Kay Thompson (2 page)
Authors: Sam Irvin
The
Eloise
and
Funny Face
Revolution
From “Fancy Pants” to
Funny Face
(1930–65)
Chapter 10
KAY’S FRANKENSTEIN MONSTER
Chapter 13
THE ROMAN SPRING OF MISS THOMPSON
Acknowledgments
VIOLENT ENTHUSIASM
To my mother, Mary,
and my sisters,
Janet and Anne,
for introducing me to the
Eloise books when I was young
and impressionable
PRECOCIOUS GROWNUP
Kay Thompson is a thrilling showbiz secret, a kind of skeleton key to mid-century Broadway and Hollywood.
—Emily Nussbaum,
New York
magazine
T
he lights dimmed, pianist-conductor Billy Stritch struck up the band, and Liza Minnelli burst onstage with four boys singing “Hello, Hello,” the first of several songs from Kay Thompson and the Williams Brothers’ 1947 breakthrough gig at Ciro’s. The scene was a private workshop recital of Liza’s re-creation of her godmother’s nightclub act sixty years after the original took Hollywood—and then the country—by storm. The invited audience was filled with a few potential investors but mostly Minnelli’s devoted fans and friends, including entertainer Michael Feinstein, actress Arlene Dahl, critic Rex Reed, Turner Classic Movies’ Robert Osborne, and the producers of
Chicago,
Craig Zadan and Neil Meron.
The performance was much more than an homage to a legendary entertainer of yesteryear. There were so many ghosts crowded on that stage, the living artists barely had room to maneuver. Kay Thompson, Judy Garland, Vincente Minnelli, and the whole of MGM,
Eloise,
and
Funny Face
. It was the culmination of everything.
As the show progressed, however, there were some technical problems. The radio mikes went haywire and the choreography was still rough around the edges. Nevertheless, it was plain to see that Liza meant business and, allowing for polishing and fine-tuning, this work in progress had enormous potential—though not everyone concurred. After the show, a television exec told Liza point-blank, “We’d only be interested if you sang ‘Cabaret’ and ‘New York, New York.’ Our audience doesn’t know Kay Thompson.”
Aghast, Liza shot back, “Well, then we need to teach them.”
Indeed. Not to name-drop or anything,
but
. . . Kay Thompson was Judy Garland’s
mentor and best friend and Frank Sinatra’s and Lena Horne’s vocal coach. She went to school with Tennessee Williams and got her first big break from Bing Crosby. She created a nightclub act for Ginger Rogers, and played charades with Gene Kelly. Bette Davis learned from her, Diana Vreeland was portrayed by her, and Danny Kaye masqueraded in drag as her.
She auditioned for Henry Ford, trained Marilyn Monroe, channeled Elvis Presley, rejected Andy Warhol, rebuffed Federico Fellini, and got fired by Howard Hughes. Prince Aly Khan made a pass at her and the Beatles wanted to hold her hand.
She costarred in a whodunit with Ronald Reagan, gave pointers to Eleanor Roosevelt, and directed John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Gala.
She was a member of the Rat Pack and she managed to dazzle the likes of Queen Elizabeth, King Juan Carlos of Spain, and Princess Grace (Kelly) of Monaco.
She was, in short, a massive overachiever. With nothing but her wits and talent, she decamped for Hollywood and New York in the 1930s, working her way up in radio to become one of the country’s most popular singing stars. In the 1940s, she expanded her range, becoming the head of MGM’s vocal department, a powerful position at a time when the studio was at the nexus of Hollywood. In the late forties and fifties, she emerged as the highest-paid nightclub entertainer in the world, with her act Kay Thompson and the Williams Brothers, featuring her nineteen-year-old protégé (and secret lover), Andy Williams.
Then she wowed audiences in 1957 when she costarred in
Funny Face
. Playing the role of the no-nonsense fashion magazine editor, critics declared that Kay had stolen the film right out from under Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire.
In a stunning feat of reinvention, Thompson became the bestselling author of
Eloise
(with those unforgettable drawings by Hilary Knight), chronicling the rascally adventures of the beloved six-year-old mascot of The Plaza, a book that spawned an industry that is still going strong today.
Her love life was just as adventurous: she was married twice but rumors of affairs with both men and women were as ubiquitous as they were star-studded.
In the aftermath of the tragic passing of Judy Garland in 1969, Thompson took Liza Minnelli under her wing, advising and guiding the young actress throughout her meteoric rise to superstardom.
In her twilight, Thompson retreated into Garbo-like seclusion, but just when it appeared that her larger-than-life story was headed for an uneventful conclusion, an astonishing final act was yet to be played out.
The Kay Thompson saga swells from small-town wannabe to international headliner, then dissolves into self-destruction and madness—the story line usually reserved for a rags-to-riches potboiler—yet with unexpected twists, outlandish turns, and a surprise ending that, even by Hollywood standards, is nothing short of preposterous.
