The Girls in the Picture Read online

  Lillian looked like a tiny angel, even more ethereal and helpless than Gladys—Gladys was shrewd enough to accept this and understand that some casting directors might prefer that type to Gladys’s own more sturdy, self-reliant appearance. But behind that saintly exterior was a spine of steel to match her own. “I’ll be a real actress someday,” Lillian vowed, as she and Gladys shared not only a stick of peppermint candy, carefully hidden from the younger children, but also a bed one stifling August night. Usually Charlotte didn’t allow Gladys to do this; she felt the family should stick together, even while sharing a tiny two-room flat with the two Gish girls and their mother. But this night, she had.

  “A real actress on the stage here in New York. On Broadway!”

  “I will, too,” Gladys promised. “I have a plan. I’m going to see Mr. Belasco!”

  “Belasco!” Lillian gave a skeptical whistle through her rosebud lips; everyone knew Mr. David Belasco was the biggest impresario on Broadway. “How?”

  “I don’t know yet, but I will. I’m tired of touring. It’s not getting me anywhere. And frankly, I’m the one with the talent; Lottie and Jack are young now, and appealing, but they’ll soon grow out of it. Mama’s hopeless! She gets such terrible stage fright, that’s why she’s only ever cast in bit parts. But I have the talent to be a Belasco actress, and I’m going to!”

  “I know you will, Gladys.” Lillian’s eyes were solemn and admiring.

  “And when I do, I’ll send for you,” Gladys continued grandly. She patted her friend’s tiny white hand. “And we can star together for Mr. Belasco. I’ll play the leading ladies and you can be the ingénue.”

  “Well, as long as they pay us the same, that’s fine with me.” Lillian yawned, then blew out the candle.

  Gladys turned over her pillow, trying to find one small, cool corner, and smiled.

  Leading ladies always were paid more than ingénues.

  —

  Mama, I made a friend!

  Gladys was seventeen, and she wasn’t Gladys any longer. She was now Mary Pickford, and David Belasco himself had christened her thus. She had appeared on Broadway! In a legitimate play, an elaborate Belasco production for which she hadn’t had to provide her own costumes. Oh, the delight of standing perfectly still for the seamstress, being measured and fitted for her very own costume that no one would ever wear but her, a real antebellum dress with actual lace petticoats, a hoop skirt, satin ribbons! While she wasn’t a leading lady with a star on her dressing room door, she had a featured part and received very good notices for her work as young Betty in William de Mille’s play The Warrens of Virginia. William’s younger brother, Cecil, had a part, as well.

  But after The Warrens of Virginia closed, Mama had urged Mary—they all called her Mary now, and even Mama, Lottie, and Jack had changed their name to Pickford—to do a dreadful thing. An absolutely appalling, horrible thing.

  She had urged Mary to take a job in the flickers.

  “You were a success, and you will be again, but meanwhile, dearest, we owe the rent. And I hear they’re paying quite a lot now, down at that Biograph place!”

  It was 1909. Mary had seen one or two flickers, passing time while on the road. She hadn’t thought much of them; they were a fad, a fancy. And the storefronts that showed them were horrid—much, much worse than even the tawdriest theater she had played. Although the audiences seemed to love them, these flickering, silent images on the screen.

  But no actor worth his salt did; it was humiliating to think that she, a Belasco actress, would work in the flickers! How could she do it?

  “They pay five dollars a day,” Mama said.

  The next morning, Mary showed up at the Biograph studio on 14th Street, dressed in her very best new heels and a pretty straw hat that Mama had just retrimmed. She was doing the Biograph Company a great favor by showing up, of course. It wasn’t every day a legitimate actress deigned to visit a flicker studio.

  But as she confronted the front door of the brownstone, she felt a flush of humiliation; what she hadn’t told Mama—or Lottie or Jack or Lillian or anybody—was that she’d already tried the Biograph studio before, a year earlier, and been sent away, deemed not worthy.

  Not worthy! Of the flickers!

