My Life as a Mankiewicz (4 page)

Major Studios in the 1940s

At that time, with a few notable exceptions (Samuel Goldwyn, David O. Selznick, etc.), virtually every actor, writer, producer, director, cameraman, and editor was under contract to a major studio. These weren't merely work centers—they were more like self-contained sovereign states. They even had their own baseball teams. The commissaries served gourmet food of all kinds, available twenty-four hours a day. The more important filmmakers had their own bungalows, often with a bedroom. There were steam rooms, barber shops, and mail delivery, and each studio had an extensive back lot with its own Western Street, Jungleland, Big City Streets, and more.

The 20th Century Fox lot sprawled over most of what is today called Century City, a major office building and condo community next to Beverly Hills. Dad had a large bungalow surrounded by fake grass and a little picket fence. When I rewrote and directed the two-hour movie-pilot of
Hart to Hart
, that bungalow was occupied by Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg, then the two most powerful producers in television, with five hours on the air weekly, not counting long-form projects. The bungalow had been enlarged to accommodate both of them, but when I entered Aaron's office and saw the working brick fireplace and adjoining bedroom, waves of memories crashed in.

According to Dad, the most important man on the lot, the one you wanted on your side, was not Darryl Zanuck but Henry the Bootblack. He shined the shoes of every executive on a daily basis. They were constantly on the phone and talked freely in front of him while he worked. As a result, he knew everything that was going on at Fox: whose contract was being dropped, what project was going to get a green light or be canceled, and who was currently in or out of favor. When one of Fox's films returned to Los Angeles from African locations, the studio brought a group of Watusi warriors with them for additional shooting on the back lot. To prevent them from being culture shocked, they were housed at the studio inside the Jungle set. The commissary catered to their specific food preferences, but they still had one major complaint—no women. Henry the Bootblack was drafted to remedy the situation. He recruited a posse of downtown African American hookers who were bused to Fox several nights a week. As I said, there was absolutely nothing you couldn't get at a major studio in the forties.

Snapshots from 1940s Films

Woman of the Year
(1942)

The first pairing of Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, produced by Dad and directed by George Stevens. Dad knew Hepburn well from
The Philadelphia Story.
At that time he and Spencer Tracy were great friends and habitually lunched together in the MGM commissary. Hepburn recalled she knew that and that she was about to work with Tracy even though they'd never met. One day she positioned herself in front of the commissary and “accidentally” ran into them as they were leaving. Dad made the introductions. They chatted briefly, then Tracy excused himself since he was shooting and had to get back to the stage.

Hepburn watched him leave, turned to Dad, and said, “He's rather short, isn't he.”

“Don't worry,” Dad replied. “He'll cut you down to size.”

Dad and Tracy owned a boat together, a 104-foot schooner, the
Sartosha.
It was moored in Long Beach and was costing them a fortune to maintain, needing daily wash downs for its pristine teak decks and at least a skeleton crew on permanent salary. They tried to sail to Hawaii once, ran into a storm one day out, turned around, went home, and finally sold it. I was putting around Catalina Harbor with Robert Wagner some forty years later in a rubber Zodiac when we saw a beautiful schooner at anchor called the
Jomar.
We pulled alongside. The captain recognized R.J. and asked us aboard. It turned out he owned Martinson's Coffee (an eastern brand). Their instant coffee was called “Jomar.” In the captain's cabin we looked through the ship's log. Sonofagun. It once had been called the
Sartosha
, and there were Dad's and Tracy's signatures as cocaptains. I told Dad, and he was thrilled that she was still afloat.

Dragonwyck
(1946)

The great German director Ernst Lubitsch (
Ninotchka, Heaven Can Wait)
was somewhat of a mentor to Dad. Our house was always filled with the German-speaking members of Hollywood in the forties since Dad and Mother both spoke the language. Lubitsch was the original director on
Dragonwyck
but fell ill before the shooting started. Dad had written the screenplay, and Lubitsch went to bat on his behalf with Zanuck, insisting that Dad replace him as director.

While writing the screenplay, Dad once asked Lubitsch what exactly he wanted out of a certain scene. The director replied, “Give me some of those great Lubitsch touches.”

They were lunching in the Fox commissary one day when a young man approached the table and stuck out his hand: “Mr. Lubitsch, I just got my first job as a director this morning and I wanted to shake your hand for luck.”

“Certainly,” said Lubitsch, taking it. “When do you start shooting?”

