Judy Garland: A Biography Read online

  Working with as much secrecy as possible so that no one else could step in and grab the rights away from him, Freed began negotiations with Goldwyn. During this time Mayer had been on an extensive European trip buying all the foreign talent he could. Greer Garson and Hedy Lamarr were two of the acquisitions from that trip. On his return Freed went to see Mayer and told him he owned The Wizard of Oz and that he saw it as a fantasy musical and as a vehicle for Judy.

  Sixteen at the time, Judy was full-bosomed and looking very mature. Her Metro image since Love Finds Andy Hardy was now of yearning young womanhood. Dorothy, in The Wizard of Oz, was a little girl no more than eleven. Mayer thought Judy was wrong for the film and vetoed her inclusion in the package. But he did like the property and agreed with Freed that it would make a good musical. Shirley Temple was under contract to Fox. Mayer set out to borrow her, but first he struck a low blow to Freed.

  Quoting Bosley Crowther’s The Hollywood Rajah:

  Mayer himself got great enjoyment from exercise of power and from feeling himself responsible for advancement of someone’s career. “I’ve taken this boy and I have made a great actor (or director or producer) out of him!” That was one of his favorite and oft-repeated remarks. He felt he needed to make people grateful and beholden to him. He literally bathed in the sunshine of his own esteem.

  At the other extreme, Mayer could not stand being wrong about anyone; and the year before he had lured Mervyn LeRoy (Harry Warner’s son-in-law) away from Warner’s with an astronomical bribe of a $300,000 yearly salary. LeRoy had already proved his competence and genius at Warner’s with Little Caesar, I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang, and Anthony Adverse. Mayer gave him Luise Rainer (who was then a big star) and a feeble script entitled Dramatic School to produce. It was a disaster. Finding this a bitter pill, he was still determined LeRoy would produce great films for him, greater than those he had produced for Harry Warner.

  It seemed no one could miss with Shirley Temple. Calling Freed into his office, Mayer let him have the news. The studio was buying the property from him and would give him the grand opportunity of being associate producer. LeRoy was to produce, and Metro was borrowing Shirley Temple. Knowing that if he refused his Metro days would be over and that Mayer would see to it that the other studios wouldn’t touch him, Freed had little other recourse than to accept.

  Mayer had taken it for granted that Fox—owing him a favor for the future use of Gable in Gone with the Wind (to be produced by his son-in-law David Selznick for Fox but with an unusual agreement that it be a Loew’s release)—would agree. To his amazement, Fox refused to lend La Temple.

  Judy and Ethel were brought before the high Rajah and told of their good fortune, being warned at the same time of his ability to replace Judy if she did not buckle down and deliver. While the screenplay was being prepared, she was to go on alternate days of fasting. Dorothy had to look wide-eyed and gaunt.

  Judy was delivered into the hands of the trainers. The fasting regime was put into effect. Her teeth were capped; her hair dyed, then bewigged; her body girdled and strapped tight, and hours of supervised practice imposed in how to walk and dance while so restrained. At the same time, she attended classes from nine to twelve in the little schoolhouse that was then next to the film library on the lot, struggling to keep up the B’s and C’s that she was expected to make for credit to graduate from high school.

  Publicity releases went out that Metro was sparing no expense in this venture. It was to be one of the top-budget pictures of the year, filmed in both black-and-white and color, with a star supporting cast, directed by the inimitable Victor Fleming, who was one of the greatest directors of that period (Treasure Island, Captains Courageous, Red Dust, Test Pilot—and after The Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind). Harold Arlen and E. Y. “Yip” Harburg were brought from Broadway to write the score.

  Judy was getting the star treatment, but much to Ethel’s chagrin, the studio was paying them the combined salaries of $350 a week—and at that, Ethel received the larger amount. Mayer refused to grant Rosen an interview. Before the cameras rolled on The Wizard of Oz, Ethel knew Rosen had to be replaced. In one of the most scurrilous sellouts in Hollywood history, Mayer persuaded Ethel to sign with his pal Frank Orsatti. This meant Judy no longer had free representation, for Orsatti was bound by what might be called a “Devil’s pact” with Mayer. Orsatti was famous for introducing beautiful girls to studio executives in exchange for personal favors. Through Mayer’s help, he was now a successful film agent. But there was no way he could chance opposing him on any issue or contract. To appease Ethel, Orsatti agreed to a figure of $500—a raise of $150 a week when at the same time Mickey Rooney, with good representation, was making close to $5,000 a week.

