Enter John Gavin. He'd been on the U-I lot since 1956, largely in forgettable programmers on which the studio made its name. He certainly filled the bill on tall, dark and handsome. There was a time I thought he was the handsomest man in the movies and I couldn't see enough of him. While never a threat to Hudson he did get at least three wonderful opportunities in 1959-60, in two classics and one immensely popular film, that would forever keep his name alive.
Throughout his 22-year movie career, however, perhaps after commenting on his stunning face, one would often hear he can't act. Frankly, I think that's a little harsh and yet I could never deny that he was wooden and seemed like he always wanted to be elsewhere. And funny that even in his two most famous films, it's not Gavin that one bombards with compliments.
His lineage is impressive coming from two families that helped settle early Spanish California. His father, Juan Apablasa, hailed from Spain and his mother, Delia Pablos, was from a powerful family in Sonora, Mexico. Gavin was raised speaking English and Spanish. He would attend socially prominent Catholic schools in Los Angeles and would graduate with honors from Stanford University majoring in Latin American economic history. He liked to say he did not come from wealth, that he attended Stanford on a scholarship. The second part of that sentence is probably true.
He served in the Korean War as a naval officer. He never entertained being an actor despite his movie star good looks, striking 6'4" frame and soothing speaking voice. One day after his military hitch he offered his services as a technical adviser to a family friend who was producing a naval movie at U-I. Someone at the studio saw him and offered an acting contract on the spot. Gavin declined.
His father urged him to accept the offer, reminding him of the wonderful salary he was being offered. Of course he did accept but it's not unfair to say that Gavin never really had that fire in his belly for his new profession and perhaps that has something to do with why he never reached the hoped-for heights.
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| No competition with Rock Hudson on his boat |
He said his training at Universal was not as extensive as most others received and claimed he was thrown into movies being untrained. His first role was as Rory Calhoun's brother in Raw Edge (1956) who is killed after a couple of scenes at the beginning. Behind the Wall, a prison story where he plays a fall guy, came the same year. His handsome presence was well-used in Four Girls in Town (1957). The town was Hollywood and the title stars were looking for careers and nabbed most of the screen time. He plays an Easterner who comes west and becomes a gunslinger in Quantez (1957). He supported Fred MacMurray and Dorothy Malone.
In 1957 he married actress Cicely Evans. They had two children together and the marriage would last eight years.
He first worked for director Douglas Sirk and had his first star billing in A Time to Love and a Time to Die (1958) based on the novel by Erich Maria Remarque. He plays a German soldier who's been on the Russian front for some time. He secures a leave and returns to his bombed-out home town to find his parents missing. On his plight to locate them, he finds love. The actor acquitted himself well and the film was a moderate success.
Sirk liked him well enough to cast him in Imitation of Life (1959). It was produced by the flamboyant Ross Hunter, slave to fashion and beauty and bigtime actresses looking to have their careers revitalized. Gavin and Hunter would make several pictures together. Life, the story of a white woman desperate to be an actress and a black friend who becomes her maid and their two daughters, was soap opera gold and a boon for Kleenex.
Its astounding financial success was largely due to it being the first film Lana Turner made after the notorious murder of her gangster boyfriend by Turner's daughter. In this film Gavin was her boyfriend who is also coveted by Turner's daughter, Sandra Dee. With all the hoopla created, little of it was for Gavin.
A Breath of Scandal (1960) is lightweight fare about a horny princess (Sophia Loren) banished to the countryside to cool off. While there she runs into millionaire Gavin and falls head over heels. The film, the two stars and the countryside were lovely to behold but no one included it on their résumés.
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| Romancing Janet Leigh before she showered in Psycho |
Then came those two classics that Gavin is damned lucky to have been a part of despite his receiving far less press than any of his costars. He plays the boyfriend of Janet Leigh in Psycho (1960) who winds up at the Bates Motel with her sister, Vera Miles, looking for her. Tony Perkins rightly claimed most all of the attention. Hitchcock wanted Rod Taylor for the boyfriend role but Gavin was forced on him by U-I. The director didn't care for The Stiff as he called the actor.
He was very fortunate to have been signed to play Julius Caesar in Spartacus (1960). Old Jules never looked so handsome. Producer/star Kirk Douglas assembled a large, prestigious cast and I'll be damned if Gavin wasn't right in there in scenes with Laughton and Olivier. Having read my recent review of the film, you already know I think Gavin's best contribution was alighting from the baths and grabbing a towel. The scene produced sensations in me that I'm still learning to deal with. I've seen some handsome actors in my day but that scene... oh yeah, that scene.
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| Fresh from bathing in Spartacus |
I've never come to grips with how I feel about Midnight Lace (1960). I love mysteries, a dollop of suspicious characters, creepy music and Rex Harrison (if I have to), Myrna Loy and Roddy McDowall. I've never been sure how I felt about Doris Day in a rare drama (I do know her constant sobbing wore me the hell out) as a London housewife terrorized by phone calls and voices in the foggy park across the street. The story and certainly the outcome was a little too predictable. Gavin, as a neighbor who comes to Day's rescue a few times, is bland and beautiful.
He had now been paired with the studio's three top blonde movie queens, Turner, Dee and Day. U-I was trying all it knew to get this man's career going. If they knew what they were doing and truly meant to stand behind him they would have given him a role that required emotions, especially anger. He needed to erupt. I wanted that perfect hair messed up, some stubble, maybe a little more skin. Play someone disreputable. Downplay those looks. Grab some of the action. Reach for the stars. But no.
