Kendra Bean - Ava Gardner: A Life in Movies

2017 Kendra Bean and Anthony Uzarowski

Published by Running Press,

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The Ava Gardiner photograph on the Cover is by Milton H. Greene and is protected by United States and international copyright laws, and is used with permission from The Archives, LLC, 2610 Kingwood Street, Suite #3, Florence, Oregon 97439 T# 541-997-5331.

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ISBN 978-0-7624-5994-0

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017930766

E-book ISBN 978-0-7624-6043-4

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TENNESSEE WILLIAMS ONCE SAID OF AVA GARDNER, , I think of a sort of poem or koan: Laughter through tears. Sex and sweetness. Hugs and second helpings. A steady shoulder. My beautiful, ballsy friend. During her own lifetime and beyond, the pervasive narrative, both factual and mythologized, has largely focused on Avas private lifethe men, the booze, the restless and at times self-destructive attitude that made her the subject of global tabloid scrutiny. In truth, there were many Avas: the public Ava, the love goddess, the glamorous film star; the private Ava, shy, independent, impulsive; Ava, the loyal, discreet, and giving friend.

Ava was more than a movie starshe became a legend in her own lifetime, known the world over for her earthy sensuality that sizzled on movie screens. She had an alluring magnetism that seduced many famous men, leading to short-lived marriages to Mickey Rooney, Artie Shaw, and Frank Sinatra, with whom she carried on a turbulent lifelong romance.

Beyond the legend, she was a very real person. To many people around the world, she was a dear friend who is cherished and remembered with great love to this day. Fame came relatively easy to the green-eyed daughter of a tobacco planter from North Carolina. At age nineteen she secured a contract with Hollywoods biggest studio, getting her big break a few years later playing the sultry femme fatale in Robert Siodmaks 1946 film noir classic The Killers . But as a true product of the Hollywood star system, she was given little credit for her abilities and even less encouragement to grow as an actress. When MGMs hold on her became too oppressive, she fled to Europe, becoming much like the free-spirited, glamorous, Hemingwayesque expats she portrayed in films such as The Snows of Kilimanjaro and The Sun Also Rises .

Ava never believed in her talent, and she never gave her career in movies much thought. Yet for someone who remarked, . None of us kids who came from M-G-M were. We were just good to look at, she left a rich and often underrated screen legacy. In a career that spanned nearly half a century she worked with many now-legendary directors and traversed film genres, appearing in noir, westerns, costume dramas, romantic comedies, musicals, and, later, even blockbuster disaster films and horror.

out, Cukor wrote in one of his letters to Ava. Youd have had a great career as a title writer. Not Came the Dawn but real comical stuff. Why did you keep this special talent of yours hidden from me?

It was not our goal to write a definitive biography. Rather, our book aims to challenge the well-worn perception of her life and work by bringing together a new narrative perspective with the largest collection of photographs ever assembled in an Ava biography. much better than she thought she was. She had no vanity about her talent, said her dear friend Gregory Peck. The Edna St. Vincent Millay verse might have been written about AvaHer candle burns at both ends. It will not last the night. But oh my friends and ah my foes, it sheds a lovely light.

KENDRA BEAN and ANTHONY UZAROWSKI,
London, May 2016

Ava at age 12, Brogden, North Carolina. Getty Images/John Springer Collection.

T HE TOWN OF LIPHOOK, NEAR PORTSMOUTH IN THE SOUTH of England, was teeming with people from Londons film world in early June 1955. In residence were the cast and crew of Bhowani Junction, MGMs lavish Eastmancolor film set in India. The company had taken over a stretch of the Longmoor Military Railway in order to stage one of the films key scenes. At the bottom of an incline, a group of train carriages was carefully arranged and set on fire to look like a horrific accidentthe product of eight weeks worth of preparation from the art department. Director George Cukor was busy setting up a shot, yelling his commands over a loudspeaker to two hundred extras strewn about on the ground, covered in fake blood, bandages, and prosthetic wounds. Lunch would be announced soon, but one more take had to be completed first.

Thomas Wiseman observed the action. The Austria-born British journalist was young but already had ample experience dealing with high-profile film people as author of the showbiz column for Lord Beaverbrooks Evening Standard . When reflecting recently on how different it was speaking with celebrities over a half century ago, he said, major stars were much more accessible than they are now. I would ring up someone I wanted to interview, without going through a PR person, and arrange for us to have lunch.

, surrounded by makeup department personnel, awaiting her cue. One of the makeup women used a large silver can to douse the star with glycerinOnly stuff that shows up like sweat on screen. Terrible stuff, the actress said. A male colleague dirtied her already filthy sari in blood correctly pigmented for Eastmancolor. Wiseman noted the actresss beauty and the stick of chewing gum in her moutha gift from her older sister in Americathat hinted at her detachment from the controlled chaos surrounding her.