  “You can’t kill a talent like Judy’s,” Yip Harburg said. “Only bad material can do that.”

  Judy was given the best material and surrounded by the best talents in the business. The ad copy announced, “Dreams Come True! Metro-Gold wyn-Mayer’s Technicolor wonder show is the greatest since ’Snow White.’ ”

  At last Ethel’s dream was about to come true.

  10While Metro spared no expense constructing the fantasy world of Oz, the Munich Peace Pact had been signed; Hitler had paraded through the streets of Asch; the swastika was blazoned on everything; and the world moved toward war.

  But the fact that occupied most of Judy’s thoughts was that on completion of Oz she planned to graduate with a class at Hollywood High School. Customarily, when young contract players had passed all high school requirements, they would be sent to a local high school for graduation and for the few days preceding it. Being well-known performers set them apart, but it did have meaning to the teen-agers.

  The filming of Oz was Judy’s most difficult to date. There was the sheer physical exhaustion of wardrobe and makeup demands, aggravated by the strain of rigorous dieting. It was impossible for her to spend much time in the schoolroom, so a teacher, Rose Carter, was assigned to remain with her for eight hours of the working day. That way, when a stand-in was taking her place while lights and camera were being adjusted, or when she was briefly out of a scene, lessons could be conducted. But imagine the difficulty of such a procedure amid the noise and confusion of forty or more set workers striking and constructing sets; actors rehearsing; sound being adjusted; cables, dollies, and cameras being dragged across the crowded stage, causing anyone in their direct path to jump out of the way, while the lowering of microphones and overhead wires caused the rest of the company to duck for their lives.

  Judy’s problems were intensified by pressures from the front office, critical of every shot she was in; by Ethel standing constant surveillance like an agent from a foreign country; by the anxiety, the nervousness, and the supercharged energy created by the pills; and by the atmosphere of combat on the set caused by Judy’s being cast with a group of seasoned older veterans.

  According to Margaret Hamilton (the Wicked Witch of the West), there was little love lost for Judy on the part of the four main male stars (Bert Lahr, Ray Bolger, Jack Haley, and Frank Morgan). Fearful that she might upstage them, Miss Hamilton claims they played against her—not with her. Judy was also much aware that she had been second choice on the film. There was no question that apart from some of the studio technicians; Edens; a young man named Barron Polan, who was Mervyn LeRoy’s secretary/assistant; and Maggie Hamilton, she was delivered daily by Ethel into an arena of supermagnified hostility.

  Through the years Judy claimed a close friendship with Miss Hamilton, though after Oz they saw very little of each other. Meeting Maggie Hamilton clarifies this; for in person, more honestly cast as the mother of us all, she is an irrepressibly warm, demonstrative, chatty lady whose voice soothes, eyes communicate, and easy touch assures. She was and remains symbolically everything Ethel was not. Happily for Judy, she could confide to Miss Hamilton the things that were troubling her.

  Maggie, a seasoned performer herself, found her own smaller role exhausting, har
dly able at the close of a shooting day to drag herself home. But Judy, coping with much, much more, never seemed at a loss for energy. The older woman, fearing the truth, asked about this; and Judy told her she was being given “a lot of pills to sleep and a lot of pills to stay awake.”

  Maggie was horrified. “Why do you take them? Why don’t you refuse?” she demanded.

  “Well, I just can’t seem to either get up or go to sleep without them anymore,” the young girl replied.

  As the end of the film and graduation grew closer and closer, Judy’s spirits soared. “Isn’t it marvelous? I’m going to graduate with a class,” she told Maggie excitedly. “Would you like to see my dress?”

