I Love the Illusion: The Life and Career of Agnes Moorehead (29 page)

On April 6, 1952 Agnes, Laughton, Boyer, and Hardwicke reopened in
Don Juan in Hell
in New York City. While it didn’t have quite the excitement
of the initial New York engagement at Carnegie Hall, the show was still
consistently sold out. Agnes was invited to a number of social events that
spring, including the annual April in Paris ball. Her invitation called this
“the great French party of the year.” While proposing not to impose on her,
they did: “We do not want to impose upon you by asking if you would
appear in the Francois I or the Louis XIV Tableaux, but if you could possibly
do so, we will have a superb costume waiting for you when you arrive at the
Hotel, and you can either ride a horse or lead one by the reins.” Agnes had
to decline the invitation as her work in
Don Juan
would conflict. But she
did make a champagne supper party for Ethel Merman held at the Pen and
Pencil on April 26. That April, she also received word that the Motion
Picture Exhibitor’s had given her the Laurel Award for her “sparkling
performance in
Show Boat
.” She was awarded for giving the top performance
by an actress in a character role. The film itself also was selected as Best
Musical of 1951.

Meanwhile, Hume Cronyn was wooing Agnes to appear in the play,
Jezebel’s Husband.
On May 7, he invited her to meet the author, “if you’re
at all interested in the play.” Her interest was peaked and the wooing
continued. On May 24, Cronyn wrote her that he found a director named
Sherman Marks and that he and the writer were on Cape Cod discussing
script changes: “if you’re still interested, I should like you to meet him
when he returns to town next week. I do hope you can be persuaded to do
the play.” About a week later, Cronyn was writing again, this time
apologizing about an item which had appeared in the
New York Times
on
May 29 which stated, “Agnes Moorehead will play Jezebel,” when apparently no contracts had been signed. Cronyn explained in his letter, “I don’t
believe in this kind of publicity although I doubt that it does any positive
harm — unless, of course, it embarrasses you. However, I did not authorize
the release and I know that you were not consulted. Consequently, I made
a fuss about it . . . I can only pray that it will turn out to be justified . . .”
Cronyn’s prayer would go unanswered.

Agnes always maintained that actors should not get mixed up in politics.
She rarely took a public stand on an issue or endorsed a candidate. She just
didn’t think that it was an actor’s place to do so, once saying it was like
“mixing water with oil.” One area where she was active, and had been since
the earliest days of her career, was in speaking out in support of Israel. She
did so again at a New York rally on May 22, 1952.

She had also seen many actors she had known and worked with — especially
in radio — fall victim to the Blacklist for real or imagined communist or
left wing sympathies. It was the era of McCarthyism, a dark age in
Hollywood history. Agnes really had nothing to fear. Politically, she was to
the right, but she often voted for the man over the party and had friends in
each party. (Adlai Stevenson and Robert Taft, for example, could be introduced as her friends.) Orson Welles, an outspoken liberal, was investigated
and, while not found to be a communist, he certainly was not considered a
friend of the witch hunters. He was eventually gray-listed and spent a
decade exiled from Hollywood working in Europe.

Sylvia Richards was a radio writer and a contract employee for Walter
Wanger who had written screenplays for such films as
Rancho Notorious
and
Ruby Gentry
. According to author Victor Navasky (
Naming Names,
1980),
she appeared before the House Committee on Un-American Activities in
1953 as a friendly witness. She admitted to being a Communist, “because
I was young and irresponsible and I didn’t want to think for myself.” She
was separated from her husband, also a fellow writer, Robert Richards,
whose best-known film was
Winchester ’73
and who, ironically, wrote a film
called
Johnny Stool Pigeon.
While she did admit to being a communist to
the committee she later told Navasky that she did it primarily because she
was afraid of going to jail; she had two children and, “my ex-husband was
not helping to support the kids.” Her estranged husband was also called
before the committee and he took the Fifth — refusing to answer any questions.
Both of them knew Agnes, but it was Robert who wrote her a startling letter,
one which must have been painful for Agnes to read. It was not an unusual
letter, and the circumstances that Robert Richards speaks of were common of
many people who were accused of being communists, and it deserves to be
recounted in depth:
Dear Aggie,
As you may know, I was called, and have appeared, as a witness before

