If the hate hokum died down now and then, it was replaced with news about how much they feuded. This, at least, bore some truth because along with that love came a lifetime of battles and they were as star-crossed as any lovers could be. But why? Why all the deception? What and who was behind it all? Was this just some of the myth-making cooked up by the studio's high-powered publicity department or was something more sinister at hand? To what extent were Eddy and MacDonald in on the ruse?
They came into my life in 1962, long after both had stopped being movie stars. I had never seen Nelson Eddy in any movie and had only seen Jeanette MacDonald in one, San Francisco, which I treasured. I very much liked her performance and in fact find it to be the best thing she ever did. They entered my life like a team of whirling dervishes. It was the year I met my future father-in-law, as gaga over celebrities as anyone I've ever known. This is probably the time to mention he named his first daughter Jeanette and her brother Nelson.
If my future father-in-law wasn't singing (bellowing, really) Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life, then he was humming or whistling it. He liked showing off his own baritone voice, holding the ah for as long as he could. Soon he had me seeing their movies, usually on the telly but occasionally in one of L.A.'s numerous nostalgia theaters. Weren't these movies the best, he trilled, the very best? Had I ever heard better singers? Isn't it astonishing how good-looking they are?
My responses included the fact that I did indeed find them both to be pretty damned good singers. Operatic voices were new to me but the more I heard them, the more I liked them. Her lyric soprano voice was so melodic and clear and when his booming baritone hit some of those high notes, I sometimes got goosebumps. I hemmed and hawed a little about the films but eventually said that although I loved musicals, these really were not so much for me. I thought they were corny and as I saw so many all at once, I found most of them indistinguishable from the others. I said I thought she was ok as an actress but he was pretty bad. I'm sure he ignored me for a while. My opinion has changed very little over the years.
Nelson Eddy was born in 1901 in Providence, Rhode Island, and Jeanette MacDonald was born in 1903 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. They started life with some things in common. Both were from poor families, both adored their mothers and both developed an early love of singing and had operatic-style voices. Over the course of her life, MacDonald certainly loved singing but Eddy had to sing. Both also grew up becoming promiscuous. She would one day discard adult ways but Eddy never got over his need to roam.
He always knew he wanted to be a singer and it likely came from the fact that his parents loved music. Both sang in church and he worked backstage at the local opera company. The parents fought frequently and there was violence. Eddy's fans back in the day certainly weren't aware that he had a bad temper and was often obstinate throughout his life. It's what he learned at home.
With his mother behind him all the way, young Nelson learned singing primarily by imitating opera recordings. He began singing in church, of course, but was soon acting in a school play and singing in minstrel shows. Early on everyone was talking about the wan-looking, slim kid with that booming voice. He was a robust sort, however, and that energy would take him forward. The only thing that took him away from singing was the opposite sex
He managed to find himself working in Philadelphia when he was 14. Jeanette would have still been there. Too bad they hadn't an opportunity to meet... their lives might have turned out much differently. He earned enough money to hire a coach who, in turn, being so impressed with his new student, loaned him the money to study voice in Europe. He made his operatic stage debut in 1923 and his radio debut a year later. In 1927 he was the star of his own radio series. Jeanette was long gone from Philadelphia in 1928 when he gave his first concert recital there.
Along the way he had mastered several languages, at least as they pertained to the scores of various operas. He would intermingle concerts and recitals with radio work for most of his life. Some of that would be interrupted while he worked at being a movie star and when that came to an end, he dove into nightclub work. He would work all over the U.S. and everywhere he played, there was some nice lady to make him feel welcome. He kept phone numbers and when he returned for another engagement, she was still welcoming.
In 1933, Nelson was... one hastens to say discovered because he had already gathered a fair share of fame.. seen by a scout from the mighty MGM at one of his concerts. He almost surprised himself by signing a seven-year contract. It was odd that he did because he had no interest in being a movie star except he quickly realized it would bring attention to his concert performances.
MGM put him through all the classes that most everyone attended at one point, but the focus, for Nelson at least, was on acting. There would always be speculation about whether he learned anything. They did, of course, love his voice, and thought it might blend perfectly with that of a pretty redhead they had recently hired.
MacDonald was the youngest and prettiest of three sisters, all of whom were musically inclined. She was obsessed with being a famous stage star after finding work as a young child in various theatrical productions, including operas. She was seven when she joined a touring dance troupe and soon became its little star. She had already discovered a level of ambition... a trait she would expand as time went on.
