My Mom was a big deal in New York & at the Plaza Hotel in the 60’s. She knew all their secrets, and they depended on her crack team in keeping their many celebrity clients’ valuables safe. I was a kid, but got to spend a lot of time at the Plaza, rather like Eloise. My Mom could get anything she wanted there.
She also got tons of celebrity gossip. She was too much the lady to repeat really good dirt, but she did tell me about a man who stayed for long periods at the Plaza. She knew I was an old movie fan, so she told me all about this actor, who she persisted in calling Gary till her dying day.
I was a fan, but I was also a kid, when I first heard these stories. Since much more information about this complicated man’s life comes to light, these stories make more sense.
Actually, even as a kid reading movie star biography, I knew this actor had a reputation for being a cheapskate. I’ve since learned it was far more than just being cheap, and far more than just a reputation! His most famous live-in situation with another A list actor was the subject of a famous quote from a famous blonde actress. She quipped about the actor not paying bills. When she said it, it was hilarious.
Apparently, even though he is now ranked as the number one most popular actor/leading man in the world/in some polls, a comedic genius-the real man behind the stunning exterior was dark, depressed, looking for salvation anywhere he could find it. Cold, calculating, paranoid, mean, suspicious, all applied to the Great Actor. He was, no doubt-a great actor, and a great Hollywood movie star. After all, who better than he embodied the handsome gay star who pretended to be straight his entire life? He made a living playing out this game, and it can’t have been easy. New documentaries & biographies about his childhood miseries make these reveals more pathetic than anything.
He apparently would hole up for days at a time at the Plaza, asking for no service & no visitors. He had a cheap dime store hot plate, and came to the Plaza with bags of canned soups. He apparently lived on booze, soup he heated up himself, and a tin of saltine crackers.
There was a lot of alcohol, a lot of black moods, and a refusal to pay for anything more than was absolutely necessary. It was perhaps pathological. It was certainly deeply engrained in his personality. This was a side of himself he never, once, displayed on film. It’s too bad he couldn’t have gone there, but after all, his reputation now couldn’t be better. He is numero uno! Above Gable & Bogart!
He had known abandonment, poverty, and was unable to relax & enjoy his wealth. Apparently, the face he presented publicly was very different from the image of perfection we saw onscreen.
She also got tons of celebrity gossip. She was too much the lady to repeat really good dirt, but she did tell me about a man who stayed for long periods at the Plaza. She knew I was an old movie fan, so she told me all about this actor, who she persisted in calling Gary till her dying day.
I was a fan, but I was also a kid, when I first heard these stories. Since much more information about this complicated man’s life comes to light, these stories make more sense.
Actually, even as a kid reading movie star biography, I knew this actor had a reputation for being a cheapskate. I’ve since learned it was far more than just being cheap, and far more than just a reputation! His most famous live-in situation with another A list actor was the subject of a famous quote from a famous blonde actress. She quipped about the actor not paying bills. When she said it, it was hilarious.
Apparently, even though he is now ranked as the number one most popular actor/leading man in the world/in some polls, a comedic genius-the real man behind the stunning exterior was dark, depressed, looking for salvation anywhere he could find it. Cold, calculating, paranoid, mean, suspicious, all applied to the Great Actor. He was, no doubt-a great actor, and a great Hollywood movie star. After all, who better than he embodied the handsome gay star who pretended to be straight his entire life? He made a living playing out this game, and it can’t have been easy. New documentaries & biographies about his childhood miseries make these reveals more pathetic than anything.
He apparently would hole up for days at a time at the Plaza, asking for no service & no visitors. He had a cheap dime store hot plate, and came to the Plaza with bags of canned soups. He apparently lived on booze, soup he heated up himself, and a tin of saltine crackers.
There was a lot of alcohol, a lot of black moods, and a refusal to pay for anything more than was absolutely necessary. It was perhaps pathological. It was certainly deeply engrained in his personality. This was a side of himself he never, once, displayed on film. It’s too bad he couldn’t have gone there, but after all, his reputation now couldn’t be better. He is numero uno! Above Gable & Bogart!
He had known abandonment, poverty, and was unable to relax & enjoy his wealth. Apparently, the face he presented publicly was very different from the image of perfection we saw onscreen.
Rock Hudson?
ReplyDeleteNot really a blind
ReplyDeleteBut sad
So far we got a guy who likes eating lunch by himself, or at least wanted to one particular day, a sad woman eating nachos, and a short guy who is unpleasant.