But that is Kay Thompson—wildly talented and hilariously eccentric, yet with an exasperating underbelly of neuroses that deprived her of the recognition she so richly deserved. Until now.
Kitty Fink Becomes Kay Thompson
(1909–32)
In a year Which Shall be Nameless
In east St. Louis
This vunderkind,
This enfant prodique,
This miracle, lyrical,
Slightly hysterical Gal Was Born.
—Roger Edens,
The Passion According to St. Kate, Opus 19, #46
L
ike Eloise at The Plaza, Kay Thompson was a figment of the imagination. Both were dreamed up by Kitty Fink as whimsical escapes from a mundane and sometimes painful childhood.
Kitty’s father was Leo George Fink, born on January 12, 1874, in Vienna, Austria, the son of Mark Fink, a Jew from Norway, and Antoinette “Antonie” Steiner, a Christian from Vienna. Troubled by anti-Semitism and interfaith bigotry, the Fink family immigrated to America in 1886 with high hopes for a safer and more prosperous future. Unfortunately, anti-Semitism existed on both sides of the Atlantic and so, like many others, the Finks submerged their Jewish heritage in order to assimilate into mainstream society.
When Leo arrived in the United States at the age of twelve, he was teased by bullies for his broken English and foreign ways. Afraid to draw attention to himself, he kept his mouth shut and faded into the background. As he sat on the sidelines, Leo’s youth passed him by, and when it came to dating girls, he was a late bloomer. How Leo ended up in St. Louis is not known, but it was love that anchored him there.
The object of his affection was a waitress named Harriet Adelaide Tetrick, an attractive WASP from the Midwest. Most people called her Hattie, but Kay later nicknamed her Flavia, the Latin word for “yellow-haired,” because of her bleached-blond tresses (a look Thompson later adopted). Though her ancestors were German, Hattie was as American as apple pie. Born in 1888 in Eureka, Kansas, she was raised 140 miles northwest in Abilene, home of future President Dwight D. Eisenhower, two years her junior. She also lived for a time in Iowa, but by the age of eighteen ended up in St. Louis, where she got a job waiting tables at a local restaurant. It was there that she met a shy, thirty-two-year-old admirer named Leo Fink.
For Leo, Hattie was stylish, youthful, and outgoing, an appealing manifestation of everything he was not. And that was just fine with Hattie. Though he was fourteen years her senior, she admired his gentle demeanor and saw him as a responsible man who would provide well for her and their intended family. Smitten, Leo wanted to “rescue” Hattie from the workplace, so he proposed marriage on the condition that she quit her job and become a stay-at-home wife. She agreed and they tied the knot.
Emulating family trades he knew from Vienna, Leo had opened L. G. Fink, Inc., Jeweler and Pawnbroker, at 719 Pine, on the corner of North Eighth Street, where three balls, symbolic of pawnshops, hung over the door.
The first Fink residence was a modest apartment in a lower-income neighborhood at 3966 Laclede Street. Hattie was musical at heart, so even though space and money were tight, she convinced her husband to acquire an upright piano—probably an orphan from his pawnshop.
Sociable with all the neighbors, Hattie offered piano and singing lessons to friends while her husband managed the store in town. Leo didn’t like this arrangement one bit. He believed a wife should be making babies, not earning money; that was the man’s job. Unfortunately, Hattie’s passion for fashion exceeded her spending allowance, so she saw no reason why she couldn’t help fund her expensive taste in clothes. This rebellious behavior was a constant source of conflict—with Leo assuming the role of strict disciplinarian.
The solution to their differences came on January 28, 1907, when the stork delivered a baby girl named Blanche Margaret, a dark-haired beauty. To Leo’s
great relief, Hattie would now have no time for anything except being a mom. And the job title stuck.
Hattie may have acquiesced to her duties as a housewife, but when it came to religion, her Presbyterian background prevailed. However, no matter how much Leo may have desired to blend in as an American Protestant, he was never able to erase his Yiddish accent. Regardless, there were no menorahs to be found at holiday time; their house had the requisite Christmas tree and stockings were hung by the chimney with care.
On November 9, 1909, the stork made a second stop at the Fink residence, this time armed with a blue-eyed, redheaded, freckle-faced bundle of joie de vivre named Catherine Louise, but everyone called her Kitty—until the time when she left home to become Kay Thompson. Her middle name, Louise, was inspired by her city of birth, St. Louis, and it became the basis for the name of her alter ego, Eloise.
Having outgrown their tiny home, the Finks relocated three miles northeast to a slightly larger dwelling at 5965 Maple, in a more family-oriented, middle-class neighborhood. Hattie busied herself with a rapid succession of additions to the family: first, on March 20, 1911, a boy christened Leo George Fink Jr., known to everyone as Bud, and then, on August 20, 1912, a girl named Marian Antoinette.
