Jeannie Out of the Bottle - Barbara Eden [16]
Ayn Rand, author of The Fountainhead, was one of the Studio Club’s earliest residents. Like many of us, she was so poor that she couldn’t afford to pay her rent, so a charitable benefactor donated fifty dollars. But instead of using the donation to pay her rent, Ayn promptly went out and splurged on a set of black lingerie.
Marilyn Monroe was another Studio Club resident who had trouble coming up with the rent. She finally raised it by posing for that notorious nude calendar, in which she reclined on red velvet. It caused a scandal, but made her an overnight star.
Marilyn was probably the biggest star ever to launch her career while living at the Studio Club, but other names aren’t chopped liver, either: Dorothy Malone, who won an Oscar for Written on the Wind and who, during her time at the Studio Club, dated Mel Tormé; Diana Dill, who met and married Kirk Douglas while she was still living at the Studio Club; Donna Reed; Evelyn Keyes; Rita Moreno, of West Side Story fame; Sally Struthers; and tragic Sharon Tate, who was murdered by the Manson family.
Long before any of us had made it in the business, we knew that we had to abide by the club’s stringent rules. For example, if we wanted to have a guest at the club for dinner, we were obliged to alert the staff a few days in advance, and get permission. Men of any age, of course, were not allowed to set foot in any of our rooms, which we had to keep spotlessly clean and tidy at all times.
The Studio Club was arranged around a courtyard, and the center of operations was the reception desk, right by the entrance, where Florence Williams, an attractive and imposing dark-haired woman, managed the club and ran a tight ship. She answered all our calls, took messages, and made sure to lock the Studio Club’s doors at midnight sharp. We all knew that we had to be in at midnight without fail, or we would be locked out, no matter what. However, permission would be granted if we did request a pass to go away from the Studio Club for the night or the weekend, although we had to leave Florence a number and an address where, if necessary, we could be contacted.
The Studio Club’s strict rules didn’t trouble me much, as I wasn’t planning to invite men into my room or be out late at night. In fact, because I wanted to be free to audition during the day but needed a salary in order to survive, I got a job in a local bank, which began at four and went on into the evening.
Otherwise, whenever I came back home to the Studio Club, I spent most of my time hanging around the notice board, answering as many of the advertisements as possible and auditioning for every single job around.
I was determined to make it in Hollywood, and I knew that auditioning for everything going—amateur as well as professional—was the only way in which I could become a successful actress, or at least survive financially.
At least that’s what I believed. However, after about a month at the club, I was to discover that there might be an alternative route to survival in Tinseltown, one of which my aunt Margie definitely would have disapproved. And, to tell the truth, so did I.
IT WAS ONE of those smoggy Los Angeles mornings. I’d just come back from an audition for a car commercial that I knew I wouldn’t get, and I was feeling rather despondent. As I trudged up the sweeping Studio Club staircase, Jolene Brand, a statuesque brunette actress who I knew was moonlighting as a showgirl at Ciro’s nightclub on Sunset Boulevard, was coming down the stairs toward me.
She stopped and asked me to have coffee with her. I was due at the bank in two hours’ time but was free until then, so I said yes.
Still a bit downhearted at not getting the commercial, I sat back and let Jolene do the talking. And, boy, did she talk! What was I doing at the Studio Club? What was my acting experience?