ReplyDeleteThe depravity. The unspeakable depravity.
Archie Leach
ReplyDeleteAnd Cary Grant liked being let alone sometimes too, away from nosy people wanting to bother him.
ReplyDeleteI'm spotting a definite theme here.
Cary "Gary" Grant. Cheapskate, probably closeted, stayed at the Plaza for a time.
ReplyDeleteFood, food, food, food and more fucking food,
ReplyDeleteVegan soups, vegan crackers
DeleteWill this person ever write a blind without mentioning food in some way`?
ReplyDeleteChaplin..notorious cheapskate. Terrible childhood. Themes of homosexuality in some of his films.
ReplyDeleteDamn I am late but yes most def, CG. This is the joke in question regarding him and his long time lover and answer to yesterday's BI Carole Lombard:
ReplyDeleteTheir good friend, Carole Lombard, when joking about Grant notorious cheapness said "Their relationship is perfect. Randy pays the bills and Cary mails them.” Between the two of them, they had 7 failed marriages, but they were most likely marriages of convenience.
She's Entys cocktail waitress at the bar he's at now drinking lunch, what do you expect? Wait for today's repeat blind eagerly.
ReplyDeleteNo shrimp were involved?
ReplyDeleteIf I ever tell five or six stories in a row about how I encountered someone who wanted me to leave him or her alone, please point this out to me.
ReplyDeleteLOL
Delete
ReplyDeletethis blind needs more vegan ... was it at least vegetable soup ?
@J +1000
ReplyDeleteAnd people who deny themselves food also focus way too much on what everyone else is eating.
That is so true. I work with 30+ women in an office. They are constantly on diets and are going through the vegan obsession. They are absolutely obsessed with food and what we all eat. Very judgemental. Very annoying.
DeleteCary Grant.
ReplyDeleteCarole Lombard as the actress: “Randy pays the bills and Cary mails them.”
I now understand shrimp. I'm ok with it. all of it. these blinds are delightful.
ReplyDeleteI like these blinds. She's a very easy-to-read writer. Am I wrong to presume the writer is female? Has that been distinctly stated somewhere?
ReplyDeleteNothing really block buster yet, but still insightful.
So her Mom was kind of the East-Coast mashup of Ray Donovan and Kathy Richards.
DeleteHimmmm mentioned on twitter a couple of weeks ago that he was writing some Old Hollywood blinds for CDAN...I wondered for a moment if InsiderHer could be Himmmm incognito. Pretty sure Himmmm’s stories would be more epic though...more diamond dusted caviar than shrimp, enchiladas and tinned soup. He wouldn’t have just stared at Demi Moore’s boobs either, he would’ve totally knocked her up like Kate Beckinsale and Brandon Lee’s sister.
ReplyDelete+1 to these blinds. They are light and interesting.
ReplyDeleteCary Grant and it IS sad.
@Amy
Ever hung around dancers? Their obsession with food is epic. They pretend to hate food, call some of it poison, but can't shut up about it. Rather than call it "diets" they have euphemisms like "cleanse" or "restarting their systems". It amounts to the same thing - Diets. BTW, with the obsession with clean versus unclean foods comes a whole lot of smoking much of the time.
If find it all very amusing and tuck in with more gusto after spending time around them.
@plot smoking or cocaine which they are absolutely fine with shoving up their noses to keep slim but look at you like a murderer if you indulge in red meat. The hypocrisy eh?
DeleteLove these Plaza Hotel blinds. Please, keep them coming. I'm wondering, can you or your mother corroborate this one for me? I hope I'm not spoiling any run-up...
ReplyDeleteThe Plaza Hotel is the site of room 233, 'where Roy Cohn held child abuse orgies in order to blackmail elites.'
"When New York attorney John Klotz began to investigate Roy Cohn on behalf of a client…declassified New York government files and spadework by a private detective substantiated the allegation that there was indeed a 'blue suite' at the Plaza, Suite 233."
"The FBI Director J edgar Hoover is alleged to have been witnessed dressed up drag with two young boys at the Plaza Hotel."
"Detective James Rothstein had an opportunity to have a sit-down with ... Roy Cohn.
During this sit-down, Cohn admitted to Rothstein that he was part of a rather elaborate sexual blackmail operation that compromised politicians with child prostitutes."
Peter Fraser was one of Roy Cohn's lovers.
