THE QUIET LOVE STORY OF MAXENE ANDREWS & LYNDA WELLS

This past weekend, Hollywood manager and model Lynda Wells passed away at the age of 84 after a vallant battle witth cancer. She was the manager and companion of Maxene Andrews as well. For much of her life, Maxene Andrews lived in harmony—literally and figuratively—with the world watching. As the soprano voice of the Andrews Sisters, she helped define the sound of America during World War II, her voice ringing out from radios, USO stages, and movie screens as a symbol of patriotism and optimism. Yet behind the carefully maintained public image of smiling glamour and perfect harmony existed a private life shaped by restraint, secrecy, and ultimately, devotion. At the center of that life was Lynda Wells.

When Maxene met Lynda Wells in the early 1970s, she was in her mid‑50s and already a legend. The Andrews Sisters’ heyday had long passed, and Maxene’s relationship with her surviving sister, Patty, had deteriorated into estrangement. It was a period of personal recalibration following decades of fame and pressure, and it was during this quieter chapter that she and Wells connected. Various accounts describe Wells first as Maxene’s manager, but describing her role that way alone misses the depth of their bond. Wells soon became Maxene’s most constant companion, her advocate, and eventually her family in every way that mattered, even if the law did not yet recognize it. 

Their partnership unfolded in an era when same‑sex relationships, especially among public figures tied to patriotic imagery, were not merely frowned upon but could have destroyed careers and legacies. Maxene had already experienced how carefully image had to be managed. Earlier in her life, she had married music publisher Lou Levy, a union that ended in separation in 1949, and while she later entered relationships with women, these remained deeply private. With Wells, however, something shifted. Friends and later historians have noted that this was not a fleeting romance but a lasting, stabilizing relationship that endured for more than two decades, until Maxene’s death in 1995. 

What makes their love story particularly poignant is the way it was lived: plainly, quietly, and without bitterness toward a world that gave them no vocabulary for legitimacy. Wells traveled with Maxene, managed her later career, and cared for her in health and illness. They made a home together, not as a rebellion but as a natural extension of companionship. In later interviews, Wells emphasized that Maxene did not frame her life through labels or activism; singing remained her great love, and Wells was the person who made life around that love possible.

Because same‑sex marriage was not an option, Maxene and Wells took a step that may seem unusual today but was a known legal strategy among queer couples in the twentieth century: Maxene legally adopted Wells as her daughter. This act was not about redefining their personal relationship but about ensuring basic protections—hospital access, inheritance rights, and recognition as family—at a time when the law offered no other path. Historians have since documented this practice as a quiet form of resistance and survival rather than secrecy for its own sake. 

Their bond remained largely invisible to the public during Maxene’s lifetime, but it was undeniable to those who knew her. When Maxene died of a heart attack on October 21, 1995, she was vacationing on Cape Cod with Lynda Wells at her side. Wells was there not as a footnote, not as an assistant, but as the person who had shared Maxene’s private world for over twenty years. In death, as in life, their connection was quietly acknowledged, even if never publicly celebrated in the way it might be today. 

In recent years, as scholars, journalists, and filmmakers have revisited the lives of historical figures with fuller honesty, the love story of Maxene Andrews and Lynda Wells has begun to emerge from the margins. Projects like An All American Affair: The True Story of Maxene Andrews aim to tell that fuller story—not to diminish Maxene’s legacy, but to deepen it by acknowledging the reality of the woman behind the voice. 

Their story is not one of scandal or tragedy. It is a story of endurance, of choosing companionship in a world that demanded silence, and of finding love not in defiance of identity but in its quiet acceptance. Maxene Andrews spent her life singing in perfect harmony with others. With Lynda Wells, she finally found a harmony that required no performance at all...

HOLLYWOOD LOVE: FRANK SINATRA AND MIA FARROW

On July 19, 1966, Frank Sinatra and Mia Farrow embarked on a marriage that would become as iconic as it was tumultuous, symbolizing the glamour and complexities of Hollywood love stories. Their wedding took place at the Las Vegas home of Sinatra's friend Jack Entratter, with the couple exuding an unusual charm. At the time, Farrow was only 21, a young actress whose ethereal beauty had caught the public’s eye, while Sinatra, a legendary crooner and established Hollywood icon, was 50. Despite the nearly 30-year age gap, their romance captivated the media and fans alike, drawing both fascination and speculation. Sinatra’s affection for Farrow was undeniable, and at his insistence, she initially agreed to step back from her budding acting career to focus on their marriage. This decision came at a time when Sinatra’s career was thriving, and he longed for a more traditional companion, perhaps one who would shadow his footsteps quietly. However, Farrow’s youthful ambition and emerging identity as an actress soon conflicted with Sinatra's expectations. Their brief marriage would come to reflect the clash between two distinct personalities—a seasoned star seeking stability and a young actress navigating the waters of fame and independence.

In the months that followed their wedding, Farrow traveled with Sinatra on his film shoots, portraying the role of the devoted wife. Yet the dynamic soon began to reveal cracks, as Farrow grew restless with the idea of being just a companion on the sidelines. In 1967, Farrow made the pivotal decision to accept the lead role in "Rosemary’s Baby," a horror film that would later define her career. Her commitment to the film led to a clash with Sinatra, who had cast her in a role in his own upcoming movie, The Detective. Farrow’s involvement in Rosemary’s Baby soon ran over its scheduled timeline, creating a rift with Sinatra that would culminate in a drastic turn. While Farrow was immersed in the haunting scenes of the film, Sinatra’s frustration grew, feeling sidelined as his wife’s professional ambitions took precedence over her commitment to their marriage. When Farrow failed to report for filming on The Detective, Sinatra, in a decision that spoke to his own sense of pride and professionalism, replaced her with actress Jacqueline Bisset. The couple's relationship continued to strain, as Sinatra’s lawyer served Farrow with divorce papers on the set of Rosemary’s Baby in November 1967, a dramatic moment that underscored the tragic end to their whirlwind romance.

