Blind Item #6 -Old Hollywood Blind Item
Back in her heyday, this comedic actress was A-list and then suddenly quit at the top of her game, mainly because her married lover (one of the richest men in America the time) and financial backer butted too many heads with Hollywood's movie moguls. The following incident happened when the star was at the height of her popularity. One day, her lover decided that their living situation should be taken one step further. He and his mistress went to Tijuana to get a divorce from his long suffering wife and get hitched right there on the spot. The actress didn't know it at the time but she was also pregnant with his child. The wife didn't take the news of their divorce so well, she became a virtual recluse. Amazingly, this never leaked to the press for obvious reasons.
Marion Davies and William Randolf Hearst. You know, Lydia's great-grandad.
ReplyDeleteMy thought too
DeleteYou Go Nutty! I was thinking the same but I never knew they got married.
ReplyDeleteNutty! Amazing.
ReplyDeletegood job @nutty
ReplyDeletei was getting confused between wife, lover, mistress, actress...
Wow, interesting!
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patricia_Lake
The divorce, marriage and birth of their daughter were a tight secret. The daughter , Patricia, was raised as Marion Davies' niece
ReplyDeletehttp://articles.latimes.com/1993-10-31/news/mn-51785_1_marion-davies
God I love wikipedia...Apparently Veronica Lake was supposedly that child. Interesting.
ReplyDeleteI went to a party once in a huge mansion in SF and supposedly it was the old Marion Davies place and the attic still had a lot of her gorgeous dresses. A lot of people went up to see but I never did. Now looking at the date of her death I wonder how much of that was true since this was in the mid 1990's.
@Sherry, I think it was Patricia Lake, who married Arthur Lake ("Dagwood" of the live-action "Blondie" series).
DeleteI wonder if the divorce/marriage was even legal? No one knew...Davies went down as mistress to...when she died.
ReplyDeleteThose old school peeps were scandalous as heck! Good job @Nutty
ReplyDeleteI think the daughter, Patricia, was the wife of Arthur Lake, the actor that played Dagwood in the Blondie movies.
ReplyDelete@Glitter, JINX! ;)
DeleteI loved that series. Penny Singleton, Baby Dumpling, Daisy, all fabulous!
The only thing Wiki disagrees with this blind is the wife, Millicent, becoming a virtual recluse. They state she built an active philanthropic social life for herself in NY...
ReplyDeleteMarion's rep got tranished due to Citizen Kane, she was actually a good actress during her day & remained married to hearst & took care of him finacially & physically when he was unable to support them anymore...Patricia apparently didn't know for sure if they were trully her parents either, she knew the rumors & knew that she looked like Hearst...
ReplyDeletePatricia did Blondie the radio version of Blondie, where she married the actor who played Dagwood, & he continued to play Dagwood in the movies
ReplyDeleteI dont get it. Why wld child have to be kept secret?
ReplyDeleteOrson Welles in Citizen Kane.
ReplyDeleteIts says Marion Davies got married to Horace Brown in 1951...when Hearst divorced his wife in 1951. I'm confused how this is them?
ReplyDeleteHorace G. Brown
ReplyDeleteHorace G. Brown was Marion Davies's husband. He was a former sea captain and policeman and sometime actor.
Davies married him on October 31, 1951, ten weeks after the death of her lover William Randolph Hearst. She was 54 at the time. It was not a happy marriage: Davies filed divorce papers twice but no divorce was ever finalized. The marriage lasted until her death.
@auntliddy.. I think because divorce in that day carried a social stigma Millicent chose to avoid...
ReplyDeleteOh Lord..You guys are of course correct. Reading comprehension isn't working well for me today.
ReplyDelete@loopy: I love the Blondie movies, too. I would love to see them again.
ReplyDelete@Glitter, when I was a kid, they showed them on Saturday mornings in chronological order.
DeleteHow do you get a divorce without the consent of the other partner ?
ReplyDeleteNevada, with its 6 week residency requirement & several Caribbean countries allow it after 30 days & one or two will do it immediately, but that's not always respected in the US.
Deletewow good blind and great comments
ReplyDeleteI love old blinds!
ReplyDeleteMaybe "virtual recluse" means west coast only?
Arthur and Patricia Lake had a great marriage and were both alcoholics who died with very little money. Kind of sad she didn't get buckets of Hearst's money the way his other sons did.
ReplyDeleteRosebud
ReplyDeletePlease give us more Old Hollywood blinds. T. W.
ReplyDeleteThe relationship between Hurst and Davies had to be kept secret because he was trying to get into politics - divorce & a movie star mistress (add an illegitimate child into that) would have stifled his political ambition. As it was it was never realised I believe.
ReplyDeleteYou guys are good! Marion Davies it is!
ReplyDeleteI forgot to mention that she was considered the ultimate hostess and threw some of the most legendary parties. She really was one of the more fascinating Old Hollywood actresses.
ReplyDeleteI love the story about her and Joan Crawford sticking up for Billy Haines and his lover after a rather brutal homophobic attack. Marion wanted to get Hearst involved, but Haines insisted they keep it quiet. I'm glad that Enty has brought back the Old Hollywood blinds.
Who are you people and who are these people? I know the Hearst family and Veronica Lake but only the names.
ReplyDeleteAmanda Hearst
ReplyDeleteYou guys are good, and I love the Old Hollywood blinds too. Keep 'em coming, Enty!
ReplyDelete