“In ten days.”

He left. Lubitsch turned to Dad: “That young man is directing his first film and he has ten days to prepare. I need six months. It should be the other way around.”

Dragonwyck
starred Vincent Price, Gene Tierney, and Walter Huston. It was a melodramatic, gothic nineteenth-century romance in which Price played a Dutch aristocrat, “the patroon” in a huge, upstate New York manor house. Vincent later told me about the first day of shooting: “It was the most curious piece of direction I ever received. Joe, God bless him, was so psyched up on his first day. He kept reminding me how to carry myself as a nobleman. ‘Erect, always erect,' he repeated endlessly. My first shot was simply to walk down a long staircase. We rolled, someone yelled ‘speed,' and Joe said: ‘All right then, Vincent. Nice erection!'”

Harry Morgan was also in the film. Some forty years later I was directing him in
Dragnet
with Dan Aykroyd and Tom Hanks. Harry had done the TV series with Jack Webb and was playing Danny's boss. One day he asked me, “Is this your first feature as a director?” I nodded. “How about that? I was in your father's first feature,
Dragonwyck.”
As it was sinking in, Harry added: “I wouldn't make too much of that. I was in everyone's first feature.”

Dad was so hyped at finally directing that one day he asked his cameraman, Artie Miller, for his viewfinder, “just because as a director I thought I should.” He raised it to his eye: “I couldn't see a fucking thing.” Miller took the viewfinder from him, turned it around, and handed it back. Dad had been looking through the wrong end. This mistake became a memorable moment four years later in
All About Eve
when, just before the famous party sequence, Gary Merrill says to Bette Davis, “I was just telling Eve about the time I looked through the wrong end of a viewfinder.” She replies, “Remind me to tell you about the time I looked into the heart of an artichoke.”

The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
(1947)

The first of four films he would do with Rex Harrison. The female lead was once again Gene Tierney, whom Dad recalled as “in many ways, the most beautiful woman I ever saw.” Need I say more?

The film was later made as a TV series starring my dear friend Hope Lange. Mrs. Muir's little daughter in the film was played by a very young Natalie Wood, later to become one of the best friends I ever had. Natalie's Russian mother (we called her “Mud”) was fiercely ambitious for her daughter. The first day Natalie was to work, Dad was behind schedule and couldn't get to her. He called her and “Mud” over and told them she'd work tomorrow, then gave Natalie an overnight assignment to keep her busy. “Learn how to spell Mankiewicz,” he said. “Once you can spell Mankiewicz, you can go to work.”

The next morning, an eager little Natalie arrived. “Mud” ushered her up to Dad. Natalie took a deep breath and said, “M-A-N-K-I-E-W-I-T-Z.”

“Almost,” Dad replied. “You only got one letter wrong.”

Natalie turned bright red. Her mother scowled at her. Dad remembered: “I suddenly realized that it wasn't Natalie's fault, that this horrible woman had drummed the wrong spelling into her and was now blaming the child.”

Years later Dad flew to L.A. from New York to visit his longtime agent, Burt Allenberg, who was dying in the hospital. As he walked down the hospital corridor, a voice suddenly spoke up from behind him: “M-A-N-K-I-E-W-I-C-Z.” It was Natalie. He hadn't seen her since the film. She winked. Years later, no matter where we were, I could turn to Natalie and say, “Spell Mankiewicz,” and she would rattle it off as if it were indelibly imprinted in her brain, which it was.

All About Eve
(1950)

A classic film. Dad's high water mark. Among its many virtues was a wonderful supporting performance from a young Marilyn Monroe. Dad told me this story about her, which I've never forgotten: Right after the film had wrapped, Dad was browsing at the magazine stand outside Martindale's Book Store in Beverly Hills. Exiting the store came Marilyn, carrying a paper bag with what she'd bought. He was surprised to see her leaving a bookstore, which he hardly thought would be her natural habitat. They hugged. Pointing at the bag, Dad said, “What've you got there, Marilyn?”

She pulled out the book. It was a volume of nineteenth-century poetry by Heinrich Heine.

Dad was shocked. “You're a fan of Heine?'

“I don't know who he is,” she said. “Sometimes I come in here to look around and I try to find a book that seems lonely, like no one's ever going to buy it, and I take it home with me.” I've always found that story so touching and so indicative of what I imagine to have been her real personality.

