The Mammoth Book of Hollywood Scandals (16 page)

The article was full of lies – terrible at best and libellous at worst – but for Clara it was the straw that broke the camel’s back. She suffered a full-blown nervous breakdown and was immediately rushed to Glendale Sanatorium, where she was ordered to rest for six months, while at the same time being put through a series of cures to “relieve” her stress, including electric shock treatment and an abstinence from all visitors. “Absolute quiet is necessary for recuperation,” the doctor told concerned friends, while Clara herself managed to get word out that she was planning to retire from pictures indefinitely.

Studio boss B. P. Schulberg pretended not to be too worried; after all, his star had made threats to leave at various stages of her career in the past, and nothing had ever come of it. He told reporters that no decision would be made until Clara was well enough to talk, but that “she is in no condition to talk business at the present time”.

However, just days later came the shock news that Clara was adamant about her retirement and had requested that her contract be cancelled immediately. Paramount were beside themselves, as their star still had two more films to make before the projected end of her contract in October 1931. At the same time they knew that there was nothing they could ever do to control Clara Bow; they had never succeeded in doing so in the past, and they knew they wouldn’t in the future. It was with a heavy heart, therefore, that they reluctantly agreed on the termination and Schulberg released a statement: “In accordance with Clara’s wishes, we have consented to tear up her contract with Paramount.” He then went on to say how difficult it was to discard an association he had enjoyed for many years, “particularly with one who has earned our personal liking and admiration . . . I am sorry to see her leave Paramount for she is a great and popular screen star.”

While Paramount licked their wounds and wondered who would become the next It Girl, from her sick bed, Clara released her own statement:

“I am deeply grateful. Already I feel much better than I have for many weeks, as I struggled to regain my health so that I could carry on. I wanted my contract broken if Paramount saw fit, so that I might get back on my feet again . . . Now that this worry is over I can face the task of regaining my health with a free mind. It’s like leaving home to leave the studio after so many years, but I know it is the best thing for me to do.”

A few days later Clara Bow travelled to Nevada to spend time with Rex Bell and recuperate on his ranch, telling reporters, “I am going to forget anything and everything connected with pictures.” She then added, “as soon as I’m able, I will become what is known as a freelance player, contracting for a single production at a time”. She also denied rumours that she would sign with another studio, although she did admit to having various offers, all of which she had turned down, until the time was right that she could “stage a comeback”.

In the end, Clara Bow never did make the big comeback she hoped for, though she did marry Rex Bell and gave birth to two sons whom she adored. She was never far from scandal and health problems, with another threat of a lawsuit from a casino and several breakdowns adding to her problems in future years. She also never obtained the full happiness she had always looked for, and she was unable to recover from the Daisy DeVoe trial, which had sent her over the edge in the first place. She died of a heart attack on 27 September 1965 at the age of sixty, and ex-lover Harry Richman was chosen to be one of the pall-bearers at her funeral.

Clara’s life and career were over and, for some considerable years, her films were forgotten. However, in 2011 the producers of
The Artist
became inspired by the actress and looked at her style in order to create the look of one of the main characters in the film. Since then, interest in her has had something of a revival, with a new documentary broadcast in the UK during December 2012 and an exclusive showing of her movie
It
played to a packed-out audience in London in January 2013.

But what of Daisy DeVoe? Well, when she was released from prison in April 1933, the former secretary went to work in the aviation industry. Of her time in jail, she later declared, “I had a ball”, while explaining that the prison wardens had loved her as she always volunteered to polish their nails . . .

Although her career has been long since forgotten, Peg Entwistle gains the grisly and tragic honour of being the only person to ever commit suicide by jumping to her death from the Hollywood sign.

Millicent Lilian (Peg) Entwistle was born in Port Talbot, Wales, in 1908. She was brought up in London and New York, although her childhood was not a happy one. The details are still shrouded in mystery, but it is said that she tragically endured the death of her mother, stepmother and father, all by the year 1922.

