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Bombshell: The Life and Death of Jean Harlow
Her name epitomizes an era, a decade of Depression in which harsh reality created a demand for lush film fantasy - and no Hollywood star was as luscious or fantastic as Jean Harlow. She was MGM's most bankable asset, a blonde bombshell whose bleached hair, voluptuous body, and bawdy humor inspired a fervent cult following that remains to this day.
368 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1993
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August 2, 2016
There are three great mysteries to the Jean Harlow story. One: What really happened that night in 1932 when Harlow's second husband, Paul Bern, died by gunshot wound (when everyone in Hollywood seemed to know about it before the police)? Two: What was the true nature of her death? And three: Who was Jean Harlow?
For this biography, published in 1993 and scrupulously researched like no Harlow bio before or since, David Stenn interviewed more than 200 people (most of them dead now) and consulted a vast assortment of sources, documents and archives (including never before seen family documents and letters) to find out the answers to those questions. And by God, he answers them, persuasively and reasonably.
He also turned what I thought would be a fun, fast, delicious candy-trifle of a read into a story of an incredible injustice perpetrated on the life of a human being, and after reading it I was in a profound rage over what was done to Jean Harlow. The great star died 80 years ago next year (a gruesome and arguably preventable death), and even with the sense of so much time passed I felt a deep, fresh grief over her while reading this. My respect for her soared a thousand percent but so did my pity.
Harlow made a movie in 1933 that is one of my all time-favorites, Bombshell, and my initial intention was to use this book as a launch-off point to review and pay homage to that astute and hilarious meta movie -- one that mirrored Harlow's own life. But this book changed those plans. I learned too much, and once I learned it I found that it could not be unlearned or unremarked.
When Harlow died in 1937, at the inconceivable age of 26, she had toppled Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, and Norma Shearer as the queen of MGM, and, by default, that made her the top adult female star in the world (I say adult because little Shirley Temple was at the top of the box office at the time). This despite the fact that barely a half dozen years before, in 1930-1931, critics and even Harlow herself lambasted her as the worst actress in the business. Those opinions began to change in 1932, with a run of sensational films that tapped not only into Harlow's sexuality but revealed a sense of her proletarian nonchalance. Audiences found her to be a natural, an odd mixture of untouchable goddess and approachable girl next door.
That latter quality always remained in Harlow because she never wanted to be an actress or a star. Unlike most girls with looks in her day, she did not fantasize about movie glamor or a movie career. She was a bookish girl, who voraciously read novels and wanted to write stories. She was so apathetic about movies and acting that when she arrived at an age when young girls flocked to Hollywood to act, desperately trying to stand out from the crowd and be selected, Harlow simply stood around -- and the movies flocked to her. Dropping one of her friends off to a studio for a casting call, executives didn't see the friend, but saw Harlow. Within hours, her phone was ringing off the hook. She paid no attention, until her stage mother, her namesake "Mother" Jean, found out and forced her to try out.
This biography, in a large sense, is not just about one damaged woman, but two such women -- Harlow and her controlling mother. There's a doppelganger aspect in the story of a woman named Jean Harlow renaming her daughter, Jean Harlow, in an attempt to, in a sense, channel her own aspirations into her younger "version." Reading the story of Jean's mother makes us feel almost as sad for her as we feel for Jean. The elder Jean had career plans that were dashed. Her marriage to a dull dentist was a socially enforced match. As the mother's own beauty -- said to have been even greater than her daughter's -- faded, she transferred her hopes and expectations to her popular daughter. And thus grew the emotional control and economic exploitation. The elder Harlow was as despised in Hollywood as the younger was beloved. We can't quite consider the mother a villain, though, despite how badly she exploited and emotionally chained and retarded her own daughter. Because the elder Jean Harlow, in a sense, was also a prisoner of stifling social conventions and expectations. The Harlows came from a privileged class, and that class sense always remained: the imperative to be superior. One of the myths of the Harlow story is that hers was a rags to riches tale, but not so. Harlow came from well-to-do Midwestern stock. Her Brooklynish accent and her sassy street-smart confidence on screen seemed to suggest proletarian roots, and that added to her appeal, but also fed into the false myths.
The greatest myth, and the one most inconvenient for Harlow and exacerbated by her screen roles, was that she was just a dumb blonde with loose morals who would lay anything that moved. Too many men took this at face value, and Harlow's rebellion often took the form of marrying men who were either unappealing or asexual. Her marriage to producer Paul Bern was typical. Harlow just wanted a family and a home, but she also wanted a man who did not claw at her like a dog in heat. The ironic outcome was, in the case of the marriage to Bern, a sexless marriage: the most desirable woman in the world married to a man referred to behind the scenes in Hollywood as MGM's "palace eunuch," rumored to be gay but never quite proven to be. Like most of Harlow's men, he could be incredibly kind to her, yet, somehow, unfairly cruel. Everyone, from Harlow's mother to even the most seemingly caring of men in her life, found the need to put Harlow in her place, to denigrate her as dumb and vulgar and low class, in order to maintain a sort of sick control.
Harlow was trapped in a matrix of expectations that was controlled by others, and their fruits realized similarly, but not by herself. (She made millions squandered by others, and left debts upon her death. Her mother and layabout con-artist husband built themselves a white mansion bigger than Harlow's and lined their toilet seats with ermine). She had two abortions, not because she wanted them, but because her mother and the ever-present threat of scandal necessitated it. Her whole life was dictated by circumstances not of her own making, those circumstance almost always dictated by enslavement. Breaking out was impossible. She was thoroughly brainwashed with a kind of Stockholm Syndrome.
To the end, her mother called her "Baby," and that nickname was picked up by others. When asking about Harlow, her co-workers would say, "Where's Baby?" or "How's the Baby doing?" It was not just a harmless endearment. It was a method of infantilizing and control.
And so was her hair. Her fame was tied so largely to her shock of white hair, that it, like so many other things, became a vector of control. After having it severely damaged from chemical bleaching and dyes to the point that it nearly fell out for good, her panicked studio near the end of her career gave her a makeover that allowed it to take on a more natural brownish cast. As Harlow said: "I've always hated my hair, not only because it limited me as an actress but because it limited me as a person. It made me look hard and spectacular; I had to live up to that platinum personality."
At 21, as Harlow was making her first big waves as a fledgling star, Stenn summarizes her life to that point: "She was a bride at 16, a bit player at 17, a star at 18, a divorcee at 19, a mobster's mistress at 20, a bride once again at 21, and a widow two months later."
On top of everything else, there was a ticking time bomb inside of Harlow, one that author Stenn uncovers in a masterstroke of research, tracing the previously nebulous cause of her death to something that happened to her at age 15. It makes the tragedy of her short life all the more poignant.
Harlow was ever misinterpreted. The girl who thought nothing of casual nudity (to the dismay of many around her) was not trying to provoke or shock. She was, as one of her screenwriters, Anita Loos, astutely observed, exhibiting the traits of a detached personality. Harlow just didn't care. She was not hard or arrogant, as some seemed to interpret, but shy and considerate and even sociable when crushing social expectations weren't present. When Harlow's snooty co-stars rushed to their private dressing rooms during breaks, Harlow stayed on the set, half nude, sharing laughs and dirty jokes with the crew, buying everyone coffee and donuts when the chintzy executives tried to cut their salaries and small perks. That is why Harlow was beloved by her co-workers of every class, and by the public. She even won over people who tried to hate her, and then found they simply couldn't. She was a nice person.
She was also a consummate professional, with a photographic memory. With a script, she could do wonders. When asked to ad lib, she was terrible. Anita Loos ingeniously figured out Harlow, studying her unique mannerisms and ticks and incorporating them into Harlow's scripts, so that the result allowed Harlow's real personality to emerge within a scripted context.
In a pattern all too typical of her life, her first big break came with her contract to the maverick tycoon, Howard Hughes, who cast her in a high-profile role in his 1930 World War I aerial epic, Hell's Angels. She was not very good in it, and her performance was excoriated. And, like so many things, it was yet another trap. Nobody, it seemed, could get Harlow out of this restrictive contract that was stifling her career. Hughes refused to let her out of it, and instead used her as a chattel slave, farming her out to other studios and sending her on the road to perform a terrible, nerve-wracking theatrical roadshow in which Harlow had nothing to do but stand before the slobbering masses like a sex doll. For that, Hughes got 80 percent or more of everything she earned. The rest, of course, went to Harlow's mother and her gigolo leech husband, the philandering Marino Bello, whom Harlow referred to as "the Sicilian pimp."