The divorce papers, served amid the intensity of filming, came as a blow to Farrow, who later admitted that she bore some responsibility for the marriage’s failure. Reflecting on the relationship, Farrow described herself as an “impossibly immature teenager” during that period, noting how their vast age difference had contributed to the dissolution of their union. Sinatra, in contrast, was accustomed to a lifestyle and partner dynamic that Farrow could not comfortably conform to. In hindsight, she acknowledged that they had been at different stages of life, and despite her deep admiration for Sinatra, their needs ultimately clashed in ways that were irreconcilable. The age gap, combined with Sinatra’s traditional expectations and Farrow’s desire for a career, created an insurmountable rift. Though the romance was short-lived, it left an indelible mark on both of their lives. The two managed to mend their friendship in the years following their divorce, remaining close and supportive of one another until Sinatra’s death, an unusual yet enduring connection forged through mutual respect and affection.
Their wedding day, captured in photographs at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas, remains etched in Hollywood history. The images show a young, hopeful Mia Farrow alongside the charismatic Sinatra, both of them draped in a mix of glamor and vulnerability. Farrow’s pixie cut, a daring fashion statement at the time, contrasted with Sinatra’s classic, polished look, encapsulating the blend of old Hollywood and the emerging modern era. These photos reveal the undeniable chemistry between them, a bond that, despite the challenges, was once filled with genuine warmth. Yet, the marriage was emblematic of the intense pressures that often plagued Hollywood couples, caught between personal aspirations and public scrutiny. Sinatra and Farrow’s relationship story became part of the Hollywood lore, capturing the imagination of fans who saw in them a mix of romance, mystery, and sadness. Though their marriage ended, the brief union left behind a powerful narrative of love, ambition, and the struggles that come with balancing personal and professional lives under the spotlight.

In August 1968, their divorce was finalized, closing a chapter on what could have been a legendary love story. The aftermath saw both continue to build their legacies, with Sinatra further solidifying his place as a music and film icon, while Farrow’s performance in Rosemary’s Baby catapulted her into stardom, forever intertwining her name with one of cinema’s most haunting films. They each pursued separate paths but kept a bond that would last through the decades, with Farrow speaking warmly of Sinatra even after his passing. This marriage, though short-lived, stands as a reminder of how love and ambition can collide, especially in an industry that magnifies every flaw and tests the resilience of relationships. Sinatra and Farrow’s wedding day photos remain a poignant glimpse into a fleeting but unforgettable romance—a union that was both a product of its era and a timeless tale of two people who, despite their differences, found a moment of connection in the unpredictable world of fame...

HOLLYWOOD LOVE: JERRY STILLER AND ANNE MEARA

 Jerry Stiller on meeting Anne Meara: "She seemed to sense I had no money, so she just ordered coffee. Then she took all the silverware. I picked up her check for ten cents and thought, 'This is a girl I'd like to hang out with.'

Meara met Stiller in 1953, and they married in 1955, after a two-year relationship. Until he suggested it, she had never thought of doing comedy. "Jerry started us being a comedy team," she said. "He always thought I would be a great comedy partner." They joined the Chicago improvisational company The Compass Players (which later became The Second City), and after leaving, formed the comedy team of Stiller and Meara. In 1961, they were performing in nightclubs in New York, and by the following year were considered a "national phenomenon," said the New York Times.

Their often improvised comedy routines brought many of their relationship foibles to live audiences. Their skits focused on domestic themes, as did Nichols and May, another comedy team during that period from the Chicago Compass Players project. "They were Nichols and May without the acid and with warmth," notes author Lawrence Epstein. They also added a new twist to their comedy act, he adds, by sometimes playing up the fact that Stiller was Jewish and Meara was Catholic. After Nichols and May broke up as a team in 1961, Stiller and Meara were the number-one couple comedy team by the late 1960s. And as Mike Nichols and Elaine May were not married, Stiller and Meara became the most famous married couple comedy team since Burns and Allen.

Though Meara was born, baptized, and raised a Roman Catholic, she converted to Judaism six years after marrying Stiller. She took her conversion seriously and studied the Jewish faith in such depth that her Jewish-born husband quipped, "Being married to Anne has made me more Jewish." Anee Meara died in 2015, and Jerry Stiller died in 2020...

HOLLYWOOD LOVE: GENE WILDER AND GILDA RADNER

In 1991, Gene Wilder wrote a touching story for People Magazine on Gilda Radner's final days. Their love was a rare love in Hollywood. Even though Gene Wilder would eventfully remarry, I don't feel that he ever got over the death of Gilda. Even as she was dying, Gilda Radner went for laughs. At home, Gene Wilder remembers, she enacted her infamous Saturday Night character Roseanne Roseannadanna, shouting at the cancer cells invading her body, ”Hey, what are you trying to do in here? Make me sick?” The cruel punch line, of course, was yes, and on May 20, 1989, ovarian cancer claimed America’s comedic sweetheart. Wilder was bereft. As Gilda once described their bond, ”My life went from black-white to Technicolor.”

Until three weeks before Gilda died, I believed she would make it. If I made one contribution to this ovarian-cancer nightmare, it was that I was so dumb – or ignorant or innocent that I never believed she would die so soon. Never. Gilda would wake up frightened in the middle of the night and ask me over and over again, ”Am I going to die?” I kept telling her, ”I’ll die before you do.” And I meant it. Gilda was too strong a fighter. Her spirit would never give in to cancer, I thought. I was wrong.

Three days before she died, at Cedars-Sinai, she had to go down to radiology for a CAT scan – but the people there couldn’t keep her on the gurney. She was raving like a crazed woman – she knew they would give her morphine and was afraid she’d never regain consciousness. She kept getting off the cart as they were wheeling her out. Finally three people were holding her gently and saying, ”Come on, Gilda. We’re just going to go down and come back up.” She kept saying, ”Get me out, get me out!” She’d look at me and beg me, ”Help me out of here. I’ve got to get out of here.” And I’d tell her, ”You’re okay, honey. I know. I know.” They sedated her, and when she came back, she remained unconscious for three days. I stayed at her side late into the night, sometimes sleeping over. Finally a doctor told me to go home to get some sleep.

At 4 A.M. on Saturday, May 20, 1989 I heard a pounding on my door. It was an old friend, a surgeon, who told me, ”Come on. It’s time to go.” When I got there, a night nurse, whom I still want to thank, had washed Gilda and taken out all the tubes. She put a pretty yellow barrette in her hair. She looked like an angel. So peaceful. She was still alive, and as she lay there, I kissed her. But then her breathing became irregular, and there were long gaps and little gasps. Two hours after I arrived, Gilda was gone. While she was conscious, I never said goodbye.

For us, it all started on the first Sunday in January 1986. We were driving to play tennis in Los Angeles at a friend’s house. Gilda began to feel what she described as a fog rolling in. She said, ”I can’t keep my eyes open. I think I’m going to fall asleep.” She lay back and looked like she had taken a sleeping pill. We made it to the tennis courts, and once she started playing, it went away.

We thought it probably wasn’t serious, but she went to an internist in Los Angeles to check it out. He did a full blood workup and came back and said, ”You have Epstein-Barr virus, chronic fatigue.” He told her, ”Go home, relax, don’t worry about it.” But over the next months the symptoms kept coming. They’d come for 10 days and go away. The sudden fatigue, the feeling of a fog would hit, and then she’d take a nap in the afternoon and wake up feeling fine.