Determined that her adult life would be better than her childhood, Peg became a stage actress, appearing in Boston and on Broadway, where she began to forge a busy career. She acted in plays such as
The Home Towners
and
Tommy
, and treated her career very seriously, studying hard and insisting that she would prefer to play roles that carry conviction rather than the standard Hollywood fluff. “To play any kind of emotional scene I must work up to a certain pitch. If I reach this in my first word, the rest of the words and lines take care of themselves,” she told an interviewer early in her career.

As time went on, her career really began to take off, but unfortunately Peg was still unfulfilled in her personal life. This seemed destined to change in April 1927, however, as while acting in Eugene O’Neill’s
The Great God Brown
she met actor Robert Keith and the two hit it off straight away. Incredibly, such was the attraction that the two decided to marry just four days later – a decision that she was later to regret.

Predictably, the marriage was not a happy one. The couple fought constantly, and when they divorced in 1929 Peg said that her life with Keith had been a continuous round of pain and suffering. According to the actress, he had torn her hair from her head and also failed to tell her he was the father of a six-year-old son from a former marriage. Suddenly marrying after only days of knowing each other did not seem such a good idea, and she would never make the same mistake again.

Free from the abusive marriage, in 1929 Peg visited California with the New York Theatre Guild to appear at the Geary Theater. Unfortunately, on her return to New York, her career seemed to slow somewhat and she ended up appearing in several plays that did not enjoy the same success as she had previously experienced. In April 1932, Peg decided to leave her Broadway career behind and instead travel back to Los Angeles in search of fame and fortune in the movies. Once there, she moved into her Uncle Harold’s Beachwood Drive home and was ecstatic to win a part in the play
The Mad Hopes
by Romney Brent. Her joy was short-lived, however, when the play was not deemed a success and closed very quickly, taking Peg’s hopes of stardom with it.

Still, she refused to give up on herself. Until the downturn she had experienced on Broadway, Peg’s career had been relatively successful and she was determined it would be even better in the future. Her dreams looked set to come true when RKO offered her a part in their film,
Thirteen Women
, though after completion she heard rumours that most of her work had ended up on the cutting-room floor. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the film itself was delayed during editing, preventing its release for some time to come.

Once again her confidence was shaken; her first big role had possibly ended up on the cutting-room floor and no other films were on the horizon. She became depressed, but this time Peg did not have the strength to pull herself and her career back together again. Her spirit was broken, her nerves shot, and friends blamed it all on the depressing part she had played in
Thirteen Women
. Aged just twenty-four, Peg believed her career was over and on the evening of 16 September she decided she could go on no more.

At her home at 2428 Beachwood Drive, a heartbroken Peg put pen to paper and wrote the following note: “I am afraid. I am a coward. I am sorry for everything. If I had done this a long time ago, it would have saved a lot of pain. P. E.”

She folded the paper and placed it in her handbag, before telling her uncle Harold that she was meeting friends at a nearby store. If this was indeed her plan, she never made it, and instead walked two miles to the famous Hollywood sign – the symbol of hope for many would-be actors and actresses including, at one time, Peg herself.

We will never know how long Peg stood at the sign that night. Did she look out over the town, its lights glimmering with the possibility of glamorous film premieres and parties? Did she wonder where it had all gone wrong, and if there was any possibility she could put it all back together again? Who knows. All we know for sure is that at some point during the evening, Peg went to the back of the letter H, located the workmen’s ladders and proceeded to climb up. What went through her mind and how long she stood there will forever remain a mystery, but at some point while standing looking out at the city below, Peg Entwistle took a deep breath and threw herself from the fifty-foot letter, sending herself careering down the mountainside, her body a mass of broken bones and dreams.

The next morning, an unidentified female hiker was taking a stroll through the Hollywood Hills when she came across a shoe, jacket and purse. There was no sign of the owner, so the concerned woman looked inside and discovered Peg’s last note. Having read it, she immediately thought the worst, and started to look around for a body. She did not have to search long, as when she happened to gaze down the mountainside, much to her horror she saw a crumpled body lying there.