  Things were different now, yet still the same. Yes, she was a Belasco actress, and that stamp of legitimacy could never be removed. Yet she was a Belasco actress with a family to feed, and it was between seasons. As soon as she dropped her card here at this—flicker—place, she’d hurry on up to the theatrical offices; maybe some of the fall tours were beginning to cast.

  Mary opened the door and stepped inside; the place was mayhem, exactly as she’d remembered it. The lobby was full of men in shirtsleeves and green visors huddled over adding machines and ledgers. Office boys ran back and forth; so did various people with that awful film makeup, layers and layers of ghastly yellowish pancake troweled on. Mary walked up to a receptionist, handed over her card, and then was instructed to “take a seat over there, girlie.”

  She shuddered, rose to her full five feet (in heels), and perched on the edge of a bench. Across the room was a clock; she would wait exactly fifteen minutes, then leave. Five dollars or not, she would not subject herself further.

  One of the office boys, racing past, stopped and gazed at her, up and down. Mary was accustomed to this kind of gaze; every time she auditioned, she was given it. It was the gaze of someone summing up, taking in, deciding; her fate hung in the balance of gazes like this. The office boy lingered a bit longer than usual, and Mary suddenly felt a compulsion to make a face at him. She scrunched her nose and stuck out her tongue. He took a step back, astonished, then he grinned and sped off.

  Two minutes later, a very tall, very thin man with a nose like a beak stood beaming down at her.

  “Are you an actress?” he drawled with a southern accent.

  “Of course I am!”

  “What kind of experience?”

  “A decade in the theater, and the last year with David Belasco!”

  “Hmmm. Well, you’re too little and too fat.”

  “What—”

  “Miss—”

  “Pickford. My name is Miss Pickford,” Mary sputtered, jumping to her feet, quivering with outrage. “And if you think—”

  “I think you’ll do. I’ll guarantee three days’ work each week at five dollars a day.”

  “Mr.—Mr.—”

  “The name’s Griffith.”

  “If you think a Belasco actress will work in flickers for only five dollars a day, you’re quite mistaken. I require a guarantee of twenty-five dollars a week. Plus extra if I work more than three days.”

  Mr. Griffith laughed. He stuck his hands in his pockets, shook his head, and laughed again.

  “I’ll take it up with the board” was all he said, but Mary saw the unwilling admiration in his eyes, and she raised her chin in triumph. “Now, let’s get you into makeup and see what you can do.” He grabbed her by the arm and ushered her into the women’s dressing room, then left her.

  “Hey, D.W.,” someone called after him, and Mary pursed her lips at the informality of the flickers. In the theater, no one would dream of calling Mr. Belasco by his first name! In the theater, she wouldn’t be fearful—as she was now—that someone might burst into the dressing room, perhaps even Mr. Griffith himself, and try to get her to perform “favors” in exchange for a role. She’d heard of such things happening in the flickers. To be honest, she’d heard of such things happening in the theater, as well. But so far, some kind of virginal aura had protected her.

  No one propositioned her, however; what happened instead was that Mr. Griffith himself burst back into the dressing room and began to apply makeup on her quite roughly—terrible makeup, makeup that obliterated all her features, making her face look like the moon, pale and without planes, her eyebrows far too dark, almost black, which didn’t go with her light brown curls at all. Wielding powder puffs and brushes, he attacked her face with so
mething like fury. Then he tossed her a dress, enormous, and told her to yank it up if she needed to. Finally, with a small grunt of approval, he left, telling her to come right to the set after she changed.

  She’d heard that most flickers were made outdoors, to capture the sunlight, but at Biograph, she found herself directed to a basement room, pitch black, crammed with furniture and painted flats, a wall of lamps made of glass tubes that were suddenly switched on with a menacing hiss, followed by more lights beneath metal hoods, hanging from tall poles. The effect was instant, searing heat and blazing light; she held up a hand to her eyes, blinded.

  “All right,” called that Dixie-tinged voice again. “Let’s do this. Little Miss Belasco Actress, you’ll be Pippa. In this scene, Pippa will play a guitar, and stroll from crowd to crowd. You’re beautiful, you’re graceful, you’re animated, you’re charming. All right, ready—roll!”