Deciding to pair Gavin with Dee in not one but two back-to-back atrocious comedies was actually not smart for either one of them. But Gavin is the focus here. What's a tall, handsome, Brooks Brothered, older gentleman like him doing with Gidget/Tammy who was over a foot shorter? Romanoff and Juliet and (OMG) Tammy Tell Me True, both 1961, were different but oh so silly and proof that this couple was not a good match.
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| With 3-time costar Sandra Dee |
For my money I'd add one more film that aided Gavin in screen immortality and that would be Back Street (1961). We're not talking classics here, okay, but we're talking one of the crowd favorites, one of writer Fannie Hurst's great weepies. It was Gavin's second journey into Hurst country having done Imitation of Life. For me it was one of his best roles and for every moment he might go wooden, the screen was suddenly illuminated with Susan Hayward or Vera Miles and all was forgiven. You may have caught my gushing review earlier.
In 1962 he began appearing more on television than he did in movies, obviously a sure sign the movie gig isn't hitting any high notes. He also starred in his own series, Destry (1964), a remake of the role played by James Stewart in 1939 and Audie Murphy in 1954. It only lasted one season. Of course I watched it and while I thought he was fine, the series looked to be done on the cheap. A year later he had another one-season series, the WWII-themed Convoy.
He made the first of two Spanish-language films in 1967 and another in 1976.
His costarring role as Trevor Graydon, the adored boss of Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967), was nice work. He brought a straight-faced comedy flair to a role that could have been a takeoff on the actor himself. I'm not saying Gavin was stuffy but he certainly imbued Graydon with a great deal of it... and almost snickered doing it.
It would be nearly everyone, critics and the public, who would snicker at The Madwoman of Chaillot (1969). I will never forget seeing it... unfortunately to the very end. The lights went up and I looked around to see if there were any suicides. This is one of the most off-the-(expletive)-wall pieces of gibberish about kooks, goofballs and weirdos at a Parsienne park. Despite a cast that included Katharine Hepburn, Yul Brynner, Danny Kaye, Paul Henreid and Richard Chamberlain, the film lacked cohesion and I could hardly stand it.
Pussycat, Pussycat, I Love You (1970), a not well-conceived semi-sequel to 1965's semi-dreadful What's New, Pussycat?, pretty much signaled the end of Gavin's movie career. By now the movie landscape had changed from the day when he really might have had his best chance. Now he couldn't compete except as the star's pal, a la Gig Young, and that didn't excite him.
And then something did get the juices flowing. In 1971, he signed on to the James Bond franchise when those folks wanted an American to replace George Lazenby in Diamonds Are Forever. But at the last minute, after successfully sitting out a salary dispute, Sean Connery returned. Bye bye Gavin. Understandably.
In the early 70's he lent his baritone voice to the summer stock circuit of The Fantastics and then on Broadway opposite Michele Lee in Seesaw.
He kept busy and happy becoming more involved in politics. He became a special adviser to the secretary general of the Organization of American States which concerned itself with diplomacy and regional security. For the Alliance of Progress Gavin promoted American and Latin American film production. He starting working on the board of the Screen Actors Guild in the mid-60s and in 1971 he became its president and served for two years.
He'd rubbed shoulders on numerous occasions with Governor Reagan who had once held Gavin's same position with SAG and one day, as president, Reagan would make him another offer.
In 1974 Gavin married actress-singer Constance Towers. The first time I'd seen her was in the John Wayne-William Holden western, The Horse Soldiers (1959). Their long marriage was solid. I would see photos occasionally in the L.A. papers and they were dazzling to behold at some society event. I saw her once at the Pantages Theater opposite Yul Brynner in The King and I and in the occasional guest role on television. She was the one who would bring home the acting bacon. Gavin was happy dabbling in politics and as a businessman, philanthropist and true son of Los Angeles.
So what happens? Reagan, now president, offers him an ambassadorship to Mexico in 1981 which he was thrilled to fill. For some time the Mexican people had been aware of Gavin through his being a spokesman for Bacardi rum.
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| Visiting Mexican earthquake site with friend |
The fact that an actor-president gave Mexico an actor-ambassador didn't sit too well with the people he would come to live among although they would give him hell for returning to Los Angeles so often. The Mexicans joked that they were going to send their favorite comedian, Cantinflas, to DC in retaliation. It was a bit unfair to accuse Gavin as having no qualifications.
His 5-year stay as ambassador was contentious, especially, of course, with the opposing party. He couldn't seem to do anything right as far as they were concerned. He frequently put his foot in his mouth which didn't help his cause. He quietly resigned, after which some American execs gave him high marks for fostering trade.
After his ambassadorship was over, he became a public relations exec for Atlantic Richfield and later president of the parent company of Univision, the Spanish-language television network.
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| With Mrs. Gavin, Constance Towers |
Except for those occasional pics of him or him and Towers, he stayed out of the limelight for the last 20 years or so of his life, which, of course, suited him fine. He wanted to do good things in business and politics and felt he accomplished that. He knew he'd be best remembered for his films and his wooden acting and he maintained a good sense of humor about it. He'd say his wife was the actor in the family.
Always called Jack, Gavin died in 2018 in Beverly Hills of complications from pneumonia. He was 86.
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from the 50s
Interesting stuff old friend. Glad to see you are continuing on with your interests/passions and have not succumbed to Covid/old age. Be well and take care. Regards to Mr. B.
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