Day 18: Barbara Billingsley

BARBARA BILLINGSLEY

DECEMBER 22, 1915-OCTOBER 16, 2010

WORK: Actress, model

SPOUSES: Glenn Billingsley (m. 1941; div. 1947), Roy Kelino (m. 1953; died 1956), William Mortensen (m. 1959; died 1981)

CHILDREN: Drew Billingsley, Glenn Billingsley

Hi ho, folks! I’m feeling a little nostalgic and also a little controversial, and I have been very intrigued by the lasting effect of “Leave it to Beaver” in it’s portrayal of stay at home moms. It’s actually astounding, the fact that a wholesome family sitcom that lasted about five years has affected generations of families (for better or worse, but more on that later). So today I want to talk about Barbara Billingsley, the lovely lady that played June Cleaver and became her caretaker.

Barbara was born Barbara Lillian Combes in Los Angeles in 1915, the youngest of two girls to a police officer and his wife. Her parents divorced when she was about four, and her mother went to work as a foreman in a knitting mill (literally never thought I would ever have to type the words knitting mill).

While still in her first year of college, the musical revue “Straw Hat” that she was in gained enough attention to be brought to New York for a Broadway run. The run was rather short, five performances to be exact, but Barbara decided to stay in New York, finding work as a fashion model. She married her first husband, Glenn Billingsley, in 1941 and took his last name. In 1945 she was offered a contract at MGM, and she and her husband made the move back to her hometown of Los Angeles. The film industry proved to be disappointing, and she mainly played small roles that largely went uncredited. She stuck it out, though, and by the mid 1950s she had graduated to supporting roles in films and, most importantly, made the transition to television appearances. From 1955-57 she had guest starring roles on over half a dozen network sitcoms. 1957 also saw her make her debut in the role that would define her career, and Americana, as June Cleaver in “Leave it to Beaver.” (Pardon the synopsis, I have to educate the children) The show featured Barbara as June, the picturesque American housewife who, with her businessman husband Ward, is raising two boys. Throughout the series the boys, mainly Theodore “Beaver” (so called because of his front teeth), cause trouble and get into sticky situations, and June is usually the one to help them work it out. Through her wisdom, grace, and dignity, the boys always sort things out. Of her character she would say later in life, “Some people think she was weakish, but I don’t. She was the love in that family. She set a good example for what a wife could be. I had two boys at home when I did the show. I think the character became kind of like me and vice versa. I’ve never known where one started and where one stopped.”

After the sitcom ended in 1963, Barbara quickly found herself typecast as a sickly sweet housewife, and she semi-retired from acting in the 1970s. In 1980 her career was revived in the comedy “Airplane!” In the film she spoofs herself as a typical, sweet housewife who just so happens to “speak jive.” Throughout the remainder of the decade she appeared as a guest on sitcoms and the revival of “Leave it to Beaver,” which ran for four seasons. She would continue acting throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, officially retiring in 2003.

Barbara died at 94 from polymyalgia, having lived out the rest of her life happily surrounded by family.

HIGHLIGHTS AND LITTLE KNOWN FACTS:

1. Barbara often questioned her character’s reactions to the Cleaver children’s misbehavior, basing her concern on personal experience as the mother of two sons. As the co-producer Joseph Connelly explained, “In scenes where she’s mad at the boys, she’s always coming over to us with the script and objecting. ‘I don’t see why June is so mad over what Beaver’s done. I certainly wouldn’t be.’ As a result, many of Beaver’s crimes have been rewritten into something really heinous like lying about them, in order to give his mother a strong motive for blowing her lady-like stack.

2. Jerry Mathers, who played young Beaver, adored and idolized Barbara, stating later that she was a role model for him and the rest of the cast.

3. Barbara’s only regret about “Leave it to Beaver” was the fact that in 1950s television contracts residual payments end after six reruns.

