Myrna Loy

Myrna Loy

Myrna Loy

The Only Good Girl in Hollywood

Emily W. Leider

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University of California Press

Berkeley and Los Angeles, California

University of California Press, Ltd.

London, England

© 2011 by Emily W. Leider

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Leider, Emily W.

Myrna Loy : the only good girl in Hollywood / Emily W. Leider.

p.   cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-520-25320-9 (cloth : alk. paper)

1. Loy, Myrna, 1905–1993.     2. Motion picture actors and actresses—United States—Biography.     I. Title.

PN2287.L67L46     2011

791.43′028092—dc22

[B]

2011011571

Manufactured in the United States of America

20    19    18    17    16    15    14    13    12    11

10    9    8    7    6    5    4    3    2    1

In keeping with a commitment to support environmentally responsible and sustainable printing practices, UC Press has printed this book on Natures Book, a fiber that contains 30 percent postconsumer waste and meets the minimum requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (R 1997)
(Permanence of Paper)
.

For Rosa and Linus,

a new generation of movie lovers

Contents

List of Plates

Introduction

1. The Climb

2. Not Your Typical Helena Girl

3. Life without Father

4. Enter Myrna Loy

5. Warner Bros.’ Exotic Vixen

6. Breakthrough

7. Cutting the Veil

8. Mr. and Mrs. Thin Man

9. Myrna Loy vs. MGM

10. Mrs. Arthur Hornblow Jr.

11. Wife vs. Mistress

12. Trouble

13. Things Fall Apart

14. Rebound

15. Postwar

16. Breaking Away

17. Mrs. Howland Sargeant

18. New York Ending

Appendix. Myrna Loy’s Film, Television, and Theater Credits

Notes

Bibliography

Acknowledgments

Index

Plates follow page 180

Plates

1. David T. and Ann Williams, paternal grandparents of Myrna Loy.

2. Aunt Lu Wilder, maternal grandmother Isabella Johnson, and Della Johnson Williams, ca. 1900.

3. Myrna Adele Williams, 1905.

4. The Williams family, 1912: Della, David Jr., seven-year-old Myrna, and David Sr.

5. Myrna Williams at age fifteen, 1920.

6. Myrna Loy revisits the Williams ranch in Crow Creek Valley, 1940.

7. “Fountain of Education,” Venice High School sculpture by Harry F. Winebrenner, 1922.

8. Myrna Loy and an unidentified dancer in the Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre Prologue to

The Ten Commandments

.

9. The September 1925 issue of

Motion Picture

introduced Myrna Loy with a question, “Who is she?”

10. Joan Crawford and Myrna Loy as dancers in

Pretty Ladies

(MGM, 1925).

11. Myrna Loy the exotic, in a retouched press photograph.

12. Myrna Loy with cast and crew of

Don Juan

(Warner Bros., 1926).

13. A publicity herald for

The Girl from Chicago

(Warner Bros., 1927).

14. Tom Wilson, Myrna Loy, and Heinie Conklin in blackface in

Ham and Eggs at the Front

(Warner Bros., 1927).

15. Myrna Loy and Conrad Nagel in

State Street Sadie

(Warner Bros., 1928).

16. Myrna Loy and Anna May Wong in

The Crimson City

(Warner Bros., 1928).

17. Myrna Loy and Maurice Chevalier in the musical

Love Me Tonight

(Paramount, 1932).

18. Myrna Loy and Irene Dunne in

Thirteen Women

(RKO, 1932).

19. Myrna Loy as Fah Lo See in

The Mask of Fu Manchu

(MGM, 1932).

20. Warner Baxter, Myrna Loy, and Charles Butterworth play cards during a break in shooting

Penthouse

(MGM, 1933) as director Woody Van Dyke looks on.

21. William Powell, Myrna Loy, and Clark Gable in a publicity still for

Manhattan Melodrama

(MGM, 1933).

22. Ad for

The Thin Man

(MGM, 1934).

23. Nora Charles in a scene that was cut from

The Thin Man

.

24. George Hurrell shot this portrait of Myrna Loy in 1932, soon after she signed with MGM.

25. Portrait of Myrna Loy by Ted Allan, 1934.

26. Cary Grant and Myrna Loy confer with Amelia Earhart on the set of

Wings in the Dark

(Paramount, 1935).

27. Spencer Tracy and Myrna Loy, costars in

Whipsaw

(MGM, 1935).

28. Myrna Loy and William Powell being filmed in

Escapade

(MGM, 1935).

29. Myrna Loy with her stepson, Terry Hornblow, in Beverly Hills, ca. 1937.

30. Jean Harlow, Clark Gable, and Myrna Loy on the set of

Wife vs. Secretary

(MGM, 1936).

31. William Powell and Myrna Loy take in a view of the newly completed Bay Bridge from San Francisco’s Telegraph Hill, 1936.

32. Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Hornblow Jr. outside their custom-built home on Hidden Valley Road in Beverly Hills, ca. 1937.

33. Arthur Hornblow Jr. flanked by Myrna Loy and Claudette Colbert at Paramount, 1939.

34. Della Williams, Aunt Lu Wilder, David (Myrna’s brother), Myrna Loy, and Arthur Hornblow Jr. at the train station, 1940.

35. The cover of

Hollywood

shows Tyrone Power as Major Safti and Myrna Loy as Lady Esketh in

The Rains Came

(20th Century–Fox, 1939).

36. William Powell in drag and Myrna Loy playing along in

Love Crazy

(MGM, 1941).

