Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool Read Online Free PDF Page A

payments,’ she told me. ‘I adore it. It’s cheap, it’s easy to keep clean and I
don’t have to vacuum. Peter,’ she confessed, ‘I’ve never vacuumed.’
    It was small. The bedroom was at one end with the bathroom next door to it. In the middle was the living room that converted into another bedroom, and at the front end, overlooking the ocean,
was the kitchen. Built on the side was a wooden cabin used as a day room and at the back was a little garden where Gloria grew tomatoes and flowers. The swimming pool, also used by other residents
of the trailer park, was outside the kitchen window. I thought it idyllic.
    Her mother and Joy were sitting in the day room which was cool and shaded from the sun. Whereas Gloria genuinely looked a lot younger than her actual age, I suspected that Joy probably looked a
lot older than hers. Although they were both tall, Joy was a bigger woman than Gloria, with a darker complexion, a deeper voice and a well-worn look. She didn’t wear make-up. She was plainly
dressed. It was difficult to believe that they were sisters.
    ‘Well hello, Peter.’ Joy stood up to greet me. ‘I’ve been looking forward to making your acquaintance. Mother and I are just having tea and English muffins. Come and join
us.’
    Mother wasn’t quite sure who I was but smiled and said, ‘Hello, dear.’
    She was well over eighty. Wearing a mauve twin-set and a row of beads, with her hair waved and rouge on her cheeks, she reminded me of a little bird, a little operatic songbird. Her voice was
high-pitched and seemed to demand great effort. Her accent changed in varying degrees from a lowland Scottish to a proper English pronunciation, but sometimes fell into West Coast American
slang.
    ‘Have you ever come across my friend Violet Fairbrother back there in England?’ she said.
    ‘No,’ I replied. ‘I’ve never come across her.’ I had no idea who Violet was.
    ‘Oh not now, Mother dear,’ Joy interrupted. ‘Peter doesn’t want to know about Violet now. Let’s ask him later.’
    Mother wasn’t easily put off. While Gloria prepared a meal of carrot juice, baked potatoes and salad, I sat enthralled while Mother unravelled some of her history and family
background.
    Mother was called Jean MacDougall. She was born in Scotland but moved to England in her teens where she studied acting at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. Along with her best friend, Violet
Fairbrother, she was, she told me, a star pupil and went on to play Puck at a London theatre before being asked to join the Benson Players, a forerunner of the Royal Shakespeare Company, at
Stratford-upon-Avon.
    When she married Gloria’s father, Michael Hallward, she gave up the theatre and they emigrated to Canada, where Joy was born. The family then moved to Pasadena, California, where Jean gave
birth to Gloria. When she was divorced by Michael Hallward, Jean started teaching acting and elocution at her home to keep the family going. Gloria was her ‘star’ pupil and she was
determined that her daughter would become an actress. One of Gloria’s first acting parts was as ‘Glamorous Gloria’ in a high school play. Jean’s encouragement and
determination for her daughter to succeed were rewarded when Gloria, after leaving high school, was asked to play Dodie in
Goodnight Ladies
at the Blackstone Theatre in Chicago.
    Mother chaperoned her daughter everywhere (and went on doing so throughout most of Gloria’s career), so when Gloria was asked to understudy Sabina in
The Skin of Our Teeth
at the
Plymouth Theatre in New York, Mother went with her. She coached Gloria in the part that turned out to be her first important break, that of the young Scots barmaid in a play called
Highland
Fling
, which was directed by George Abbott. From that performance Gloria was asked to play a very good part in the Broadway production of
The World’s Full of Girls.
She was spotted
by Louis B. Mayer, taken back to California and put under contract