Fraser says that Donald trump was certainly Roy Cohn's apprentice."
Trump bought the Plaza Hotel in 1988.
TRUMP, MOSSAD, PLAZA HOTEL
http://aanirfan.blogspot.com/2016/12/trump-mossad-plaza-hotel.html
Of course, the room is gone now, remodeled like the rest of the hotels from back in those days... like The Gotham where that poor Playboy Playmate Stephanie Adams Jumped with her son to her death out of a rear room that allegedly had no balcony and opening windows...(Oh, the place allegedly also has underground tunnels from back in the day when it was the Gotham Book Mart (Can anyone else corroborate this?)
Follow The WHITE RABBIT: Playboy Model Stephanie Adams-Murder Or Assassination? NXIVM; Models; New Age Witches & Druids
https://voat.co/v/pizzagate/2581117
I like the Plaza blinds as well.There's a sweetness to them that provides some welcome fresh air. Keep it up!
ReplyDeleteBut they make me hungry.
DeleteFool me once...
ReplyDeleteDidn't even read it. I'm not paying for amateur gossip, you know!!
People who won't shut TF up about food are the worst. Well okay pedos are the worst, but foodies are definitely obnoxious. The only meal I want to hear about is your last one. I usually recommend they start using drugs since they're so obsessed with their senses. Guarantee a donut when you have the munchies will taste so much better than whatever artisanal bullshit you're paying too much for now.
ReplyDeleteI became a food asshole when I tried to cut out sugar. Couldn’t hack it. Life’s too short not to eat cake! If ever I feel bad about what I eat I look at Madonna’s Instagram - she was obsessive about diet and excercise her whole life and yet still ended up looking like Bette Davis in What Ever Happened To Baby Jane.
ReplyDeleteMadonna makes me feel a bit sick. Her legs always seem to be akimbo too, displaying her bits. No thank you. Helen Mirren is who I look up to. She looks healthy, her age but beautiful.
DeleteI'm thinking Bing Crosby. Def A+ forever, acted in plenty of comedies with Bob Hope, abusive with his sons and noted to be very cheap.
ReplyDeleteBetter than reading about rape, pedophilia and murder
ReplyDeleteCary Grant and Randolph Scott lived together in Hollywood. They were photographed in their beautiful home for a coffee table book by Architectural Digest. Mr. Scott was seated at the piano in the photo.
ReplyDeleteAnother vote for these blinds, if only for the comments. Haven't laughed so hard all day :)
ReplyDeleteJimmy Stewart?
ReplyDeleteGary Cary 😀
ReplyDeleteBull Murray I'm quite sure
ReplyDeleteThank you Hortensia. I was going to ask who Randy was.
ReplyDeleteI like these blinds too. Old Hollywood with a touch of nostalgia.
This does seem Cary Grant. One of my ALL Times fave actors
ReplyDelete" Everyone wants to be Cary Grant, even me wants to be Cary Grat, even i want to be Cary Grant"
i wonder what he meant by this quote, if the" cary Grant model" was who HE really wanted to be ( but wasn't) or he would have wanted to be if he wasn't already so likely the first, as he was not really like him, as this blind and others sources say
the non conformability of the " real" Cary with his public image was revealed by Orry Kelly, former Grant friend and lover. He said some ugly things about him, said and hinted.
regardless, he was a wonderful actor, and until someone doesn't reveal some REALLY ugly things abut him, he will always be
" even me wants to be Cary Grat," this part is a mistake
ReplyDeleteCary Grant was a known LSD user, which always amused me.
ReplyDeleteSounds like Gary Grant.
ReplyDeleteBi.
Known woman beater. (Dyan Cannon and others...)
One of my screen favorites.
Yes, he really said "Even I want to be like Cary Grant."
We, of all people should know there is no correlation between what is on screen/image and reality of their lives. Sometimes there is some, usually a lot of gaps. Sometimes a huge gap.
All of us are neurotic in some ways.
Actors/directors/producers are usually more neurotic than the average person. (Hence drawn to the biz... it's true- seeking love/self esteem/validation.)
Superstars and legends are usually off the charts for neuroticism or socio/pyschopathy. (Not all- but most.)
Charlie Chaplin and Cary Grant both came up in very hard circumstances in England
ReplyDeleteGrant had it worse, about 15 years younger than Chaplin.
I can’t imagine going from dire poverty in turn of the century England
to making it big in the USA