Eventually, after much expense, Harlow was extracted from that contract, but then found herself enmeshed in a tragedy and a scandal in 1932 with the mysterious death of her husband, Paul Bern. I won't go into all the details of this event. Suffice it to say, Stenn does a yeoman job of providing a convincing and persuasive interpretation of this strange episode, and in doing so shows just how powerful the studios in Hollywood were in their day. They, literally, were the law in Tinseltown; the cops were an afterthought.
Harlow, Stenn points out, was the first star in Hollywood history to survive and prosper professionally from scandal -- something that has become commonplace since, but which before had ruined careers outright. (To relieve her pains, her outlet was often secret booze binges, a favorite being gin; kept secret, of course, because of Mother Jean.)
After the scandal, Harlow made her greatest films -- and some that were not so great that are buoyed by her presence. The list of classics includes: Red-Headed Woman (1932); Red Dust (1932) (in which the on-screen chemistry between her and Clark Gable was so palpable audiences believed they actually were lovers; they weren't); Dinner at Eight (1933), the incomparable comedy of manners with its immortal final line, Bombshell (1933), my favorite of her films, as noted, and I'm pleased to learn was her own favorite; China Seas (1935), a rollicking entertainment; and, Libeled Lady (1936), an instant classic screwball comedy with one of the best casts in Hollywood history, and so on.
Religious sensibilities and rural morals were outraged by the onscreen and off-screen antics of stars like Harlow, leading to tightening censorship in 1934 and both Harlow and Mae West were the two primary targets of the wrath of a new Catholic Church initiative known as the Legion of Decency, whose standards would hamstring the movies for the next three decades. Too many of Harlow's screen heroines, it seems, were too casual about sex, and even worse, not punished for that. From now on, if there was to be sex (every-so slightly hinted at), there would have to be punishment, or reform.
But censorship did not hurt Harlow's career, because by now she had become an accomplished comedienne, not just a vamp. And in lesser films such as Wife Vs. Secretary, she could show moments of incredible sadness and poignancy. There's a strange but moving scene in that film with Gable, the married executive, looking sadly into the face of Harlow, the secretary, as they both realize their duty to the moral code, and the sadness that they can never be lovers. It is subversive because the suggested sense of duty seems only that, and their true feelings are very apparent.
To reach the heights of A-level productions such as Dinner at Eight and Libeled Lady with their veteran thespian casts, would have seemed inconceivable to Harlow barely a few years before. During the making of Platinum Blonde in 1931, director Frank Capra remembered witnessing a nervous girl who couldn't act, who made mistakes and flubbed lines constantly, and who simply had no confidence before the camera. But what he also noticed was someone eager to learn and to please. When others left the set, she stayed behind, watching and studying and practicing and trying to improve.
By the time of Dinner at Eight, just two years later, Harlow had become so good that when the last "Cut!" was sounded on the set, the cast cheered for her. Deeply moved and elated, she ran into her dressing room and cried for joy. It was the most joyous and proudest moment of her life. It was her moment. Not her mother's. And because it moved me so much to read it, I am leaving this review there.
(KR@Ky 2016)
----------
For those interested, here are the initial fragmentary parts of the original review I had intended to write, with the assessment of the movie Bombshell:
Bombshell (1933), starring the Blonde Bombshell, Jean Harlow, was a movie about making movies. But, more subversively, it's a movie about the making of images, and dreams. It was written by John Lee Mahin, one of those sharp-as-a-tack screenwriters who knew exactly what he was doing, and what he was trying to say. It has been called one of the first meta fictional movies. It is a movie about itself, or more precisely, about its star. And it is deadly accurate; even prescient. It's as subversive as a Pre-Code Hollywood movie could be, and the more it throws in conventional plot points to divert us from its messages, the more we see them in sharp relief. It is Jean Harlow's greatest film, featuring her greatest performance -- it is very nearly a confessional -- and her co-star, Lee Tracy, playing her press agent, the pushy Space Hanlon, is equally as sensational. Their scenes together are dynamite. (The scene where Hanlon likens her to a fertility goddess, helping men get it up to repopulate the world is pure Pre-Code manna). The ending of the film is just as funny as the finale of Wilder's Some Like it Hot. It was made at MGM, the king of the studios, and it is glossy, hilarious, evocative and sad. It is an autobiographical film about Harlow's own life that somehow slipped past the powers-that-be at the studio -- because what it has to say is not pretty. (The movie Burns is making during this film is Red Dust, a notorious Pre-Code that Harlow had filmed the year before, with an insider replication of the famous nude-in-the-rain-barrel scene). Even when it seems like an apologia for the studios (Lola's really just a good girl, not at all like that stuff in the scandal sheets), we know it doth protest too much; the modus operandi behind it all has all been exposed. Mixed messages and conventional framing and plotting are perfect Trojan horses. Bombshell is one of the best films I've ever seen, and one of my all-time favorites.
The film opens with one of those classic, manic Slavko Vorkapich montages showing the wild life of the star, alternating with the dew-eyed rapt faces of the audiences dreamily watching their fantasy Bombshell on the screen, Lola Burns (Harlow). The montage fades out and in the next scene we are taken to Burns' very bedroom, a white-telephone deco dream of whiteness, where she, almost camouflaged in a mass of white ornate sheets, is rudely awakened by her maid. Does America's dreamboat want to awaken? No, she's about to have a sexy liaison in her sleep, and she chastises the maid for ending it. Already, we have the subversion. Despite the glamorous trappings, this girl is no different from us. She's supposed to have it all, but the best she can hope for is what's in her dreams. No different than the unrequited desires of her own audiences. As we come to find out, she is, indeed, just like us. Everything we see is manipulation, image-making, dream creating. Like the Harlow in real life, she is a hostage.
If you're interested in classic Hollywood and Harlow, the film is essential viewing, and, as it happens, it mirrors what this autobiography tells us about the star.
Ironically, the movie was based on the life of another Hollywood star, the sexy "It Girl," Clara Bow, whose star was fading fast at the time. But so many people, including those in the studio crew, found it so accurate to Harlow's own life that they couldn't help remark to each other about it in whispers. Harlow's own exploitative family would invade the movie set at midday in the same manner that Lola Burns' money grubbing family does in the film.
------
(fin)
------
Jean Harlow, photographed by George Hurrell
For this biography, published in 1993 and scrupulously researched like no Harlow bio before or since, David Stenn interviewed more than 200 people (most of them dead now) and consulted a vast assortment of sources, documents and archives (including never before seen family documents and letters) to find out the answers to those questions. And by God, he answers them, persuasively and reasonably.
He also turned what I thought would be a fun, fast, delicious candy-trifle of a read into a story of an incredible injustice perpetrated on the life of a human being, and after reading it I was in a profound rage over what was done to Jean Harlow. The great star died 80 years ago next year (a gruesome and arguably preventable death), and even with the sense of so much time passed I felt a deep, fresh grief over her while reading this. My respect for her soared a thousand percent but so did my pity.
Harlow made a movie in 1933 that is one of my all time-favorites, Bombshell, and my initial intention was to use this book as a launch-off point to review and pay homage to that astute and hilarious meta movie -- one that mirrored Harlow's own life. But this book changed those plans. I learned too much, and once I learned it I found that it could not be unlearned or unremarked.
When Harlow died in 1937, at the inconceivable age of 26, she had toppled Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, and Norma Shearer as the queen of MGM, and, by default, that made her the top adult female star in the world (I say adult because little Shirley Temple was at the top of the box office at the time). This despite the fact that barely a half dozen years before, in 1930-1931, critics and even Harlow herself lambasted her as the worst actress in the business. Those opinions began to change in 1932, with a run of sensational films that tapped not only into Harlow's sexuality but revealed a sense of her proletarian nonchalance. Audiences found her to be a natural, an odd mixture of untouchable goddess and approachable girl next door.
That latter quality always remained in Harlow because she never wanted to be an actress or a star. Unlike most girls with looks in her day, she did not fantasize about movie glamor or a movie career. She was a bookish girl, who voraciously read novels and wanted to write stories. She was so apathetic about movies and acting that when she arrived at an age when young girls flocked to Hollywood to act, desperately trying to stand out from the crowd and be selected, Harlow simply stood around -- and the movies flocked to her. Dropping one of her friends off to a studio for a casting call, executives didn't see the friend, but saw Harlow. Within hours, her phone was ringing off the hook. She paid no attention, until her stage mother, her namesake "Mother" Jean, found out and forced her to try out.