Certainly, the towering performance in the film was given by Bette Davis as Margo Channing. Some forty years later I was having dinner with her at Robert Wagner's house. I asked her who her favorite director had been. She replied: “My favorite was my dear Willy Wyler, what a charming, wonderful man. The most talented director I ever worked with was your father, but of course, he was a prick.”

I called Dad to tell him what she'd said, and he roared with laughter. “I'd have expected nothing less from her,” he said.

There was a hit Broadway musical based on the film called
Applause.
It opened decades later and starred Lauren Bacall as Margo. Weeks before the opening, Bacall (“Betty”) called Dad and asked him to please attend on opening night. She wanted to bring him out onstage during her solo curtain call. Dad had been friends with Betty (and Bogart) for years. He told her how flattered he was by the gesture, then said: “I wish you all kinds of luck, Betty, but I'm never going to see it. I think it was a pretty good film and I'll never understand why anybody thought it was a good idea to stop it a dozen times for songs.” The show was a hit. Betty won the Tony. Dad never saw it.

3

The 1950s

Developing a Character

In movies today, if you steal a scene from another writer, line for line, it's still called plagiarism. If you steal a scene from another director, shot for shot, it's called an homage.

—Joseph L. Mankiewicz

New York City

Needless to say, moving from laid-back southern California (the late comedian Fred Allen called it “a great place to live if you're an orange”) to the cacophony of taxi horns and bustling pedestrians that was and still is New York City was a culture shock to a nine-year-old. Everyone on the street seemed to walk with a sense of purpose, as if he or she had a mission to accomplish, and right now.

We moved into a large apartment (the entire ninth floor) at 730 Park Avenue, on the corner of Seventy-First Street. It wasn't easy getting in. First, the family had to pass muster with the Admissions Board of the building. Luckily for us, Dad had won four Oscars in the last two years, and both the great composer Richard Rodgers (who lived on the floor below) and the celebrated novelist Edna Ferber were residents who were happy to vouch for us. Also on the board was John Loeb, cofounder of the noted brokerage house of Loeb, Rhoades, later to become Shearson Loeb Rhoades. He was apparently so picky that he'd denied occupancy to V. K. Krishna Menon, India's ambassador to the United Nations and later its foreign minister, on the grounds that he didn't want people wearing turbans going up and down in the elevator.

The only problem we ever had with a neighbor was after Chris and I got a miniature pool table in our bedroom. The pool balls themselves were normal size and weight. We used to try all sorts of trick shots—the balls constantly hit the floor. One day a visibly troubled Richard Rodgers rang our bell. It seemed our bedroom was directly over the office where he wrote his music. At that time he was composing his famous symphonic poem
Victory at Sea.
When the series named after it subsequently aired on television, every time the cymbals clashed, signifying the pounding waves, Chris and I fantasized that it was our contribution, clearly one of the pool balls hitting the floor. I got to know Dick a little in later life. He finally found it funny.

Dad and Mother had separate bedrooms for the first time. Hers was at the end of the hallway, directly opposite the bedroom occupied by me and Chris. The kitchen, pantry, formal dining room, and living room were spacious and comfortable. Life should have been good. Unfortunately, Mother's illness was recurring more frequently and with greater intensity. She would actually become a completely different person, one full of anger, even rage, and her frequent nighttime visits to our bedroom to yell were a source of dread—especially to me, since I was her favorite target. I would pretend to be asleep, but to no avail. I'd already developed pronounced asthma, and the attacks were getting worse. After she'd finished her outburst and left, my wheezing would keep Chris awake. I would go into our bathroom, close the door, and lie there, fighting for air, staring at myself in the full-length mirror until I finally fell asleep.

Dad and Mother thought it best if Chris and I went to different schools. Chris was enrolled at Collegiate, and I attended St. Bernard's School for Boys, a posh grade school on Ninety-Eighth Street between Fifth and Madison Avenues. I had a little cap with the school shield on it that I wore every day taking the Madison Avenue bus up and back. I'm sure these days no one would let their ten-year-old child take the bus alone that far on a daily basis, but New York City in 1951 presented no such problem. The fare was a dime. The work was hard, but I relished it. To this day, more than half a century later, I still get my yearly invitation to “The Old Boys Dinner.”

