Pink Triangle: The Feuds and Private Lives of Tennessee Williams, Gore Vidal, Truman Capote, and Famous Members of Their Entourages (Blood Moon's Babylon Series) (133 page)

Elizabeth knew that Kerr had had a sexual tryst years before with Stewart Granger, but she was not certain if Burton had had an affair with her in Britain.

Relationships between Burton and Wilding were still friendly, and Elizabeth had no animosity toward him. It had not been a bitter divorce. They were both involved in the rearing of their two sons, and both of them loved their boys very much, even though neither of them would ever win any awards for parenting.

Wilding was no longer lusting for Elizabeth. He showed up with a beautiful Swedish actress, Karen von Unge. She recalled, “Michael was a dear, sensitive man who should have been a great painter. Here he was, carrying suitcases of chili for Elizabeth from Chasen’s in Los Angeles because she asked for them. She simply asked, and men did—it was that simple.”

Huston looked upon Wilding as “a pathetic figure. He was once a big star in England, but he gave it up for Elizabeth. What did it get him? Now he serves her drinks and picks up dog poop for her. He’s like the Erich von Stroheim character in
Sunset Blvd
.. Formerly married to Gloria Swanson in the movie, he becomes her butler.”

Anticipating feuds or muggings, Huston passed out derringers to key members of his cast. These were the kind of small pistols that late 19
^th
-century card sharps were known for concealing within their sleeves. With the pistols, he gave each person a silver bullet with a name etched onto it. Even though she was not a member of the cast, the derringer he gave Elizabeth was gold-plated.

Unlike the others, Elizabeth received five bullets, each with a name on it—Richard Burton, Sue Lyon, Ava Gardner, and Deborah Kerr. The director also included one with the name of John Huston.

On seeing Elizabeth again over drinks, Gardner said, “Dear heart, you and Richard are the Frank (Sinatra) and Ava (Gardner) of the 1960s.”

Evelyn Keyes, though not in Mexico, was present—at least in the group’s collective memory. Elizabeth had stolen Mike Todd from her following Keyes’ divorce from John Huston. Keyes was now married to Artie Shaw, who had been Gardner’s former husband.

The plot thickened when Budd Schulberg, author of the Hollywood novel,
What Makes Sammy Run?
and the screenplay for
On the Waterfront
, arrived to seduce Gardner. Viertel had once been married to Schulberg’s former wife, Virginia Ray.

In a conversation one day at the beach with Elizabeth and Dick Hanley, Viertel confessed that he had abandoned his pregnant wife to run away with Bettina, arguably the most famous French fashion model of the 1950s. “She later dumped me for Aly Khan.”

“I know Bettina,” Elizabeth said. “I know Aly Khan, too. Oh do I know Aly Khan!”

“Huston tried to console me when I lost Bettina,” Viertel said. “He told me ‘Aly Khan is one swell guy.’ Then, when Aly Khan fucked Huston’s wife, Evelyn Keyes, I told him, ‘It’s okay, John, Aly is one swell guy.’ He punched me in the mouth. I love John, though. He’s fucked everybody from Marilyn Monroe on the set of
The Asphalt Jungle
to Truman Capote on the set of
Beat the Devil
when they shared a double bed. He even screwed a neo-Nazi woman in London who gave him syphilis—something he later referred to as ‘the Hitler clap.’”

When Viertel left to return to the set, he, as a man of the world, kissed both Elizabeth and Hanley on the lips before departing.

Tennessee arrived in Puerto Vallarta with Frederick Nicklaus, a young recent graduate of Ohio State University. Tennessee told Huston, “Frederick is the world’s greatest living poet, though not discovered as of yet.”

“You’ve already introduced Freddie boy to me in Key West,” Huston reminded the drugged playwright.

“I’ve dealt with Bogie, so I know how to handle difficult, temperamental personalities,” Huston later said. “Williams is an odd bird, always in flight. He can also ‘fly’ off the handle at just a perceived insult. Not only that, but he is eccentric, a sex addict, a pill pusher, an alcoholic, and, perhaps, a genius. A genius is always difficult to handle. I already had Ava Gardner, Richard Burton, and Elizabeth fucking around. Now, Tennessee with his fat wallet would soon be buying every good looking Mexican lad at the port.”

Tom Shaw, Huston’s assistant director, detested Tennessee and his volatile personality. In his bulldog manner, he said, “I hated the mean son of a bitch. I was having a drink at the bar, and he was berating the shit out of this poor Mexican bartender. At the time, I didn’t recognize who he was. I said to myself, ‘Who is this asshole?’ He was a vicious kind of faggot.”

One night over drinks, the key players were asked by Herb Caen, the San Francisco columnist, what they most wanted in life. Huston said, “Interest.” Gardner wished for “Health.” Burton opted for “Adventure,” Viertel for “Success,” and Deborah Kerr “Happiness.” Elizabeth chose “Wealth.”

Tennessee requested, “Better sex.”

James Bacon, the veteran Hollywood reporter who’d once seduced Marilyn Monroe, arrived on the scene. “I’m from Hollywood, and I knew both John Barrymore and Errol Flynn, but I’d never seen such heavy drinking. One night in a tavern, Burton downed twenty-five straight shots of tequila, using Carta Blanca beer as a chaser.”

Tennessee and Huston could almost keep up with him.