I think the main arguments for taking this stand are pretty well understood
by most people, whether or not they agree with them.
But as I attended the hearings, waiting to be called, and as I was myself
examined on the witness stand, I began to see other reasons which I had
perhaps not previously considered as carefully as I might. It seemed to me
no longer simply a matter of refusing to aid in the sacrifice of careers —
careers of people whom I had known only as fine and decent and loyal
Americans — in order to save my own.
The blacklist, it occurred to me, is only a means of creating fear. Fear
is only a means of stifling opinion. And I could not escape the terrible
conclusion that in attempting to stifle opinion, this committee was actively
and knowingly serving those elements in this country who want to force us
into war —
aggressive
war.
There were repeated questions on Korea, the implication being all too
obvious that any disagreement on this tragic affair or with present foreign
policy in general, constituted treason to one’s country.
In my own case, for example, the assertion in as positive a manner as I
was able to make it that I would defend my country against attack from any
source whatsoever, including the Soviet Union, was not considered sufficient
by the committee. I was probed further. The phrase ‘preventive war’ was not
mentioned, for obvious reasons, but again the implication was unmistakable
that anyone who could not be wholeheartedly behind such a mad (in my
opinion) and unthinkable crime was also a traitor to his country.
I cannot help sincerely believing, therefore, that the persons who refused
their cooperation to this committee, rather than being in any sense “disloyal,”
have in their small way rendered a distinct service to their country, and
perhaps to the world. For it seems to me that the fear, the attempt to
intimidate, must be resisted somewhere, by someone. The Atom Bomb will
make small distinction between nationalities or political affiliations.
I am sure you know that many of the persons who took this stand at these
last hearings literally do not know how they are going to pay the rent next
month. Legal expenses have been necessarily heavy. There have been other
expenses — transcripts of the hearing record for purposes of preparation, etc.
I am trying to raise money to defray some of these expenses. And I feel,
considering all the circumstances, that I have a right to ask you for a
substantial contribution to such an end.
I hasten to add that if, on any grounds, you should “decline,” I think you
know me well enough to realize that such a declination could never in any
way alter my feelings of respect and affection for you personally. I know you
would not want to decline.
It is perhaps indicative of the work of this Un-American Activities
Committee that many people may justifiably wish to make such contributions
anonymously. I leave the methods of such anonymity to you.
I realize this sounds like a very stiff and formal letter. I am sorry. Perhaps
it is because these seem like very stiff and formal times. In any event, along
with the formality (and the dun) I send you my very best wishes and my
love.
Sincerely,
Bob Richards

On this letter is written, “Did not answer.” Whether she did help
Richards or some of her other friends who may have fallen pray to
McCarthyism, anonymously, is not known. What is known is that Agnes
never did speak out against it nor did she endorse it. Her friend, writer
Norman Corwin, who did speak out publically against the Blacklist, doesn’t
blame Agnes. “No, she was the most apolitical person I ever knew. Not a
political bone in her body. So she never spoke out against the Blacklist, but
on the other hand she never joined the blacklisters like some others ended
up doing.”

With her marriage to Jack over and done with, Agnes and Robert Gist were
married in Yuma, Arizona on Valentine’s Day, February 14, 1953; Agnes
was 52 and her new husband, 28. Unlike Jack, Gist was his own man and
didn’t, according to Paul Gregory, “allow Agnes to run him.” To a point, it
seems. When Gist accompanied Agnes in her one-woman show in 1954,
“so she could keep him on a short leash,” according to Gregory, she insisted
that Gist dye his hair red so they would have the same hair coloring. He did.
It also seems that some of her friends were surprised about the
marriage or even who Gist was. Helen Hayes didn’t acknowledge Agnes’
marriage for more than six months after it occurred. “Shame on me for not
writing as soon as I got the happy news of your marriage. Is the groom that
attractive man you brought to my dressing room at the Morasco?” That
same year Agnes bought, for a bargain price, “the old Sigmund Romberg”
mansion on Roxbury Drive in Beverly Hills. It was reported that Agnes was
“doing it over room by room.” The mansion had high ceilings and a patio
“very much like some of our French courter homes” and Agnes was
furnishing the home with antiques she had collected over the years. Her
neighbors included her good friend Lucille Ball, Jack Benny and The
Jimmy Stewarts. She would live in this home for the rest of her life.