We left L.A. for our home in Connecticut, and the symptoms got worse. She was so bloated she started to have trouble buttoning the top of her slacks. She’d look at me and say, ”I can’t close this button.” And she hadn’t gained any weight.

In June we went to Paris, and I took her to my favorite bistro. After we ate, she started feeling uncomfortable, and the discomfort grew when we went outside walking on the street. She said she had cramps, pains in her tummy, terrible bloating. She lay down and doubled over on the curb while I hollered for a taxi to go back to the hotel. In July we got back, and she started to develop what she called nervous legs. She couldn’t keep them still. She had shooting pains down her thighs. All the time she was moving them, even in bed at night. Moving, moving, moving until finally she went to sleep.

All these months we’d been seeing different doctors. A gynecologist in California did a pelvic examination and said everything was fine. One of the doctors thought the symptoms just had to do with her ovulating. In New York her gynecologist said she thought it was a stomach problem. We went to a gastroenterologist who did some blood work, a sonogram and a pelvic. He said it wasn’t anything life-threatening. He said, ”She’s a very nervous, emotional girl. She’s got to relax.” Gilda kept saying to all the doctors, ”It’s not cancer, is it?” But the doctors – every one of them for 10 months – took note of the fact that Gilda was a high-strung person and kept telling her, ”No, don’t worry. Go home and relax.”

Then Gilda started to bloat so much that her belly stuck out like a balloon. We went back to California, and she went to see the internist again. He sent her for another gynecological exam. They found nothing. Then he did more blood work, and finally, three weeks later, he called and told us to come in. ”Something’s irregular about your liver function,” he said. Gilda started to scream, ”What do you mean? What are you saying?”

On Oct. 24 he put her into the hospital. That night, 10 months after Gilda was first examined, the doctor told us, ”We’ve discovered a malignancy.” When she first heard the words ”ovarian cancer,” Gilda cried, but then she turned to me and said, ”Thank God, finally someone believes me!”

When I left that night, the doctor took me outside. I never told her this, but he said, ”She doesn’t have much chance.” They operated 36 hours later and found a grapefruit-size tumor. It was advanced ovarian cancer, Stage IV. The doctor told her, ”I left you clean.” Then came the world of chemotherapy once every three weeks for months. Gilda wanted to find humor in it to make it less scary. We made a video of her during chemotherapy that she would play back later, when she was feeling better. ”Look at me,” she’d say, bouncing around like she was the lightweight champion of the world. When her hair fell out, she was devastated, but eventually she made jokes about that too.

Of all the mistakes I made dealing with her illness, and I promise you I’ve made some I’m too ashamed to talk about, it was never an issue when Gilda lost her hair. Those little bean sprouts growing on top of her head were adorable, like a newborn baby. I thought it was sexy. And the more I thought that, the happier it made Gilda. But still, we both had rough times. No matter how often she went in for chemo, the night before was always bad because she knew she would be so sick afterward. ”I don’t want to go,” she’d say in tears. Gilda was going through hell, but for a while doctors thought the treatments were working. One internist told us, ”Do you realize how lucky you are? This could be a cure.” He gave us hope. But he didn’t know much about advanced ovarian cancer – and neither did we.

For weeks after Gilda died, I was shouting at the walls. I kept thinking to myself, ”This doesn’t make sense.” The fact is, Gilda didn’t have to die. But I was ignorant, Gilda was ignorant – the doctors were ignorant.

She could be alive today if I knew then what I know now. Gilda might have been caught at a less-advanced stage if two things had been done: if she had been given a CA 125 blood test as soon as she described her symptoms to the doctors instead of 10 months later, and if the doctors had known the significance of asking her about her family’s history of ovarian cancer. But they didn’t. So Gilda went through the tortures of the damned and at the end, I felt robbed.

All along I kept hearing Gilda saying, ”Don’t just sit there, dummy, do something!” So I started contacting experts, looking for explanations. Among the many doctors I called was Dr. Ezra Greenspan, Gilda’s New York oncologist. I asked him, ”What if someone had given Gilda a CA 125 blood test when she first started showing symptoms?” He told me, ”She could be alive today.” The rationale I have worked out for myself is simple, and I live with it. The doctors who worked with Gilda were mostly wonderful people. But here’s the thing: None of them put it all together and said, ”Wait a minute, now. Does anyone in your family have ovarian cancer?”

As it happens, Gilda’s grandmother, her cousin and her aunt had ovarian cancer, but she didn’t know it. If only they had taken a thorough family history, she would have found out. So many of the doctors wrote off what Gilda was telling them by saying she was a high-strung, emotional, nervous girl. But that’s not why she died.

If I need to cry or think a little bit, I’ll go over to the cemetery where she is buried to make sure the tree our friends planted is doing well and the grounds are kept up. I think one of the things that would make Gilda happiest is if Sparkle, her Yorkshire terrier, pee-peed right on top of her grave. One for Mama. She’d laugh.

I don’t feel guilty about what happened. We were all so ignorant about ovarian cancer. That’s one of the reasons I went to Congress to testify. I don’t like giving speeches. It makes me nervous. But I kept hearing Gilda shouting, ”It’s too late for me. Don’t let it happen to anyone else.”

I’ve learned a lot about ovarian cancer since Gilda died, but I’ve avoided talking about it in such a public way because I don’t want to pretend to be a doctor. But we have to learn from the past, from the mistakes. I’m hoping in some small way to help the other Gildas out there. When I was walking through the halls of Congress, waiting to testify, I could hear that raspy, whining voice – Gilda’s – saying, ”Go on, don’t make such a big deal of it. Now, don’t get mushy, don’t get melancholy. You’re not the victim. I was the victim. Don’t go soft and sad and poetic, as if a great tragedy happened to you.”

Okay, okay, Gilda. Now will you stop hollering in my ear!

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HOLLYWOOD LOVE: JULIE ANDREWS AND BLAKE EDWARDS

Despite being married to her first husband from 1959 to 1967, screen legend Julie Andrews found lasting love with her 2nd husband - director Blake Edwards. Later, Andrews went on to share her meet-cute story with the late Blake Edwards, her husband of over 40 years who she first made eye contact with at an intersection in Hollywood as he sat in his Rolls-Royce. "I was trying very hard not to fall in love with him. And that was Blake Edwards," Andrews said of Edwards, the director of Breakfast at Tiffany's and The Pink Panther movies. Edwards himself once described the way they'd met as "wonderfully Hollywood."