This biography, in a large sense, is not just about one damaged woman, but two such women -- Harlow and her controlling mother. There's a doppelganger aspect in the story of a woman named Jean Harlow renaming her daughter, Jean Harlow, in an attempt to, in a sense, channel her own aspirations into her younger "version." Reading the story of Jean's mother makes us feel almost as sad for her as we feel for Jean. The elder Jean had career plans that were dashed. Her marriage to a dull dentist was a socially enforced match. As the mother's own beauty -- said to have been even greater than her daughter's -- faded, she transferred her hopes and expectations to her popular daughter. And thus grew the emotional control and economic exploitation. The elder Harlow was as despised in Hollywood as the younger was beloved. We can't quite consider the mother a villain, though, despite how badly she exploited and emotionally chained and retarded her own daughter. Because the elder Jean Harlow, in a sense, was also a prisoner of stifling social conventions and expectations. The Harlows came from a privileged class, and that class sense always remained: the imperative to be superior. One of the myths of the Harlow story is that hers was a rags to riches tale, but not so. Harlow came from well-to-do Midwestern stock. Her Brooklynish accent and her sassy street-smart confidence on screen seemed to suggest proletarian roots, and that added to her appeal, but also fed into the false myths.
The greatest myth, and the one most inconvenient for Harlow and exacerbated by her screen roles, was that she was just a dumb blonde with loose morals who would lay anything that moved. Too many men took this at face value, and Harlow's rebellion often took the form of marrying men who were either unappealing or asexual. Her marriage to producer Paul Bern was typical. Harlow just wanted a family and a home, but she also wanted a man who did not claw at her like a dog in heat. The ironic outcome was, in the case of the marriage to Bern, a sexless marriage: the most desirable woman in the world married to a man referred to behind the scenes in Hollywood as MGM's "palace eunuch," rumored to be gay but never quite proven to be. Like most of Harlow's men, he could be incredibly kind to her, yet, somehow, unfairly cruel. Everyone, from Harlow's mother to even the most seemingly caring of men in her life, found the need to put Harlow in her place, to denigrate her as dumb and vulgar and low class, in order to maintain a sort of sick control.
Harlow was trapped in a matrix of expectations that was controlled by others, and their fruits realized similarly, but not by herself. (She made millions squandered by others, and left debts upon her death. Her mother and layabout con-artist husband built themselves a white mansion bigger than Harlow's and lined their toilet seats with ermine). She had two abortions, not because she wanted them, but because her mother and the ever-present threat of scandal necessitated it. Her whole life was dictated by circumstances not of her own making, those circumstance almost always dictated by enslavement. Breaking out was impossible. She was thoroughly brainwashed with a kind of Stockholm Syndrome.
To the end, her mother called her "Baby," and that nickname was picked up by others. When asking about Harlow, her co-workers would say, "Where's Baby?" or "How's the Baby doing?" It was not just a harmless endearment. It was a method of infantilizing and control.
And so was her hair. Her fame was tied so largely to her shock of white hair, that it, like so many other things, became a vector of control. After having it severely damaged from chemical bleaching and dyes to the point that it nearly fell out for good, her panicked studio near the end of her career gave her a makeover that allowed it to take on a more natural brownish cast. As Harlow said: "I've always hated my hair, not only because it limited me as an actress but because it limited me as a person. It made me look hard and spectacular; I had to live up to that platinum personality."
At 21, as Harlow was making her first big waves as a fledgling star, Stenn summarizes her life to that point: "She was a bride at 16, a bit player at 17, a star at 18, a divorcee at 19, a mobster's mistress at 20, a bride once again at 21, and a widow two months later."
On top of everything else, there was a ticking time bomb inside of Harlow, one that author Stenn uncovers in a masterstroke of research, tracing the previously nebulous cause of her death to something that happened to her at age 15. It makes the tragedy of her short life all the more poignant.
Harlow was ever misinterpreted. The girl who thought nothing of casual nudity (to the dismay of many around her) was not trying to provoke or shock. She was, as one of her screenwriters, Anita Loos, astutely observed, exhibiting the traits of a detached personality. Harlow just didn't care. She was not hard or arrogant, as some seemed to interpret, but shy and considerate and even sociable when crushing social expectations weren't present. When Harlow's snooty co-stars rushed to their private dressing rooms during breaks, Harlow stayed on the set, half nude, sharing laughs and dirty jokes with the crew, buying everyone coffee and donuts when the chintzy executives tried to cut their salaries and small perks. That is why Harlow was beloved by her co-workers of every class, and by the public. She even won over people who tried to hate her, and then found they simply couldn't. She was a nice person.
She was also a consummate professional, with a photographic memory. With a script, she could do wonders. When asked to ad lib, she was terrible. Anita Loos ingeniously figured out Harlow, studying her unique mannerisms and ticks and incorporating them into Harlow's scripts, so that the result allowed Harlow's real personality to emerge within a scripted context.
In a pattern all too typical of her life, her first big break came with her contract to the maverick tycoon, Howard Hughes, who cast her in a high-profile role in his 1930 World War I aerial epic, Hell's Angels. She was not very good in it, and her performance was excoriated. And, like so many things, it was yet another trap. Nobody, it seemed, could get Harlow out of this restrictive contract that was stifling her career. Hughes refused to let her out of it, and instead used her as a chattel slave, farming her out to other studios and sending her on the road to perform a terrible, nerve-wracking theatrical roadshow in which Harlow had nothing to do but stand before the slobbering masses like a sex doll. For that, Hughes got 80 percent or more of everything she earned. The rest, of course, went to Harlow's mother and her gigolo leech husband, the philandering Marino Bello, whom Harlow referred to as "the Sicilian pimp."
Eventually, after much expense, Harlow was extracted from that contract, but then found herself enmeshed in a tragedy and a scandal in 1932 with the mysterious death of her husband, Paul Bern. I won't go into all the details of this event. Suffice it to say, Stenn does a yeoman job of providing a convincing and persuasive interpretation of this strange episode, and in doing so shows just how powerful the studios in Hollywood were in their day. They, literally, were the law in Tinseltown; the cops were an afterthought.
Harlow, Stenn points out, was the first star in Hollywood history to survive and prosper professionally from scandal -- something that has become commonplace since, but which before had ruined careers outright. (To relieve her pains, her outlet was often secret booze binges, a favorite being gin; kept secret, of course, because of Mother Jean.)
After the scandal, Harlow made her greatest films -- and some that were not so great that are buoyed by her presence. The list of classics includes: Red-Headed Woman (1932); Red Dust (1932) (in which the on-screen chemistry between her and Clark Gable was so palpable audiences believed they actually were lovers; they weren't); Dinner at Eight (1933), the incomparable comedy of manners with its immortal final line, Bombshell (1933), my favorite of her films, as noted, and I'm pleased to learn was her own favorite; China Seas (1935), a rollicking entertainment; and, Libeled Lady (1936), an instant classic screwball comedy with one of the best casts in Hollywood history, and so on.
Religious sensibilities and rural morals were outraged by the onscreen and off-screen antics of stars like Harlow, leading to tightening censorship in 1934 and both Harlow and Mae West were the two primary targets of the wrath of a new Catholic Church initiative known as the Legion of Decency, whose standards would hamstring the movies for the next three decades. Too many of Harlow's screen heroines, it seems, were too casual about sex, and even worse, not punished for that. From now on, if there was to be sex (every-so slightly hinted at), there would have to be punishment, or reform.
But censorship did not hurt Harlow's career, because by now she had become an accomplished comedienne, not just a vamp. And in lesser films such as Wife Vs. Secretary, she could show moments of incredible sadness and poignancy. There's a strange but moving scene in that film with Gable, the married executive, looking sadly into the face of Harlow, the secretary, as they both realize their duty to the moral code, and the sadness that they can never be lovers. It is subversive because the suggested sense of duty seems only that, and their true feelings are very apparent.
To reach the heights of A-level productions such as Dinner at Eight and Libeled Lady with their veteran thespian casts, would have seemed inconceivable to Harlow barely a few years before. During the making of Platinum Blonde in 1931, director Frank Capra remembered witnessing a nervous girl who couldn't act, who made mistakes and flubbed lines constantly, and who simply had no confidence before the camera. But what he also noticed was someone eager to learn and to please. When others left the set, she stayed behind, watching and studying and practicing and trying to improve.
By the time of Dinner at Eight, just two years later, Harlow had become so good that when the last "Cut!" was sounded on the set, the cast cheered for her. Deeply moved and elated, she ran into her dressing room and cried for joy. It was the most joyous and proudest moment of her life. It was her moment. Not her mother's. And because it moved me so much to read it, I am leaving this review there.
