Sex in the Gilded age

[Randy Bryan Bigham]

Hi, Kyrila!

What movie are you talking about? Swanson’s come-back film, Sunset Boulevard?

I hope you’re well - and keeping up your "Titanic Lecture Lady" reputation out there in Florida!

We’re counting down the days till Dorothy sees print. L’il Miss Dot is another example of Gilded Age sex not being quite as boring as you might think!

Best wishes,
Randy

 

[Sandy McLendon]

Randy:

I'm thrilled to hear that Lucile did Swanson's clothes for Beyond the Rocks; the Internet Movie Database does not list a costuming credit for the film, and Lucile's own entry (under the name Lady Duff-Gordon) stops at 1921's Heedless Moths. The IMDb is very incomplete for silents.

You need to know that the print of Beyond the Rocks found in the Netherlands was a European print, with Dutch titles and the Nordisk-Paramount logo representing the distributor for Holland. It's a reel shorter than the version that premiered in America; that was very often done for general release. The print is sepia, and about two minutes have restorable edge damage. Aside from that, the film is in remarkable condition. Here's a link to more info:

Silent Era: Beyond the Rocks (1922) Recovered

The 2001 Restoration of Caina (1922).

web.archive.org

I would be very pleased to endorse your book on Lucile; you have only to ask. If it's half as good as your articles here on ET, it's going to be a stunner.

Thank you for the kind words about the Great Day article. As I hope I made clear in it, it's speculation, but the version of the story I set forth is what I believe to be true. I think L.B. Mayer put Crawford up to "throwing" the movie, and I think Joan was very happy to oblige.

 

[Kyrila Scully]

Sandy, thanks so much for posting that link to Silent Era. I adore silent films, but there's none to be found in South Florida. You would think with all the celebrities who live here that someone would provide such an art form for the public, but no! However, I can still cling to hope that I'll get to see some of the films I've read about. I was hoping the release of the new Chaplin documentary would spur even an interest in his films, but it seems to have fizzled with the end of the film festivals.

Yes, Randy, I was referring to Sunset Boulevard. I'll have to check what I wrote before. I hope my father's Alzheimer's isn't catching! LOL Anyway, I've been very busy attending to my family's needs and trying to sell my condo so I can move in with them to take care of my parents full time. I will enjoy hearing from everyone privately, though!

All the best,

 

[Donald J A Smith]

Randy: Speaking of 'It' and the 'It Girl', the legendary, mythical, iconic 'tiger-skin' actually existed! "Would you like to sin with Elinor Glyn on a tiger skin?" (Hope you didn't hear me tell this story before!) I was familiar with it - as a conversation-piece - at John Richardson's brown-stone in New York in the 1970s. When I next talk to Elspeth, I must tell her!

 

[Sandy McLendon]

Donald:

Elinor carted her tiger-skin around for years, along with pillows, pagodas, and other chatchkes. You might call it part of her act- it seems to have been a way of living up to the expectations people had of the scandalous Madame Glyn. She certainly created a stir in Hollywood- the town had never seen anything quite like her before. What was funny about Elinor's props in Hollywood was that she first stayed at the Hollywood Hotel, which at that time was not much more than a run-down rooming house. Elinor was a well-known patron of the Paris Ritz by that time, so the Hollywood must have been a shock. She didn't have much of a choice; the Hollywood was really the only hotel close to the studios, which was important because most streets in town weren't yet paved.

Glyn didn't really complain about the primitive conditions; she was always at her best when circumstances forced her to "rough it" a little.

 

[Shelley Dziedzic]

I wonder if you saw the 2001 "Cat's Meow" Sandy- I thought Joanna Lumley turned in a colorful interpretation of the saucy Elinor- now that was a scandal royal with Hearst, Chaplin, Davies and Ince!

 

[Randy Bryan Bigham]

Kyrila:

I haven’t seen The Osbornes enough to know whether you’re right or not. But I am a fan of Sunset Boulevard!

Don:

I think Elinor claimed to have bought her first tiger-skin (her homes were full of them) with her first royalty check. So the famous scenes in Three Weeks in which the heroine lolls about on a tiger skin with a rose in her mouth, was autobiographical to some extent. Who is Elspeth? Do you mean Elinor’s granddaughter, Elspeth Chowdharay-Best?

Sandy:

Thanks for the link to the silentera.com site about Beyond the Rocks’ discovery. I should clarify that Gloria’s costumes for that movie were not all by Lucile. At least one of the evening gowns was done by a studio designer — Gloria loved it, Elinor didn’t, but it stayed in the film. Elinor may have designed some of the other dresses herself; later her contract with Paramount even gave her costume approval. But at least one of Gloria’s outfits — a linen suit and cape with matching hat and Russian boots, all in biscuit color, was from Lucile’s fall 1921 collection. There is a still of her with Rudolph Valentino wearing this ensemble.