The last thing the hiker wanted was any kind of publicity, so instead of trying immediately to raise the alarm about the young woman who had fallen to her death, she decided to do things as quietly as she possibly could. She gathered up Peg’s purse, shoe and jacket, wrapped them carefully and took them to the Hollywood police station, where she laid them neatly on the steps of the building. That done, she then walked to a phone booth, telephoned the Central Police Station, gave her statement and quickly hung up.

Police found the bundle of items on the steps of the station and immediately descended on the area of the Hollywood sign, looking for the woman’s broken body. It was quickly found and after raising it back up the mountain, the corpse was taken to the morgue where sadly it lay unclaimed. At that point it was not known who the poor woman was, but the police decided to circulate the suicide note to the press, anxious to discover if anyone had any answers.

As Peg’s Uncle Harold read his newspaper the next morning, his heart skipped a beat. The suicide letter was signed P. E. – could that possibly be a reference to Peg Entwistle? Surely not. But then he hadn’t seen the girl since she had left home several nights ago, so while his heart prayed it couldn’t possibly be his niece, his head knew different. Suddenly everything became clear and he raced to the morgue to see for himself. Once there he was shown the body and the horrific realization came that the poor broken girl before him really was the beautiful girl with whom he had been sharing his home in the recent past.

He was devastated, but now that the police had a name, they also wanted an explanation, so despite him being just as confused as they were, Harold told them all he possibly could. He told officers that although Peg had never confided her grief to him, he had become aware of the fact that she was suffering “intense mental anguish”. He laid his head in his hands and sadly exclaimed, “She was only 24. It is a great shock to me that she gave up the fight as she did.”

Now that the identification had taken place, it was time for Peg Entwistle’s funeral, which was attended by a small gathering of friends. Her body was cremated and her ashes were sent to the family plot in Cincinnati, where she became famous not for being a stunning actress, but for being the first (and likely only) person ever to throw herself from the Hollywood sign.

A sad epitaph came days later when rumours circulated that a letter had arrived at Uncle Harold’s house, asking Peg to star in a new play. The accuracy of this story is open to debate, however; and so too is the rumour that Peg Entwistle’s ghostly figure is frequently seen ambling around the letter H of the Hollywood sign, still desperately seeking her lost fame and fortune.

When Jean Harlow married older producer Paul Bern, she hoped she had met her partner for life. Tragically, two months later he was found dead, and the shock that rippled around the world was so dramatic that even today the incident is still widely discussed. Whole books have been dedicated to the case; articles have brought forward new theories; and internet forums are still buzzing with people desperate to know what really happened to the husband of the late, great Jean Harlow . . .

Paul Bern was born in Germany in 1889 as Paul Levy and relocated to the United States with his family when he was still a young boy. Deeply interested in the stage, he spent some time acting before moving behind the scenes and carving a career for himself in New York. However, he was ambitious and not content with just working on the East Coast, so eventually moved to Hollywood to work as a writer, producer and director at several studios, but in particular, MGM.

Known as the “Father Confessor”, Bern was an extremely popular member of the film industry and was available whenever anyone needed advice, consoling or a good listening ear. His sister later described an incident which confirmed his generous spirit: “I once visited him when he was sick in bed with a high fever. The phone rang. After he was through talking he jumped out of bed and raced away in his car because somebody in need had called him.”

This was the kind of man Paul Bern was. He championed charities, escorted actresses to premieres and was known as a gentle, sincere man. A wonderful friend, yes, but very much a confirmed bachelor it seemed, so when it was announced that he and sex goddess Jean Harlow were to be married in July 1932, Hollywood was astounded. He was forty-two, his bride was twenty-one, and while they had been seen out together many times over the course of a year, nobody thought that the couple were serious about each other. Even when they eventually tied the knot, people who knew them both still could not quite believe it. Bern was a loyal companion, a reliable shoulder to cry on, but husband material? It was believed not.