Dell Publish-
ing Group, Inc. Copyright © 1962 by Allen Rivkin and Laura Kerr.
A Hundred Different Lives by Raymond Massey; reprinted by permission
of Little, Brown and Co., and McClelland and Stewart Limited.
Copyright © 1979 by Raymond Massey.
The Jewish Mothers' Hall of Fame by Fred A. Bernstein; reprinted by per-
mission of Doubleday, a division of Bantam, Doubleday, Dell Pub-
lishing Group, Inc. Copyright © 1986 by Fred Bernstein.
Ladies Man by Paul Henreid and Julius Fast; reprinted by permission of
St. Martin's Press, Inc., New York. Copyright © 1984 by Paul Hen-
reid and Julius Fast.
A Life by Elia Kazan; reprinted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf Inc.
Copyright © 1988 by Elia Kazan.
One Reel a Week by Fred J. Balshofer and Arthur C. Miller; reprinted by
permission of the Regents of the University of California and the
University of California Press. Copyright © 1967 by the Regents of
the University of California.
On the Set of Fellini Satyricon by Eileen Lanouette Hughes; reprinted by
permission of William Morrow & Co. Copyright © 1971 by the
Author.
The Parade's Gone By ... by Kevin Brownlow; reprinted by permission
of Alfred A. Knopf Inc. Copyright © 1968 by Kevin Brownlow.
Walt by Charles Shows; reprinted by kind permission of the Author. Copy-
right © 1979 by Charles Shows.
When the Shooting Stops . . . The Cutting Begins by Ralph Rosenblum
and Robert Karen; reprinted by permission of Ralph Rosenblum
and Robert Karen. Copyright © 1979 by Ralph Rosenblum and
Robert Karen.