Silver Screen (Jun-Oct 1940)

PRIVATE LIVES HAVE you ever wondered what a movie star's relatives are really like? Stars have been publicized to the skies, but there has always been somewhat of a mystery about the family behind the front. I asked Don Ameche to talk frankly. He doesn't talk about his leading ladies. Even though he is America's number one dramatic star on the radio, he isn't given to explaining how to lead a double-barreled career. Actually, he was reluctant when I told him what I had in mind. An honest, unpretentious story of the way he and Mrs. Ameche had reacted to their parents and to their brothers and sisters, I told him, would give a lot of people an entirely new opinion of Hollywood. Many a sob tale has been tossed off about a movie star's mother. Few, indeed, are the celebrities on the coast who have had fathers since fame. On the whole the theory prevails that the less said the better about an actor's or actress's relations. Six feet tall, unspectacular but funloving, Don finally said, "If you promise not to make it sound like Hollywood hooey, I'd be glad to admit how Honey and I figure things out. We aren't dipped in glamour, Honey and I. We haven't time for it. So, if you want to know us, you're in for a rather different kind of expose!" On the surface the Ameches have a luxurious set-up. Don recently bought the Al Jolson country place, a beautiful, fourteen-room farm house centering five acres of garden and orchard. There is even a fine swimming pool in this rural hideaway which, incidentally, is twenty minutes drive from the hectic studios. Yet, from the moment Don met me at the door and we went into the comfortable sunroom stretching across the back of the house, Don was at ease. Mrs. Ameche came in and out a couple of times. Their conversation clinched what he said to me. It wasn't sophisticated, Noel Coward dialogue, but the unaffected, conferring of two genuine human beings. "If you get me going about our families," Don explained, "it's going to be just another version of 'Our Town.' Of course, I don't think we're freaks in any way. None of us has ever gone to New York and bowled over the big city. Before I got married, I guess I was the bad boy of my family. We have had our flush and our fast, finagling days, and we've survived. Each of us has his own little dream, and we always lend a helping hand when we can; But we don't interfere with one another too much." What Don, the eldest of the Ameches, has done for his own and his wife's folks and how they trust him fascinated me. "Honey and I needed this bigger place. As it is, there's hardly room to bring in anyone else when our families get together. You see, I have three brothers and four sisters and she has two brothers and two sisters. None of them live here with us, but we are always visiting back and forth. "My father came over from Italy when he was twenty-two. My mother, who is Pennsylvania Dutch and Scotch-Irish, married him when she was just fifteen. There are eight of us kids and half are very fair and blue-eyed like mother. "My parents were able to give their three oldest about everything a pre-depression, middle-class American family averaged. Dad went broke and I couldn't help out until I got into pictures. Our family is great on marriage; we marry young and start raising children! None of us has ever thought of divorce. We have our little scraps, but once we walk up to the altar it is for keeps. 'You don't need a lot of money, either. When Honey and I married I only had $200.00 saved and we splurged most of it on a fur coat for her. We had our share of struggling. Honey gave up her good job as a dietitian to take a chance on me. I use to telephone her at the most ungodly hours! I was working like the devil on four radio shows a week when we took the plunge in Chicago. I could only get off two days for a honeymoon. We had to scrimp when Donnie was born. You bet I changed many a diaper when Honey wasn't up to it. Sure, I believe a young husband should pitch in and do everything he can around the house if his wife is temporarily ill. Honey and I have no new fangled rules for holding each other. "We had two sons when I decided to tackle Hollywood. Honey insisted upon moving out to a cheap summer cottage to save enough for me to come out here and try my luck. My first test, at Metro, was a failure. She didn't reproach me. Eight months later two 20th Century-Fox producers accidentally saw it and phoned me to come on out. Within a month Honey, who'd been sick, came out with the babies. If you don't think she's a brick, you're crazy! She was en route to the dentist to see about four impacted wisdom teeth when I sent her the tickets to leave that night. She had to shop, pack, make feedings for the three-months-old baby who had intestinal flu, and what a trip west she had ! Donnie kept crying, 'Put on my new coat so Daddy'll think I am wonderful!' the baby kept yelling and falling out of the basket. I'd rented a house, but there were no stores and no laundry near and I had to work until 11:30 the night she arrived. It rained steadily for the next three days. Honey struggled with my Ford jallopy, which started like a Mack truck. Ann, our hired girl, who'd been down with scarlet fever, got out here in a month. By that time, Honey was exhausted so I sent them all to Arizona to cheer up under the desert sun. It snowed there for the first time in fifteen years. "Honey says Hollywood is just like Dubuque. The women know where the other girls get their clothes and have a fairly accurate idea what they paid." Mrs. Ameche passed through the room to inform him that Grandpa (Don's father) would be out of the hospital in another day or two. Don brought his parents West and began buying a ranch home for them two months after he signed his contract with Zanuck. He grinned at Mrs. Ameche, who has lovely blue eyes, unbleached long blonde hair. She doesn't try to make up with mascara and eye shadow. She relies on unreserved sincerity and an active sense of humor. Plus quick adaptation to whatever mood Don is in. "She's It around here from all angles," Don declared, smiling. "She had to inveigle my father when he tried to get out of going to the hospital. Honey had [Continued on page 95] 42