Midafternoon, July 3, 1968 — the studio, already half empty, most everyone was off and running to a festive July 4.
After the last of my secretaries had given me her good-bye, she rushed back into my office, her face a-blush, her voice a-stutter.
"Mr. Evans. I've just gotten off the phone with Mr. Cary Grant." Her stutter so pronounced now, I couldn't make out what she said.
"What?"
"Mr. Grant would like to see you."
"Why didn't you put him through?"
"He. he told me not to. He wanted to know what your weekend plans were. I, I hope I wasn't out of place. I, I told him you didn't have any. Mr. Grant he laughed. Could you spare a moment for him later this afternoon?"
"Call him. Tell him I don't have one plan, zero, till July fifth. Whatever time he wants to come is fine with me." A moment later, she returned, stuttering, "He, he's coming here Mr. Evans—at six. Can I stay?" Her face now a Delicious apple. "Please?"
"I thought you were off to Catalina."
"Catalina can wait. Cary Grant!" Her eyes said it all.
"Sure, stick around."
A few hours later, Cary and I were sitting at opposite ends of my coffee table being served tea by the trembling hands of my now flustered secretary.
She whispered in my ear, "Could I could I ask Mr. Grant for his autograph?" There was only one Cary Grant!
"My secretary's blown her weekend to check out your smile. Write down the old CG for her, will ya?"
Before he could take a pen out from his inside pocket, a still photo was placed before him by my secretary—an 8-x-10 glossy from Indiscreet, a film made a decade before opposite Ingrid Bergman.
"Dear, dear. Where did you find this one?"
"From the film library—it's my favourite film."
Looking closely at the picture, he flashed it to me, "How young I looked. No wine has ever aged as well. It was such fun with Ingrid. Own the negative, you know."
With pen in hand, Cary looked up, flashing his cleft-chin smile again.
"My dear, what is your name?"
"J-J-Jennifer."
He stood up. "It can't be!"
She stuttered back, "D-D-Did I say anything wrong?"
"My favorite name. It's my daughter's name. Jennifer, Jennifer. Isn't that something!" He wrote across the 8-x-10 glossy, "Jennifer, my favorite name of all ... Cary."
No fireworks could have matched the glow of Jennifer's face. Fireworks? Forget it. The most colorful firecracker of her life had just splashed across her world.
Was Cary here to tell me that he wanted to work again, come out of retirement, do his first gig at Paramount?
Would that be a coup!
"Isn't it marvelous? One of Us running a studio," referring back to a decade before when we met as fellow actors at Universal. He, the most glamorous star in the world. Me, a contract player at $175 a week. Most every day we'd pass each other on the lot. Though at the time we had never met, I couldn't help myself, staring at him in awe.
What was the connective tissue that caused the most glamorous star in the world to become friends with a fledgling young actor?
A Yugoslavian basketball player. A guy? Uh-uh, a girl. Luba Otashavich by name, later changed to Luba Bodine.
Cary met her while making The Pride and the Passion in Spain with Sophia Loren and Frank Sinatra. Cary fell madly in love with Sophia. Sophia, who was married to Carlo Ponti, broke off the relationship. Her marriage came first.
Sophia's stand-in and double was Luba. Not quite a carbon copy, but who could be?
Yet she was a lovely remembrance who could match Sophia's spark, energy, and charisma better than anyone. She was put under contract to Cary's company at Universal. At first, I had no idea of her relationship with Cary. In my eyes Luba was a young Sophia Loren--a knockout. To Cary, Luba was but a shadow, a remembrance of a lost love. To me, she was what love could be all about. Because Cary was her mentor, it was important to her that he approve of me. Our kinship started almost the moment we met. For more than a year, several nights a week, the three of us would go out togeth-er. A drive-in movie, with sandwiches to go from Nate 'n Al's, a night ball game, an industry function, there we were —Luba, Cary, and myself.
For two or three years Luba played a very important part of my life. Her relationship with Cary stayed the same— not platonic. All three knew what the action was. All three wanted one thing—to make one another's lives a bit more fun, with no questions asked.
Now, a decade later, Luba's married to one of the world's wealthiest men. Cary's married to dynamic Dyan Cannon. I'm between gigs, a momentary bachelor. Cary and I were more than friends, we were close friends. Sipping our tea, I couldn't help but think how exciting it would be to get Cary out of retirement and back on to the Paramount lot.
When you're an original, you owe it to the world you can't retire simply because you can't be duplicated. Everything about Cary was stamped "original."
How many times had Cary chuckled "As an actor, I don't know how good I am. I just play myself to perfection." Katharine Hepburn jokingly said, "Cary? He's just Cary. He's a personality functioning."
Fashion is temporary. Style lasts forever. Till this day, Cary's the only man I've ever met who could walk into a room backward with more grace than anyone walking forward.
Suddenly, dead serious, he said, "Need some advice, dear Robert." Great! He's going to ask me what picture he should do.
"Why doesn't Dyan love me?"
He's asking me? I don't even know her. Being overly aggressive, "Would making a picture together help?"
"I'd be on my knees in broken glass if I thought it would help." Sadly, he shook his head.
