Hollywood Madonna : Loretta Young

298 Pages·2011·2.26 MB·English

by  Young

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