Parting Glances
Twice recently I observe an attractive young woman interviewing graduating seniors at a nearby Barnes & Noble bookstore. Curious about the company she works for I stop to chat.
She answers with a pleasant, charming mid-twenties smile. Paying her a compliment I say, "You're a dead ringer for Kim Novak." "Who's she?" she says sweetly. Innocently. Not a clue.
Startled by her answer I mention "Vertigo," and let it go at that, wondering just how many movie stars of my own past are unknown to today's youngsters?
Conversely, it occurs to me over coffee as I read the Freep horoscope, entertainment happenings, birthdays of the day, I know little or nothing about the personalities listed as year-older celebrants. Makensie Vega, who? Don Omar, duh. Ashton Kutcher. (Well, that's another story.)
Racked at hand are magazines: People, In Touch, OK!, US, Pop Star! Ah, dear me, yes! Divorce, scandal, drug addiction, abortion, suicide, bad TV ratings. It sells. The rich and famous live in glass houses. Windows occasionally soaped, graffiti sprayed, peed on, for a buck-fifty a look see.
I, too, enjoy a quickie share of "whisper whisper" — especially the kind about holier-than-thou types who get caught with their panic down in public watering holes. But of late I've come to draw the line on what I find is an egregious intrusion of celebrity privacy.
There's something journalistically hitting below the garter belt to running tabloid pictures, say of near-senile Zsa Zsa Gabor wheelchair bound, fragile Elizabeth Taylor looking like a ninety-something hellion, or Rip Torn, the once Sweet Bird of Youth, obese and bloated.
God knows we all have our gravity-compromised moments. Especially as we get older and older. But deliberately tarnishing the icons of silver screen beauty, talent, wit, grace. Is nothing sacred? (Rev. Billy Graham hasn't aged too well, by the way.)
Then, too, there's what I call having carnal knowledge with zombies. Digging up the sex life of those deceased, outing them, telling all. Usually in gleeful, shocking detail. Forget the admonition, speak no ill of the dead. Now it's uncover the long-buried, wormy dirt. . .
. . . Katherine Hepburn with 150 female partners. Tyrone Power into non-Olympic aqua sports. Charles Laughton concocting lacto-vegetarian sandwiches. (Well, let's not go there.) . . .
I suppose it all starts with Kenneth Anger's "Hollywood Babylon," a 1965 snoop's compendium, with grainy photos of sex, mayhem, misfortune. Albert Dekker — who's he, anyhow? — hanging himself in drag, asphyxiation for kinks gone amiss (no pun intended). Groucho Marx, head to toe with tats . . .
Latest entry for snooping about for gossip in Hollywood Forever Cemetery is "Full Service," a tell-all expose by 88-year-old, former bartender Scotty Bowers, who "coordinated" sex for the rich and famous for over 50 years. (Grove Press, $25)
If you believe Scotty, he pimped everybody, screwed all. Cary Grant. Randolph Scott. Spencer Tracy. Walter Pidgeon. Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams, Vivien Leigh. Dezi Arnez. Cole Porter. (Golden Shower Ty. Gourmet sandwich Laughton.)
As for Hepburn's 150 muffs, Bowers down plays it, "Why not? It's over a period of 49 years." Sure Scotty. Who's to contra-dick you? Fun for your profit. Sex with the living dead.
