Spencer Tracy_ A Biography - James C. Curtis [295]
Production was closed down once again in mid-August so that background plates could be made by a second unit in Florida. The Hollywood Victory Committee took the hiatus as an opportunity to propose a tour of the Pacific for Tracy that would take him to Hawaii, Canton, Fiji, New Caledonia, Brisbane, and Samoa beginning September 20 and continuing through the end of October. Tentatively agreeing to the plan, he was plainly dubious of making high-profile appearances where performances might be expected of him. “What can I do?” he said to Adela Rogers St. Johns. “I’m no good. I’m just an actor. I have to have a part and a play and everything, and how can you do that? I can’t talk well myself. I’m not the guy they see up there on the screen at all. I’m just a very ordinary man and probably not nearly as sure of things as they are. I can’t sing or dance or tell stories. Send someone who can make ’em laugh, somebody who has something to offer.”
He was back on the set of Joe following Labor Day, his plans for the Pacific tour now conflicting with Fleming’s schedule and the studio’s need to keep him available for retakes once his vacation kicked in. Leo Morrison was in the process of negotiating a new contract when someone noticed it contained no provision for retakes during his vacation periods, which started at six weeks and could extend to twelve weeks if he did two consecutive pictures or twenty-four weeks if he elected to do a play. A Guy Named Joe wrapped on September 20, 1943, with considerable miniature work yet to be shot, meaning it would likely be a month before the film could be previewed and any fixes identified. In lieu of the Pacific tour, Tracy agreed to go north into Alaska to visit some newly established bases, taking with him a small troupe of performers that included Marilyn Maxwell, Nancy Barnes, and comedian Johnny Bond.
Kate was in the first days of filming Dragon Seed when he left, a growing anxiety over the mere act of flying taking hold of him as he arrived in Seattle. It had been many years since he had seen Lois and Kenny Edgers, now a dentist with a thriving practice, and with the weather fogging in plane traffic, he seized the opportunity to meet them for dinner. Walking into Spence’s suite at the Olympic Hotel, Kenny could see that he was on the phone with Louise. “Here’s Kenny now,” Spence said to her, “and you should see him. He has hardly any gray hair!” Tracy, of course, had begun to gray early. He had just been informed that the Alaskan base had no accommodations for the women in his troupe and that the weather was unsatisfactory. As they waited it out, the pressure mounted for a decision on his part.
Taking advantage of their proximity to Victoria, Tracy phoned Lincoln Cromwell, now also in private practice and with a young family. “Spence told me to get right on over there,” Cromwell recalled. “There was no saying no to the man, so I just closed my office and took the afternoon ferry across the Sound. Evidently, he needed me for moral support.” Tracy told Cromwell that his troupe was in a “state of rebellion” and many wanted to turn back. According to him, the actors and showgirls were afraid of flying and of entering a war zone, which Alaska technically was, and that he was having little success in reassuring them. “I was all for Spence, but after a day the truth of the situation became clear to me. He, himself, was the source of the fear and dissension circulating through the group.”
Tracy was plainly terrified of flying any farther, and the final omen had come the day before, when a waitress in the hotel coffee shop told him that she had also served Wiley Post just before he left on his fateful flight to Alaska with Will Rogers. “On a conscious level, Spencer appeared unaware that he was the author of the rapidly spreading ‘rebellion’ in his troupe. However, he finally acceded to the consensus and, after three days, they all returned by plane to Los Angeles.”
Kenny Edgers had a call