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Heroine to her Hairdresser
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was what she'd heard or read, and she was on her guard. I found out later," Turpy smiled, "that both she and Rosemary shared a sneaking suspicion the first thing we'd want to do would be to bleach or dye their hair. They'd made up their minds," she went on, "that they'd quit the minute we tried it.''
That they didn't try it is one of the reasons Turpy is still working on Pat's hair at Warners. But it doesn't account for the friendship between the star and the hairdresser. To me, always positive my hairdresser is my mortal foe when she talks me out of wearing curls where I want them, such a friendship is an incredible thing. Turpy cleared it up.
"Pat has definite ideas about what she wants done with her hair," she explained, "but she's reasonable. When I try it her way and she realizes I was right, she admits it. On the other hand," Turpy went on, "if, after I get through, she still thinks she's right, she sticks by her guns and I give in."
With this give-and-take as a basis, they got along so well together during working hours that pretty soon they were seeing each other outside the studio, too. Visiting at each others' homes or going off to the mountains for weekends of hiking.
"Pat likes the simple things," Turpy told me, "she doesn't go in for Hollywood parties or that sort of thing. She'd much rather play badminton, for instance, than dress up and step out to a night club." She added thoughtfully : "John is like that, too."
John is John Barry, editor of a Victorville, California, newspaper, with whom Pat's name has been linked romantically for some time now. It was even rumored at the time she obtained her divorce from Oren Haglund that her interest in John might be the reason. It's true that she spends all her spare time in Yucca Loma, a desert resort near Victorville, and it's also true that John makes his home in a bungalow on the grounds of the hotel where she stops. But whether it follows that she will marry John, she won't say. She will admit, however, that she has the time of her life with
him, horseback-riding and dancing at the Green Spot, Victorville rendezvous for all the cowboys for miles around. As Turpy says, Pat loves the simple things and she's never happier than when she dons cowboy clothes and boots and sets off for the desert.
But Pat's interest in cowboys, at least, started before she met John. When she was making "Cowboy from Brooklyn," for instance, the director always knew where to find her when he needed her. She was sure to be somewhere just out of camera range, talking to the cowboys working in the picture or learning rope tricks, of all things ! So their common love of the outdoors is no doubt at the bottom of his new friendship— or is it romance? — of Pat's and John's. Whether it actually is a romance, Turpy said she didn't know. The only person who does for sure is Priscilla herself, and she refuses to discuss it.
"There's nothing I can tell you about it," Turpy said again, by way of emphasis. "Pat doesn't discuss her personal affairs much, even with her friends." Then she was silent a while, picking thoughtfully at her salad. "I suppose you know about Pat's eating habits?" she asked, suddenly reminded. I shook my head.
"She goes on food binges," Turpy said, "choosing one food and sticking to it three times a day until she grows tired of it. Once, when she was on a chili bean binge, she even gave a chili bean dinner for the cast of 'Brother Rat and a Baby.' "
Despite her healthy appetite, there are times when Pat is underweight, especially when she's been working very hard. She'd made three pictures in a row before "Four Wives," and the start of the film found her running far behind her usual poundage. "One day her mother visited the set with some candy," Turpy said. "Rosemary and Lola wanted to be in on the feast, but Mrs. Lane looked them over carefully and said meaningly : 'Pat needs this more than you.' They took the hint," Turpy laughed, "and watched while she swallowed the chocolate.
"But Pat doesn't like a lot of attention on the set," Turpy went on quickly. "As a
Jeffrey Lynn discovers Priscilla Lane in "Million Dollar Baby," their new Warner Bros, starrer.
S6
matter of fact, it's because I know when to leave her alone that we remain good friends. When Pat is doing a dramatic scene for a picture, she'll go off in a corner by herself," Turpy explained, "and read or just sit quietly between shots. We've all learned to understand her need for privacy at such times, so we don't bother her. We save the visiting for the comedy sequences."
Once the dramatic scenes are filmed, Pat relaxes, is gay.'Then is when she indulges her love for gags. She pulled a honey of a one on a new cameraman during a recent picture. "Pat told him, with the usual convincing dead-pan, of course," Turpy said, smiling, "that her face wasn't symmetrical, and that therefore they built up one side of it with wax. 'We have to be very careful,' Pat explained to him, 'that the wax doesn't start to drip under the hot lights, while the camera is on it.' And she finished," Turpy said, laughing, "with an earnest: 'You'll watch it, won't you?' Another time she startled a set visitor by blocking off two front teeth with black chewing gum. When the unsuspecting visitor asked for her autograph, Pat obliged and then smiled her best smile for him — with the two teeth apparently missing. You could hear his gasp all over the set, and then Pat's giggle."
I wanted to know whether Priscilla had ever tried any of her gags on her hairdresser. "She certainly did," Turpy said, "and well as I know her, she had me believing it." It happened during the filming of "Four Daughters," when Turpy and her husband, who isn't in the picture business, were building a new house. She wanted to select bricks for the fireplace and, since nothing much seemed to be happening on the set, went away for two hours. "When I returned," she chuckled, "I found Pat and the head of my department waiting for me, to tell me they had suddenly decided to change Pat's hairdress for the scene, and had needed me. My absence had held everything up, they said. Pat was raging about, shouting that she couldn't have that sort of thing, she needed a hairdresser who was there when she wanted her. I was through, she said. They put on such a good act," Turpy said, laughing, "that I was all ready to pack and leave by the time they let me in on the gag."
That's as near to a quarrel as Pat and Turpy have ever come, in their four years of association at the studio and at their homes.
"I always feel like one of the family when I visit the Lanes," Turpy said. "Their house in the valley is such a cheerful place. Pat and Rosemary bought the house they live in, in San Fernando Valley, and they make their home with their mother. But it's understood that it's Mrs. Lane's house," Turpy said, "to do with as she pleases. The girls both want it that way. One of the first things you notice and admire about Mrs. Lane is the way she handles her daughters. I've never heard her say, as so many mothers do, 'Your sister does thus-and-so, why don't you?' Her attitude has always been that they're individuals and she respects their right to act as individuals."
One of the things Pat likes to do at home is write poetry, and her room is littered with it. "She writes all sorts of things," Turpy said. "The time Thanks for the Memory was popular, Pat spent a lot of time composing new lyrics to fit the song. She must have written dozens."
It was time for Turpy to go back to work, and she started to leave. "Did I tell you what you wanted to know?" she asked curiously.
"You certainly did," I assured her. "And if I hadn't known it already, I'd know now that if you want a clear picture of a star, you've got to get it from someone who's around when the cameras aren't."