In May, Agnes’ agent wrote her about dining with Jean Negulesco, the
director of
Johnny Belinda,
about using her in his new film, tentatively
titled,
My Mother and Mr. McChesney:
“He was very much impressed with
this script, thought it was excellent . . . when I told him about your playing
the part of the nun, he thought it would be just wonderful as he has always
been crazy about you . . .” That summer, following the ending of the
Don
Juan in Hell
engagement in New York, she returned to Hollywood to shoot
the picture, now retitled
Scandal at Scourie,
at MGM. Norman Corwin was
one of the film’s three screenwriters. The film reunited her with her good
friend Greer Garson and Garson’s longtime leading man, Walter Pidgeon,
in what would be their last film together. Agnes plays Sister Josephine, who
runs a Catholic orphanage near Quebec. A fire burns the orphanage down
but one orphan is missing, a little girl. The little girl is found by Sister
Josephine and admits to her that she started the fire unintentionally. Sister
Josephine tries to find a family to adopt the little girl. Enter Mr. and Mrs.
McChesney (Garson and Pidgeon). The husband, however, doesn’t want to
adopt the child due to her being Catholic; Mrs. McChesney adopts her
anyhow. The little girl has a hard time in the Protestant community she
now lives in due to religious bigotry and when another fire occurs and
appears to be caused by arson, she is accused of it.

By this time, the Garson-Pidgeon teamings were running out of gas at
the box office. Agnes and Garson got on very well, but there may have been
a bit of professional rivalry on Agnes’ part, according to Paul Gregory.

