TV Radio Mirror (Jan - Jun 1956)

New Baby To Share (Continued from page 44) situation . . . "until," as he says, "it came time to consider the matter of Vicki and the new baby." Admittedly, then, both Hal and Ruby were concerned. Ruby, who is taking a few years' hiatus from the footlights to star in her important real-life role of being a mother, explains: "I had never been separated from Vicki. We knew she was bound to suffer a shock if ever she thought she might have a rival for our affections." To prevent it, they began to take Vicki into their confidence many months before the baby was due, seeking to share the coming child with her. "When she asked questions," Hal says, "we'd tell her straight. We didn't go in for any of this stork stuff." On the whole, their approach was most successful, but it did produce certain small consternations. With a chuckle, Hal recalls: "It was bad enough when Vicki would run up to strangers on the street, bend backwards, and announce proudly, 'See, I've got a big tummy — just like Mummy's!' But, the day she almost broke up a friendship, we wondered if we had gone too far." That happened during a weekend spent with another young couple who had just bought a new home in Connecticut. The place adjoining was one of "estate" proportions, owned by an older woman who most kindly invited them to use her swimming pool. Hal and his friend were loafing against the stone fence, talking with her, when small Vicki dashed up, all eyes. Surveying the woman's ample figure, she piped in penetrating childish treble, "You have a big tummy." Hal says, "Thank heaven, our host was quick-witted. Pretending to misunderstand, he replied, 'Yes, Vicki, she does have a big Tommy. A beautiful big torn cat. Let's go try to find him.' That saved the day. Later, when I found out how self-conscious the woman really was about her size, I shuddered to think what Vicki nearly did to a fine friendship." .N oticing a small undercurrent of fear in Vicki's growing excitement, Hal and Ruby realized they must plan the actual homecoming of the baby as carefully as they would a second-act climax in a play. Vicki went to stay with friends when Ruby left for the hospital and, on July 1, 1955, David Vining Holbrook made a safe debut into the world via Caesarean section. When they arrived home, Ruby put tiny David in his crib in the bedroom before Hal went to fetch Vicki. On meeting her, he had much to say about "Mummy's anxious to see you" — but not a word about the baby. After opening the door for the excited child, he vanished. "We wanted Vicki to have her mother all to herself when she came home," he explains. Mother and daughter were left alone in the living room and, for half an hour, they talked and played just as they always had. At last, when Ruby felt Vicki was happy and calm, she asked, "Do you remember, Vicki, what I promised to bring to you from the hospital?" Vicki's eyes widened in delighted recollection. "Ooooh, my baby!" she exclaimed. "Mummy, did you bring me my baby brother? Where is he?" Ruby replied gently, "He's waiting for you in his crib." Hand in hand, the petite, dark-haired woman and the sunny, sandyhaired child walked in to meet the new member of the family. Drawing on their skill as actors, Hal and Ruby had controlled a crisis and brought it to a happy conclusion. "From then on, David was Vicki's baby," Hal says proudly. "Instead of having a rival, she had some one new to love and share generously with us. She feels secure and her nose was never 'out of joint,' not for a minute." Hal, Ruby and their children live in a modern apartment with large rooms and big windows, high above Manhattan's busy streets. It is conveniently close to a park, a playground and a good nursery school which Vicki attends. But, like many young parents, the Holbrooks are considering a move to the country. "It sounds as though it would be good for the children— until we realize how it would cut down the time we have with them. My schedule would make commuting difficult, and Ruby would have a real problem when she goes back into show business eventually." Ruby, whose present contact with the theater is restricted to a class in modern dance, has no immediate plans beyond the hope that, when she does return, it will be to some production where she and Hal can work together. That's what they've always done, since they met on the bare stage of The St. John's Players, a civic theater group in chilly Newfoundland. xial was then in the United States Army Engineers. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Harold R. Holbrook, Sr., he had been reared in Boston. He prepped at Culver Military Academy in Indiana, from which both his father and his uncle had been graduated. "There's where I got lured into a play," he says. "And, from then on, it was show business for me." Joining a summer stock company in Cleveland proved decisive, for its director was Edward A. Wright, head of the drama department at Denison University, Granville, Ohio. Hal says, "Ed persuaded me to go to Denison, and we've been friends ever since. He was best man at our wedding and he got us started in the theater." Hal had a year at Denison before the Army called him and sent him to St. John's in Newfoundland — the jumping-off place for Europe. Ruby was a native of St. John's, the daughter of Emanuel and Amelia Johnston. "My father," she smiles, "was the only member of his family who broke away from the fishing village where they all lived and went to the big city (pop. 67,000) to become a traveling salesman." In high school, Ruby appeared in Gilbert and Sullivan operettas, learned to be a stenographer, and wondered how she would ever get from remote St. John's to the theatrical production centers. Romance and career merged the night both she and Hal joined the Players. "In a little Chinese play, 'Lady Precious Stream,' we were cast opposite each other. While being make-believe lovers on-stage, we fell in love — for real." At the end of the war, when Hal was shipped back to the United States, Ruby flew, to New York and they were married September 21, 1945, at the Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration. For them, the place held a double significance. Hat's favorite uncle had been married there. It also is beloved and famed among actors as "The Little Church Around the Corner." As soon as Hal completed his Army service, they both enrolled at Denison. They were graduated in 1948, and the two left on tour immediately. The idea for this had its germ in one of Ed Wright's class assignments. 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