Ten years before they actually married in 1969, Julie Andrews and director Blake Edwards met like ships passing in the night, the actress revealed in a 2015 interview with Good Morning Britain.

Andrews explained how they spoke briefly from their cars, outside of a therapist's office, during their first introduction, which she deemed "corny": "I was going one way and he was going the other, he rolled down the window after smiling a couple of times and he said, 'Are you going where I just came from?'"

Despite their rom-com-appropriate meeting, their marriage was far from easy, particularly because of Edwards's hypochondria, mood swings, and suicidal thoughts. Together, they raised Emma, Amy and Joanna (two adopted daughters), and Jennifer and Geoffrey (Edwards's children). And Andrews admitted that as the daughter of an alcoholic mother and stepfather, she may have tried to "rescue" Edwards in a way. "You have to remember, I was very used to that kind of thing, cause I was—you know—a very big codependent with my own family," she said. "And so I became that with Blake."

No matter what, Andrews told herself, "we will have harmony in this house," and made it work. Andrews and Edwards were devoted to each other from their marriage in 1969 until the director's passing in 2010, and for their 20th wedding anniversary, Andrews read him a poem, one that still remains embedded in her memory: "And darling, when I show you this poem—I know what you will say. 'What else?' You'll grin. 'What else, will you write of me today?'"

HOLLYWOOD LOVE: DINAH SHORE AND BURT REYNOLDS

He said goodbye to the love of his life in 1994 and regretted it every day since ..

Every February, Burt Reynold an elderly man, grey and stooping, walked alone through Forest Lawns Cemetery, Palm Springs, California, and placed a wreath of roses on the grave of the woman he loved and lost.

Burt Reynolds outlived the love of his life, Dinah Shore by 24 years until his death in September of 2018, but he never forgot his true love.

They had met in 1970 when Burt Reynolds was 35 and Hollywood's most sought-after leading man. She was 53, now the grande dame of TV talk shows, cool, aloof and still hauntingly beautiful. Reynolds had burst into movies from college football and his dark macho looks made him the star of half a dozen big-earning Westerns and the dream lover of millions of women fans.

He had married and divorced TV Laugh-In star Judy Carne, and had well publicised affairs with Sally Field, Raquel Welch and tennis star Chris Evert. He was living with Japanese actress Miko Mayama and Hollywood rumour was that they would get married. But meeting Dinah Shore, as a guest on her TV chat-show, changed all that. "I had never met her before but out of the blue I asked her to come to Palm Springs for the weekend. She said no, but I knew it was the beginning of the most special relationship of my life.

"I'd never met anyone like her. I realised there was a big age gap between us but it didn't make the slightest difference. I was already in love with her."

"Being with Dinah opened every Hollywood door," Reynolds said. "I got to know Sinatra, Jack Benny, Edward G. Robinson, Groucho Marx, Peggy Lee, Orson Welles. Everyone knew Dinah and they all loved her."

After four years together, the happiness and closeness of Burt Reynolds and Dinah Shore had become Hollywood legend. "We dreamed of building a house in Hawaii. We couldn't have been more in love. But there was a snag. Dinah wouldn't marry me.

"She said it was because she couldn't give me children and it's true I wanted them badly. But we could have adopted. I knew it was more than that.

"Even so, Dinah had everything I ever wanted in a woman. And when I told her: 'I want to be with you for the rest of my life,' I really meant it. And yet a year later he was telling friends: "Breaking up with Dinah is the hardest thing I have ever done in my life. I knew it was time to get married or move on, and she refused to marry me."

During a tearful confrontation in 1975, Reynolds told Dinah Shore: "I will love you all my life. The hardest part is that I'm falling deeper in love with you every moment." Then he turned and walked away.

Reynolds cried for days afterwards. "A piece of me was lost. I missed the closeness and the friendship and to be truthful I've never stopped missing it ever since. Every time I picked up the phone I wanted to call her".

Burt Reynolds' desire for children made him marry glamorous Loni Anderson. They had a son, Quinton, but the marriage was soon in trouble and ended in a $10 million divorce.

Alone again, Burt Reynolds rang Dinah Shore hoping to get together again. But she refused to see him despite his pleading.

Finally, from a friend, he discovered her tragic secret — the reason why she had refused to marry him and why she now had broken off the relationship for good. Dinah Shore had terminal cancer. She died in 1994.

He never got to say goodbye to Dinah so for the rest of his life Burt would visit her grave, and now maybe they are together again...

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HOLLYWOOD LOVE: SAMMY DAVIS JR AND KIM NOVAK

In 1957, Sammy Davis Jr. was a rising star. He’d just completed an acclaimed performance in Mr. Wonderful on Broadway and had a popular nightclub act with his father and uncle called the Will Mastin Trio. It was a strong comeback from a car accident three years earlier, when a pipe went through Davis’s eye, permanently blinding him. For the rest of his life, he would wear a glass eye.

The accident, however did nothing to curtail Davis’s charisma and sex appeal. Hollywood starlet Kim Novak certainly noticed him. She was about to film Hitchcock’s Vertigo when she saw Davis perform in a Chicago nightclub. Though they didn’t speak much at the time, Davis wanted to get to know the actress. His friends Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh obliged by inviting both of them to a party at their house. Soon afterward, there was a blind item in a gossip column: “Which top female movie star (K.N.) is seriously dating which big-name entertainer (S.D.)?”

This bit of idle gossip was far from harmless. An affair between Novak and Davis had the potential to destroy both of their careers. In 1957, interracial marriage was illegal in half the states. Most Americans were against it. A Gallup poll from 1958 showed that only 4 percent of Americans approved of interracial marriage. On top of that, the United States Supreme Court had only recently ordered the desegregation of public schools, and the showdown in Little Rock, Arkansas, over the integration of the city’s Central High School would occur the following year. The national atmosphere was fraught with racial tension.

As a black man, Davis had been stopped from dating white women before, but this time was different. Novak was a movie star. That year, newspapers were calling her “the hottest female draw at the box office” thanks to films like The Man with the Golden Arm and Pal Joey. Columbia Pictures was grooming her to replace Rita Hayworth, who studio head Harry Cohn disliked. As the latest Hollywood sex goddess, Novak was potentially worth millions.

When he saw the gossip item, Davis called Novak to apologize for putting her in an awkward position with the studio. According to his autobiography Sammy, Novak replied, “The studio doesn’t own me!” and invited him over for spaghetti and meatballs. Soon after, they were dating.

Their affair continued for most of 1957. Davis and Novak were aware of the risks they were taking, but that, it seems, made the relationship more exciting. “She hadn’t thought about me anymore than I had thought about her—until it was forbidden,” Davis wrote in his autobiography. “Then we became conspirators, drawn together by the single thing we had in common: defiance.”