Paul recalls that Agnes would tell him, “I’m as big a star as Greer Garson”
to which he would reply, “Agnes, go to the bathroom and get it over with.”
“Are you saying I’m full of shit?”
“You bet.”
Paul says that Agnes would take this from him because they knew each
other for so long and she had a genuine respect for him, but she wouldn’t
have taken it from others, “especially those she didn’t respect — she would
have cussed them off.”
That fall
Don Juan in Hell
played two weeks in Los Angeles before
beginning a two-month cross-country tour with Vincent Price replacing
Laughton as the Devil. According to Price, it was Agnes who suggested him
to Charles for the part. Laughton had to leave the show due to a film
commitment, and rehearsed Price in San Francisco where Vincent was
appearing in the play
The Lady’s Not for Burning.
According to Price,
Laughton had made a pact with the original cast members stating that they
would all stick together and, “for some obtuse reason, decided to do it in
an underhand way by rehearsing me in it without telling anyone else — except
Agnes. She was the confidante of Laughton and the producer, and I was the
ignorant, stupidly innocent party. I knew nothing of the original agreement,
nothing of Laughton’s film — he told me he was ill; I only knew it was a
great part and that to work with Hardwicke and especially with Boyer was
a dream come true. And Laughton’s personal direction night after night
during the San Francisco run was one of my greatest theatrical excitements.
He was a superb, if eccentric, man and actor, but an enlightenment as a
director.” There can be no doubt that the change from Laughton to Price
was not widely known since most of the theaters on this tour had publicity
material and brochures already printed stating that Laughton was appearing as
the Devil.
Price maintains that Laughton’s deceitful way of rehearsing another actor
for the part of the Devil without telling Boyer and Hardwicke “destroyed
their respect and friendship” for Charles. Price also later wrote, in his
unpublished memoirs, that “I am afraid Agnes’s part in the whole affair . . .
did nothing for her relationship with any of us.” He says that he came to
the conclusion that Agnes resented the good notices he received. “Our long
friendship chilled to the bone and it was a bone which never entirely
buried. I should have been grateful to her for suggesting me for a great
experience. Instead, I sympathized with the other’s feelings of betrayal.”
Still, Price loved the show and working with Boyer and Hardwicke. He
would recall that all of them, including Agnes, enjoyed reading murder
mysteries. “We had a tacit understanding that if the girl wasn’t seduced by
page fifteen or if there hadn’t been a murder by page ten, the book was
thrown out the window.” This latest tour took the Quartette to the
Midwest: Iowa, Chicago, Detroit, Washington, D.C., Baltimore,
Philadelphia and then into New England for stops in Connecticut and then
a week in Boston before heading west again with stops in Pittsburgh and
several cities in Ohio before ending with another two days in Chicago a
week before Christmas.
Agnes spent a good deal of her spare time while traveling with
Don Juan
in Hell
toward developing her own one-woman show. She found the idea
hugely appealing. Laughton had proved that such an undertaking could be
lucrative and Agnes had legions of fans who knew her work from films,
radio and the stage willing to spend a few dollars to see such a distinguished
actress in person. Paul Gregory, who would produce Agnes’ one-woman
show, says the origins of the show were pure and simple economics. “Actors
go through dry spells in Hollywood. So I said to Aggie let’s do a onewoman show which we would present in New York and if it turns out very
well we decided it would be a good idea to do a tour titled,
An Evening with
Agnes Moorehead.
”
It appears that as early as 1949 Agnes had been toying with the idea of
doing a one-woman show at Charles Laughton’s urging. Laughton wrote
Agnes on 6/5/49, telling her: “I am almighty serious about this reading
thing . . . it would be nice to meet and talk about it again some time.” He
added, “I do love you every time I see you. The moist look in the eye isn’t
phony.” The following month he wrote her again, “I hope to goodness you
persist with the reading thing. I am so terrified. It gets into the wrong
hands. People like Ray Massey and Basil Rathbone could kill the whole
bloody racket. I have no doubt you know some females who could do the
same thing for you.”
She spent a great deal of time trying to select material for the new show.
It was a cinch to include an excerpt from the program which most people
still identified with her — Mrs. Ebert Stevenson in
Sorry, Wrong Number.
In fact, that would be the dramatic climax of the show. Agnes loved the
color lavender, so one of her choices was a reading of James Thurber’s
“Lavendar with a Difference.” Now, the piece really has nothing to do with
the color; it was Thurber’s reminiscence of his mother, still her identity
with the color must be one reason she decided to include it. This piece
would remain steadfast in her one-woman shows to the very end. She had
a great love for Thurber and collected many of his books in her personal
library. She once asked Thurber for permission to use his material in her
shows and his reply gratified her: “You and Lionel Barrymore gave me so
much pleasure that you can use anything of mine. Free.” He later thanked
Agnes for helping him sell many more books through “your popular readings.”
Another of the highlights was the reading of the letter from Queen
Elizabeth to the Bishop, Dr. Richard Cox, done with power and flourish,
that caught the attention of a critic: “She read Queen Elizabeth’s imperious
letter to the Bishop of Pike in 1573, sounded like the rolling of drums in
her opening phrase, ‘Prrroud Prrrrelate . . .’ when she finished the brief role,
the actress said, ‘Elizabeth!’ and grinned at the audience — and the audience
couldn’t help grinning back.”
Other selections included Marcel Proust’s “Remembrance of Things
Past” and the story of “Moses and the Bullrushes” as told by a Negro maid,
with an exaggerated stereotypical dialect. (Later in the 60’s Agnes would
continue to include this piece, but changed the dialect to that of a heavy
southern dialect; she would introduce it by saying it was her cousin Daphne
from Louisiana). Usually after this piece she would do a dramatic reading
of the story of the flood from the Bible. She also delivered Ring Lardner’s
“Some Like ’em Cold.”
One of the comic highlights of her show was “Household Hints Down
Through the Centuries.” These included a 14th-century recipe for a dish
called Cocyatrice, a 16th-century cure for bruised withers and, from the
17th century, “How to cure canaries of asthma.” Many of these would
continue to be staples of her one-woman show for the next twenty years,
but she occasionally varied things. By the late 50’s, “Sorry, Wrong Number”
was out; it was just too elaborate to stage every night, not to mention what
it took out of Agnes physically to execute it every performance. Replacing
it would be a speech she always admired, one delivered by Laughton in
Don
Juan in Hell,
“The Devil’s Speech on Destruction.” Her recitation never
ceased to induce a thunderous standing ovation. When her mood dictated,
she would also recite Robert Frost, Rupert Brooks (“These I Have Loved”)
and on one occasion, according to Warren Sherk in his book on Agnes, even
the phone book.
The show opened in Salt Lake City on January 30. The reviews were
good. In Salt Lake City the
Tribune
critic wrote: “It was an evening of
smiles, chuckles and laughs, of serious attention and meditation and some
dreaming. Miss Moorehead made it a completely artistic evening.” In
Oklahoma City, over 2,000 people attended the concert and the reviews
acclaimed Agnes as a “great artist,” presenting a program which “ranged
from the hilarious to the lofty, and her performance evoked tears one
moment and laughter the next.” By the time the tour reached Ottumwa,
Iowa it had a new name, coined by Paul Gregory, “The Fabulous Redhead.”
Gregory said he overheard a member of the audience refer to Agnes in this
way and that he thought it would make a good name for her show.
Prior to the Salt Lake opening, Charles Laughton, her director, wrote her
a letter of directorial advice: