Hope: Entertainer of the Century (80 page)

Several people offered to donate
: Get-well letters, Hope archives.

“If I had taken a day off”
: Louella Parsons, “Faith, Hope and Charities,”
Los Angeles Examiner
, Pictorial Living, March 29, 1959.

Hope “seemed depressed”
: Vernon Scott, UPI, March 2, 1959.

“He’s quieter now”; “Nobody moved as fast”
: Vernon Scott, “Bob Hope—on the Road to Retirement?,”
Los Angeles Examiner
, May 10, 1959.

“I felt . . . people were always looking past me”
: Timothy White,
Rolling Stone
, March 20, 1980.

Hope chewed out Bill Faith
: Faith,
Life in Comedy
, 274.

“Bob Hope is the champ”
: George Rosen, “Familiarity Breeds TV Fame,”
Variety
, February 10, 1960.

“Don’t you think this is a rather strange way”
: Letter from Jimmy Saphier, August 5, 1959, Hope archives.

“It’s a little straight”
: Hope and Thomas,
Road to Hollywood
, 88.

“I don’t want it to be the
Road
”
: Ibid.

“Was I Lucy?”
: Ibid., 89.

Hope wanted instead . . . Frank ended up using his own
: Thompson,
Portrait of a Superstar
, 129–30.

“I entertained his father!”
: Hope,
I Owe Russia
, 187.

a deal that Hope publicly complained about
: Dan E. Moldea,
Dark Victory: Ronald Reagan, MCA and the Mob
(Viking, 1986), 142–43.

“Lenny, you’re for educational TV”
:
San Diego Union
, April 6, 1978.

CHAPTER 10: KING

“It was scary”
: Janis Paige, interview with author.

“Everybody hated Zsa Zsa”
: Andy Williams, interview with author.

“He said, ‘Jan, she’s throwing hysterics’ ”
: Paige, interview with author.

“Bob Hope is such a good American”
: “Sinatra Suspects Had Earlier Plot,”
New York Times
, February 28, 1964.

“If there is anybody who has”
:
Daily Variety
, March 6, 1962.

in Seattle, drawing crowds so big
:
Daily Variety
, July 13, 1962.

who would take Hope . . . to Jack Ruby’s nightclub
: Tony Zoppi, interview with author.

Hope did the show, unaware that Nichols
: Many letters and clippings in the
Hope archives chronicle this misconceived event, including a wrap-up by Tony Zoppi in the
Dallas Morning News
, July 2, 1962.

“Let’s face it, Bob”
: Letter from Warren Leslie, July 5, 1962, Hope archives.

“I can’t wait till I get home”
:
Time
correspondent files, June 8, 1962.

“He was just a doll”
: Jack Shea, video interview, ATAS archives.

“This is one of the only bills”; “The president was a very gay”; “I feel very humble”
:
New York Times
, September 12, 1963; and
Time
correspondent files, September 12, 1963.

“Hope is the closest anybody”
: George Rosen, “Of Hope (Bob) and Fulfillment,”
Variety
, April 26, 1961.

“This is all the talent we have, fellas”
:
Time
correspondent files, September 1963.

“When things go wrong”
: Ibid.

Hope would call and bark
: Mort Lachman, interview with author.

Bob would sometimes squeeze Mort’s arm
:
Time
correspondent files, September 1963.

Lachman was miffed and quit . . . went back to Hope
: Lachman’s break and reconciliation chronicled in
Daily Variety
stories, March 25, April 13 and 15, 1964.

around $350,000 per hour, plus another $50,000
: Rosen,
Variety
, April 26, 1961.

too steep for Buick
:
Variety
, March 22, 1961.

“He’s shallow in the sense”
:
Time
correspondent files, September 1963.

“When he’s not quipping”
: Ibid.

no whistling . . . or hats
: Liberman, unpublished memoir.

“If it were Danny Thomas”
:
Time
correspondent files, September 1963.

“Bob who?”
: Art Schneider, video interview, ATAS archives.

“From now on, don’t argue”
: Hal Kanter, interview with author.

“Are you telling these interviewers”
: Liberman, unpublished memoir.

“There’s always some guy”
:
Time
correspondent files, September 1963.

“I never put in another expense account”
: Sid Smith, interview with author.

When Alberti arrived . . . Hope asked why
: Bob Alberti,
Up the Ladder and Over the Top
(Bob Alberti, 2003), 136.

Even a family member . . . was startled to get a bill
: Nathaniel Lande, interview with author.

“We were paying it off”
: Dorothy Reilly, interview with author.

“Why did he care?”
: Bob Mills, interview with author.

“Thanks a lot, kid”
: Janis Paige, interview with author.

“Well, if they settle for anything less”
:
Time
correspondent files, September 1963.

“Emotionally he’s still the vaudevillian”
: Ibid.!

“Dad was always of the mind”
: Linda Hope, interview with author.

“Even within the family”
: Justine Carr, interview with author.

“He was an impersonal guy”
: Malatesta, interview with author.

“We sat down for dinner”
: John Guare, interview with author.

“You could imagine Theresa”
: Ibid.

“It was not a house full of undercurrents”
: Ibid.

“They obviously had a lot of money . . . The Hopes were very supportive . . . He was very kind to me”
: Tony Coelho, interview with author.

“Your hospital needs a new wing?”
: Dwight Whitney, “Bob Hope,”
TV Guide
, January 16, 1965.

“It was something that obviously called out”
: Linda Hope, interview with author.