  The answer, of course, was Yes, and Judy ran into the dressing room to bring it out. It was nothing like what might have been expected—just a very simple little dress that met all the requirements a graduate must have; but it was the biggest thing in Judy’s life, and she was absolutely thrilled about it.

  Judy, however, was sent on a tour with Mickey Rooney as soon as the film was complete, meaning she had to forfeit graduation. Maggie was so upset that she called the girl who headed the publicity department and who had organized the tour.

  “Do you realize what you have done? This is a terrible thing,” Maggie told her.

  “Well, it’s only a graduation. It’s not so terrible,” the girl responded.

  Maggie said, “It is! It’s just really terrible. It’s one thing in the world this girl wanted to do and it’s just an awful thing! Is there anyone I can call who could be helpful?”

  “There’s nothing you can do, Miss Hamilton,” she was informed. “The orders for this tour came directly from Mr. Mayer.”

  And of course, there was nothing Maggie Hamilton could do. (Subsequently, Judy received her high school diploma from University High School.)

  Working along with the scenarist, Harburg and Arlen tried through the musical score to transpose the emotional yearnings that could motivate a young girl leading a drab existence to make a dream come true.

  “Here was Dorothy,” Harburg says, “a little girl from Kansas, a bleak place where there were no flowers, where there was no color of any kind. What does a child like this want? The only thing colorful in her world was a rainbow.”

  Arlen got the melody of “Over the Rainbow” first, but the lyrics did not come easily. When the song was complete, no one was sure about it. It was included in the first rough cut, but during the running of the final it was decided that the song was too cloying and sentimental and should be removed; and it was. Only after the initial sneak preview was it spliced back into the print—and then because it was felt the picture at that point was slow and needed a change of pace and it was too late to shoot a new musical sequence.

  Oz was a dream come true, but filming it was a continuous nightmare. Seven assistant directors came and went. Tensions were evident and the emotional temperatures high among cast and crew. The front office pulled out all the stops, and the film was finally brought in for over $2 million—an unprecedented budget for a film in this category. The cast, including a troupe of midgets, grew to over nine thousand. All of Metro’s twenty-nine sound stages were ultimately utilized to construct sixty-five spectacular sets. The special-effects department had to produce tricks with actors never before attempted. Cameramen had to film people flying without photographing the telltale ropes. A tornado was to be created, and Dorothy and Toto, her dog, carried off into the sky on it as if it were a giant black bird. Then Maggie Hamilton, as the Wicked Witch of the West, was to be melted down to a black pool.

  To accomplish the last, the set was constructed above the ground with a platform elevator thirty inches square in the spot where the witch, Miss Hamilton, was to stand. Her dress was nailed all the way around and covering the platform. When she began to melt, the platform descended and the air rose into her dress until finally, nothing was left but the hat.

  No one who has seen the film could forget Dorothy’s wonder-lit eyes as she wandered through Oz, the innocent child, the little-girl-lost sighing with deep pathos, “Why, then, oh why can’t I?” as she watched the bluebirds fly over the rainbow.

  Judy stated later in her life, “I think the American people put their arms around me when I was a child performer, and they’ve kept them there—even when I was in trouble.” It was true, and it was because of her characterization of Dorothy. The portrayal was not just wistful or charming, nor did it contain the quality of endearing cuteness that would have been brought to the part by Shirley Temple.

  A desperation to believe crept into Judy’s performance. She was much more than a young girl in jeopardy as she pursued a dream. Achieving the dream was where the spirit of survival existed. And in the end the dream was one shared by the majority of the American people—that their small, brown lives would be touched with wonder; that there could be a Land of Oz in their own backyards. It was not a children’s tale, for it was adult in philosophy; and Judy’s eyes and voice mirrored severe human suffering, which they knew and identified with. In Judy’s Dorothy, there was a plea for love and protection. It communicated itself with alarming depth.