Arthur Silber, a close friend and companion of Davis, often chauffeured the couple to a rented beach house in Malibu. They went to great length to hide their relationship—Davis would sometimes lie on the floor of the car under a blanket to avoid being seen with Novak.

“It was like we were in the FBI or something,” Silber says in an interview. “I would drop him off in front of her house in Beverly Hills and we would set up a time or a day for me to pick him up.” Davis also had a private phone line installed at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas where he worked so he could talk to Novak without the hotel switchboard listening in.

In December, Novak went home to Chicago for the holidays while Davis stayed in Las Vegas. He missed Novak so much that he found a replacement for his act and flew overnight to see her and meet her parents.

Irv Kupcinet of the Chicago Sun-Times heard about the visit and mentioned it in his column. Gossip heated up. There was a rumor Davis and Novak had taken out a marriage license. “Kim Novak is about to become engaged to Sammy Davis Jr. and Hollywood is aghast,” reported The London Daily Mirror. When Columbia Studio head Harry Cohn found out, he became enraged that his star—who he regarded as property he’d invested in—was dating a black man.The next morning, while flying to Los Angeles, he had the first of several heart attacks that would soon kill him.

By all accounts, Cohn was a ruthless studio chief who admired Benito Mussolini and had ties to the Chicago mob. He even wore matching ruby “friendship rings” with gangster Johnny Roselli. There are various accounts of what happened next, but what’s clear is that Cohn took out a mob hit on Davis. Gangster Mickey Cohen found Davis’s father and passed on the threat. Silber was there when Davis received the phone call, and he begged Davis to break up with Kim Novak. Sadly, Sammy called Kim Novak, and they both agreed to end the relationship. It was a sad end to a beautiful romance and another example of how racism destroyed lives and relationships...

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HOLLYWOOD LOVE: BOBBY DARIN AND CONNIE FRANCIS

In the late 1950s, music was changing. A new group of singers emerged from these early days of rock ‘n’ roll. Two of those singers that rose to fame were Bobby Darin and Connie Francis. Not only were they the king and queen of these new recording artists, but they also had a short lived  love affair. It was a love affair that Connie Francis never really recovered from.

Bobby's new manager George Scheck worked hard to help the career of a young new singer he had discovered named Connie Francis (Concetta Franconero). Her father was an intimidating man who wasn't about to let ANYTHING stand in the way of his daughter's career. But this didn't stop Bobby Darin, who fell head-over-heels in love with Connie. In fact, he started to tell people that he wanted to marry her and that, not only would she make the perfect wife, but also the perfect mother for his children! (According to Connie Francis, Bobby actually proposed to her prior to EITHER of them ever having a hit record.). Despite some disagreement about material, after several weeks Darin and Francis developed a romantic relationship. Francis' strict Italian father would separate the couple whenever possible. When her father learned that Bobby Darin had suggested the two lovers elope after one of her shows, he ran Darin out of the building at gunpoint, telling him to never see his daughter again.

Once successful, Bobby and Connie remained close "professional" friends forever, even co-hosting the Heart-To-Heart Telethon for the American Heart Association as the King and Queen of Hearts! In 1959, they appeared together on The Ed Sullivan Show and sang a couple of duets. Ironically, Connie even recorded "My Teenage Love", the demo Bobby had written and recorded that first launched his career! (She also cut his composition "My First Real Love", which was released as her fourth MGM single ... and the backing group credited on the record, The Jaybirds, was, in fact, Bobby Darin overdubbed!

Francis saw Darin only two more times – once when the two were scheduled to sing together for a television show, and again when Francis was spotlighted on the TV series This Is Your Life. By the time of the latter's taping, Bobby Darin had married actress Sandra Dee. In her autobiography Francis stated she and her father were driving into the Lincoln Tunnel when the radio DJ announced Dee and Darin's marriage. Her father made a negative comment about Bobby finally being out of their lives. Angered, Francis wrote, she hoped the Hudson River would fill the Lincoln Tunnel, killing both her and her father.

When Bobby Darin died tragically young at the age of 37 in 1973, Connie had to be sedated. She threatened to slice her wrists and was unconsolable for days. Francis later wrote that not marrying Darin was the biggest mistake of her life. As late as 2011, Connie was talking about her lost love Bobby Darin. Would the relationship have worked? Probably not. Bobby Darin wanted a wife that would sit at home while he had the fame. He found that woman in Sandra Dee. Connie, at the time of their romance, had as much drive and determination as Bobby Darin had. The relationship might have never gone anywhere, but Bobby and Connie both shared a lasting love for each other…

STEVE LAWRENCE: LIFE WITHOUT EYDIE

In discussing Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, Frank Sinatra once said, “Steve and Eydie represent all that is good about performers and the interpretation of a song . . . they’re the best.”

High praise indeed from the “Chairman of the Board” himself. In the mid 1990s the husband and wife singing duo of Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme toured with “Old Blue Eyes.”

Lawrence was born Sidney Liebowitz, in Brooklyn on July 8, 1935. Eydie Gorme was born Edith Gormezano in the Bronx on Aug. 16, 1928.

While singer Tony Bennett was able to introduce himself to a new generation of fans and reinvent himself in the mid 1990s after appearing on episodes of MTV Unplugged, Steve & Eydie still never attempted a crossover or reinvention; instead they remained dedicated to their prime audience – the cocktail generation raised on the music of the Rat Pack.

During a phone conversation we had with him in the 1990s, Lawrence had a few things to say about Bennett’s transformation.

“I think we could bring the same to the show that Tony did – that is, he’s doing what he’s always done and that’s the way to go,” Lawrence told us. “You don’t abandon one audience in an attempt to capture another. A few of our colleagues have done that and it’s proven to be a big mistake.”

Outside of occasional appearances on The Dean Martin Show back in the 1960s; the closest Lawrence came to attaching his star – even for the briefest of moments – to anything remotely considered hip or topical was when he appeared as agent Maury Sline in the 1980 hit film, The Blues Brothers starring John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd.

Their stylish act consisted of married couple comic banter, but the centerpiece always remained the music. Lawrence, the easygoing crooner with the rich baritone, and Gorme, the belter with the big, brassy voice, covered the musical landscape with hits from the masters: George Gershwin, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin and Jerome Kern.

In October 2010, Steve and Eydie reached a career milestone when they celebrated their 50th anniversary as a popular singing duo. They were married in Las Vegas in 1957. Joe E. Lewis attended the ceremony wearing Chinese pajamas and Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, who were married there the same day, were witnesses.

