TV Radio Mirror (Jul - Dec 1962)

a hunk of the spotlight. I'm ambitious by nature, and because it took me so long to step up, I'm all the more anxious and determined not to fall down now and go boom." That the struggle left its scars is quite evident, but one thing that didn't get damaged is Vince's sense of humor. "When you're climbing," he grins, "you console yourself by saying, 'Wait till I hit the top . . . then I'll relax and rest.' But when you get up there, that's when you discover there's just no time to relax and rest, not if you want to hold on or even do a little more climbing. I'm not sore or bitter about the years it took to get me there. In fact, I'm grateful to be able to look back. I'm even grateful for the struggle. Believe me, there are a lot of fine actors around who may never get a break, and I'm aware of that, too. "But I am wrapped up in my career. It's become a habit with me after all this time. Being a good actor now and a better one tomorrow is the big incentive of my life. I admit it. In a way, I'm glad of it. I wouldn't be true to myself if I started bleating that I'd rather be a hearth-and-homebody, watching TV with the family. Right now, I'd rather make TV than watch it. And I feel that anyone who gives as much of himself to just plain work, the way I have to do, would add up to a lousy husband and father. I feel I'd be cheating the girl who staked her happiness on marrying me. I don't think a woman in love is looking just for a man's physical presence. She wants him to be with her emotionally and mentally — and, right now, I couldn't be. My mind is usually on Dr. Ben Casey and the next day's script.' "I hope, of course, that after a while the tension will ease up, and I can put my mind to becoming a family man." And the tension may very well be easing up right now. No one was happier than Vince about the plans for Sam Jaffe, Bettye Ackerman and Harry Landers (he plays Dr. Ted Hoffman) to begin getting more to do in the show. If the work slows down, would his marriage plans speed up? "They might," Vince admits. And no sooner is this concession out than he's back to worrying about the kind of husband and father he'd make. Vince has been engaged three times before — in 1951, 1952 and 1955. "Looking back," he says, "I realize it's just as well nothing came of those romances. I'd probably be out selling insurance or real estate like other actors I know. And most of them are miserable, they're so unsuited to it." "I want a family ... I come from a long line of family men . . "I don't believe you can make a wife happy with a checkbook." "I don't want to cheat my wife . . I don't want it half-way." Vince feels strongly that actors, like other men, must meet the responsibility of earning a living for their wives and children. In his own case, the problem of money has always been a big one. When he first came to Hollywood, he was under contract for a while and drawing good money. He spent it faster than it came in. He had a sleek car, nice apartment — a closet full of suits. Then, as so often happens in Hollywood, his option wasn't picked up. "I learned a lot about money in the years that followed," Vince recalls. "Once I was down, not to three cents — but to a box of home-made fudge my mother had sent me. Between acting jobs, I lived on my unemployment checks, but there were some periods when even they were mighty small." The problem of money, however, has by now been removed. His salary has recently been upped and will, in time, vault to a handsome $10,000 a week, "plus a piece of the action." But Vince's early experience in Hollywood has paid off when it comes to money. He recently moved into a rented Beverly Hills house which, he says, will be furnished slowly. When Columbia Pictures approached him about doing trailers for "The Interns," Vince said he'd be willing to do it for free, since he felt the picture was a good one. When they insisted they wanted to give him some payment, Vince suggested they contribute a couch to his new diggings — an indication that a much more practical streak is developing in Vince's character. A business manager is investing most of Vince's salary and he is living on an allowance — a necessity since two of his "habits" are the horses and picking up the check for old pals not yet in the chips. The rumor that these tendencies are keeping Vince broke, however, could hardly be true; after all, the hours he puts in give him little time for either. We reminded Vince that he can hardly use "lack of financial security" as an obstacle to marriage now. He laughed self-consciously. "You got me there," he said. "But I don't believe you can make a wife happy by giving her a checkbook — you still have to give your time, your major concentration and your love. . . ." Vince does not try to pretend that Sherry is the first girl in his life. "There isn't a man alive," he says, "who hasn't been turned down. I have — and sometimes when I'm out on a date with Sherry, I remember and I'm glad. I mightn't be out with her if that girl who said 'no' had said 'yes.' "When I (Continued on page 75) 32