Modern Screen (Jan-Dec 1960)

She'd never said that to any grown-up before. Her aunt slapped her and Judi knocked her clear into the dining room. Then she ran upstairs and sat on the window ledge to cool off; thinking, says Judi, "that Daddy would probably kill me." Next thing she knew Judi almost did that job herself. She slipped off the ledge and landed on her tail, busting two vertebrae. Her dad took her home to a Portland hospital. Trouble on her back Sometimes when trouble hops on your back it just stays there, riding like a monkey. From then on trouble rode Judi Boutin's teens, almost until she got to Hollywood. First off, they put her back a grade at Holy Name Academy in Seattle, where her folks shipped her. Then, Easter vacation she caught a critical dose of poison oak that invaded her lungs and bloodstream. She puffed up like a balloon, couldn't eat and darned near died in another hospital. To this day Judi breaks out in spots every spring, even though she stays miles away from the shrub. Then, it cooked her junior year but she got into Holy Child School in Portland as a senior by boning up that summer. One week end in November Judi went skiing on Mount Hood, zipped into a turn and found herself tangled up in a mess of ice and snow. "Come on, Judi — get up," the kids said. "I can't," she told them. She'd shattered her left leg. That put her on crutches for six months and finally the doc cut out her knee cap. "You won't be skating again," he sentenced. "Try and stop me," gritted Judi. She meant it, too. Judi fully intended to rejoin the Ice Follies the minute she got out of school. "The whole thing had been such a big gas," she sighs, "and I knew that whatever happened, show business was for me." But the doc was right — her knee wobbled— so Judi had to bounce off in another direction. That last year she did some musicals at the Portland Civic Theatre. Her folks didn't object; they called it a "phase." But Judi's dad had other plans for her — he wanted her to go to Oregon U. and study chemical engineering. He said she could join some other girls on a trip to Europe first, as a graduation present. "I want another one," said Judi. "A summer course at the Pasadena Playhouse." "Good Lord," her father flipped, "I thought we'd gotten over that! But," he finally softened, "we'll make a deal. You can go, but if you don't have yourself an acting job by the end of summer, you'll hit the math books at Oregon State — okay?" By summer's end, Judi was prepared to pay off the bet. The six weeks' session at Pasadena hadn't set any rockets blasting. So many other stage-struck kids swarmed around Pasadena that she barely edged into a dinky part in the last act of Picnic for one performance. She didn't meet any Hollywood directors, agents, or producers. In fact, Judi herself invaded Hollywood only once expressly to get a look at Schwab's Drug Store, which she'd read about and hankered to see. The only stars she saw were George Burns and Gracie Allen, who came over to see their son Ronnie in the same play with Judi. They just mumbled "very good" politely when Ronnie introduced them, without much enthusiasm. No joke "See?" her dad triumphed, back in Portland. "You're not such a great actress as you think you are, are you? Now, get with that geometry and trig." Grimly, Judi got with it — for two weeks. I) Then one day the telephone rang. "Miss Boutin," said a gravelly voice, "this is George Burns." "Go away," said Judi, "I'm studying." She thought it was a joker she knew who always tried to be funny. It wasn't. "We thought you might like to do our TV show with our son Ronnie," explained George. "Can I speak with your father?" So, Judi was saved by the bell, a telephone bell. With a bonafide acting offer and George's promise to take care of his little girl, Herbert Boutin knew he was licked. Judi knew, of course, that it wasn't really George Burns who wanted her for the show; it was Ronnie. They'd got along great as classmates in Pasadena. As a pro in Hollywood, Judi soon discovered, with a jolt, things could be different. Judi stayed with family friends first and the day she arrived, Ronnie Burns came over. He mixed himself a drink, put on a record and promptly, according to Judi, "made the big pass." "I let him drop with a thud," she says, "and out he stormed. Next day we rehearsed at the Burns house and Ronnie wouldn't speak to me. I seem to lose friends," muses Judi, "before I gain 'em." She wasn't a bit surprised when, five weeks later, she was dropped from the show, on a flimsy excuse. But they soon asked her back. Judi's a habit that, once acquired, is hard to break. Judi Meredith (she switched her name because people Is the startling change in