Steve and Eydie began their careers as members of the cast of Steve Allen’s original Tonight Show. While starring with Allen, their individual recording careers flourished with such hits as “Blame It on the Bossa Nova” for Eydie and “Go Away Little Girl” for Steve. Steve and Eydie share a Grammy for the album, We’ve Got Us, and Eydie won a second Grammy for her solo recording of “If He Walked Into My Life.”

“We’re no different than anyone else,” said Lawrence. “Our disagreements run the gamut from professional to personal. In fact, one of the best shows we ever did came on the heels of a fight we had. I can’t recall what precipitated it. We walked out on stage and we were so hostile to each other. The more venomous it became, the more the audience loved it. When the show was over we were cleansed. It was actually cathartic.”

Steve and Eydie had two sons, one tragically died in 1986 at the age of 23 after knee surgery from a fall in a softball game. The young man, Michael, had experienced a mild heart condition as a teenager. Overcome with grief, the couple didn’t perform for a year.

On Aug. 10, 2013 the singing team was silenced forever when Gorme passed away just shy of her 85th birthday.

Since then, Lawrence, for the most part, has been absent from live performances and public appearances are rare.

When discussing the prospect of retirement at the time of our interview, he said, “Retirement is a decision based on a lot of different emotional levels. We’re sometimes the best ones to know and sometimes we’re the last ones to know. When you can no longer reach certain notes; when you are physically not strong enough to transmit that needed energy to an audience; these are all tell-tale signs along the professional highway that it might be time.”

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HOLLYWOOD LOVE: DESI ARNAZ AND LUCILLE BALL

I have to preface this story by saying I think Lucille Ball is overrated. I feel she is overrated as a funny lady. I feel she was more an actress doing comedy than an actual comedienne. I think her success as a funny lady was due to one person – her husband Desi Arnaz. Years later it would seem ironic that they met, in 1940, on the RKO set of a picture called Too Many Girls. She was a 28-year-old contract player with a string of forgettable films, he, at 23, a dashing, Cuban-horn nightclub bandleader. They married six months later. While she tended a soaring Hollywood career, but mediocre film career, he toured the country with his rumba band. 

By 1950 Lucy was starring on radio with actor Richard Denning in the popular CBS show My Favorite Husband. When the network launched a version of the show for the new medium of television, she insisted that Desi be cast as her spouse. The formula was magic. In its six-year run, I Love Lucy, making perfect use of Ball's vibrant talent and Desi's behind-the-scenes business savvy, would become the most successful comedy series on TV and earn millions for the couple's production company, Desilu. Each week 40 million viewers watched the onscreen antics of the Ricardo family. But off-screen, the Arnaz marriage, which produced two children before ending in a 1960 divorce, was a volatile interplay of alcoholism, infidelity—and a surpassing love that endured for nearly 50 years.

A lot of people though only knew the couple from what they saw on I Love Lucy, but there was a lot more to their marriage. Lillian Briggs Winograd, one of Lucy's closest friends once said: “Lucy had two or three miscarriages before she gave birth to little Lucie (on July 17, 1951. three months before the show's debut). She thought that having a baby would hold them together. Some of Desi's womanizing was alleviated from the moment little Lucie was born. I think he felt more sensitive about those things and stopped some of that. For a while, at least.”

Many people who knew them said Lucy was very bright, but Desi was the brains. He was the staunch one. He ran the whole thing. Lucy just deferred to him. When they were beginning I Love Lucy, Desi bargained for ownership of those 179 episodes, so they could show them to their children. There was no concept of reruns in those days. A few years later Desi sold them all back to CBS for millions. However, Desi always knew she was the star. While Desi had the affairs and drank, Lucy was tough on him. Family friend Bob Weiskopf had this to say: “There were a lot of occasions when Lucy insulted Desi—usually indirectly. She'd mention to someone else, Vivian [Vance, who played Ethel Mertz], for example, what had happened in a poker game over the weekend in Palm Springs. In front of him, she'd talk about what stupid plays he had made. I thought, "Jesus Christ, this guy's a saint." I would have punched her in the nose.”

In the mid-1950s, the magazine Confidential came out with a story saying Desi was a womanizer. A copy was given to Desi, and Lucy said, "I want to read this story." It was during a rehearsal day, and she went into her dressing room. Everybody was frozen on the set. She finally came out, tossed the magazine to Desi and said, "Oh, hell, I could tell them worse than that."

Veteran reporter Jim Bacon had this to say about the final straw: “Lucy put up with it quite a bit, but then it just became too embarrassing. Especially when he got arrested on Hollywood Boulevard. That was sometime in the '50s. The cops picked him up, drunk, standing in front of this whorehouse, singing Cuban songs.”

Desi was the love of Lucy's life. It was romantic, passionate, everything you could imagine in a love affair, and she was deeply hurt by what happened. They had tried like three times to get a divorce, but Lucy had always stopped it. Finally she planned to move to Switzerland, take her kids and get out of Hollywood. At the time, in 1960, she had one final commitment to do Wildcat on Broadway.

After their divorce in 1960, Lucille went on to marry comedian and producer Gary Morton (1924-1999). He was a dependable guy but not the love of Lucille’s life. Ball would go on to have two more sitcom hits back to back – The Lucy Show and Here’s Lucy. Ball became a very rich woman, but Desi Arnaz did not fare as well. Arnaz buried himself in a life of booze, women, and gambling. When his good friend Jimmy Durante died in 1980, he was visibly drunk at the funeral and had to be walked out. He didn't know where he was. He was even bombed that day.

Desi died of lung cancer on December 2, 1986. Ball visited him two days earlier and was visibly shaken. Lucy loved Desi till the day she died [following heart surgery on April 26, 1989], and she never recovered fully after his death.. He was the father of her kids. Close friends said that even after she married Gary, she'd still run home movies of her and Desi and the kids when they were little. Everybody was in them, smiling by the pool, running up real fast, waving hello, Lucy walking knock-kneed and doing her Lucy faces. She'd sit there giving commentaries. She loved watching those movies.

Was Lucille Ball the funniest woman? Was the marriage of Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball the greatest marriage? The answer is maybe not, but he helped to make Ball the icon she remains to be 25 years after her death. Lucy was the beauty and the talent, and Desi was the brains. Fans remember the happy times of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz on the screen, and maybe that is what is most important...

HOLLYWOOD LOVE: JIMMY AND GLORIA STEWART

It is so rare to find true Hollywood love stories that last. However, in the classic years of Hollywood it was possible. One such great love story was the marriage of screen legend Jimmy Stewart and model Gloria Hatrick McLean.