Full Circle with Willie

Dad knew Leo Durocher, who was then the manager of the New York Giants baseball team. I thought he was a cool guy and became an immediate Giants fan. It was 1951, the year of Bobby Thompson's “miracle” home run, which beat the Dodgers and won the pennant. That year was also the rookie season of my all-time baseball hero, Willie Mays. Even Vin Scully, the legendary Dodger announcer, told me one night Mays was the best all-around player he'd ever seen. Half a century later I was having a drink in L.A. at the bar of the Palm restaurant (I'm a regular) chatting with a friend when a waiter who knew me came up and said, “You'll never guess who just walked past you—Willie Mays.”

My head snapped around. There he was, about to sit down at a table. I have never, ever, approached a celebrity in my life, but I made an immediate beeline for him.

“Mr. Mays?” He turned. “My name is Tom Mankiewicz, my first year in New York was your rookie year, and I have a framed, autographed uniform of yours on the wall of my office, right next to my desk.”

Mays smiled. It's funny what happens when you meet a childhood hero. I'd worked with John Wayne, Frank Sinatra, and Marlon Brando, but for the first time in my life my knees started to wobble as I quickly regressed to nine years old.

“I…just wanted to say there's only one best player who ever lived, and you're it.”

“Hey, thanks a lot,” Willie replied. “But there's a guy right behind you who might disagree.”

I turned. It was Frank Robinson. They were eating together. When they finished and started to walk out, the entire restaurant gave them a standing ovation.

Meanwhile, at Home

At home there were frequent fights between Mother and Dad now, all of them at night, complete with yelling and slamming doors. And then, the next morning, the skies cleared and no one mentioned a thing. It was like living simultaneously in two parallel universes, and it instilled in me a grim determination to one day be independent from all of it, to have my own, private safe place, which I would create for myself. But there was worse yet to come. Much worse.

The Barefoot Contessa

(Nights of terror, a drink from Bogie, I meet a killer and take Ava Gardner to the movies)

Dad made
The Barefoot Contessa
in Italy in 1953, directing his own screenplay. It was the first film he made for his recently formed independent production company (Figaro) and starred Humphrey Bogart and Ava Gardner. Dad was nominated for his writing. Edmond O'Brien won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Dad and Mother had decided to take me to Rome with them. I was going on twelve. Chris was almost fourteen and would go to Lawrenceville prep school, which had an eighth-grade year. He would join us on vacations.

We moved into a beautiful apartment on the Via Bruxelles. I was tutored by an American teacher every day, keeping up with the academic requirements of St. Bernard's, and had plenty of time to explore the wonders and beauty of Rome, a city with which I fell in love. Little did I know then that I would return to shoot films there twice in my life. Many of my childhood excursions were taken inside a tiny Fiat “Topolino” (Italian for Mickey Mouse) driven by Rosemary Matthews, a young Englishwoman in her twenties who had signed on to the movie as an English coach for Rossano Brazzi. The Italian actor was making one of his first appearances in an American film. Rosemary was smart, fun, spoke fluent Italian, and proved invaluable to Dad on the film as her responsibilities increased. If you'd told me then she'd later be married to him for more than thirty years, I'd have thought you were nuts. Looking back now, I'm sure they must have had an affair during that time, but neither one was forthcoming about it during their lives, and I never asked.

The city and apartment had changed, but not the relationship between my parents. There were the same screaming fights at night, not every night but too many nights. This time, Dad was actually shooting a film, working fourteen hours-plus a day. Sometimes he took off in the middle of the night for somewhere unknown to get some sleep. But, thank goodness, I wasn't alone. Mother's mother (“Gross”) had come down from Austria to stay with us and proved a godsend for me as my protector whenever Mother made an unscheduled visit to my room late at night. Gross was devoutly Catholic. She was terrified by and heartbroken at her daughter's condition, but she was a staunch defender of mine, yelling back at Mother every time she castigated me. Those nights were scenes from a true horror movie. Mother yelling, Gross yelling back, then dropping to her knees, making the sign of the cross and praying loudly in German to God and Jesus while I put an oxygen mask over my mouth from a tank that sat at my bedside. One night I had desperate trouble breathing. Dad called a doctor, who came around and gave me a shot of adrenalin directly over my heart. Decades later, while shooting a film in Europe, I drove to Bad Gastein, Austria, where Gross lived. She was quite elderly but thrilled to see me. We both cried when we hugged. I took her to lunch, and she knew the names of the films I'd done. Someone must have given them to her—I couldn't imagine Gross was much of a James Bond fan—but she was so proud of me.