At 17 she moved to New York where her middle sister Blossom (known professionally as Marie Blake) had made some inroads in her own theatrical career. Jeanette's early dancing years soon paid off and she was appearing in dancing choruses all over town. Apparently, without knowing it at the time, she was keeping up with Nelson in the sex department. There was even talk that she was part of an escort service for awhile and no one disputed that she wasn't opposed to sleeping with the right people.
There was nothing more important to her than her career. She was driven and purposeful and very talented. Her mother, whose every word Jeanette hung on, told her repeatedly to never let love get in the way of her career. And she never did. We'll hear of this again.
While she was very busy singing and dancing, Paramount Studios sent reps to New York to do some canvass auditioning. While Jeanette was one of the chosen, nothing became of her audition until top Paramount director, Ernest Lubitsch, came across it a year or so later. He put her in her first film, The Love Parade (1929), which is also the first of four films she did with Maurice Chevalier (the others are Love Me Tonight and One Hour with You, both 1932, and The Merry Widow (1934). They are all rather fluffy musicals with varying degrees of critical success but the public loved them.
She made other movies of the same kind while at Paramount and she had become one of that studio's temperamental female stars... there were many over the years. Chevalier said he never found her to have much humor. She was spoiled, headstrong and decidedly lacking warmth. She would admit to being driven. One day she would be branded The Iron Butterfly.
Louis B. Mayer, head of MGM, had been trying to hire her... those in the know said he was besotted with her. He promised her the moon, anything she wanted, if she'd come aboard. And she did. Two things happened very quickly. She not only became Mayer's personal pet (the only other one in his great stable of actresses was Greer Garson) but she began sleeping with him. In no time at all she became Miss Unpopularity around MGM.
MacDonald came to MGM a big star and Eddy came as a big nobody but only in regards to the movies. That was one of the big differences between them. Even after he could get through the MGM guard gate with a simple nod, he piddled around doing little. His first credited role came in 1933's Dancing Lady, also Fred Astaire's first movie, although the stars were Joan Crawford and Clark Gable.
That noisy chatter around the lot was getting louder and more frequent that Mayer was going to team them in a series of movies and if his hunch proved right (and it usually did) the public would take to them like a hankie after a sneeze. It was the Depression and he knew he had not one but two fabulous singers in his very midst and together they would help take the world's cares away... and make MGM a lot of dough.
The truth is a little darker. Mayer was only interested in MacDonald. She was the prized mare in his stable and he would see to it that she shot to the top of movie stardom. He loathed Eddy. Whether behind his back or in his presence, Mayer referred to him only as the baritone. Mayer was correct when he referred to the baritone as not much of an actor. One would be hard-pressed to find a top star (and he was) as wooden as Nelson Eddy. I made a bad mistake one day watching one of his films with my father-in-law and said shut up and sing already. Apparently that's how Mayer felt, too.
The studio head was a jealous man and a vengeful one. It could be seen in any number of ways but some of his brain cells closed down when he heard that his two future screen partners were sniffing around one another off screen. His rage was never aimed at MacDonald (and oh, how some of her coworkers wished it had been) but he would shoot himself in the foot to get at the baritone. Adding to this is the fact that Eddy's rage was just as gargantuan as his boss's, chiefly due to the fact that Eddy knew Mayer was sleeping with MacDonald. But Mayer was the boss and far more a savvy player in this drama than either of his songbirds.
In 1934 the duo began making the first of their eight films together, Naughty Marietta (1935). It tells the tale of a French princess on the lam in colonial New Orleans who finds true love. It is an operetta (a lighter version of an opera containing spoken dialogue, which at MGM, at least, was done in English) by Victor Herbert. Its most popular musical offerings are Italian Street Song, Tramp, Tramp, Tramp and the aforementioned Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life.
Marietta was a rollicking success and not only did the couple's new fans clamor for more, five months after its release Eddy was receiving more fan mail than any other MGM star. During the 30s he would be the highest-paid singer in the world. Take that, L. B. Mayer. Unfortunately for all concerned, that was never going to happen, especially after MacDonald told him she and Eddy were in love, allowing all that sweet mystery to drift away. Eddy would have probably been paid off or found in a ditch somewhere except for the teary-eyed Jeanette's pleadings.
Less than a year later Rose Marie (1936) was in theaters. This operetta by Rudolf Friml and Herbert Stothart went on to become one of their most popular films, especially in hindsight. (It is the one I've seen most recently... like four days ago... I considered it preparation for this posting.) The plot concerns an opera singer in the Canadian Rockies searching for her fugitive brother (Jimmy Stewart) and the Mountie who is looking for him, too. Among the songs were the melodic title tune and one of the most famous of all their movie songs, Indian Love Call.
