By Myself and Then Some (12 page)

The next night at the theatre there was no George Kaufman around. We hadn’t had a rehearsal and I still didn’t know what was going on. There were meetings that night. What did they talk about at all those meetings? The next day Florence told me. She and Dorothy had seen George and he had said we were going to close after our Washington run. I burst into tears. It had never occurred to me that this might happen. I’d never dreamed that we would not open in New York. That was my second heartbreak in the theatre. I cried and cried, and when I cry I am a sight to see. Swollen red eyes, a mess! Florence and Dorothy tried to comfort me, telling me not to say anything until an official announcement was made. I knew that if I met anyone else in the cast, they’d know in a minute just by looking at me. So I went back to the Lincoln Memorial.

It was a crisp, clear day When I got to the Memorial quite a few people were there, but everyone was whispering. It was too overwhelming to do anything else. Lincoln was still in his chair, still looking at me, eyes following me as I moved. I went over to one side to see if he might turn his head. He didn’t. I read the speeches inscribed there – the Gettysburg Address on one side, the Second Inaugural Address on the other – and was transported again, my own sorrow pushed to the back of my mind for the moment. I stayed for almost an hour, but as I walked down the steps and away from him, my own pain came to the fore again.

Would I see George that evening? When would everybody be told? I’d have to call Mother and give her the bad news. All dreams shattered once more. When I got to the theatre, I found a letter in my box at the stage door. It was addressed to ‘Peggy Bacall,’ on Hotel Carlton stationery. It said,

He didn’t know my name, but it was kind of him and thoughtful to write me a note. No one else got one. I would treasure it, right name or wrong name.

The cast was gathering onstage. The stage manager stood there and grimly announced that the closing notice would be put up tonight. There was going to be a rewrite of the play. Messrs Kaufman, Gordon, Sheekman, and the Goetzes were very sorry, thanked us all, and hoped we would all be together soon again. That softened the blow a bit – for a novice like me. There was at least hope, hope that it would all happen again and soon. The pros were not surprised, they said sure it might reopen, but who knew when? Better not count on it. Could it all fall apart so quickly, all that work, the sets, costumes, lighting, actors? All those people out of work so quickly? Yes, it could.

The drama of performing the play – a comedy in particular – knowing it was going to close. We had ten more shows. That’s what they meant when they said the show must go on. How valiant the actors were, I thought. The audience would never guess. The company was working just as hard, caring just as much. I realized then what a noble profession the acting profession is, what terrific people professionals are. What a dramatic situation for an imagination like mine! Smiling through tears, drama within drama within drama. Made to order for the likes of me.

Was it all over? I had taken so long, I thought, to get this part. Would it be another year before I got another?

We all went for a snack after the show, building each other up, rehashing what all those past meetings had meant, trying to be hopeful about the play being done again. It was still only the beginning of October, maybe there would be plays casting for January openings. Anything could happen! We said good night sadly, we all felt closer to each other. Nothing like disaster to bring people together.

In my room I went over and over what had happened. I read and reread George’s note, clinging to the hope of a new play or this one again. I would savor every day onstage for the next eight days and try not to feel totally defeated at the end of that time.

I called Mother, told her we were closing for a while, they thought it was wiser to rewrite the play and then call us all back, it probably wouldn’t take more than a few weeks. Being totally unknowledgeable about the theatre, she believed me, and I was so convincing, I did too.
‘Anyway, I’ll be home soon and I miss you.’ She was wonderful as always. She knew how disappointed I was, said, ‘Keep your chin up, you’ll be back at work in no time.’ So we buoyed each other up on mutual love and no reality.

The ten performances came and went. We packed up Saturday night – make-up, personal effects back at the hotel – but not heading for Boston, our next stop on the road to success. Instead, back home to our failure. Some of us promised to keep in touch, we’d see each other soon, after the rewrite, meantime good luck. Goodbye Washington, goodbye Roosevelt, goodbye Lincoln … goodbye hope. Hello despair.

At least I had been mentioned in a review. At least George had written me a personal note – that might help the next time around. Eighteen can be knocked down, but eighteen doesn’t stay down for long.

I arrived home, showed Mother my clipping, my note from Kaufman. I called Charlie and Grandma, they were loving and sweet. My family made me feel safe. Charlie was full of encouragement and his usual rhymes: ‘Don’t be disheartened, you’ve only just started, I can see from afar, you will be a star.’ I adored him.

The next day I went to Max Gordon’s office. He was warm, apologized for the way things had turned out, and said the play might come to pass again. He told me I had looked very good in the play and that everyone involved had liked me. But if a job came up, take it;
Franklin Street
would not be done again quickly. Keep in touch with him and his office, and let him know how I was faring. That was the end of that chapter

B
ack to Walgreen’s, back to
the casting lists in
Actor’s Cue
. Of course I told Betty Kalb and other friends that the play was going to be done again. I made it all sound more hopeful than it was, made my meeting with Buzz more dramatic, my conversations with Kaufman the same. I was the only one who had ever been on the road, after all – I knew things they didn’t know. That made me feel better. My fantasy world was a marvel. It allowed me to laugh and joke, to feel hope again.

Back to pounding pavements. I could not think in terms of going back to the garment center or ushering, though I surely would need the money soon. I had saved something from the tour – there hadn’t been
much to save, but maybe it would get me through until the next job.

It was not easy being on the outside once more. Funny how you get the feeling that once you have a part in a play the work will never stop. Was that ever a wrong feeling – as I would spend the next thirty years discovering! At least I had one more credit – and a good one – when I went into producers’ offices, but that mattered not at all if there were no parts.

George Kaufman was casting a new play – Well, there must be something for me in it! I went charging up to Max Gordon’s office, asking where I could find George. Couldn’t I read the play, couldn’t I at least see him? He was never around when I was, so I had to content myself with leaving messages with everyone in sight. And hounding the office, making a general pest of myself.

One day I received a letter in the mail. The heading in red, center of the page:

That gave me such a lift, though it didn’t mean a job or even an audition; it did mean that he thought enough of me to write, and something might come along one day and he’d always give me a chance!

One Saturday morning in 1942, Mother and Rosalie took me to the Capitol Theatre to see a movie called
Casablanca
. We all loved it, and Rosalie was mad about Humphrey Bogart. I thought he was good in it, but mad about him? Not at all. She thought he was sexy. I thought she was crazy. Mother liked him, though not as much as she liked Chester
Morris, who she thought was
really
sexy – or Ricardo Cortez, her second favorite. I couldn’t understand Rosalie’s thinking at all. Bogart didn’t vaguely resemble Leslie Howard. Not in any way. So much for my judgment at that time.

S
ometime in November of that
year I met an English writer named Timothy Brooke. He was very tall, very thin, very charming and funny – a good deal older than I, but we got along well. There was no attraction on my part, I just enjoyed his company tremendously, I’d never met anyone like him. He’d lived in America for many years, knew all sorts of people like Evalyn Walsh McLean, who owned the Hope Diamond, Mabel Mercer, Nicolas de Gunzburg, who was an editor of
Harper’s Bazaar
. That fact and his growing attachment to me started the chain of circumstances that would reshape my life. Timothy didn’t have much money, but enough to take me to Tony’s, a little club in the east Fifties where Mabel Mercer sang. It was a very popular club, and she was adored by Europeans, Americans, anyone who knew Paris, anyone romantic, all musicians. She would sit on a wooden stool with a piano behind her, a light on her, and bouquets and tables all around. That was my first taste of nostalgia.

One night at Tony’s, Timothy said he had told Nicky de Gunzburg about me. Perhaps I could be used in photographic modeling. Tim thought Nicky might be there that evening, so I should be prepared. Wouldn’t that be wonderful? I thought. Not a nine-to-five job, but I’d make enough money and still be free to pound those theatrical pavements. As promised, Nicky de Gunzburg did turn up – a dapper, friendly, charming man – a baron! Another first for me.

He came over to the table and Tim introduced me – ‘This is the girl I’ve been talking to you about.’ Nicky (he wasn’t Nicky to me for a long time) said, ‘If you will come to my office tomorrow, I’ll send you over to one of our fashion editors to see if she can use you.’ I thanked him fervently (I did everything fervently) and said I’d see him the following day.

The following day I was just as nervous as if I were trying out for a play. Nicky told me the fashion editor’s name was Diana Vreeland – he’d mentioned me to her and we would go over to her office. A secretary said we could go in to where an extraordinary-looking
woman sat at a desk covered with papers, photographs, boxes with bits and pieces of jewelry, scarves. She was very thin. Black hair combed straight back, turned under and held in place by a black net snood with a flat band on top. She was wearing a black skirt, a black sweater, and black ankle boots. She had white skin, brown eyes, red mouth, long nose, pink cheeks, lovely teeth, long fingernails painted dark red. Definitely an original. Very direct in manner and speech. She stood up, shook my hand, looked at my face – with her hand under my chin, turned it to the right and to the left. She saw I was awkward, not made up, far from the perfect model. She asked me what I’d done before, I told her – it was practically nothing and some time back. She said, ‘I’d like Louise Dahl-Wolfe to see you. We’re having a sitting tomorrow – could you come to the studio? It won’t take long.’ I said, ‘Of course I could.’ I was scared to death. The efficiency and matter-of-factness of the whole magazine operation and particularly of Mrs Vreeland were intimidating. I’d never been in the offices of so grand and powerful a fashion magazine as
Harper’s Bazaar
. I hadn’t a clue what Mrs Vreeland’s reaction to me had been. I knew I felt like a gawk – never thought I was a beauty, so I never really expected too much. I just hoped.

The next day I went to the appointed studio at the appointed time. There was a sort of dressing room, rather like the theatre – make-up lights around mirrors, canvas chairs, clothes on hangers, and boxes of accessories, all of which, I was to learn, were permanent fixtures at fashion sittings. The studio was a large room with lights, backings – and Dahl-Wolfe and her cameras. She was a rather short, stocky woman whose sandy hair was pulled up tight in a bun or braid on the top of her head. A friendly, open woman who was number one in her profession. Diana Vreeland was there and brought me in to meet her. Dahl-Wolfe said, ‘Let’s take a few shots first.’ She wanted to see what her camera could catch. I had no makeup on, but she said this wasn’t a serious sitting, it was just for her, really. She had me stand in the middle of the studio floor. I was a basket case of nerves. She had her Rolleiflex camera around her neck – that was her favorite camera – and another one on a tripod. She put the lights where she wanted them and through my twitching said, ‘Look left … look right … turn to the right and look over your shoulder … left profile.’ She asked me about myself, snapping away very quickly as she talked. There was no real
posing, she just caught me as I fell and as she wanted it. It was much less painful than any other modeling I had done. I was still shaking – I couldn’t seem to find a way out of that. The only thing that ever helped was for me to talk – to make jokes – and to not stand still for too long. I didn’t dare go too far, as I was a stranger in those parts and wasn’t sure what their reaction would be. But it was my nature to try to make people laugh or at least smile, and it eased my twitching mouth, made me feel more an actress, less a model.

After about half an hour Mrs Vreeland thanked me and asked me to leave my phone number. Did I work through an agency? Not anymore. ‘We’ll call you as soon as we go over our layouts.’ I made some stunning remark like ‘I hope the camera will still work after it’s looked at me.’ Knocking myself out of the box before anyone else did. I didn’t much like the idea of modeling, though it might be fun for a while, but I did like the two women – even though they’d frightened me a little.