“Bob admitted to me that the great love”
: Liberman, unpublished memoir.

Frankland died of a drug overdose
: “Britain’s First Miss World Killed by Drug Overdose,”
London Telegraph
, December 18, 2000.

“Bob Hope lives in his own world”
: Dana M. Reemes,
Directed by Jack Arnold
(McFarland, 2012), 152.

Hope proposed a gala premiere
: Memos from Arthur Jacobs, January 1959, AMPAS archives.

“I explained to Bob that the magazines”
: Ibid.

“The film industry needs a positive approach”
:
Variety
, May 9, 1962.

“It’ll be Southern California’s answer”
: Peter Bart, “Bob Hope to Build Own Disneyland,”
New York Times
, July 31, 1965.

The Bob Hope Desert Classic had its origins
: The tournament’s history is recounted by Larry Bohannan in
50 Years of Hope
(Pediment Publishing).

The mammoth field included
: Bill Shirley, “Pros to Tee Off at Desert Today,”
Los Angeles Times
, January 22, 1965.

“He never came to a board meeting”
: Ernie Dunlevie, interview with author.

“without doubt one of the best”
: Eddie Gannon, interview with author.

“He could hit the ball farther”
: Lachman, interview with author.

“He would do a benefit”
: Linda Hope, interview with author.

“He was a fair golfer”
: Arnold Palmer, interview with author.

“Palmer got the blue-collar guys”
: Dunlevie, interview with author.

once on a course that filled the inside
: Hope,
Confessions of a Hooker
, 8.

CHAPTER 11: PATRIOT

the Air Force limited Hope’s troupe
:
Variety
, December 20, 1961.

“Hope did a valid service”
: Dorothy Reilly, interview with author.

a marine who claimed he had “hitchhiked”
: Faith,
Life in Comedy
, 284.

“Christmas without Bob Hope”
:
Variety
, December 11, 1963.!

“one of the roughest we’ve ever had”
: “Dick, Please Be Good, So I Can Bow,”
TV Guide
, April 11, 1964.

“Bob Hope is so established”
: Jack Gould,
New York Times
, January 18, 1964.

“greater than that normally used”
: UPI dispatch,
New York Times
, December 25, 1964.

for every five thousand men
: Faith,
Life in Comedy
, 298.

they found a chaotic scene
: The Brinks bombing was widely reported at the time. More complete accounts of it are in Bob Hope,
Five Women I Love: Bob Hope’s Vietnam Story
(Avon, 1966), 111–21; and Faith,
Life in Comedy
, 299–300.

“We had no electricity”
: Mort Lachman papers, Writers Guild of America archives.

“tiny room, with one Coke bottle”
: Janis Paige, interview with author.

“We supposedly had thirty thousand men”; “I started complaining”; “He was definitely not a hawk”
: Jill St. John, interview with author.

“Shortly after the explosion”
: AP, March 17, 1967.

The cue-card stand had collapsed
: McNulty gives his version of the widely repeated story in a video interview, ATAS archives.

an “altogether asinine”
: Howard Thompson,
New York Times
, August 12, 1965.

“Hello, Yankee dogs!”
: Bob Thomas, AP, July 21, 1965.

It was a rough trip from the start
: The 1965 Vietnam tour is recounted at length in Hope,
Five Women
; as well as in Faith,
Life in Comedy
, 306–8; and Lachman’s papers, Writers Guild archives.

“In case of an attack”
: Jack Jones, interview with author.

“Tension became almost unbearable”
: Hope,
Five Women
, 169.

“It was one of the most emotional”
: Jones, interview with author.

“He was a happy, positive force”
: Ibid.

Bing Crosby sent him a letter
: AP,
Los Angeles Times
, December 31, 1965.

Jack Shea . . . reluctantly told Hope
: Jack Shea, video interview, ATAS archives.

“On January first I would take a thirty-day leave”
: Art Schneider, video interview, ATAS archives.

“Because of his continued and patriotic”
:
Congressional Record
, January 27, 1966.

“frequent visitor to Vietnam”; “Camp Runamuck”; “It’s on the paper”
:
Variety
, April 6, 1966.

He taped a half-hour TV program
:
Variety
, February 16, 1966.

“Can you imagine returning”
: Bob Hope, “An Open Letter About Our GI’s,”
Family Weekly
, June 12, 1966.

“One group is fighting”
: Faith,
Life in Comedy
, 311.

“People seem to forget”
: Peter Bart, “Cold War Alters a Hollywood Law,”
New York Times
, August 5, 1965.!

“They call you a comedian”
: Jack Warner, letter to Hope, December 26, 1963, Hope archives.

More than 62 percent said yes
: Faith,
Life in Comedy
, 312–13.

“a couple of the Washington boys”
: Ibid., 312.

only 60 percent of the seats . . . at the Yale Bowl
:
Variety
, July 27, 1966.

some stars turned him down
: Tom Buckley, “Hope Says Some Performers Refused Vietnam Trip,”
New York Times
, December 22, 1966.

The new Miss World . . . nearly backed out
: AP, “India’s Miss World Reconsiders Plan for Trip to South Vietnam,”
New York Times
, November 28, 1966.

“He played the straight man”
: Phyllis Diller, interview with author.

Hope just missed . . . Lynda Bird Johnson
: Bob Hope, as told to Pete Martin,
The Last Christmas Show
(Doubleday, 1974), 209.

give him small parts . . . and sent regular “royalty” checks
: Robert Colonna,
Greetings, Gate!
, 217; and interview with author.