(KR@Ky 2016)
----------
For those interested, here are the initial fragmentary parts of the original review I had intended to write, with the assessment of the movie Bombshell:
Bombshell (1933), starring the Blonde Bombshell, Jean Harlow, was a movie about making movies. But, more subversively, it's a movie about the making of images, and dreams. It was written by John Lee Mahin, one of those sharp-as-a-tack screenwriters who knew exactly what he was doing, and what he was trying to say. It has been called one of the first meta fictional movies. It is a movie about itself, or more precisely, about its star. And it is deadly accurate; even prescient. It's as subversive as a Pre-Code Hollywood movie could be, and the more it throws in conventional plot points to divert us from its messages, the more we see them in sharp relief. It is Jean Harlow's greatest film, featuring her greatest performance -- it is very nearly a confessional -- and her co-star, Lee Tracy, playing her press agent, the pushy Space Hanlon, is equally as sensational. Their scenes together are dynamite. (The scene where Hanlon likens her to a fertility goddess, helping men get it up to repopulate the world is pure Pre-Code manna). The ending of the film is just as funny as the finale of Wilder's Some Like it Hot. It was made at MGM, the king of the studios, and it is glossy, hilarious, evocative and sad. It is an autobiographical film about Harlow's own life that somehow slipped past the powers-that-be at the studio -- because what it has to say is not pretty. (The movie Burns is making during this film is Red Dust, a notorious Pre-Code that Harlow had filmed the year before, with an insider replication of the famous nude-in-the-rain-barrel scene). Even when it seems like an apologia for the studios (Lola's really just a good girl, not at all like that stuff in the scandal sheets), we know it doth protest too much; the modus operandi behind it all has all been exposed. Mixed messages and conventional framing and plotting are perfect Trojan horses. Bombshell is one of the best films I've ever seen, and one of my all-time favorites.
The film opens with one of those classic, manic Slavko Vorkapich montages showing the wild life of the star, alternating with the dew-eyed rapt faces of the audiences dreamily watching their fantasy Bombshell on the screen, Lola Burns (Harlow). The montage fades out and in the next scene we are taken to Burns' very bedroom, a white-telephone deco dream of whiteness, where she, almost camouflaged in a mass of white ornate sheets, is rudely awakened by her maid. Does America's dreamboat want to awaken? No, she's about to have a sexy liaison in her sleep, and she chastises the maid for ending it. Already, we have the subversion. Despite the glamorous trappings, this girl is no different from us. She's supposed to have it all, but the best she can hope for is what's in her dreams. No different than the unrequited desires of her own audiences. As we come to find out, she is, indeed, just like us. Everything we see is manipulation, image-making, dream creating. Like the Harlow in real life, she is a hostage.
If you're interested in classic Hollywood and Harlow, the film is essential viewing, and, as it happens, it mirrors what this autobiography tells us about the star.
Ironically, the movie was based on the life of another Hollywood star, the sexy "It Girl," Clara Bow, whose star was fading fast at the time. But so many people, including those in the studio crew, found it so accurate to Harlow's own life that they couldn't help remark to each other about it in whispers. Harlow's own exploitative family would invade the movie set at midday in the same manner that Lola Burns' money grubbing family does in the film.
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(fin)
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Jean Harlow, photographed by George Hurrell
May 7, 2014
This book quite engrossed me. Jean Harlow was NOTHING like the characters she played on screen. Her life is endlessly fascinating to me now simply because it was so unusual and mysterious. David Stenn does a great job covering every known aspect of her life. He's easy to read.
Just a few tidbits from Jean's life: First of all, her MOTHER was the real "Jean Harlow" and was also completely evil and insane (meaning CRAZY - a real narcissistic personality). Jean's real name was Harlean Carpenter, so I will refer to her as that and her mother as "Mother Jean", which is what everyone called her.
Harlean did not want to be a movie star. Her mother pushed her to do it. Her mother also broke up most if not all of her 3 marriages. Harlean was a prisoner of her mother and Mother Jean's boyfriend/second husband Marino Bello. Her real father seemed like a really nice guy. Mother Jean divorced him bc he was a "boring" dentist and never let Harlean see him. (She saw him anyway in secret whenever she could.)
Why didn't Harlean get away from her terrible mother? She had not one single ounce of backbone in her, that's why. She was so incredibly PASSIVE and sweet. EVERYONE loved her who knew her. But, man, ZERO fight in that little girl. Her mom told her to get an abortion and she just goes, "Okay." It's really sad. But her mother.... I'm telling you, pure evil.
Someone once told me she died young from a severe sunburn. Not true at all! I get the idea from this narrative that she just didn't want to live anymore. SO much crap happened to her in such a short time. She contracted scarlet fever at age 16 while she was away at summer camp and that led to a 10 year slow decline into eventual kidney failure. She had a HORRIBLE death. They didn't have dialysis back then so there was no hope for her.
EVERYONE talked about her like she was the most beautiful human being they'd ever seen. Her mother restricted EVERYTHING in her life right down to what she ate - it's so bizarre. I mean, how do people become that controlling and get away with it?
Harlean's second husband had a really, super-mysterious death. Nobody to this day knows precisely what happened or whether it was murder or suicide. I read another book purely on that subject alone and that book was also a page-turner. ('Deadly Illusions: Jean Harlow and the Murder of Paul Bern' by Samuel Marx and Joyce Vanderveen)
She was a natural blonde but dyed her hair pure white by using equal amounts of peroxide, ammonia, Clorox, and Lux Flakes (a kind of soap). (As a hairdresser I found this bit particularly interesting:) Her hairdressers said it HURT her; terribly painful to the scalp - EVERY week. At one point she was forced to wear a wig so her hair could recuperate from all the bleaching.
Jean Harlow aka Harlean Carpenter had one heck of an interesting/sad life. I've been trying to get hold of all her movies ever since I read this. She's as intriguing to read about as she is on film.
Just a few tidbits from Jean's life: First of all, her MOTHER was the real "Jean Harlow" and was also completely evil and insane (meaning CRAZY - a real narcissistic personality). Jean's real name was Harlean Carpenter, so I will refer to her as that and her mother as "Mother Jean", which is what everyone called her.
Harlean did not want to be a movie star. Her mother pushed her to do it. Her mother also broke up most if not all of her 3 marriages. Harlean was a prisoner of her mother and Mother Jean's boyfriend/second husband Marino Bello. Her real father seemed like a really nice guy. Mother Jean divorced him bc he was a "boring" dentist and never let Harlean see him. (She saw him anyway in secret whenever she could.)
Why didn't Harlean get away from her terrible mother? She had not one single ounce of backbone in her, that's why. She was so incredibly PASSIVE and sweet. EVERYONE loved her who knew her. But, man, ZERO fight in that little girl. Her mom told her to get an abortion and she just goes, "Okay." It's really sad. But her mother.... I'm telling you, pure evil.
Someone once told me she died young from a severe sunburn. Not true at all! I get the idea from this narrative that she just didn't want to live anymore. SO much crap happened to her in such a short time. She contracted scarlet fever at age 16 while she was away at summer camp and that led to a 10 year slow decline into eventual kidney failure. She had a HORRIBLE death. They didn't have dialysis back then so there was no hope for her.
EVERYONE talked about her like she was the most beautiful human being they'd ever seen. Her mother restricted EVERYTHING in her life right down to what she ate - it's so bizarre. I mean, how do people become that controlling and get away with it?
Harlean's second husband had a really, super-mysterious death. Nobody to this day knows precisely what happened or whether it was murder or suicide. I read another book purely on that subject alone and that book was also a page-turner. ('Deadly Illusions: Jean Harlow and the Murder of Paul Bern' by Samuel Marx and Joyce Vanderveen)
She was a natural blonde but dyed her hair pure white by using equal amounts of peroxide, ammonia, Clorox, and Lux Flakes (a kind of soap). (As a hairdresser I found this bit particularly interesting:) Her hairdressers said it HURT her; terribly painful to the scalp - EVERY week. At one point she was forced to wear a wig so her hair could recuperate from all the bleaching.
Jean Harlow aka Harlean Carpenter had one heck of an interesting/sad life. I've been trying to get hold of all her movies ever since I read this. She's as intriguing to read about as she is on film.
August 12, 2015
What to say about this book? I didn't know anything really about Jean Harlow before reading this. I've only seen a handful of her movies and read a little about her life on IMDB's webpage and what was said about her in Myrna Loy's autobiography. After reading this, I would say her life was crazy and very sad.
I remember when I read she passed away at such an young age, I was amazed and kind of shocked that she died so young. After reading this biography, I really can understand why. She lived a life that was way to hard on a average person, and Jean Harlow was not an average person.