Rose Marie had special meaning for them because of what happened behind the scenes. They got married! Well, um, not really but forever more they considered themselves spiritually married, having performed a little ceremony in a beautiful spot (their spot) at the Lake Tahoe location, complete with one ring. In the years to come, it was a place to which they would return to express their love or recapture it.
One day MacDonald found herself with child, an event that would be repeated over the years. (Eddy adamantly refused to use protection.) He proposed making it legal and she, of course, knew she had to tell Mayer. Eddy knocked her up and Mayer knocked her senseless when he reminded her that her contract and its tight-assed morals clause which forbade her to marry or divorce or have a child without his approval.
Say what? People seemed to sell their souls to be movie stars in those days. I have a hard time wrapping my brain around it and my most critical assessment has always been whores one and all. Consider, too, that cohabitating in those days was against the studio rules, too. You may recall another of Mayer's disgusting machinations (and a worse one) in our earlier piece on another of his favorites, Van Johnson.
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| MacDonald with Louis B. Mayer |
She was ordered to have an abortion, her marriage nonsense was to stop and except for their time on the screen, she was to cease and desist in seeing Eddy. Mayer's argument was that their marriage would be bad for their screen careers and hence bad for business. He felt part of their allure was that the public needed to feel that love and connection with an unmarried person. Of course that notion has been around for years and applies to many stars but the thing is so many fans already thought they were married in real life. Mayer's other piece was if they did marry, they would also likely divorce and that really would be bad for business.
Mayer needed to control MacDonald and all else would fall into place. He knew he could not really appeal to the baritone in any real way because Eddy would happily have said or done something to end his contract and overall movie career. He didn't care... he had already accomplished his goal of becoming even more famous, guaranteeing more success for radio, concerts and recordings. But Mayer did make sure the baritone had less screen time and occasionally had him made up to look like a cadaver.
Eddy flew into one of his rages, not helped at all by the fact that MacDonald had a miscarriage. Part of his appeal, it's been said, on the screen, was his puppy-dog nestling against her bosom and the loving if not obedient way he gazed at her. Much of that was so in real life, as well, but the unvarnished truth is that all this bizarre drama with Mayer took it out of his prized pair. There were arguments and physical altercations. He would stay drunk and there were separations although generally they were due to concert engagements for one or both. He may have married her spiritually, but he still cheated on her, especially when away.
To their credit, both remained mum about any aspect of their personal relationship. Many of their friends, it's said, didn't know the extent of their involvement. Mayer, of course, was delighted they were upset with one another and he made sure it was publicized. He is as responsible as anyone for starting the myth that they were feuding.
Both stars still had close relationships with their mothers... Eddy, in fact, lived with his mother for so long that it would occasionally give rise to those pesky gay rumors. (His ruby red lips and often-prissy demeanor didn't help.) His mother always loved MacDonald but her mother always disliked Eddy. She certainly didn't want her daughter marrying him and she reminded her that it was always career first. Even worse was that her mother was apparently in cahoots with Mayer... his spy who would report sightings to him. Soon, the lovers were sneaking around more than ever.
Eddy bought a second home in Burbank. Part of the reason for this particular house was because it was near a riding stable. Both not only loved to ride horses but they each owned one and they were kept at this stable. Over the years there would be a number of secret places where they would tryst. There would be much passionate lovemaking for years but there came a time that MacDonald changed her ways. She was not only not as promiscuous as she once was but her ardor cooled in general. It caused many a fight and increased more so when he stepped up his assignations with other women.
On her part was a lack of energy. She not only worked hard and put everything into her work, but she had always been rather sickly and frail and suffered from hay fever. Most taxing was a weak heart, something that she apparently inherited. Eddy would be all over the emotional plane... sometimes he was understanding and tender and other times filled with rage.
Around the same time that she made San Francisco, Eddy was also making a film without her, Rosalie (1937). It starred dancer Eleanor Powell and Ilona Massey, both of whom Eddy managed to bed. I thought Eddy took a decided back seat to Powell in the film although I loved his singing of Cole Porter's title song. The highlight, however, was Powell's famous drum dance.
Eddy pushed and pushed MacDonald for marriage but insisted that she give up her career and of course she wouldn't do it. When he acted out, he was frequently so over-the-top and she simply dug in her heels. By all accounts, they both were stubborn, self-righteous and temperamental. Mayer encouraged them both to marry but not to each other.
They had been pouting for awhile when they were assigned to appear together in Sigmund Romberg's Maytime (1937). The lady always said it was the favorite of all her films and it was my father-in-law's as well. Because of him it is the MacDonald-Eddy film I have seen the most. Others may know better but I suspect it's the movie that contains more opera than any of the others although it became famous the world over for Will You Remember? Singing this song over the years in concerts and nightclubs caused the lovers to get misty-eyed.