My first and only look-see at a crack in Mr. Grant's sterling armour.
"Does she like you, Cary? Do you like her? Are you pals? Don't answer me, please. Think about it. Answer it, but only to yourself. That's what it's all about."
With full aplomb, changing the subject beautifully, Grant cleft-smiled me, "Dinner tonight?"
'Sure. Why not?"
"Chasen's—nine P.M.?"
"Woodland—got a great duck in the oven, give you a sneak peek of Rosemary's Baby. It's the final print."
"Is it as good as they say?"
"We'll find out tonight."
"Can I bring Dougie? He's in town."
That night of July 3, 1968, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Cary Grant, and I finished off two ducks, wild rice with plum sauce, followed by a lemon soufflé. Rosemary's Baby? We never saw it. We talked, laughed, talked, laughed, about every imaginable subject regarding relationships between men and women, except—a big except—the one Cary and I had discussed earlier at our clandestine meeting at Paramount.
The afternoon of July 4, an envelope marked "Personal and Confidential" was delivered to the front door by special messenger. Inside was a three-page handwritten poem, not from Cary, but from Dougie, about the magic of Grant, Evans, and Fairbanks bringing in the July 4 fireworks together.
What I had tried to get across to Cary that afternoon about like, about friendship, conditional and unconditional, was answered not by his words, but rather by Dyan's action. A few months later, poor Cary was sued for divorce, Dyan claiming he used to beat her—in front of the servants, no less. Me, like a schmuck, was asking the same guy "Do you like your wife?" Apparently, her like for him was minimal at best. A bitter child-custody fight ensued. The most valuable jewel of Cary's life—his daughter, Jennifer--was now his only to visit, not to have.
When I was first put into the catbird seat to run Paramount, the one thing I knew for sure was that every eye in the joint was on alert to see how "the womaniser" operated.
Knowing that, my deportment was conservative. With purpose, at my daily lunches at the studio commissary my chair, without fail, always faced the wall. I knew full well that if I sat facing out into the room and gave a smile here or a hello there, the gossip windmill would start turning a smile into a romantic interlude.
Hollywood is a town where most people are looking for work, rather than working. It propels gossip into a major industry. By the way, gossip is never good. Why should it be, who would listen? By the time an eighth of a truth gets back to you, it is so exaggerated it is laughable or even harmful.
I don't know why but before my first shave, I already landed right smack in the center of gossip. After a while it doesn't matter. It's been said that when people stop talking about you, that's the time to worry. I wouldn't know—it's never happened.
For three years, from 1966 to 1969, I had a lover, a mistress. I was obsessed with her : the Paramount mountain. It was a seven-day-a-week, eighteen-hour-a-day affair. It got worse. From obsessed, I became possessed. I doubt whether there was one night a week for three years that I left the studio before midnight. I couldn't help it. I didn't want to fail.
Every so often, between the time the sun went down and the time I left the studio, a director, actor, writer, or producer pal would drop by the office, many a time with a beautiful girl by his side. Whether it be for twenty minutes or an hour, they'd have a drink, talk, and a laugh.
During those three years, almost every woman who dropped by with a pal shared a connective tissue. All of them came from different parts of the country, all dreamed of becoming actresses, all were studying. All had legitimate jobs—-salesgirl, waitress, or dental hygienist—all shared the same dilemma : no wheels.
Without exception, all of them were given an ultimatum by their parents : "Stay at home—anything you want that we can afford, you can have. But if you leave and go out to Hollywood, you're going to have to make it on your own.
We will not support you."
How dumb and shortsighted parental decisions can be. A son is one thing, a daughter another. If it meant taking a night job, I'd make certain my daughter was covered no matter where she wandered. When things get tough, rent not paid, electricity turned off, little or no food to eat, and too scared to ask her judgmental parents for help, sadly, no matter how decent a girl is, she ends up spreading her legs in the world's oldest profession.
Not having a car in Los Angeles is tantamount to not having shoes in New York. One has to drive, not walk their way up the ladder to success.
From time to time, even if it was a casual hello, I'd pick up a magnetic quality of a car-less wannabe actress. With no strings attached, I'd rent her a Mustang convertible. Cost—$148 bucks a month from my pal, David Shane, who owned Hollywood-U-Drive-It. Was I looking for reciprocity? No, I didn't have the time. Was I propositioned? By some, because they thought it was necessary. Did I have liaisons with any? A few. Was my gesture altruistic? No, selfish. What greater turn-on is there than knowing that at a moment in time in another's life your presence made the difference between growth or compromise?
Ali MacGraw and I were getting married in October 1969. How could I tell her that I was renting cars for fourteen girls? Try to explain it! I couldn't. Instead I called David Shane.
"Get the cars back—I'm getting married."
"You can't," David shrieked. "You're my biggest customer."
"I may be eccentric, David, but I ain't crazy. I'm marrying Ali, and I don't need no front-page tabloid shit." Why do I tell the story? Today, of the fourteen girls, six have become internationally famous stars, none earn less than a million bucks a year. Four married men whose wealth is such that their state tax is more than I make a year.
The others I've lost track of. Yet back then, a $148-a-month car made the difference in the paths their lives took.
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