She constantly needed support and love from someone. During her young life, I feel she didn't get any from anybody. Everyone used her to get what they wanted at her expense. She mother and stepfather were the worst of the bunch. Her husbands and boyfriends, were weak and didn't do what should have been done, and that was, get her away from her mother and stepfather. I feel, out of all the men, William Powell would had been the one to do this. He did find away to get rid of the stepfather. But, for what ever reasons why, he didn't get her away from her mother. I really think, that hunted him for the rest of his life.
But even if she had gotten away from her mother, her life would have ended young. But, she could have had a wonderful and happy young life, if someone had loved her enough to do it.
I remember when I read she passed away at such an young age, I was amazed and kind of shocked that she died so young. After reading this biography, I really can understand why. She lived a life that was way to hard on a average person, and Jean Harlow was not an average person.
She constantly needed support and love from someone. During her young life, I feel she didn't get any from anybody. Everyone used her to get what they wanted at her expense. She mother and stepfather were the worst of the bunch. Her husbands and boyfriends, were weak and didn't do what should have been done, and that was, get her away from her mother and stepfather. I feel, out of all the men, William Powell would had been the one to do this. He did find away to get rid of the stepfather. But, for what ever reasons why, he didn't get her away from her mother. I really think, that hunted him for the rest of his life.
But even if she had gotten away from her mother, her life would have ended young. But, she could have had a wonderful and happy young life, if someone had loved her enough to do it.
September 10, 2010
I love classic Hollywood, and one of my favorite actresses is Jean Harlow. She was beautiful, she was funny, she had sass, and amazing platinum hair. David Stenn does an amazing job writing about the wonderful life and tragic death of Jean Harlow. I am not usually one to get teared up reading a book, in fact, I can't remember a time when I did cry reading a book. But, the end of this one had me in tears. Stenn describes the last agonizing days Jean spent dying in the hospital and it was just so heartbreaking. She was only 26 and had so much more life and potential in her. This book does her justice.
August 5, 2007
The definitive biography, and it reads like a novel! Mostly because Stenn teases us at the outset with a promise to reveal how the Baby really died at age 26 (no, it was *not* because her mother was a Christian Scientist). This promise is very thoroughly fulfilled, and I'm not giving it away here. He also gives very convincing evidence about the actual circumstances of husband Paul Bern's death (though he does introduce the caveat that nobody will ever know for sure). I guess my only problem with the book is this: I now dislike William Powell a teensy little bit, though the description of his being "purple" with grief at her death is memorable and sad.
February 25, 2016
I have to say, this book was pretty darn depressing. Jean Harlow lived a fairly sad life. Initially, she was not a successful actress and was ridiculed for her lack of talent. Eventually, she became the greatest actress of her time, but privately her life was in shambles. Her romantic relationships were always lacking, her mother was a constant overbearing presence in her life, and her alcoholism began to take its toll fairly early on. It was fascinating to learn so much about Jean Harlow, though.
November 12, 2020
Jean Harlow was the screen siren of the 1930s, the female James Cagney. She zoomed to the heights of movie stardom in that time between the end of the silent pictures but before the puritanical code hit the talkies. Her sudden ascendance and her sudden end made her a legend in her time and a cult figure today.
She was controlled by her overbearing mother, living a life that her mother wanted to live. Offscreen, Harlow was down-to-earth and not too full of herself. Onscreen, she was the inspiration for the later Marilyn Monroe, bringing platinum blonde to the masses. Jean Harlow lived a full life for one so young, as she bounced from man to man and is still not considered to be fully innocent in the death of her second husband. Her shocking death from kidney failure in 1937 stunned the Hollywood community. The illness was misdiagnosed, although it would not have mattered anyway as there were no medical miracles available at that time to save her (her kidneys had essentially been dying since she was a teen).
Prior to getting this book, I was aware of the Harlow name but had never seen any of her flicks. I had started reading about all of the wildness of 1920s Hollywood and Harlow's story seemed a 1930s extension of the times. The research here is exemplary, as the author debunks some previous biographies which turned out to be worthless. As for the subject, I simply didn't have much sympathy for her. She was a victim, a puppet controlled by others, and I just wanted to scream when her actions showed a "whatever" attitude.
This is a great book for the Jean Harlow fans and also worthwhile for those, like me, who just can't believe some of those Golden Age tales.
Book Season = Summer (muggy studios)
She was controlled by her overbearing mother, living a life that her mother wanted to live. Offscreen, Harlow was down-to-earth and not too full of herself. Onscreen, she was the inspiration for the later Marilyn Monroe, bringing platinum blonde to the masses. Jean Harlow lived a full life for one so young, as she bounced from man to man and is still not considered to be fully innocent in the death of her second husband. Her shocking death from kidney failure in 1937 stunned the Hollywood community. The illness was misdiagnosed, although it would not have mattered anyway as there were no medical miracles available at that time to save her (her kidneys had essentially been dying since she was a teen).
Prior to getting this book, I was aware of the Harlow name but had never seen any of her flicks. I had started reading about all of the wildness of 1920s Hollywood and Harlow's story seemed a 1930s extension of the times. The research here is exemplary, as the author debunks some previous biographies which turned out to be worthless. As for the subject, I simply didn't have much sympathy for her. She was a victim, a puppet controlled by others, and I just wanted to scream when her actions showed a "whatever" attitude.
This is a great book for the Jean Harlow fans and also worthwhile for those, like me, who just can't believe some of those Golden Age tales.
Book Season = Summer (muggy studios)
April 4, 2011
I've been reading The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest on and off since late January. I've been having a hard time getting into it, but now that I've finally hit a good pace, I went and picked this Jean Harlow book up. Go figure.
Anyway, I wanted to read this particular book because it's lauded as the definitive Harlow biography. There was some great information in David Stenn's story about Jean's life, from her nightmare of a mother to her relationships with her three husbands and later William Powell. Stenn also provides a wealth of information about the weeks leading up to Jean's death by kidney failure at age 26. I devoured this entire book in one day. Granted, the hardcover version I have has the largest font and widest columns I've ever seen in a book not meant for kids. I guess that's an occupational hazard when you're contracted to write X amount of pages on a person who died so young.
I would have liked to have read more details about Jean's personal relationships. After explaining the circumstances behind it, her arranged marriage to cameraman Hal Rosson is only briefly mentioned before Jean's mother steps in and they're suddenly divorced. Stenn tells us that Rosson wasn't aware of the conspiracy and he truly loved Jean. So how did he take it when Jean divorced him? Did he ever find out why she really married him? Little questions like this keep popping up.
Still, this is a great book for Jean Harlow fans. She's given a respectful and sympathetic, yet realistic treatment by Stenn. William Powell, however, doesn't exactly come out smelling like a rose.
Anyway, I wanted to read this particular book because it's lauded as the definitive Harlow biography. There was some great information in David Stenn's story about Jean's life, from her nightmare of a mother to her relationships with her three husbands and later William Powell. Stenn also provides a wealth of information about the weeks leading up to Jean's death by kidney failure at age 26. I devoured this entire book in one day. Granted, the hardcover version I have has the largest font and widest columns I've ever seen in a book not meant for kids. I guess that's an occupational hazard when you're contracted to write X amount of pages on a person who died so young.
I would have liked to have read more details about Jean's personal relationships. After explaining the circumstances behind it, her arranged marriage to cameraman Hal Rosson is only briefly mentioned before Jean's mother steps in and they're suddenly divorced. Stenn tells us that Rosson wasn't aware of the conspiracy and he truly loved Jean. So how did he take it when Jean divorced him? Did he ever find out why she really married him? Little questions like this keep popping up.
Still, this is a great book for Jean Harlow fans. She's given a respectful and sympathetic, yet realistic treatment by Stenn. William Powell, however, doesn't exactly come out smelling like a rose.
April 2, 2018
Ever since I read Zelda by Nancy Milford I’ve been in the mood to read biographies. Particularly Old Hollywood Stars, & I decided to pick up this biography of Jean Harlow. & let me just say, this book did not disappoint.
I’ve never seen any of her films, but I’ve seen clips here & there, & I’ve heard of her. After reading this I requested a ton of her movies from the library. This was a quick read with so much information I never knew about. Her mother really was a nightmare that used her. If you’re interested in Jean Harlow, or anything Old Hollywood, I highly suggest reading this. It includes famous names in this book from Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, William Powell, and many more actors she was in contact with. I definitely plan on reading this author’s biography of Clara Bow.
I’ve never seen any of her films, but I’ve seen clips here & there, & I’ve heard of her. After reading this I requested a ton of her movies from the library. This was a quick read with so much information I never knew about. Her mother really was a nightmare that used her. If you’re interested in Jean Harlow, or anything Old Hollywood, I highly suggest reading this. It includes famous names in this book from Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, William Powell, and many more actors she was in contact with. I definitely plan on reading this author’s biography of Clara Bow.