WHY HER LEGACY MATTERS:

Barbara’s portrayal of the picture perfect housewife is synonymous with that of 1950s culture. She became the spokesperson, role model, and poster child for housewives and mothers all over the country and, for better or worse, defined a generation of parents. The reason we think of housewives of the 1950s staying home and vacuuming in pearls and high heels is because that is what June Cleaver did. Incidentally, the pearls were Barbara’s trademark look because she had what she described as a “hollow” in her neck, so she asked that they be used in the show. Additionally, the high heels were to make her look taller than the quickly growing boys playing her sons.

We know, of course, that any picture perfect, sanitized version of Americana is too good to be true and very likely never actually existed; but that doesn’t make it any less important. For years mothers strived to emulate June, her patience and her grace and yes, even her pearls. Heck, the reason older women have back issues is probably due to the amount of work they did in high heels. But despite any non-realistic portrayals of life, Barbara did give us something very real and tangible: the picture of a loving mother. A mother who took the time to teach her kids right from wrong, and never pretended that grown ups were perfect. She became the new Virgin Mary, a woman who was “all women,” or all housewives anyway. Her image was perfect, but she had problems and struggles of her own. And as for the show’s portrayal of June and Ward, she said later, “We were the ideal parents because that’s the way (Wally and Beaver) saw it.”

Barbara took her role as an unlikely icon in stride, but she also never disrespected or made fun of the image she created. She never accepted a project if it made fun of June, saying “She’s been too good to me to play anything like that.”

“June Cleaver didn’t keep her house in perfect order, the prop man did it.”

-BARBARA BILLINGSLEY

 

Day 17: Clara Bow

CLARA BOW

JULY 29, 1905-SEPTEMBER 27, 1965

WORK: Actress

SPOUSE: Rex Bell (m. 1931; div. 1962)

CHILDREN: Tony Beldam, George Beldam

Happy Monday, kids! This has been a hell of a day, and I an ready for some respite. Today I want to talk about a true icon, someone that sort of defined an era. Let’s talk about Clara Bow, the original “It” girl!

Clara was born in Brooklyn in 1905, during the hottest heat wave in years, with temperatures peaking at 100 degrees. Her parents were very poor and her father was often absent, due to his issues with alcohol and his strained relationship with his wife. Clara’s childhood was bleak and by many standards practically Dickinsonian. She and her mother worked endlessly to support themselves, with Clara attending school in homemade outfits that the other children mocked her for. She didn’t fit in, for she was too boyish and rough, preferring the tumble and rumble of other boys to girls her own age. She found solace in sports, gaining a reputation for her pitching arm.

When Clara was 16, her mother fell out of a second story window, suffering a head injury. After the accident her mother started to have violent episodes, during which she would lash out at Clara physically, oftentimes not remembering the next day. To cope with her bleak childhood, having to care for her mother and not having any real friends, Clara found consolation in the movies. She knew early on that she wanted to be a screen actress, sensing that she had something inside her that was made for it. In 1921, when she was 15, she competed in Brewster magazines nationwide acting contest against her mother’s wishes. Deemed a natural as well as a prodigy, she won the contest and was promised film work, but nothing came of it. Her father told her to “haunt” the offices of the publishing house that held the contest, and they eventually caved and introduced her to director Christy Cabanne, who cast her in “Beyond the Rainbow.” After begging casting offices in New York for work, she got a tomboy role in “Down to the Sea in Ships.” Though the role was small, almost every review singled her out as a future star and gifted comedian. Another tomboy part followed in “Grit,” after which an executive from Preferred Pictures in Hollywood approached her for a three month trial contract. At the urging of her father and against her own reluctance, Clara left for Hollywood in 1923. By 1925 she was making 14 pictures a year, always receiving rave reviews, usually for playing carefree young flappers. Despite her peppy on screen image, she worked herself to the point of exhaustion, usually making two or three films at once, working 18 hour days at a time when film actors had no union to protect them. In 1927 she made the film that would define her image. “It” is a romantic caper, the title referring to sexual magnetism. Clara plays a compassionate, funny, and very sexually liberated store clerk who is pursuing her older boss. Because of the film’s success and Clara’s continuing rise to fame, she was deemed America’s “It Girl.”