In 1949, James Stewart, distinguished actor, trend setter and military hero, added one more part to his growing repertoire, that of a family man. He met Gloria Hatrick McLean in the summer of 1948 when he accepted a dinner invitation to the home of Gary and Rocky Cooper. The 31 year old Gloria stole Stewart’s heart. She was beautiful, outgoing, well educated and she liked to play golf. She loved animals and the outdoors, and she was not an actress. When Stewart married her on August 9, 1949, they had a ready-made family. Gloria had two children, Ronald then five and Michael, three, from a previous marriage. Stewart, for years considered one of the most eligible bachelors in Hollywood, was 41 years old. In the fall of 1950, the Stewarts learned they were to become parents of twins. On May 7, 1951, fraternal twins Kelly & Judy were born. The Stewarts lived in Beverly Hills where many other celebrities resided. Yet their son Michael says they “were raised with that small-town Christian Presbyterian ethic that nobody owes you a living. If you have bad breaks, get up and move on. That was the attitude of both my parents, and it never changed.”

The Stewart family lived on Roxbury Drive in Beverly Hills, an area that was home to many of Hollywood's top stars. She was one of the few Hollywood types to plant and tend her own garden, and she would give the excess vegetables to Jimmy to take around to their neighbors. She and her husband also owned a ranch in Hawaii, returning to it every year for vacation when time permitted, to manage cattle and a macadamia nut orchard. They planned to build a retirement home there, but Gloria died before the house could be built in 1994. Jimmy never recovered and faded away after her death. He died in 1997, and his final days were spent dreaming of when he would be reunited with his beloved Gloria once again...

HOLLYWOOD LOVE: FRANK SINATRA AND AVA GARDNER

Not all Hollywood love stories come out with a happy ending - the majority of them do not. However, one of the most volatile and yet loving relationships actaully ended up in divorce and heart break. That relationship was the one between crooner Frank Sinatra and the beautiful actress Ava Gardner.

One night in 1948 Sinatra stood on the terrace of his ­Hollywood bachelor penthouse with his best friend, the songwriter Sammy Cahn, looking down over Sunset Strip. Frank's marriage to his childhood sweetheart Nancy was breaking up - it had been since he first rose to fame in the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra during World War II. His movie career was fading, and his records were not selling that much anymore.

‘Do you know that Ava Gardner lives down there?’ said Cahn, pointing to a little house nestled into the trees.

Cupping his hands to his mouth, he yelled ‘Ava … Ava Gardner!’ his big voice carrying far into the quiet evening. ‘We know you’re down there. Hello, Ava.’

The two men roared with laughter. And then a miracle. Down below, a curtain was drawn, a window opened and Ava stuck her head out. She knew exactly who it was. Sinatra’s voice was unmistakable. She grinned and waved. Was it an accident that they ran into each other a few days later, in front of her place? And then again in the street? Frank wasn’t usually keen on walking but suddenly he was getting out a lot. The third time, they both began laughing as he said hello.

He had met her, he remembered, when she was an 18-year-old starlet newly arrived in Hollywood and Mickey Rooney, no less, was madly in love with her. Though she was smokingly sexy, she was just a kid, Sinatra thought at the time, too young for him. He met her again and danced with her in a nightclub when he was with Lana, and she — at 23, divorced from both Rooney and her second husband, the band leader Artie Shaw — was with the ­billionaire tycoon Howard Hughes.

Then ­Sinatra’s friend Peter Lawford brought her to one of his parties. Dark haired with a white fur stole on her wide ­shoulders, he noticed how she prowled with the easy grace of a tigress. So began one of Hollywood’s ­legendary pairings of alpha male and female.

That night they went out drinking. Despite her stupendous looks, she had no confidence and alcohol, consumed in quantity, made her forget her deep self-doubt and feel glamorous, ­intelligent, desirable — a person worthy of the ­attentions of Frank Sinatra. She had always had a thing for ­musicians but he was in a different league. His voice had a quality, she said, ‘I’d only heard in two other people — Judy Garland and Maria Callas. It made me want to cry for happiness, like a beautiful sunset or a boys’ choir singing Christmas carols’.

Ava Gardner told the Press that she was the happiest girl in the world in 1951 when they got married but Ava's marriage to Frank was doomed from the start. Both had titanic appetites, for food, drink, cigarettes, diversion, companionship and sex. Both loved jazz. Both were politically ­liberal. Both ­distrusted sleep, fearing it as death’s mirror. Both hated being alone. Like him, she was infinitely restless and easily bored. In both, this tendency could lead to casual cruelty to others —and to each other. They quarrelled ­constantly. Friends whose house the lovers met in recalled how Ava would scream at Frank and he would slam the door and storm downstairs. Ava had trouble with intimacy.

When a man fell in love with her, she ­reciprocated for a little while, then she began to torment him. For Frank, the similarities with his bullying mother — who used to beat him but whose approval he constantly craved — were scary and exciting. In their constant battles, jealousy was their emotional ammunition. Frank could trigger it in her with the blink of an eye, so conditioned was he to ­scanning any crowded party for ­gorgeous girls. She was convinced he was ­cheating on her, even when he wasn’t.

t if it was hard work being married to Ava Gardner, it was just as tough being married to Frank Sinatra. It didn’t help that Frank’s career was on a downward spiral at the time — records not selling, films flopping — while hers was very much on the up. As a foul-mouthed facsimile of his mother, she was the dominant one in the ­relationship. As a sexual volcano, she ruled him in bed. And to top it all off, she was paying the bills while he struggled. The combination was corrosive.

They were forever breaking up, then getting back together. They would throw each other’s clothes, books and records out of the windows. The police had to be called more than once. The gossip columns had a field day, ­following their every move, tracking the time they spent together and apart. Increasingly she signed up for work that took her away from him. In Europe — while Frank was back in the U.S. ­making From Here To Eternity, the film that would put his career back on track — she was pursuing Spain’s best-known bullfighter, Luis Miguel Dominguín, four years her junior.

And leave him is what Ava did, blaming his ­infidelities. Later, she would say: ‘I was ­happier married to Frank than ever before. If I’d been ­willing to share him with other women we could have been happy.’ But, in reality, the break-up was her ­decision. They separated in October 1953 and divorced in 1957.


It was like the lyrics of a song he recorded soon after: ‘I could have told you she’d hurt you/She’d love you a while, then desert you.’ He sang it with all the pain and ­sadness of one who knew...

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HOLLYWOOD LOVE: GEORGE BURNS AND GRACIE ALLEN

George Burns began performing on vaudeville as a member of a children's singing quartet. He later tried his hand at comedy, and was performing with a partner when he met Gracie Allen in 1922. Allen, the daughter of vaudeville performers, also started on the stage at a young age, teaming with her sister in a musical act. Burns and Allen first performed together in 1922, with Allen setting up the jokes and Burns delivering the punch lines. But Burns immediately noticed that his partner was getting all the laughs, so the act was revised with Burns as the straight man, and Allen as his ditzy, scatter-brained partner. Within a few years, Burns and Allen were one of the top acts in vaudeville. They were married in 1926.

The pair made their film debut in a series of comedy shorts, and their feature debut in "The Big Broadcast" (1932). After a lengthy and successful career in radio, "The Burns and Allen Show" debuted on television in 1950, and was a top-rated show for the next eight years, nominated for Emmy awards as the top comedy show from 1952 to 1955. Allen also received Emmy nominations from 1955 to 1957. When Allen decided to retire in 1958, Burns attempted a solo career in television and nightclubs, but with little success.

Allen died in 1964, and Burns was out of the spotlight for more than a decade. He returned to play a cantankerous old ex-vaudeville star in Neil Simon's "The Sunshine Boys" (1975), co-starring with Walter Matthau. (Burns was not the first choice for the role, however. He replaced Jack Benny, who died shortly before production was to begin.) For his performance, Burns won the Academy Award as Best Supporting Actor, and launched the next phase of his career. Burns next played the title role in "Oh, God!" (1977), as well as two sequels -- "Oh, God! Book Two" (1980) and "Oh, God! You Devil" (1984). He also appeared as Mr. Kite in "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" (1978), "Just You and Me, Kid" (1979), "Going in Style" (1979), "Two of a Kind" (1982) and "18 Again!" (1988).

Burns continued to perform in nightclubs and on television. When asked if he ever planned to retire, Burns would respond, "I'm going to stay in show business until I'm the only one left." Burns died a few weeks after his 100th birthday.

After Allen's death, Burns visited her crypt at Forest Lawn at least once a month for the rest of his life. Their crypt contains the simple inscription, "Together Again." Allen was born Grace Ethel Cecile Rosalie Allen on July 26, 1902, in San Francisco, CA. She died on Aug. 27, 1964, in Los Angeles, CA. Burns was born Nathan Birnbaum on Jan. 20, 1896, in New York City, NY. He died on March 9, 1996, in Los Angeles, CA...

CLASSIC MOVIES FOR VALENTINE'S DAY

Here is an interesting article I found online, just in time for Valentine's Day. I agree on their picks...especially the underrated THE CLOCK.

Everyone knows that favorites such as "Casablanca," "An Affair to Remember," "Ghost," and "Titanic" are perfect DVD fare for Valentine's Day. But there are other terrific, lesser-known romantic films that will have you swooning — and perhaps weeping — as you celebrate the day with a loved one (or even by yourself). Here are four films guaranteed to fire up your heart.

THE CLOCK
Judy Garland is luminous in her first non-singing role in this lovely 1945 romantic drama. Garland plays Alice Maybery who meets an earnest soldier, Joe Allen (an equally poignant Robert Walker), on a two-day leave in Manhattan when she trips over his duffel bag at Pennsylvania Station and breaks the heel of her shoe. When Joe insists that a shoe-repair shop open its doors after hours to fix her heel, the two end up on an adventure that includes dinner, helping a milkman make his deliveries during the night, and, of course, falling in love.

Joe asks Alice to marry him the next day, but they go through all sorts of red tape before they say their "I Do's" in an impersonal civil ceremony. Alice doesn't feel married until they repeat their vows together at a local church. When Joe's leave ends, they bid goodbye at Pennsylvania Station so he can return to the battlefield.

Fred Zinnemann was the original director of "The Clock" but was removed after a month because the filmmaker and Garland weren't hitting it off and the early footage wasn't promising. Garland requested that Vincente Minnelli, her romantic partner who had directed her in the 1944 classic "Meet Me in St. Louis," replace Zinnemann. One of the improvements Minnelli made was to make New York City a major character, spending some $66,000 to replicate Penn Station on the MGM lot. The movie turned out swell — and Garland and Minnelli married soon after the production ended.

THE ENCHANTED COTTAGE
Some cynics may hold their noses at this tender 1945 fantasy, but true romantics will devour it like a big bowl of popcorn with extra butter. Robert Young and Dorothy McGuire, who had scored a major hit with 1943's "Claudia," reunited for this endearing story of a young pilot (Young) who was disfigured during the war. He has rented a cottage from an older woman (Mildred Natwick) in order to hide from his mother and fiancée. McGuire plays Laura, the shy, homely maid who cleans up the cottage.

The two misfits fall in love and as they do, their appearances alter whenever they are together in the cottage. His war wounds have disappeared and she is strikingly beautiful to him. Laura believes the cottage is "enchanted" because it had been used previously by honeymoon couples.

HISTORY IS MADE AT NIGHT
The Oscar-winning director Frank Borzage, who had an exceptional touch with romantic movies including 1927's "Seventh Heaven" and 1932's "A Farewell to Arms" is at the peak of his powers with this unusual 1937 production. It deftly mixes romance, comedy, drama, murder, suicide and a Titanic-esque ocean disaster.

Charles Boyer and Jean Arthur are the stars of "History," and their chemistry is palpable. Arthur plays Irene Vail, who is desperately trying to divorce her sadistic ship-magnate husband, Bruce (Colin Clive of "Frankenstein" fame). Bruce instructs his chauffeur to enter Irene's hotel room and force her into an compromising position. Bruce plans to catch them together and force her to drop the divorce proceedings. Things change when Bruce discovers a jewel thief (Boyer) in the room, who takes Irene's jewels and kidnaps her. The passionate scenes between Boyer and Arthur after the ship they're traveling on hits an iceberg are the highlights of this rarely seen classic.

LOVE IS A MANY SPLENDORED THING
Jennifer Jones and William Holden make beautiful music together in this lush 1955 romance that was nominated for eight Academy Awards including best picture and lead actress, winning three for Charles LeMaire's costumes, song for Sammy Fain and Paul Francis Webster's title tune and Alfred Newman's vivid score. Set in Hong Kong in1949-50, the melodrama finds Jones as Han Suyin, a Eurasian doctor who falls in love with handsome Mark Elliott (Holden), a married but separated American war correspondent. Their love affair encounters racial prejudice from Hong Kong society and her family.

In fact, when the book by Belgian-Chinese physician Han Suyin, which was a fictional account of her love affair with a British journalist, was published in 1952, the Production Code of America stated that "Love" wasn't suitable for a movie because it dealt with adultery and miscegenation. Finally, they let 20th Century Fox make the film as long as it was never suggested that their relationship was sexual. So how did their rapturous love scenes get past the PCA censors?


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