“I was in no condition myself, but I often had to put Burton to bed at his villa long after Elizabeth had retired,” Tennessee said. “He begged me to help him get undressed, so I took advantage. He didn’t specifically ask me to, but I also removed the Welshman’s jockey shorts. I figured I wouldn’t get a chance like this very often—to see what appealed to the stately homos of the British theater like Olivier and Gielgud in the 1940s, and to so many fine ladies.”

The cast and crew were constantly besieged by reporters, Elizabeth claiming, “There are more press guys and
paparazzi
here than fucking iguanas.”

Whereas reporters from California relished writing about the heavy drinking and the behind-the-scenes romances, the Mexican newspaper
Siempre
denounced the entire cast and crew of
The Night of the Iguana
. It attacked the “sex, drinking, drugs, vice, and carnal bestiality of this gringo garbage that has descended on our country.”
Siempre
also cited “gangsters, nymphomaniacs, heroin-taking blondes, and the degenerate American playwright, Tennessee Williams.”

One night, while drinking with Elizabeth, it became clear that her body was a sea of insect bites. “Welcome to Puerto Vallarta,” she said, “with its tropical heat, cheating lovers, poisonous snakes, deadly scorpions, hot pussies, and giant land crabs. Of them all, the most devouring are the goddamn chiggers, which dig in real deep and can only be removed with scalpels.”

The local Catholic priest attacked Elizabeth as a “wanton Jezebel” and called on the President of Mexico to deport her as an undesirable alien. When Tennessee’s arrival was publicized in the press, the priest also called for his removal from Mexico as well. “We do not need another notorious homosexual coming to Mexico to corrupt the morals of our young men.”

A drunken Elizabeth was asked one night how she’d describe the three women in the cast. She obliged: “Gardner is lushly ripe for a middle-aged woman; Kerr is refined and ladylike until you get her in bed, or so I’m told; and Lyon is…well, let’s just say nubile. No wonder James Mason had the hots for her. When making
Lolita
, he temporarily gave up his interest in boys.”

When Tennessee, in a Puerto Vallarta tavern known as the Casablanca Bar, was asked for his opinion of the Taylor/Burton romance, he said, “They are artists on a special pedestal and therefore the rules of bourgeois morality do not apply to them.”

Burton was sitting with Tennessee when he made that pronouncement. When Burton himself was asked for a comment, he said, “I am bewitched by the cunt of Elizabeth Taylor and her cunning ways. Cunt and cunning—that’s what the attraction is.”

Graham Jenkins, Burton’s brother, was also in Puerto Vallarta, and he had a more sensitive view of the Taylor/Burton affair. “Richard discovered how much he really needed Elizabeth, and his surrender to her was total. Of course, they still fought like cats and dogs. Each of them was mercurial. But they truly loved each other, and that was so evident. That did not mean that each of them could no longer see with their roving eye. Rich especially would always have that.”

For the most part, Burton was pleased with his role, telling Tennessee, “After this film is released, those boys in the press will stop calling me Mr. Cleopatra.”

The one thing Elizabeth liked about Tennessee’s play was the dialogue. “It contained some of the most bitch wit ever recorded.”

Over a private drink she had with Huston and Tennessee, she told them, “Believe me, no one adores Ava Gardner more than I do. Such a fine actress, if the role isn’t too challenging. I think you’ll make a good picture. Regrettably, if you’d chosen me for the role of Maxine, it would have been a great picture, and I would win another Oscar to give the one I have company.”

“I’m sure you’re right, my dear,” Huston said. “Right on target. Forgive my mistake in casting.”

***

Before his departure from Mexico in October of 1963 for New York, Tennessee hosted a party at his rented villa near Elizabeth and Burton in Gringo Gulch. He’d invited both of them to attend, but only Elizabeth had shown up.

There, she met Jose Bolaños, a Mexican screen writer who was enjoying a certain vogue. After the murder of Marilyn Monroe on August 4, 1962, he was getting a lot of press attention and being widely hailed as her last and final boyfriend.

Bolaños told Tennessee that he and Monroe had mutually committed themselves to get married, although some of her friends said that Monroe had promised to remarry Joe DiMaggio.

Bolaños was working on a TV commercial twenty-five miles to the south, but had come to Puerto Vallarta with the hope of meeting and ingratiating himself with Elizabeth as he had with Monroe.

Tennessee had been charmed by the charismatic young Mexican and had set up the meeting for him with Elizabeth, presumably without Burton.

Tennessee defined him as a Latin lover archetype, evocative of both Fernando Lamas and Ricardo Montalban. Bolaños was dark and handsome, with a magnetic personality. The night of their meeting, Bolaños told Elizabeth and Tennessee that his dream involved coming to Hollywood and putting both Lamas and Montalban “out of business.” Secretly, he hoped that by attaching himself to Elizabeth, she could use her influence to help him break into the American film industry.

Elizabeth might have paid scant attention to Bolaños except for two reasons: He was the only man she’d met in Puerto Vallarta who qualified for that “revenge fuck” she’d planned as a means of getting even with Burton for seducing Gardner. Also, she was tempted by the idea of learning intimate secrets about Monroe’s last lover, especially if the fallen star had considered Bolaños as marriage material.

At Tennessee’s party, Bolaños exuded masculinity, and as Elizabeth would tell Dick Hanley, “He stood so close to me he was practically rubbing that big package up against me.”

On his own turf within Mexico’s film community, Bolaños was known as a “star fucker,” having previously seduced such aging screen divas as Merle Oberon and Dolores Del Rio.