Even with the advent of “talkies” in the late 20s and early 30s, Clara held her position as a top box office draw. However, she hated the new way of working, as the microphones and more subdued style of acting made her nervous and rigid. During this period she began exhibiting signs of depression of even schizophrenia, her nerves became shot and she began to succumb to her public scandals. In April of 1931, when she was still one of the top 5 stars in Hollywood, she was brought to a sanatorium and requested to be released from her contract with Paramount. At 25, her career was deemed over.

Clara left Hollywood and married a rancher, Rex Bell, and lived in then small-town Las Vegas. She recovered enough to return to Hollywood soon after, and soon every major studio wanted her services. Clara just wanted to make enough money to leave Hollywood behind forever. In 1933, she officially retired from acting, living with Bell in Nevada. For the rest of her life she was plagued by insomnia and depression, as well as what would now be called social anxiety. When her husband was running for the US House of Representatives, Clara tried to commit suicide, leaving a note that said she preferred death to a public life. She and her husband separated, and she lived alone in a small bungalow in Los Angeles for the rest of her life. Clara died at age 60 from a heart attack.

HIGHLIGHTS AND LITTLE KNOWN FACTS:

1. The biggest misconception about Bow is that her career foundered with the coming of sound because her Brooklyn accent was too ugly. She made several talkies, in fact, starting with “The Wild Party,” a big success that was directed by her friend and champion Dorothy Arzner. In truth, Bow’s physical and mental health issues (she had schizophrenia, like her mother) were exacerbated by the stresses of her fame, particularly the fallout from her notorious tell-all memoir in Photoplayand a lurid lawsuit brought by her former secretary.

2. Perhaps because of those misfortunes and the outsider status they brought, she can now be claimed as one of the sharpest commentators on show business, and the studio system. She knew what it meant to be a “jazz baby” and it wasn’t always a party. “All the time the flapper is laughing and dancing, there’s a feeling of tragedy underneath,” she said once. “She’s unhappy and disillusioned, and that’s what people sense.”

WHY HER LEGACY MATTERS:

Clara’s legacy was almost completely wiped away by the efforts of her contemporaries. Fellow actors, as well as the studio heads that made millions from her work deemed her “too wild,” “too sexual,” and a slew of other things. Clara was a Brooklyn girl, and she was not about to pretend she wasn’t. When Hollywood royalty was putting on airs, Clara was a brash reminder of the humble upbringings that most of them had. She was sexual, sure, but no more sexual than any other top actress of the time. The difference was, she didn’t hide it. She didn’t believe in pretending to be anything other than herself, and that is what alienated her from the rest of the Hollywood elite.

Clara was the first sex symbol of American cinema, the foremost flapper, and a model for plucky girls around the world, but she was also a no-nonsense woman who had the courage that nobody else had at the time (or most times, honestly) to call out the film industry for all of their pretensions. She is also a cautionary tale of what the film business did to those that dare to break the mold, to rock the boat, and to disobey the rules. Like Marilyn Monroe (who Clara viewed as her natural successor) some decades later, Clara’s career was overshadowed by personal issues, brought on by stress and overwork from studio’s trying to make as much off of her as they could.

Clara endured too many hardships during her too short career and life, but her work and her image helped to free the American woman from the confines of societal norms and encouraged the masses to choose their own destiny. No good deed goes unpunished, and no one thanks a trailblazer until it is too late, unfortunately. And Clara truly was a one of a kind, trailblazing woman. Her success came from her, not an image she put on. And that’s how she wanted it.

I highly recommend further reading on on Clara, as well as viewing her films that are still available!

See you tomorrow!

-E

 

“They yell at me to be dignified. But what are the dignified people like? The people who are held up as examples for me? They are snobs. Frightful snobs … I’m a curiosity in Hollywood. I’m a big freak, because I’m myself!”

-CLARA BOW

Day 16: Peggy Clark

PEGGY CLARK

Unknown, 1915-JUNE 19, 1996

WORK: Lighting Designer

SPOUSE: Lloyd Kelley (died 1972)

Welcome back! It’s only been a few minutes at this point, but I am glad you’re back! One of the first names I added to my list of divas to discuss was Peggy Clark, so I am very excited to share her story with you!