You’re right to point out the mise en scene that Elinor created for herself. The tiger-skins, tasseled silk cushions, bowers of roses, etc, were the trappings of the naughty, serpentine heroines of her books, a backdrop which contrasted markedly with her own somewhat less relaxed personality, her grand airs and exaggerated Mayfair accent. This inconsistency was the core of Elinor Glyn’s self-publicity. She wanted the public to see her as both lady and harlot, saint and sinner. And it worked. "Madame Glyn" became as much an institution in Hollywood as her sister had previously been in the fashion world. As writer Anita Loos said, "If Hollywood hadn’t existed, Elinor Glyn would have invented it."

And that’s too true what you said about the sad, sagging old California Hotel which brave Elinor tried to transform into an outpost of culture! In fact her Sunday afternoon tea parties there became the hottest ticket in the social round of the burgeoning film colony. Fairbanks, Pickford, Chaplin, everybody who was anybody, came to pay homage to the queen of romance in her self-imposed western exile. It must have been a revelation, this oasis of British pomp and ceremony among the orange groves, as Elinor held court with her tea pot and gossip!

I think, by the way, that Joanna Lumley’s portrayal of Elinor Glyn was the best thing about 2001’s "The Cat’s Meow."

Randy

 

[Sandy McLendon]

Randy:

Elinor is said to have asked her husband to buy her the tiger skin, which he declined to do, already a bit weary of her tendencies toward sensuality and drama. Coincidentally, right after Clayton's refusal, she supposedly found that her mail included a substantial royalty cheque, so she cashed it and bought the skin for herself. Not long after that, Clayton arrived home to find Elinor stretched out on the tiger skin, stroking it and purring and obviously in a frisky mood. Being an Englishman of his generation, emotionally unequipped for such fancies, Clayton Glyn got the hell out of there; it was supposedly the incident that ruined the marriage, though the pair never divorced. Lucile had already made that mistake, and suffered a lot of social ostracism as a result (Lucile, rather unfairly, always resented the fact that Elinor had been presented at Court, an honour withheld from Lucile, as a divorced woman). Elinor knew better; she could get away with being the "naughty Mrs. Glyn", but she could not get away with being a naughty divorced novelist. Clayton was an alcoholic, so he retreated to his cups, with Elinor bailing him out financially to the end of his days.

Shelley:

I have not seen The Cat's Meow, owing to my reservations about any screen portrayal of the death of Thomas Ince aboard the Oneida. Whatever the truth of the matter, it is buried deep in the cover-up arranged by Hearst, and so movie scripts about it are necessarily speculative. I understand that you are very involved with the Borden House in Fall River, so I'm sure you're very familiar with just how dangerous a little public knowledge disseminated via movies and TV can be. By the way, I'm a Lizzie buff, though I'm much more interested in the psychodynamics of the Borden family than in the actual forensics of the case. I think the truth of the Borden murders is better understood when one stops poring over floor plans, artifacts, timelines and testimony, and begins focusing on the personalities involved.

However, if anyone acting today could do justice to Elinor, I'm certain that someone is Joanna Lumley!

 

[Randy Bryan Bigham]

Lucile did suffer the snubs of the immediate Royal family, who while happy to wear her dresses were obliged to ignore her socially. This owed "officially" to her being in trade, although it was definitely because of her divorce, which was anathema in those days. Lucile always said that since she was more of a bohemian anyway, she couldn’t have cared less about the exclusion, but I’m sure she was hurt and quietly resentful. It certainly rankled with her family. Her granddaughter, the late Lady Flavia Anderson, was very outspoken about it in her letters to me and I included her comments (some quite funny!) in the book. Things have changed of course — Lucile’s great grandson, the artist Sir Douglas Anderson, is a painter to the Royal Family and one of her great granddaughters married a prominent officer of the Queen’s Guard to Scotland.