April 4, 2013
Love me some Stenn! His Bow biography was tip top. And so was this Harlow one. I read it in 7 hours, and honestly I’m still not a huge Harlow fan. She wasn’t cute, and her acting in silents amounts to being sexy or wooden. But she was important. And her life story was very sad. I think Stenn did a solid job cleaning up a lot of the rumors and mythology around her, such as she was a skank who screwed everyone (that was Joan Crawford) or was only liked for not wearing panties. Also he goes to great lengths to explain how her mother didn’t kill her with Christian Science (doctors were around the entire time, real ones…who were slightly incompetent), and how whatever happened to Paul Bern barely involved her. I’m sure he’d be thrilled to know his name has solely been known for having a small…well…you know. But still very interesting.
August 30, 2018
I've been a huge fan of Jean Harlow for a while now, but I had yet to read any books on her. Of course, I knew enough about the gossip and rumors that surround her lasting legacy -- and I also knew enough to know that she wasn't the sexpot that people to this day make her out to be.
There isn't a lot of material written about Harlow, which really is a shame. Because her life was so short, and because there are a lot of people who refuse(d) to talk about some of the more serious situations of her life, and because a lot of people have passed away that were in her vicinity when she was alive, there are always going to be unanswered questions regarding her life.
This book manages to shed some light on two of the most important aspects of Jean Harlows' life: the death of Paul Bern, her second husband, and her own untimely death at the age of 26. While we may never know what actually transpired during these two separate events, the scenarios depicted here are almost bound to be the truth, simply from the reports of eyewitnesses.
However, not everyone can be trusted when talking about the great Jean Harlow and her life, something David Stenn portrays here in this book. There are always people who were angry or jealous of her -- and therefore willing to play into the stereotype of who she was as an actual human being.
Jean Harlow deserved more than what she got, and I only hope that her legacy continues to flourish -- and that we continue to respect the human being that she actually was.
There isn't a lot of material written about Harlow, which really is a shame. Because her life was so short, and because there are a lot of people who refuse(d) to talk about some of the more serious situations of her life, and because a lot of people have passed away that were in her vicinity when she was alive, there are always going to be unanswered questions regarding her life.
This book manages to shed some light on two of the most important aspects of Jean Harlows' life: the death of Paul Bern, her second husband, and her own untimely death at the age of 26. While we may never know what actually transpired during these two separate events, the scenarios depicted here are almost bound to be the truth, simply from the reports of eyewitnesses.
However, not everyone can be trusted when talking about the great Jean Harlow and her life, something David Stenn portrays here in this book. There are always people who were angry or jealous of her -- and therefore willing to play into the stereotype of who she was as an actual human being.
Jean Harlow deserved more than what she got, and I only hope that her legacy continues to flourish -- and that we continue to respect the human being that she actually was.
June 27, 2018
totally engrossing read. this young girl liked to sew and read and just wanted a family of her own but her controlling mother pushed her into the movies which was the mother's own dream. with no training and some natural talent, harlow worked hard to succeed and she sure did! an action packed brief life! Stenn does a great job bringing her to us.
August 15, 2022
Such a sad story. Well researched.
February 28, 2021
Great book about Harlean Harlow Carpenter McGrew Bern Rosson better known as Jean Harlow. She is a fascinating person to learn about, and once you start it’s hard to stop. I highly recommend this book, and watching any of her movies you can get your hands on! I will just say this, she was not at all how the studios portrayed her in real life, and her mother, “Mother Jean” was a bully. I will let you read and learn for yourself the details.
July 31, 2015
Loving classic movies the way I do, I am always anxious to get my hands on biographies of stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood. Sometimes I find them to be very good, other times they can be real stinkers that, shall we say, stretch the truth slightly; and others that are filled with downright lies about stars and their lives. You will get the ones that are biased either in favor of or against the person they are writing about. A recent one I read was so filled with lies and distortion that I regretted the fact I'd even bought it, wishing I could return it to the store. I already know enough about most of the true stars of Hollywood that if there is an exaggeration or lie in a book I'll spot it right off.
That being said, I was pleasantly surprised by Mr. Stenn's book. He obviously has a fondness for Jean Harlow and who she was; or should I say who she wasn't. Because, you see, she wasn't really anyone. Let me clarify that statement.
Jean Harlow was born into a wealthy family as Harlean Carpenter. Her mother, Jean Harlow Carpenter, was a grasping, miserly, greedy, selfish and controlling woman. Almost like a female Scrooge - except there was no redeeming this woman. She wanted to be an actress, and when that didn't pan out, she had Harlean, and decided to groom her for stardom. So an actress Harlean became, taking her mother's name.
She married three times - Charles McGrew II, Paul Bern, and Hal Rosson. None of the marriages lasted very long, and all for the same reason - her mother broke them up. She had a tremendous hold on Jean, and was afraid of losing control of "her Baby," which is the name Jean would be called throughout her short life. She would have married a fourth time - to the actor William Powell, but he refused to marry her, not wanting to marry another actress because he was divorced from Carole Lombard, and hated being known as "Mrs. Carole Lombard." Perhaps if he'd had his great success as an actor earlier in his career instead of later, things might have changed his mind and married her, but they hadn't, and he didn't. I have often wondered if he felt he'd made a mistake after Jean's death.
Jean was loved by everyone who knew her, and she was always considerate of others' feelings, both on and off the set. She was natural in herself, yet had very little self-confidence and was always looking for others' approval.
For years she played the tramp, fallen woman, mantrap, etc. She hated the roles and wanted something better, but it wasn't until Red-Headed Woman (a favorite of mine) that she was given the opportunity to shine, and her best role was in Bombshell, where she truly showed her acting chops.
But none of it made any difference. Her mother (and stepfather Marino Bello) lived off her earnings and told her what to wear, what to eat, etc. Mother Jean had such control over young Jean that unlike Jean herself, Mother Jean was universally detested.
When Jean died of kidney failure at the age of 26, the entire world was shocked. Hollywood mourned. Her mother insisted almost to the end that she merely had influenza, and by the time she called for real help, it was too late to save her daughter.
Her life was a sad one. Wife, widow, actress, daughter - but never a mother, and that is what Jean Harlow wanted most. A husband and family, but somehow that happiness managed to elude her. I would guess that a large part of that was because of her mercenary mother. How different her life would have been if Baby could have escaped her mother's clutches. But her short life was not wasted. In her films, we are able to glimpse her life, how beautiful she was, and her winning smile is magical.
This is a heartfelt biography, and highly recommended for all fans (or future fans) of Jean Harlow and her mystique.
That being said, I was pleasantly surprised by Mr. Stenn's book. He obviously has a fondness for Jean Harlow and who she was; or should I say who she wasn't. Because, you see, she wasn't really anyone. Let me clarify that statement.
Jean Harlow was born into a wealthy family as Harlean Carpenter. Her mother, Jean Harlow Carpenter, was a grasping, miserly, greedy, selfish and controlling woman. Almost like a female Scrooge - except there was no redeeming this woman. She wanted to be an actress, and when that didn't pan out, she had Harlean, and decided to groom her for stardom. So an actress Harlean became, taking her mother's name.
She married three times - Charles McGrew II, Paul Bern, and Hal Rosson. None of the marriages lasted very long, and all for the same reason - her mother broke them up. She had a tremendous hold on Jean, and was afraid of losing control of "her Baby," which is the name Jean would be called throughout her short life. She would have married a fourth time - to the actor William Powell, but he refused to marry her, not wanting to marry another actress because he was divorced from Carole Lombard, and hated being known as "Mrs. Carole Lombard." Perhaps if he'd had his great success as an actor earlier in his career instead of later, things might have changed his mind and married her, but they hadn't, and he didn't. I have often wondered if he felt he'd made a mistake after Jean's death.
Jean was loved by everyone who knew her, and she was always considerate of others' feelings, both on and off the set. She was natural in herself, yet had very little self-confidence and was always looking for others' approval.
For years she played the tramp, fallen woman, mantrap, etc. She hated the roles and wanted something better, but it wasn't until Red-Headed Woman (a favorite of mine) that she was given the opportunity to shine, and her best role was in Bombshell, where she truly showed her acting chops.
But none of it made any difference. Her mother (and stepfather Marino Bello) lived off her earnings and told her what to wear, what to eat, etc. Mother Jean had such control over young Jean that unlike Jean herself, Mother Jean was universally detested.
When Jean died of kidney failure at the age of 26, the entire world was shocked. Hollywood mourned. Her mother insisted almost to the end that she merely had influenza, and by the time she called for real help, it was too late to save her daughter.
Her life was a sad one. Wife, widow, actress, daughter - but never a mother, and that is what Jean Harlow wanted most. A husband and family, but somehow that happiness managed to elude her. I would guess that a large part of that was because of her mercenary mother. How different her life would have been if Baby could have escaped her mother's clutches. But her short life was not wasted. In her films, we are able to glimpse her life, how beautiful she was, and her winning smile is magical.
This is a heartfelt biography, and highly recommended for all fans (or future fans) of Jean Harlow and her mystique.
February 24, 2014
Near the end of the book, the author writes, "Harlow 'had to be someone she wasn't' because she never knew who she was."
If someone needed to do an analysis of the book, this statement sums it up well. The pace is extremely brisk, and sometimes moves too fast to give us more than a glimpse of Jean Harlow's intriguing personality that has been surrounded in rumors of almost mythic proportions. A nice bonus is that we do have the opportunity to become acquainted with some fascinating Hollywood characters.
The premise appears to be that Jean Harlow was almost a chameleon, changing with each situation to become a person who would be liked by the people surrounding her. When we do see her putting up resistance, it is late in her life when the illness causes severe headaches and contributes to her loss of control. For someone only 26-years old, her end was truly horrific.
Jean Harlow was an enigma in films. When she was in a role that worked, she made her performance seem effortless. No wonder so many fans thought that she was playing herself. There are times, I must admit, when I can't take my eyes away from her on the screen.
Those looking for a more in depth story of how certain films were made will find this book to be disappointing. LIBELED LADY is discussed primarily from the point-of-view of her off-screen relationship with William Powell, while others seem limited to what her home life was like during filming, or what was being done to her hair.
For my money, the definitive life story of Jean Harlow remains yet to be written. In the meantime, this one should intrigue the reader to seek out her films and/or the novel she wrote...and there should be no disappointment in that.
If someone needed to do an analysis of the book, this statement sums it up well. The pace is extremely brisk, and sometimes moves too fast to give us more than a glimpse of Jean Harlow's intriguing personality that has been surrounded in rumors of almost mythic proportions. A nice bonus is that we do have the opportunity to become acquainted with some fascinating Hollywood characters.
The premise appears to be that Jean Harlow was almost a chameleon, changing with each situation to become a person who would be liked by the people surrounding her. When we do see her putting up resistance, it is late in her life when the illness causes severe headaches and contributes to her loss of control. For someone only 26-years old, her end was truly horrific.
Jean Harlow was an enigma in films. When she was in a role that worked, she made her performance seem effortless. No wonder so many fans thought that she was playing herself. There are times, I must admit, when I can't take my eyes away from her on the screen.
Those looking for a more in depth story of how certain films were made will find this book to be disappointing. LIBELED LADY is discussed primarily from the point-of-view of her off-screen relationship with William Powell, while others seem limited to what her home life was like during filming, or what was being done to her hair.
For my money, the definitive life story of Jean Harlow remains yet to be written. In the meantime, this one should intrigue the reader to seek out her films and/or the novel she wrote...and there should be no disappointment in that.
July 5, 2015
Of all the people writing star bios, Stenn is one of the best. Everything is very well researched and presented in a way that separates substantiated facts from speculation, and he tracked down a lot of people who knew Jean in real life.
Jean was known to be a really nice person - too nice for her own good. That mother of hers broke up her marriages, pushed her into acting, and drove her to drink. Mother Jean's paramour Marino Bello was an absolute slime, taking Jean's money. I've read elsewhere that he used to try to hit on Jean, and while I have no proof, he's the kind who would. It was this perfect storm of dysfunction that gave us Jean Harlow, the actress - I think all she really wanted for herself out of life was to find a great guy and be a housewife. But she found herself acting and adapted. She became very good at it. You can see the progression watching her movies. She just got better and better.
Her life was going the other way, though. Paul Bern's death (and the question of why she was attracted to him to begin with - Stenn addresses this in the book), sneaking away from that mother to drink, falling in love with William Powell thinking this is finally IT, but Powell was relationship-phobic after Carole Lombard, and finally her illness and death. The only movie of Jean's I could only watch once was Saratoga. You can see it happening.
All in all, a great book. Some here have called it sensational, but this isn't a book of libel like "Hollywood Babylon", just a very open and honest bio. Highly recommended.
Jean was known to be a really nice person - too nice for her own good. That mother of hers broke up her marriages, pushed her into acting, and drove her to drink. Mother Jean's paramour Marino Bello was an absolute slime, taking Jean's money. I've read elsewhere that he used to try to hit on Jean, and while I have no proof, he's the kind who would. It was this perfect storm of dysfunction that gave us Jean Harlow, the actress - I think all she really wanted for herself out of life was to find a great guy and be a housewife. But she found herself acting and adapted. She became very good at it. You can see the progression watching her movies. She just got better and better.
Her life was going the other way, though. Paul Bern's death (and the question of why she was attracted to him to begin with - Stenn addresses this in the book), sneaking away from that mother to drink, falling in love with William Powell thinking this is finally IT, but Powell was relationship-phobic after Carole Lombard, and finally her illness and death. The only movie of Jean's I could only watch once was Saratoga. You can see it happening.
All in all, a great book. Some here have called it sensational, but this isn't a book of libel like "Hollywood Babylon", just a very open and honest bio. Highly recommended.
September 11, 2014
I love Old Hollywood, and Jean Harlow is one of favorite actress's from that era. Before I read Bombshell, I did not know so much about Jean Harlow, apart from her films. David Stenn's book is an excellent written book about the life and the tragic death of Harlow. I learned new things about her life, that were very sad. The ending of Bombshell describes Harlow's last days, suffering until her death. Bombshell is a great book for anyone who loves Old Hollywood, Jean Harlow, or is just curious about the original Bombshell.
September 10, 2018
She seemed to have everything but as this book shows despite the sort of fame that is almost unimaginable today Jean Harlow was a used by nearly everyone in her life and doomed by an early childhood bout with scarlet fever. A sweet-natured, retiring girl whose dream was a happy marriage and children she was driven by a gorgon of a possessive mother and stepfather who were ultimate users destroying any relationships that might have prevented their influence. A very sad story but Jean Harlow comes across as a lovely genuine person which makes her early death all the more bitter.
Read
June 7, 2015Finally found a copy I could afford, (thank you EBay and the misidentification as a paperback edition). A very well research book about a very tragic forgotten woman. She was controlled her whole life and died at 26. She was an earlier, smarter, Marilyn Monroe. I may have read this when it was first released, it seemed really familiar. I really enjoyed it and just can't get over how Harlow was the ultimate live hard, die young..
August 24, 2020
this was such a moving biography. despite how young she died she had such a rich and intriguing life, and, unlike other old hollywood biographies, the self and the hollywood image are never confused: instead, stenn explains very well how the latter came to be formed, as well as the “real” jean behind her glamourous image, far more down to earth than you’d think! i really enjoyed this biography and do recommend it
May 17, 2023
The first biography to make me cry. Stern manages to capture the unrecognized humanity that Harlow possessed and the mundane existence she so desperately craved. My heart breaks not for the career she never had the chance to finish, but for the life she never had the opportunity to start. This is not a flashy snapshot of The Baby’s cinematic career. There is no romanticization of the mystery surrounding her death. BOMBSHELL is a presentation of facts and an invitation to reconcile with them.
November 11, 2017
Jeannie's graves' a mirror too
If there's a reflection it's out of true
Burn color film if the snow don't debut
We want your virtue, lies, the booze pas de deux.
The world's a set piece but Jeannie knew
"It's time to die in bed with the flu"
& when the men cried, the girls just "achoo"
The mirror's a weapon, oh Jeannie, I'm through.
If there's a reflection it's out of true
Burn color film if the snow don't debut
We want your virtue, lies, the booze pas de deux.
The world's a set piece but Jeannie knew
"It's time to die in bed with the flu"
& when the men cried, the girls just "achoo"
The mirror's a weapon, oh Jeannie, I'm through.
January 30, 2018
Love Jean Harlow films. The whole theme that she was the opposite of her screen personna, didn't want to be in movies, wanted only to be a wife and mother, was unaware of her sex appeal, was a total victim of her mother, just doesn't ring true. It's just a bit too one dimensional to be believed.
But worth a read.
But worth a read.
April 26, 2022
I bought this book with a fairly limited understanding of Jean Harlow - I’ve seen her films, but only had a cursory understanding of her life story and her rise to fame. I found this book to be a wonderful overview of her life, and very well researched. Jean seemed to have been a lovely person who came into her field by accident, but excelled anyway.