Peggy was born in Baltimore and grew up longing to be an actress. Unfortunately, not much is known about her childhood and early life, except that she went to Smith College and graduated with a BA in dramatic arts. However, after she grew so tall that she only received male roles, she left acting behind and studied scenic design and lighting at Yale, graduating in 1938. It was the latter of the two that she took the greater liking to, and after assisting several set designers and lighting professionals, she was given the chance to design lighting for her first show, “Beggar’s Holiday,” in 1946. Her work on Broadway encompassed more than 78 productions, as a lighting designer and occasionally as a set designer. In 1968 she was elected president of the US Scenic Artistis, Local 829, the first woman to do so. She returned to both alma maters in the late 1960s and 70s, teaching lighting design.

After a career that spanned half a century, Peggy died in 1996 at 80 years old.

HIGHLIGHTS AND LITTLE KNOWN FACTS:

1. She worked closely with notable scenic designer Oliver Smith throughout the 1940s and 1950s on numerous productions, including “On the Town”and “Flower Drum Song.” Her continued success led to a trio of collaborations with producer George Abbott on “Paint Your Wagon,” “Pal Joey,” and “Wonderful Town.”

2. Clark actively supported the American effort during World War II. She served on the production staff of a USO production for military personnel called It’s All Yours, featuring Hume Cronyn. She also created a set representing a steel town used in a 1942 Labor Day pageant staged in a stadium in Ohio to explain the function of steel in a nation at war. The production used episodes from American history and featured Florence Reed and a detachment of soldiers in battle uniform sent from Fort Meade. Her work with this pageant continued for three years.

3. Peggy was also an accomplished and creative set and costume designer, designing to dozens of shows. She would usually be working on more than one show at a time, from tryouts to previews to Broadway runs. She remarked of this, “Designing lighting is like housekeeping. You have to arrange everything so you get dinner on time.”

WHY HER LEGACY MATTERS:

While not much is known about her personal life (believe me, I searched high and low), Peggy’s legacy is enormous. At a time when lighting design wasn’t even considered a profession, she a pioneer in the largely male industry. During the 1930s and early 1940s, lighting for theatre was done mostly by electricians without any sort of connection to the arts, and the entire thing consisted of “if it’s a drama make it mundane, if it’s a comedy make it bright.” Peggy took her training as an actress and used lighting as an expression of the scene. After all, before an actor utters a word the audience takes in the picture before them, and Peggy became a pioneer of letting the lighting inform what the audience felt. Through her work she legitimized lighting design as a profession, taking it from an afterthought to a position given credit in the Playbill and on the marquee. Without her work the evolution of the theatre would be entirely different. She created theatrical magic through lighting, something no one even thought possible before her and her contemporaries. So, next time you’re transported by the lighting (or nowadays, also projection) design of a show, thank Peggy for her creativity, ingenuity, and hard work.

See you tomorrow!

-E

“Good lighting is unobtrusive. .. Lighting is visual music. … It sets the mood, enables you to understand what is going on, yet never call attention to itself.”

-Peggy Clark

 

Day 15: Lorraine Hansberry

LORRAINE HANSBERRY

MAY 19, 1930-JANUARY 12, 1965

SPOUSE: Robert Nemiroff (m. 1953; div. 1962)

You guys, I’m going to be real with you. Writing is fucking hard and vulnerable. The past couple weeks have seen some amazing learning opportunities for me. I’m finding that I constantly hop back and forth between wanting to sound approachable and curse a lot or wanting to sound like a stuffy English professor. For those of you who are sticking it out, THANK YOU! You have no idea how much it means to know that somebody, somewhere is on this journey with me. Even if it is just my mom. Hi Dana.

SO, as you may have noticed, I skipped a day yesterday because of all the vulnerable icky feelings. So I am giving you a double dose of diva today. I know, you’re excited. How could you not be. To start things off, let’s take a gander at a lady who did not have this much trouble writing. In face, she is one of the most important playwrights and activists of the 20^th century, Lorraine Hansberry.

