Joan Fontaine, Rebecca 1940.
In 1939, Joan Fontaine, twenty-one years old, was slowly making her way up the Hollywood ladder. MGM signed Fontaine to play a small part in the high profile production The Women, directed by George Cukor, starring Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell and Paulette Goddard. For the young actress it was a plum assignment.
At the same time, Fontaine was subject to numerous screen tests for the role of the second Mrs. De Winter for David O. Selznick’s Rebecca, first under the direction of John Cromwell and then Alfred Hitchcock. Screen tests are grueling and the emotional toll is devastating. During this period of her life Fontaine’s nerves were seriously frayed.
Fontaine and her sister Olivia de Havilland lived in the same house in North Hollywood with their overbearing mother Lilian, a failed actress. As always, Joan and Olivia were engaged in a low-intensity conflict. Like so many Hollywood actresses, Fontaine’s father was long gone.
Fontaine freely admits that she had a thing for older men. Ambitious but deeply vulnerable the young woman was looking for security and a “protector.”
She already had a brief affair with her childhood idol, the handsome leading man Conrad Nagel. Her description of their first intimacy is less than passionate:
The whole experience had been no more than a quick surgical violation conducted with considerable modesty and no conversation. It reminded me of the time when I had to stand up in class as a child and be vaccinated. This just wasn’t as neat… and hurt more. Yet I was smugly pleased that I could now consider myself an adult.
Fontaine’s clinical detachment is best understood in context. She just wrapped production on Gunga Din. Her role was small, but her dewy innocence left a vivid impression on Hollywood producers and directors. Fontaine confesses that during production she spent much of her time girlishly day-dreaming about her director George Stevens, another older man.
Enter Brian Aherne, a respected British stage actor making a name for himself in Hollywood. He was charming, handsome and of course older.
Quick as a jump cut, Fontaine and Aherne were engaged. But the night before the wedding, Aherne’s friend, director Jean Negulesco, called Joan and told her that Brian had cold feet and wanted to call off the wedding. Unwilling to be publicly humiliated Fontaine told Negulesco that she would be at the church at the appointed time. Brian could take it from there. If he wanted to divorce her the next day, he could.
Joan Fontaine and Brian Aherne.
Aherene did show up and the unhappy couple pronounced their wedding vows.
In addition to the emotional dysfunction Fontaine just had a wisdom tooth extracted. Her jaw was swollen and aching. Aherne’s sinuses were acting up.
Right after the wedding reception, the newlyweds drove in Aherne’s light blue Packard convertible to San Francisco’s swanky Fairmont Hotel without ever discussing Negulesco’s midnight phone call.
In her fine memoir, No Bed of Roses, Fontaine describes the honeymoon:
After ordering champagne and dinner, we both changed our clothes, I into a white lace-trimmed negligee, Brian into a navy-blue-and-red patterned dressing gown. He hoped I’d excuse the worn elbows; he’d ordered a new robe from his tailor in London, but it would take months to deliver. After a knock at the door, our dinner was served in our suite by a bevy of unctuous waiters. The door finally closed on the embarrassed newlyweds, the thirty-seven-year-old groom, the twenty-one-year-old bride.
During dinner, perhaps to conceal his apprehension, Brian recounted his previous romance with Marlene Dietrich, his affection for her daughter Maria. He got up from the table to illustrate ballet steps he taught the child, having learned then while going to the Italia Conti Drama School in London. He asked me if I would object if he took Maria out one night a week. Pulling myself together, I replied, “No, not if I can go out with Conrad Nagel on those nights.” He never mentioned it again, though Marlene called him several times during our marriage to ask his advice about her daughter.
With Brian pirouetting about the room, his dressing gown flapping, its tassels waving in the air, I grew increasingly numb. The foghorns in the bay hooted their melancholy warning, the plaintive sounds I remembered from my childhood.
Finally, closing the bedroom door behind us, Brian said he wished he’d remembered to pack a hot-water bottle for his sinuses. I could have used an ice bag on my aching cheek. The lights were turned out. Somewhere, from the cornice of the hotel room, I felt, Mother was watching.
During the night, I rose quietly, slipped on my negligee, and went into the adjoining room. I huddled on a marble window ledge and watched the fog whirl past our Nob Hill aerie. Brian found me asleep there in the early morning. Mrs. Aherne had a wedding night not to remember.
The honeymoon was definitely over.
For her performance in Rebecca, Fontaine was nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award. Ginger Rogers won that year for Kitty Foyle, but the next year Fontaine took the Oscar for her work in Suspicion. Aherne’s career went cold as their marriage. They finally divorced in 1945.
Sisters Joan Fontaine and Olivia de Havilland.
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10 Comments
Just got home from work Robert – in reading about so many of these stars from Classic Hollywood I am starting to think I don’t have it so bad after all
Is there anyone in Hollywood Dietrich didn’t sleep with? Maybe that could be a small book
This is the second dreadful honeymoon story I have read here recently…..
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Bill:
Dietrich tried to seduce Fred MacMurray when they appeared together in the delightful comedy The Lady is Willing (1942.) But MacMurray was happily married and spurned Marlene’s advances.
She couldn’t believe any man could resist her and pretty much hated MacMurray.
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When you consider the maelstrom of dysfunction in Hollywood it is always a pleasant surprise that people like Shirley Temple or Deanna Durbin can make it out with their sanity and values intact.
And considering what people like Fontaine were experiencing in their private life, it is to our benefit that they managed to produce a product that have brought joy and entertainment to so many people. A lot of people have crashed and burned but thank goodness enough have been able to hold it together for a long career.
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Johnny:
Irene Dunne and Loretta Young also lead relatively sane and stable lives. I don’t think it’s a stretch to assert that being pious Catholics helped ground both ladies.
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Being a pious Catholic didn’t seem to do Teddy, Jack or Bobby Kennedy any good for their marriages.
Well, I’m sure they were pious in their minds. Though Mary Jo Kopechne and Marilyn Monroe would probably have different opinions facts.
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Johnny:
There are good uses of religion and bad uses. I know some orthodox Jews who are dishonest in business yet pious in synagogue.
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Robert–I knew someone who worked with both Fontaine and Aherne. He thought them dreadfully dull. Aherne’s books, A Dreadful Man and A Proper Job are both good reading. Dreadfull Man, about George Sanders is quite compelling.
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Barry:
Most stars are pretty dull and only come alive when they are the central focus of conversation and attention.
I read A Dreadful Man and yes, it’s quite compelling. I also like Sanders’ Memoirs of a Professional Cad.
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What a sad, sad story, Robert. It makes me wonder how any of the Golden Age stars managed to have a happy marriage. Perhaps the constant “meat market” atmosphere of Hollywood – especially for the women – deadened them to any real sense of love or romance? But you would know better than I would.
Speaking of Fontaine, I caught The Emperor Waltz on TCM a couple of months ago, and fell in love with her. In fact, I ended up crying after the movie was over, thinking that such a picture – innocent and carefree – could hardly be made in this cynical, ironic age.
Thanks for the story.
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Christopher:
Many stars of Hollywood’s golden age were thrust into the limelight at a very young age. They never had the opportunity to mature into emotionally stable adults. In addition, their values were often confused and their vision of life formed, for the most part, by the parts they played. This is a recipe for unhappiness.
Fontaine was a luminous presence. She lives in Carmel, CA and is seen, every once in a while, walking her five dogs. Sister Olivia lives in Paris. The sisters do not speak to each other.
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