  From the time of the sneak preview of Oz the studio was certain the film would be a box-office bonanza, and that Judy was potentially, and next to Mickey, their hottest young property; but they treated her like a poor relation, told her she was only the result of their publicity and that she had a long way to go as a performer. Then the studio sent her by train on that cross-country personal-appearance tour with Mickey (the one Margaret Hamilton attempted to halt), convincing Judy she needed his audience, his charisma to bolster the film. The train ride across the country was the one delight of the trip. Judy loved trains; they took her back to her early childhood and the trip across country with her father, Ethel, and her sisters. She remembered how her father had told her made-up stories of the sleeping towns and the darkened houses as they drove through the strange cities. Train rides allowed her the same fantasies. She would always like them from that date, always take a train before she would drive or fly. She even liked their smell and the rhythm of the wheels on the tracks. On a train, she was herself. There were no pressures; there was no place she had to be.

  They arrived at Grand Central Station in New York and went without any time to spare to the theater, where they were billed as America’s Sweethearts and did five shows a day (Judy and Mickey, years later, claimed seven, but the theater advertised five). From the moment they arrived at Grand Central, they were mobbed. Police reinforcements were brought in to help protect them at the Capitol where they were appearing, but one can just imagine the bedlam of 15,000 people trying to gain entry to every performance in a house that seated 5,400.

  “Come on, toots, we’ll knock them dead,” Rooney shouted as they made their first entrance.

  Judy Garland was back before a live audience. They stamped their feet, whistled, clapped their hands. Ethel was in the wings along with a long line of studio “trainers”—ready to reprimand her if she seemed too tired or reluctant; ready with a handful of pep pills and a glass of water whenever the bell sounded and she could step back to her corner.

  The Wizard of Oz opened on a Thursday—August 17, 1939—at the Capitol Theatre on Broadway at 51st Street. The advertising proclaimed that Mickey’s and Judy’s appearances inaugurated the fall season. But Major Edward Bowes, the managing director (later to conduct his famous radio amateur hour), remembered it as one of the hottest days of a long, hot summer and that fall seemed as far away as the other side of the rainbow.

  In between performances they went to luncheons, dinners, benefits, broadcasts, and interviews.

  One day halfway through their forty-five-minute appearance, Judy collapsed in the wings. Mickey was pushed back onstage. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he managed, “my partner has taken ill.”

  “She’ll be all right! Stall them!” somebody shouted from backstage.

  Rooney began a routine about a tennis match and an announc
er, interspersing it with comedy sound effects such as zot, plop, plang, following it with a similar routine about a Joe Louis fight with crowd noises, bells, et cetera. Becoming nervous, he stole a glance toward the wings. Judy was being helped to her feet by the retinue of handlers. Pushing them aside, she stood alone, and then, catching Rooney’s eye, made her way toward him. Back onstage, she continued as though nothing had happened.

  11While the rest of the world was beginning to recognize film as an art, Louis B. Mayer discovered the high-gross potential of the film musical. No other studio had the players, personnel, technicians, or space to photograph the grand-scale productions that were part of the prototype called “the Metro musical”: glossy, Technicolored, dance-packed, song-jammed, star-loaded, chorus-crowded with hundreds of rhythmic robots. Nothing lived, breathed, or contained any semblance of reality. Whatever humanity survived these films did so through the power of star personalities. Rooney and Garland were prime examples.

  Oz proved to be blockbuster box-office and sent the story department out on an immediate search for musical properties for Judy. Convinced that two stars meant three times the gross, Mayer sent the department back to look for stories that could co-star Judy with Mickey.

  Confident now that Arthur Freed was the man rightly cast as Judy’s next producer, Mayer gave him the go-ahead on a Rodgers and Hart show—Babes in Arms—that the studio owned. Not the sort of man who did not back up his investment, Mayer insisted Busby Berkeley (the most successful musical director on the Metro lot) become a major part of what came to be known as the Freed Unit.

  The Freed Unit had as its nucleus Berkeley, Edens, dance director Charles “Chuck” Walters, music director Georgie Stoll, art director Cedric Gibbons, scriptwriter Fred Finklehoffe, and cameraman Ray June. They worked together (except for Finklehoffe, who did only three) on the four big musicals that co-starred Rooney and Garland (Rooney still retaining star billing in all of them): Babes in Arms, Strike Up the Band, Babes on Broadway, and Girl Crazy. Except for the third, all were based on hit Broadway shows.