Spencer Tracy_ A Biography - James C. Curtis [304]
Loyal Davis’ son Richard knew that Tracy and his father were “very, very close” and that Tracy spent time in Chicago hospitalized under his father’s care. “There was a very private floor at Passavant [Memorial Hospital]—the top floor—and I remember he was there maybe six weeks getting dried out. Loyal and Edith kept that very quiet.” This was likely around the time of Tracy’s Midwestern tour, for there are few gaps in the time line that would accommodate such an extended period of treatment.1 Moreover, Richard Davis, on leave from the army, attended the Democratic National Convention in the company of his parents and Mayor and Mrs. Edward J. Kelly in mid-July 1944, and Tracy, he recalled, was there with them. Franklin Roosevelt was nominated for a fourth term, but the party found itself split over a Supreme Court decision invalidating whites-only primaries in Texas and the South.
“The big issue,” said Davis, “was black voting rights, and Spencer Tracy just went bananas about this. He could not understand why there were all these ridiculous rules about blacks voting in the South, and he didn’t waste any time telling Mayor Kelly. I can’t say that my father [who was an arch conservative] disagreed with Spencer Tracy. I don’t think he said anything. He respected Spencer Tracy’s viewpoint.”
Hepburn had been east herself, due back at the studio June 1 to begin work on the film version of Without Love. Tracy likely returned to Los Angeles the following month but was not seen publicly until August 12, when he recorded an episode of Command Performance for Armed Forces Radio. Back at the studio, he spent five days shooting a two-reeler in support of the Seventh Victory Loan for Canada called Tomorrow, John Jones. Played entirely in pantomime, the film was designed to be shown throughout the British Dominion during the October drive, carrying either a French or English narration track as appropriate. He would later receive a special citation for his work in the film from the Canadian Motion Picture War Services Committee, as would L. B. Mayer and all the others involved in its making.
The Seventh Cross was released on September 1, 1944, and became the best-reviewed picture Tracy had made since Woman of the Year—something of a surprise to its recalcitrant star. “This picture is going to be an artistic success,” he had groused to Rosalind Shaffer of the Baltimore Sun while waiting for a scene to be set up one morning on the grounds of the Riviera Country Club. “It will get one good review from one critic and not make any money.”
In fact, it received high praise from all corners, starting in London where it was described in a studio teletype as “a box office smash that was accorded the best press in many war-weary months.” It hit New York in late September, arriving at the Capitol after ten weeks of David O. Selznick’s home front extravaganza Since You Went Away. Zinnemann’s careful compositions (flawlessly executed by the dreaded Freund) and his placing of prominent European figures such as Helene Weigel and Helene Thimig in minor roles—bit parts really—gave the film an unusual texture for an M-G-M production. Taut and suspenseful, it was crowned