Spencer Tracy_ A Biography - James C. Curtis [413]
Nothing seemed to be going right. When the stitches from the surgery came out, the scar was nastier than expected, a sort of upside-down Y on the left side of his face. Despite repeated fittings, his wardrobe for the picture was too tight. The script still needed work—more than they seemed to think—and on the twenty-third he told off Zimbalist. (“Moron!!!” he wrote in his datebook.) The following day he was shown the new test of “the Greek” and thought it horrible. “Zimbalist—Wise BLOW UP,” he recorded that day. “Girl simply awful. Schary & I agree, others no. Schary suggests Dorothy McGuire.” When Tracy finally met Papas, an austere woman with jet-black hair and bushy eyebrows, he could scarcely contain himself. “Boy or girl???” he wrote in his book. “The Greek it is,” he conceded. “[V]ote of Schary, Wise, Zimbalist against me (Dorothy McGuire).”
The casting of Papas brought Tribute to a Bad Man still closer to Broken Lance—Papas essentially repeating the Katy Jurado role—and whatever enthusiasm Tracy retained for the project quickly boiled away. In a conciliatory gesture, the studio took out a full-page ad in the trades, formally congratulating him for having been named Best Actor at the Cannes Film Festival (for Bad Day at Black Rock) and “Outstanding Western Star” (for Broken Lance) at the Silver Spur Awards in Reno. “Wear your ‘Silver Spurs’ in health and happiness in your new picture Tribute to a Bad Man,” the copy chirped, but if Tracy was in any way mollified, it didn’t show. The day after the ad appeared, he had a blowdown with Larry Keethe when his pants still wouldn’t fit—after five tries—and Keethe, after nearly twenty years on the job with Tracy, tendered his resignation.
Shooting began at Montrose, Colorado, on June 1, with Irene Papas and actor Robert Francis (The Caine Mutiny) filming scenes for which Tracy was not required. Tracy departed for location that same day, arriving with Carroll early the next evening. According to Tracy’s datebook, Wise was “shocked” at the scar on his face and ordered camera tests to see if it would show. The following morning they all drove up to the Rodock Ranch. “Wonderful set built upon mesa [at] 8700 ft. elevation—surrounded 14,000 or [so] over Rocky Mts.—snowcovered peaks.” The weather was beautiful and clear, and the company, bedeviled by bad weather, got in a full day’s work for a change.
Tracy had been set to start shooting on the sixth, but with all the weather delays, Wise thought he might not actually be needed for another week. He spoke by phone with Schary and decided to go back to L.A. to have the scar examined by his doctor. With Wise’s blessing, Tracy left Montrose on the morning of the fifth, took the short route through Cedar City, and was in Las Vegas by 7:30 p.m. Wise called him in Los Angeles the next day to tell him that the tests made of the scar had come out okay.
Privately, Tracy asked Bert Allenberg to explore the possibility of starting the picture in Culver City and leaving the location work until last, but the studio just as privately nixed the idea, as none of the interior sets had yet been constructed. He was up at 3:30 on the morning of the tenth to place a call to Australia. “[T]alked Old One,” he noted in his book. “Wonderful connection. Dear Old One.”
Kate thought Tribute “a story with no merit whatsoever.” At her suggestion, Tracy met with Benny Thau and asked that the film be postponed. Thau said it couldn’t be done, then Allenberg pointed out that Tracy was supposed to start The Mountain for Paramount on August 1. “Allenberg gibberish threat of ‘suit by Paramount’ etc. etc.,” Tracy wrote. “What hogwash—lies, deceit, sickened by it all.” Then Howard Strickling called to advise him that there was a “plot” afoot to have Strickling go back with him to Colorado.
There was no word from the studio after that, and on June 13 there were discussions between Floyd Hendrickson and George Cohen as to how best to serve notice on Tracy that he was liable for damages if he failed to report for work. “[M-G-M counsel