37. Myrna Loy in her Bundles for Bluejackets uniform, 1942.

38. Myrna Loy and her second husband, John D. Hertz Jr., 1942.

39. Wedding of Myrna Loy and Gene Markey at Terminal Island, San Pedro, California, Jan. 3, 1946.

40. Myrna Loy and Fredric March, as Milly and Al Stephenson, stare into mirrors in

The Best Years of Our Lives

(Goldwyn/RKO, 1946).

41. Myrna Loy, Fredric March, and Lucille Ball take part in

Hollywood Fights Back

, 1947.

42. Myrna Loy and Cary Grant on the set of

The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer

(RKO, 1947).

43. Cary Grant and Myrna Loy in a promotional still for

Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House

(RKO, 1948).

44. Myrna Loy campaigns for Democratic presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson, 1956.

45. Montgomery Clift and Myrna Loy during the filming of

Lonelyhearts

(United Artists, 1958).

46. Myrna Loy and Paul Newman in

From the Terrace

(20th Century–Fox, 1960).

47. Myrna Loy and cast in

Barefoot in the Park

.

48. Myrna Loy and Henry Fonda in

Summer Solstice

.

Introduction

Myrna Loy’s grace and slender elegance, her ease before the camera, and her arresting face had a lot to do with her success on film, but she claimed that stardom entailed more sweat than glamour. In her early days at Warner Bros. she worked nonstop, sometimes moving from set to set in multiple films being shot at the same time. In 1927 alone she played in eleven movies, and she took no vacation until she had been a screen actress nearly ten years. During her six-decade career she appeared in a staggering 124 films, beginning with her debut at age twenty as a dancing chorine in
Pretty Ladies
. Fifty-five years later, in 1980, she made her last appearance on the big screen, as a sassy executive secretary in Sidney Lumet’s
Just Tell Me What You Want
.

Loy took her first full-time job, as a prologue dancer at Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre, while still in her teens. She needed to support her widowed mother, younger brother, and aunt. As a contract player for Warner Bros. in the 1920s she took part in the sound revolution, playing small roles in
Don Juan
, the first silent with a synchronized score, and
The Jazz Singer
, the groundbreaking Al Jolson musical with some sound dialogue. Hitting her stride in drawing room comedy in the early sound era, she signed with MGM in 1931, striking gold three years later as Nora Charles in
The Thin Man
and making the list of the top ten box-office stars in 1937 and 1938. After taking time off to move to New York and volunteer full time for the Red Cross during World War II, she returned to Hollywood for a memorable performance opposite Fredric March in
The Best Years of Our Lives
, winner of the Best Picture Academy Award for 1946.

Along the way, in her eighty-eight years, she found the time to marry and divorce four times, fight the House Un-American Activities Committee, become a UNESCO delegate, campaign for various Democratic Party candidates, serve John F. Kennedy on the National Committee against Discrimination in Housing, help found the American Place Theatre, and rack up credits in radio, television, and stage. She lived in four very different cities—Helena, Montana; Los Angeles; Washington, D.C.; and New York—and traveled widely. She could always see the larger world beyond Hollywood.

As a screen actress Loy was best known for her collaborative skills. She was an attuned, responsive screen partner, most famously to William Powell, with whom she made fourteen films, but also to Clark Gable (her second most frequent leading man), Cary Grant, Melvyn Douglas, and a long list of others. Never a stand-alone pillar of female power onscreen, she excelled at sharing the frame and reacting, what Cary Grant called tossing back the ball. Here she differed from her dynamo friend Joan Crawford and from such dominating female screen icons of her generation as Bette Davis, Katharine Hepburn, and Mae West. Being a top-tier movie star didn’t define Myrna Loy as it did them, and her career eventually lost momentum as a result.

Most at home in comedy, she achieved her best effects by underplaying, by suggesting meaning rather than hammering it home. No pies in the face for her. The subtle, nuanced action or reaction—a raised eyebrow, wry inflection, or crinkled nose—could say it all. Even in drama she avoided scenery chewing or broad strokes. For Loy, as an actress, less was more. Extremely modern in her minimalist technique, she remains our contemporary in her ability to grow, to stay in the game and continue evolving.

Her greatest acclaim followed the unexpected runaway success of her partnership with Powell in
The Thin Man
, which engendered five sequels. Released just months before strict enforcement of the Production Code began,
The Thin Man
pleased censors by making marriage, the only kind of sexual relationship endorsed by the Code, look like fun. Because Nick and Nora Charles lived a carefree, luxurious life on buckets of money, they made married life look like one big party, with plenty of excitement generated by a murder mystery and enough mink coats, art deco surroundings, martinis, and smart repartee to divert any Depression-weary audience. The screen’s Nick and Nora turned wedded bliss into a true partnership of near equals. Although Nick dominates and sometimes condescends, Nora holds up her end. She has wealth, wit, style, and a mind of her own. This kind of balance between complementary spouses had never been shown onscreen and became a model for subsequent couplings in cinema and television.

Comedy itself changed over the decades of Loy’s career. The cynical, urban edge of the first
Thin Man
became less cutting in the sequels, and the mingling of wealthy characters with endearing ex-cons no longer worked. Nick and Nora acquired a son and stopped being footloose. During World War II, family values took hold, and murder could no longer be treated lightly. The postwar comedy
Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House
played to the consumer’s dream of achieving happiness by buying a house in the suburbs and fixing it up with multiple bathrooms.

Nora was consistently a good sport, and usually upbeat, as was Myrna Loy offscreen. Although she once took on MGM, going absent without leave and demanding higher pay and more time off, and although from the 1940s on she sounded off periodically against isolationists and right-wingers, in private she usually shunned confrontation, as did the characters she played. In
After the Thin Man
William Powell’s Nick tells Nora: “You don’t scold, you don’t nag, and you look too pretty in the morning.” Nora wryly promises to start scolding, but she never does.