But I should say that the ostracism she faced really didn’t extend to the most fashionable members of the Court circle, who were rather unconventional themselves. Lucile was personal friends with the Queens of Spain and Romania (Victoria’s beautiful granddaughters) and she was close as well to Prince Alexander of Battenberg and Princess Alice of Hesse. She also had a great repoire with the young Princesses Margaret and Patricia of Connaught, Edward VII’s nieces. Princess Pat was something of a rebel herself, choosing to marry a "commoner" and relinquishing her Royal titles. Actually her family has remained close with Lucile’s family all these years. In fact Princess Pat’s daughter-in-law, the Baroness Saltoun, delivered a moving tribute to the Earl of Halsbury, Lucile’s grandson, at his memorial service at St. Peter ad Vincula in 2000. She was not only a good friend of Lord Halsbury’s but was attending as a representative of the Queen Mother. I met Lady Saltoun briefly after the service as we joined the queue giving our respects to the family. She wore a full-length sable coat and a feathered hat that must have been antiques. I remember wanting to ask her if they were Luciles taken out of mothballs!!! But of course I didn’t dare!

 

[Sandy McLendon]

Randy:

I've always thought that the reason Lucile was a bit miffed about Elinor's presentation at Court was that she rather expected Elinor, as her sister, not to accept anyone's offer for presentation. Elinor jolly well knew that Lucile could never be presented, so I think that's what rankled most with Lucile- she probably felt a loyal sister would have declined.

I'd no idea you'd corresponded with Lady Flavia- I'm sure you've got a trove of information that will make for wonderful reading. Is Elspeth Chowdharay-Best still alive?

Incidentally, I'm working on an article that will contain a lot about Elinor's Three Weeks. I think the novel is much deeper in its details than is commonly supposed. The story may be fluff of a sort, but the backdrop against which it is set is not.

 

[João Carlos Pereira Martins]

Hi everyone!

I just wanted to know if this era was still the period of negociated marriages, when the gentlemen had lots of lovers and attended equivalents of the today's cabarets and prostitution houses? Did the women react when they discovered the infidelities or did they shut one's eyes to the case like they did in the earlier centuries? I was just reminding that Queen Alexandra gave permission to Alice Keppel see King Edward VII one last time at his death bed.Were these attitudes normal or is this just a single case?

Sorry for the excessive number of questions and for touching such a delicate issue but it's not to offend anyone.

Regards, João

 

[Randy Bryan Bigham]

The period was notorious for its amorality. There are many books that reference it — some that come to mind are The Marlborough House Set by Anita Leslie and The 1900s Lady by Kate Caffrey. To a lesser extent James Laver’s book Edwardian Promenade is helpful. You’re right that the traditional response for the Edwardian lady was to look away from her husband’s exploits, though Queen Alexandra’s gesture does seem an extreme example of extramarital tolerance. But the philandering male often got a dose of his own medicine —— the bored wife played a bit, too! For society women who weren’t involved in charity work or some other pursuit there was little to do but spend their mornings buying clothes and their afternoons having "a bit of fun" with a gentleman caller; I’ve always wondered if that’s how the catchphrase "love in the afternoon" started. Of course, not all the flirtatiousness that went on culminated in sexual affairs; a little sweet talk over the teacups was enough for most women to feel they were being made love to.

 

[João Carlos Pereira Martins]

Thanks for the info! It's very helpful for me.

Regards, João

 

[Marilyn Lena Penner]

I suggest Randy is talking about the 'upper crust'. Not that the lower crust didn't have extra-marital affairs, but the middle class were supposed to be the stodgy sort of people who stayed true to their spouses and refused to let the trains and streetcars violate the Sabbath. (How did they expected the aged and infirm to get to church?) George Bernard Shaw called it 'middle class morality' in his play Pygmalion.
When Mr. Doolittle the dustman was a member of the 'undeserving poor', he did what he pleased, droped his 'h'es and liked it; but when he inherited money, his missus insisted they go to church and get married and act respectable. Now, George B. Shaw was always poking fun at 'middle class morality', so there must've been some of it about.
Marriages of convenience: those we know of were 'upper crust'. American heiresses married English or European titles. They got to be called 'milady'. Their husbands got to spruce up the ancestral acres - or anything else, including mistresses - with the wife's money. Edward VII liked pretty women, and Jennie, Lady Churchill was one such heiress who was reputedly one of his mistresses. "How to Marry an English Lord" is one title about the American Dollar Princesses.
Edith Wharton's novels are a good source too.
Mr. Hustak's book about Canadians on the Titanic mentioned one or two couples on board who booked seperate cabins but shared only one. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories contain a number of extramarital affairs (eg. between a sailor's wife and another sailor, an American gold king and his children's governess [the governess refused to get physical with her boss, but she didn't leave his employ.] a married African explorer and his neighbour in Cornwall.)

 

[João Carlos Pereira Martins]

Thanks, Marylin! How nice of you to share that information with us. Yes, I always got the idea that middle class was the most balanced and correct class of this age society. Second class on her best!

Regards, João