January 9, 2008
another tragic Hollywood blond bombshell story but she died so young and had so much spitfire left in her and as always she fell for the wrong man.
July 25, 2015
Enjoyable yet sad biography of the young starlet who died tragically young.
October 28, 2015
Sad story.
October 7, 2022
Esta historia, la de la flamante Jean Harlow, de la que pensaba que era simplemente una hermosa rubia platino teñida, y algo promiscua para su edad, me ha dejado anonadada y con una tremenda tristeza. Jean Harlow, conocida por todos, cuando su nombre real fue Harlean, fue simplemente un triste títere en una vida teñida por su posesiva y loca madre que la veía como un medio para conseguir una carrera en Hollywood, algo que ella siempre quiso pero no pudo conseguir; un ausente pero querido padre, un padrastro vividor, manipulador y mujeriego, y una lista de esposos que solo querían una parte de ella.
Jean Harlow pasó toda su corta vida buscando algo que nunca encontró. Sincero amor. Y su última relación con William Powell, la cual en muchos lados idolatran como su verdadero amor es totalmente lo contrario. Él la quería sí, pero no la amaba. Le daba regalos, salían juntos pero nunca formalizó su relación más allá de ello, nunca se comprometieron, y mientras Harlow languidecía falleciendo en su propia casa, él ya estaba saliendo con otra mujer...
Oh, y aquella muerte. Harlow fue apagándose poco a poco, hasta quedar irreconocible. Murió a la corta edad de 26 años de complicaciones secundarias a falla renal por una glomerulonefritis post-estreptocócica que adquirió cuando apenas era una niña.
Su vida nunca fue suya, su madre siempre le impidió conseguir su independencia y la volvió una triste marioneta, a la que accedía hacer caso sin importar sus propios deseos. Por ella abortó (2 veces), por ella abandonó a quien a mi parecer tal vez hubiera sido su verdadero compañero de vida (su primer esposo, quien la buscó inclusive después de su divorcio), por ella llegó a Hollywood, y a pesar de haberla manipulado toda su vida, Jean murió sin rencor al parecer alguno hacia ella. Aunque entre líneas se entreve que probablemente supo la triste verdad.
Una mezcla demasiado fascinante para mí. Por un lado una actriz, que a pesar de sus tantas inseguridades en su talento, totalmente desinhibida en pantalla y en la vida real, infatuada con hombres mucho mayores que ella, bañándose desnuda y dejando siempre entrever su intimidad sin temor alguno a los demás, seductora y algo frívola, humilde y cariñosa con todos quienes la rodeaban; y al mismo tiempo temerosa ante su impetuosa y obsesiva madre, nunca negándose a los caprichos de quienes la rodeaban, nunca tomando propias decisiones en cuanto a su vida, y tristemente nunca llegando a saber quien era ella realmente. Viviendo la vida de otros, pero nunca la suya.
Toda su vida fue tristeza y aquellos que sabían la verdad solo la compadecían, y aunque en muchas ocasiones la quisieron ayudar, su destino ya estaba sellado. Jean Harlow fue una trágica actriz, quien a pesar de haber vivido demasiado a su corta edad, nunca supo lo que era realmente vivir.
Jean Harlow pasó toda su corta vida buscando algo que nunca encontró. Sincero amor. Y su última relación con William Powell, la cual en muchos lados idolatran como su verdadero amor es totalmente lo contrario. Él la quería sí, pero no la amaba. Le daba regalos, salían juntos pero nunca formalizó su relación más allá de ello, nunca se comprometieron, y mientras Harlow languidecía falleciendo en su propia casa, él ya estaba saliendo con otra mujer...
Oh, y aquella muerte. Harlow fue apagándose poco a poco, hasta quedar irreconocible. Murió a la corta edad de 26 años de complicaciones secundarias a falla renal por una glomerulonefritis post-estreptocócica que adquirió cuando apenas era una niña.
Su vida nunca fue suya, su madre siempre le impidió conseguir su independencia y la volvió una triste marioneta, a la que accedía hacer caso sin importar sus propios deseos. Por ella abortó (2 veces), por ella abandonó a quien a mi parecer tal vez hubiera sido su verdadero compañero de vida (su primer esposo, quien la buscó inclusive después de su divorcio), por ella llegó a Hollywood, y a pesar de haberla manipulado toda su vida, Jean murió sin rencor al parecer alguno hacia ella. Aunque entre líneas se entreve que probablemente supo la triste verdad.
Una mezcla demasiado fascinante para mí. Por un lado una actriz, que a pesar de sus tantas inseguridades en su talento, totalmente desinhibida en pantalla y en la vida real, infatuada con hombres mucho mayores que ella, bañándose desnuda y dejando siempre entrever su intimidad sin temor alguno a los demás, seductora y algo frívola, humilde y cariñosa con todos quienes la rodeaban; y al mismo tiempo temerosa ante su impetuosa y obsesiva madre, nunca negándose a los caprichos de quienes la rodeaban, nunca tomando propias decisiones en cuanto a su vida, y tristemente nunca llegando a saber quien era ella realmente. Viviendo la vida de otros, pero nunca la suya.
Toda su vida fue tristeza y aquellos que sabían la verdad solo la compadecían, y aunque en muchas ocasiones la quisieron ayudar, su destino ya estaba sellado. Jean Harlow fue una trágica actriz, quien a pesar de haber vivido demasiado a su corta edad, nunca supo lo que era realmente vivir.
January 13, 2019
I love Jean so being able to read this book was such a treasure for me. I already knew quite a bit about her life but it was nice to have it pieced together as a timeline. To be able to read the thoughts and anecdotes from people that were blessed enough to be in her presence was a real pleasure.
Unfortunately, even though I knew how she passed, the last chapters broke my heart all the same. I sobbed reading how the man she loved and adored was too busy on set, and already seeing another woman, to show up to her bedside until she was too far gone (though it was nice to know how the guilt ate at him for some time). To know how she gave up in those last moments, resigning her mind to the fact that nothing could be done and being more than ready to leave this world behind, never having been the wife and mother she desperately desired to be, it was heart-wrenching.
I have always thought that had Jean and I known each other, we would have been great friends. Though I am no glamorous Hollywood star, I see so much of her life mirrored in my own. She just needed someone to see her, truly see her, and to love her for it. She needed someone that saw how smart and capable she was. Perhaps, if someone had done that for her, she would have stopped listening to monster Mama Jean and gone on to live her own life, instead of simply being the channel for someone else's missed chances and broken dreams. Maybe we would have never seen her grace the silver screen if that had happened but at least she would have hopefully been happy. Sadly, we shall never know.
I only have one minor complaint and that is that the author felt the need to mention Marilyn Monroe near the end. Sure, she copied Jean Harlow and even looked up to her. Both are blonde, sex symbols of their time but I believe that is where similarities end. Jean was way ahead of Marilyn, as a person and as an actor. I believe the book should be solely about Jean and any attempt to link the two at the end seemed in some way in bad taste (I admit that perhaps this is my own personal biases against Monroe coming into play here). I personally do not like the comparisons between the two and I am relieved that, though she wanted to, she never got to play Jean in a biopic.
Unfortunately, even though I knew how she passed, the last chapters broke my heart all the same. I sobbed reading how the man she loved and adored was too busy on set, and already seeing another woman, to show up to her bedside until she was too far gone (though it was nice to know how the guilt ate at him for some time). To know how she gave up in those last moments, resigning her mind to the fact that nothing could be done and being more than ready to leave this world behind, never having been the wife and mother she desperately desired to be, it was heart-wrenching.
I have always thought that had Jean and I known each other, we would have been great friends. Though I am no glamorous Hollywood star, I see so much of her life mirrored in my own. She just needed someone to see her, truly see her, and to love her for it. She needed someone that saw how smart and capable she was. Perhaps, if someone had done that for her, she would have stopped listening to monster Mama Jean and gone on to live her own life, instead of simply being the channel for someone else's missed chances and broken dreams. Maybe we would have never seen her grace the silver screen if that had happened but at least she would have hopefully been happy. Sadly, we shall never know.
I only have one minor complaint and that is that the author felt the need to mention Marilyn Monroe near the end. Sure, she copied Jean Harlow and even looked up to her. Both are blonde, sex symbols of their time but I believe that is where similarities end. Jean was way ahead of Marilyn, as a person and as an actor. I believe the book should be solely about Jean and any attempt to link the two at the end seemed in some way in bad taste (I admit that perhaps this is my own personal biases against Monroe coming into play here). I personally do not like the comparisons between the two and I am relieved that, though she wanted to, she never got to play Jean in a biopic.
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