NATALIE WOOD and BOB WAGNER good or bad . . .? Read Louella Parsons' exclusive report in Next Month's MODERN SCREEN On Sale May 5 insisted on calling her real one 'Button') worked with the Burns family four years, three with Burns and Allen and one with George. Most of that time she played Ronnie's girl friend, Bonnie Sue. But all that time Ronnie wouldn't speak to her and still doesn't. "He hated me so he even wore dark glasses the minute our scenes were over so he wouldn't have to look me in the eye," reveals Judi rather sadly. "Young men take things so hard, don't they?" Luckily, Judi doesn't. She's so loaded for life that she welcomes anything that comes along, good, bad or indifferent. Her funnybone's so responsive and her moxie so strong that she can weather any wallop with a laugh. "I've got more guts than talent, you know," she says cheerfully. Judi might get an argument on that last part, but not on the first. Because in her five years around Hollywood she's bumped into some rumbles that would send the average girl crying home to mama. Like any pea-green, super-attractive eighteen-year-old doll who solos in Hollywood, Judi Meredith learned the bachelor girl ropes the hard way. She ran into all Hollywood types — free livers and free loaders, nice people and heels, lambs and wolves. Being a heads-on type herself, honest, trusting, open hearted and, at first, as gullible as a gooney bird, Judi paid to learn. That jail record One boy who took her out, for instance, conned Judi into giving him $1500 tc finance a fancy sports car. At the time Judi had exactly $1531 in the bank, but she trustingly scribbled the check. For weeks after she was so broke (she never hollered home for help) that she couldn't even buy soap. She's yet to get paid back on that deal, but she's not sore. Another heel, a producer whom she interviewed for a job, tried forcibly to attack her — and that still makes her see red. "Him I'll get someday,'' she growls. "I'll destroy him!" The first girl Judi took an apartment with— after a chaperoned Studio Club stretch, which Judi hated — promoted her for rent, groceries, laundry, cleaning and Judi's automobile. When this mooch finally departed she walked off with half Judi's wardrobe. In between, she also managed to lan^ Judi in jail. The roommate's boyfriend (later unmasked as a professional con artist who'd had nine wives) dumped a hot Thunderbird. paH for with a rubber check, at their door. "Have Judi switch license plates with her car," he instructed his sweetie. Judi obliged — she thought it was just a friendly gesture — having no idea switching plates can be a Federal rap involving two years in the pen. When she drove up to her pad next day, five men were there. They chorused, "Hi, Judi." "Hi," she said, friendly like. "Where's the Thunderbird?*' one wanted to know. "What's it to you?" The five all flashed badges like Dragnet. "Come with us." They took Judi and the other babe to the tank, tossed them in with junkies, prostitutes and pickpockets. Judi was cleared pronto, of course, when it came out she was innocent of all the skullduggery. She asked her roommate. "Why didn't you tell them I didn't know anything about all this business?" "I didn't want to go to jail alone," wailed the chick. But even in this most frightening episode in her life, Judi Meredith kept her sense of humor. At the jail tank all the fallen women crowded around her. "What you in for, Eaby?" they asked. Judi summoned up her most hard-cooked leer. "Grand theft — auto," she barked. "Me," she laughs today, "I was just one of the girls!" That's the point about Judi — you just can't beat her down with a baseball bat. Leading with her heart Careerwise, Judi Meredith has had things fairly steady, with all those Burns shows. She's done some seventy-five other TV jobs on about any show you can name, too. and had a crack at a studio contract with Universal-International. It lasted for three pictures, then the lot started to shutter down, and she had nothing to do. Judi faced her bad luck squarely: She walked into the office of Jim Pratt, the executive who had hired her. "Look," she suggested. "You offer me a picture part and I'll turn it down. That will make things easy, won't it?" She left with no hard feelings, regrets or glooms. But it's in the romance department that Judi Meredith reveals a most awesome resilience— or maybe you'd call it a protective philosophy aimed at keeping her fractured feelings glued together. Since she arrived love's been a chronic condition. Always, Judi has led with her heart. Luckily, it's a gay heart, and sturdy. As far back as Pasadena Playhouse days, Judi was engaged. A student named Rod Franck sealed it with a ring and every