During the making of Maytime Mayer had one of his famous fits when he heard the pair had been seeing one another again when he ordered them not to. Bowing to pressure, the duo agreed their personal relationship was not going to work and that they would see others. Eddy probably already had his women lined up. MacDonald saw a man named Bob Ritchie, who not only managed her career to some degree but there were rumors they were once married and had it annulled. She also was dating a B-actor named Gene Raymond.
Mayer was insisting that MacDonald marry Raymond and her mother did as well. It didn't, however, escape anyone's notice that Raymond looked an awfully lot like Nelson Eddy. Eddy was so angry when he learned MacDonald had become engaged that he tried to buy Raymond off and he accepted. But then Mayer intervened and the wedding was on. While awaiting the big day, Eddy and MacDonald got back together and broke up again... a few times. She informed him that Raymond didn't want her to give up her career. Of course he didn't.
The 1937 wedding was one of those enormous Hollywood affairs... famous attendants and hordes of fans with police keeping them at bay, a glitzy MGM production... and not only was Eddy in attendance but Mayer insisted that he sing during the proceedings. Only in Hollywood...
On the ship heading toward their Hawaiian honeymoon, the Raymonds ran into former silent star Mary Pickford and her new husband, Buddy Rogers. It was not a happy time for MacDonald who wasn't enjoying her honeymoon as perhaps she'd wanted because Raymond was enjoying himself with Rogers.
It was known around town that Raymond was gay, probably because his several arrests over the years were not as secretive as hoped for. He and his wife got on well enough but he knew their
arranged marriage included her being hopelessly in love with another man. The two men would get into fist fight over the years generally because Eddy disapproved of how Raymond emotionally treated MacDonald.
Maytime was a rousing success so of course everyone was on the lookout for new material. Two new projects came up almost simultaneously. One was another sparkling confection and the other their first semi-dud. The latter was The Girl of the Golden West (1938). She is a saloon owner and the only girl in town. Stand back, boys. I don't recall a single tune except her singing of Ave Maria, which was thrilling.
The lovers didn't get along at all during the filming of Girl. Eddy, of course, was already haranguing his married girlfriend to get a divorce, which she declined to do. Their displeasure with one another seems to show on the screen and the more it became obvious to Mayer, the happier he was. He got off on feeding tales of a feud to the press. In truth they always went along with it and keeping the public in the dark was about the only thing these three had in common. And it took on more meaning after MacDonald's marriage. Louella or Hedda tattling of news of an unfaithful wife could have ended her career at that time.
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| A silly publicity photo on their feud |
It was a dizzying pace for everyone involved, including Mayer, both mothers, MGM's publicity machine and Raymond. Most of the time the two principals didn't know if they were coming or going. Neither of them disputed their love for one another but they had a devil of a time getting along for any substantial time. He never stopped wanting what he wanted and she never stopped saying no. It was a relationship racked with jealousy on both sides, although his was the stuff of textbooks. Each had numerous breakdowns and suicide attempts. It wouldn't be but another year that a new player was added to the drama.
Sweethearts (1938), Victor Herbert's tuneful triumph, was much adored by the public. It is a modern-day story of a Broadway acting couple getting the offer of becoming Hollywood stars at the same time she discovers he is having an affair. Hmmm. Glorious songs, too, lots of them, many of which were already famous. The title tune was another of those forever more associated with them. Sweethearts was also MGM's first color movie, which says something about the box-office draw of this couple.
They lost another child and they each went into major depression. After it subsided they again discussed marriage and she might have come as close to doing it than ever before. They discussed going to Reno for a quickie divorce and when she backed out, he upped and revenge-married Ann Franklin, a woman he knew briefly through friends. He didn't love her and never would. He didn't even like her. She didn't love him either but she loved being Mrs. Nelson Eddy. MacDonald reacted by swallowing a bottle of pills.
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| From New Moon |
They made a couple of pictures without one another but the public was crying out for more films with them together. The result was New Moon and Bittersweet, both 1940, and I Married an Angel (1942), all of them a different shade of mediocre. New Moon is arguably the best because it at least contains a popular song by Eddy, Stout-Hearted Men. The other two have no memorable songs as I see it.
Perhaps no one knew at the time that Angel would be their last film together but times were changing. This was now the 1940s and fluffy little operettas no longer held the interest of the public. The Depression was over and it was time for a whole new kind of music and attitude and actors. MacDonald and Eddy were both singing actors which is a bit different from actors who sometimes sing. In their cases, if they ceased singing, there was not much more for them to do. It wouldn't be long and their movie careers would be over... period. Besides, Greer Garson had arrived at MGM and the boss had a new redhead.