The nights of terror weren't every night, and believe it or not, there were wonderful times too. The “good” Mother was warm, intelligent, and caring. Her incredible ear for languages enabled her to speak nearly fluent Italian in record time, without a trace of accent. She took me everywhere around Rome and out to Tivoli and Ostia, with many walks in the Villa Borghese thrown in as well.

Dad was keenly aware of my situation and took me on location with him as much as he could. After sessions with my tutor I'd habitually be dropped off wherever Dad was shooting and eventually drive home with him. During these trips I'd sop up as much about filmmaking as I could. Movies were the kinds of fantasies I desperately sought out then, and Dad seemed to know that. He also seemed genuinely enthusiastic about the prospect of my getting involved in “the business” one day.

I remember one cold, cold night when the film was shooting in a cemetery. I'd been dressed for the day in shirt sleeves, and the wardrobe man got me a jacket. I was still shivering. Humphrey Bogart walked by and noticed: “Are you cold, Tommy?”

“I sure am.”

“Here, try some of this.” Bogart pulled out a flask, took off the top, and filled it with a thimbleful of scotch.

I'd never had a drink of hard liquor in my life, only an occasional sip of wine at home. But what the hell, he was Humphrey Bogart. I downed it, just like they do in the movies. My throat started burning. I coughed. And then, son of a bitch, my chest did feel warmer. Bogart grinned.

In a half hour he passed by again. “Still cold?”

“A little bit.”

He filled the top again. I drank.

Later on Dad came by to take me home. “Ready?”

I looked up at him with a stupid smile. “Yesss…” The smile remained plastered on my face.

Dad looked around, zeroing in on Bogart. “He's drunk. It has to be you, you prick.”

“Christ, Joe, the kid was cold. I was just trying to help out.”

To this day I have the singular honor of having received my first real drink from Humphrey Bogart.

On another late afternoon I found myself sitting near the set with Ava Gardner and several cast and crew members. Ava was described in the film as “The World's Most Beautiful Animal.” She was certainly all of that at the time. A huge celebrity, constantly pursued by a gaggle of paparazzi, she had recently divorced Frank Sinatra and was currently keeping company with Luis Miguel Dominguin, the most charismatic matador of his day. Part artist in the bull ring, part rock star, he was impossibly handsome with zero body fat and a thin scar running down the side of his face. Sinatra had come to Rome in an attempt to get Ava back, but left empty handed.

During this particular week, Dominguin was fighting in Spain and Ava had time on her hands after shooting. “I want to go to the movies tonight,” she announced. “What's at the Fiametta?” (The Fiametta was a little theater that ran American films in English, the only cinema in Rome to do so.) “Who wants to take me to the movies?”

She looked around. Silence. “Anybody?” Silence. Clearly, the prospect of escorting a publicity magnet to a public venue was too intimidating to those sitting there.

“Tommy, how about you? Want to take me to the movies tonight?”

“Sure,” I said.

She grinned. “Great. It's a date. I'll send my car to pick you up at Joe's.” She smiled at me and walked off.

A while later Dad had wrapped and was ready to take me home. “Guess what, Dad? I'm taking Ava Gardner to the movies tonight.”

His face darkened. “Like hell you are.”

“Why not? She asked me to.”

“Because I'm not going to have my twelve-year-old son's picture in a hundred magazines escorting Ava Gardner in Rome for the evening. When you're older you'll understand how truly bizarre that's going to look.”

My eyes misted over. I was about to cry. Dad noticed, softening. As usual, he solved the problem. That night, the public relations man on the film escorted Ava to the movies. I went with them. It was fine with me since secretly I knew I was the one who was really taking her.

Just a note, though it doesn't really apply to a twelve-year-old and Ava Gardner. Actresses, especially beautiful or publicly famous ones, are quite intimidating to most men. At the end of a marriage or a publicized affair, you'd be surprised how often their phone doesn't ring. Many guys are too scared to call. “Oh, she'd never go out with me. I'm not rich enough, good looking enough, famous enough, etc.” The truth is that most actresses are simply women with a fragile public occupation. They're just as insecure and sometimes more so than anyone else. There is, after all, a certain pressure on them to be seen as publicly desirable, which sometimes forces them to make terrible personal choices in their lives. I've known several who got married just because they thought it looked good and relieved them of the need to date men in order to stay in the news. God knows, I've had relationships of all kinds with dozens of actresses over the years. Some are wonderful people, some are not, some are smart, some are not, some are great lays, some are not, just like the rest of us.