Lorraine was born in Chicago, the youngest of four children to a real estate broker father and a teacher mother. Growing up, Lorraine’s family bought a house in the Washington Park Subdivision on Chicago’s South Side, which infuriated the white members of the neighborhood, because racism folks. Her parents were supporters of the NAACP and Urban League, as well as the Republican Party. Lorraine was told growing up: “Above all, there were two things which were never to be betrayed. The family and the race.”

Politically active from a young age, Lorraine attended University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she quickly left her mark as an activist, integrating a dorm and working on Henry Wallace’s presidential campaign.

In 1950, Lorraine left Madison to pursue writing in New York City. Living in Harlem and studying at the New School, she joined the staff of the newspaper Freedom in 1951.

In 1953 she married her boyfriend, Robert Nemiroff and moved to Greenwich Village. Her husband’s work as a songwriter helped support the two, and she began writing full time. It is widely believed that Lorraine was a lesbian, due largely to her writings in letters and journals, as well as her activism for gay rights. She and her husband separated in 1957, at which time she wrote “A Raisin in the Sun.” Based heavily on the events and lawsuit surrounding her family’s move to the Washington Park suburb, the play was the first by an African American woman to be produced on Broadway, as well as the first with an African American director. It took over a year to raise the money, and Lorraine feared that it would not be a success, as many reviewers questioned prior to it’s 1959 opening whether it contained universal or “specifically African American” experiences. To her surprise, and the reviewers, the play was a hit with audiences, being the first to portray actual African American subject matter in a commercial setting, and it ran over 500 performances.

At 29, she was not only the first African American woman playwright on Broadway, but the youngest American playwright to receive the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play. Her work would go on to be translated into 35 languages in just two years. What followed was a whirlwind of honors, public appearances, and-of course-activism. She fought hard for civil rights and used her newfound fame as a platform to further the cause. In 1963, Lorraine was given the news that she was dying of pancreatic cancer.

She continued to write screenplays, poetry, plays, and books, much of which went unpublished during her lifetime. She and her husband officially divorced in 1964, but they continued to work together. That same year “The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window,” her second work for the Broadway stage, opened. The work, about a bohemian named Sidney struggling with personal problems and feelings on not belonging, received mixed reviews but ran a hundred and one performances. Sadly, the closing night on Broadway would also be the night Lorraine succumbed to the cancer. Though she was only 34, she had changed the theatre forever.

HIGHLIGHTS AND LITTLE KNOWN FACTS:

1. Lorraine’s former husband co-wrote the hit song “Cindy, Oh Cindy,” which is what enabled Lorraine to devote her time to writing.

2. Lorraine was an atheist, as well as a critic of existentialism. She considered the philosophy too distant from the economic realities the world was facing.

3. After her death, her ex-husband Robert became the executor for any unfinished manuscripts. Adding minor changes, he completed her play “Les Blancs,” which would be adapted into “To Be Young, Gifted, and Black,” the longest running Off-Broadway play of the 1968-69 season.

WHY HER LEGACY MATTERS:

Lorraine Hansberry was a notoriously opinionated, aggressive, and forward thinking woman (bc YAS). Whatever she believed in, she believed in it totally and with complete dedication. She didn’t give a fuck what people thought, or what was “too far” when it came to her causes. When she felt injustice, she would sure as fuck whip up a picket sign and protest. Her contributions to the civil rights movement are insurmountable, from the very real affect “A Raisin in the Sun” had on the eventual passing of the Fair Housing Act in 1968 to her activism for gay rights. Lorraine’s work gave African Americans another strong voice, one that people had no choice but to hear. With “A Raisin in the Sun” she created something that forced society to look at it’s own reflection, and be horrified at the injustice. Lorraine’s life was too short, and what she accomplished she never truly got to see. Her work and private writing serves as a testament to her fighting spirit, never to close her eyes to the injustices of the world. She called people on their bullshit, whether it was individuals or the US government, and she did not apologize for it. When we grow up, I hope everyone is like Lorraine.

See you tomorrow!

-E

“The thing that makes you exceptional, if you are at all, is inevitably that which must also make you lonely.”

-LORRAINE HANSBERRY