Eddy bought his mother a home and he stayed there a great deal. MacDonald visited him often. One person who never visited was Ann Eddy since the mother despised her. Eddy would ask his wife for a divorce many times, especially when it looked like MacDonald might finally get one herself. But his wife always refused... she had no intention again of being the ex-Mrs. Anybody. She threatened Eddy that she would ruin MacDonald by going to the press with all she knew. She also threatened to ruin him financially. He backed off but little by little pieces of him fell away.
Eddy went to Universal and did three films, his last. The most successful was Phantom of the Opera (1943). She left MGM as well but one day was summoned back to do two films. One was 1948's Three Daring Daughters (they weren't) with up-and-coming MGM soprano Jane Powell as one of them. It wasn't operetta but it was hokey. Her final costar was Lassie in 1949's The Sun Comes Up. It was clearly a step down and all of Hollywood knew it. (You know I loved it. Hey, what have I told you about animal movies?) She looked matronly and it looked clear that her leading lady days were over. As it turned out, her movie career was.
She got wrapped up in performing for the troops during the war and visiting hospitals. He joined up, spent most of his time in Europe and rumor has long been around that he was a spy.
They weren't seeing one another very much after their movie careers ended because they usually performed outside Hollywood and times away could be considerable. In the early 50s their relationship took such a turn for the worse that MacDonald ended it. She told Eddy no more. While that didn't last, as it never did, it was their longest separation at three years.
She finally got to perform live on stage in an actual opera and performed in a number of recitals, concerts and made some records and was often on some radio programs. The same could be said of him except that he had his own very successful radio show and later a successful night club act with Gale Sherwood.
They continued to see one another as they always had. Finally, perhaps, the battles had subsided some. They didn't even talk about marrying as much as they once did.
I guess I've really never understood their personal relationship and over the years I have thought they seemed rather foolish. In today's vernacular, they were both drama queens. Both ultimately said they thought their lives were wasted... she says she clearly regretted ever listening to her mother. There was always some obstacle. I guess love wasn't enough and that always saddens me. On top of it she marries a gay man and he marries a woman he never loved. Opportunities wasted. What's the point?
On the professional side, I may not have much cared for their films but I was enthralled with their voices. Their operettas brought classical music to Hollywood and much joy to many people in a great time of need and I honor that. They deserve their place in Hollywood history.
In the last years of their lives, they had not seen one another much but they spoke frequently on the phone. MacDonald had suffered a number of heart attacks and in 1964 she hadn't been feeling well for some time and in fact told a few intimates that she knew she was dying. In January 1965 she rallied enough to make a trip to Houston, Texas, to see a heart specialist but died there at age 61. She had asked her sister to look after Nelson because he will not outlive me by long.
Less than two years later, Nelson Eddy died at age 65 of a cerebral hemorrhage doing what he loved to do the most... singing (on stage).
At different times in the early 60s I saw both of them. I frequented Farmer's Market in Los Angeles and was one day peering over a card rack wanting to see the faces of the couple I heard arguing. She was kind of a dumpy little thing, not at all pretty, and was doing most of the barking. Just as I was about to pull away, he looked up and in an embarrassed manner, looked at me
and shrugged. It was Nelson Eddy.
Not much later I went to the (now-demolished) Picwood Theater on Pico Blvd. in West Los Angeles for a MacDonald-Eddy retrospective. Thanks to my father-in-law, I wasn't interested in watching whatever films were being shown but I was hoping to catch a glimpse of MacDonald. Eddy was not attending. As I arrived I saw the back of her going in the theater or back stage somewhere. By the time I entered the auditorium, she was on stage.
I listened to her lovely speech which I have all but forgotten today except for one thing... she expressed her gratitude for so many young people coming to these films. When she finished, I hightailed it back to the lobby. She took so long to get there (or
yikes, heart racing) might she go out another door?) that I sat down on some carpeted stairs to wait it out. I was looking away, I guess, when I heard an unmistakable voice say something like may I join you, I need to sit for a moment? I'm sure I gurgled something and as I noticed her small entourage nearby, we chatted for a minute or so while she fixed her shoe strap. The only thing I vividly remember from that brief time is when we were parting she said thank you for taking the time to talk to me.
The comment left an indelible impression on me. She is thanking me? I remember thinking that she looked older but very pretty and a little sad. I wanted to comfort her. Maybe I did.
Next posting:
A good 30s film
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