  A guitar thrust in her hand, Mary was startled by an unholy sound—a clicking, whirring staccato, which seemed timed to the movements of a man behind a camera, cranking away. As the film went through the camera, tiny little dots, like snow, filled the air.

  Somehow, without tripping over the debris on the floor—someone had actually left a boot there—Mary managed to grimace and move, pretending to strum the guitar, from group to group, instinctively keeping her face bathed in the harsh lights, turned toward the camera.

  “Who’s the new dame?” someone muttered, and Mary whipped her head toward the source of the voice; it was an actor, glaring at her, perhaps handsome, but who could tell with all that ghastly makeup?

  “I am no dame. Mr. Griffith? Mr. Griffith?” She let the guitar fall to her side, and held her hand up to shield her eyes as she searched the hazy figures assembled behind the camera for one she recognized. The tall, erect figure stepped out of the shadows.

  “Mary Pickford! Do not ever, under any circumstances, ever stop a scene until I say cut! I’m the director! I am God, do you understand? You’re just a silly little actress, Belasco or not. Do you have any idea how much film costs per foot? You’ve cost us two dollars. Which will be coming out of your salary, young lady!”

  Mary felt her face burn; tears stung her eyes and she was torn between dropping to her knees and sobbing and hitting that actor over the head with the guitar. She was so confused; there were a few elements that felt familiar from the theater—all the actors, the playing of a scene—but the rest was entirely, bewilderingly foreign. Those blazing lights—she could feel the makeup melting on her face! That horrific turning of the camera, so noisy, like the clattering of a streetcar. The deitylike presence of the director, having no compunction about humiliating an actress. Mr. Belasco treated actresses like goddesses! Like the artists they were, with great care and respect and decorum. He would never yell at her!

  “Owen, step out and play up to her. Make love, you two. Have you ever made love, Mary Pickford?” Mr. Griffith studied her with that odd combination of admiration and amusement, and she knew he was testing her, trying to break her.

  Which was one thing she would never allow him to do.

  “Of course,” Mary retorted, despite the fact that her heart was racing and her palms were so clammy they did drop the guitar, which landed with a twangy thud. She was only seventeen! And despite the public’s notion that actresses lived sordid lives, Mama had never allowed her to go anywhere unchaperoned, or even entertain the idea of a beau. Not that she’d ever met anyone who—

  The young actor who had called her a “dame” stepped up to her. “Owen Moore,” he said with a gallant smile, then he grabbed her by the waist, pulled her to him with assurance, and Mary found herself fondling his shirt collar, his buttons, nuzzling his neck, resting her head against his very solid, very masculine chest—

  “Roll!” Mr. Griffith commanded, and this time, Mary didn’t even hear the camera, so intent was she on the beating of Owen Moore’s heart beneath her ears, her lips, as somehow—she had no idea how she knew to do this; it was as if a switch inside of her had been flipped on by the sound of this man’s heart—she kissed his chest, softly, little fairy kisses, and she heard his sharp intake of breath, and felt a smile she’d never smiled before—teasing, victorious—curl the edges of her lips.

  And still she managed to keep her face turned toward the camera.

  “Cut!”

  Owen Moore released her with a startled expression on his face; he looked as if he couldn’t trust himself to touch her any longer. He also looked as if he’d been the butt of some joke; his eyes narrowed as he studied her.

  “You’ve never done that before?”

  Mary, dizzy, her pulse ringing in her ears and not quite trusting her voice, shook her head.

  “Come back tomorrow, Miss Belasco Actress,” D. W. Griffith boomed down at her. There was laughter in his eyes that he didn’t try to hide. “Or would you rather have dinner with me tonight?” His voice suddenly dropped two octaves and took on a tone that reminded Mary of the dusky velvet of the jewel box in which Mama kept her wedding ring, the way the velvet clasped the simple gold band in its soft, yet unyielding grip.

  Then she wondered why on earth she’d thought of that box at that moment.

  “No, I think not,” Mary replied as primly, as ladylike as possible, avoiding Owen Moore’s suddenly darkly threatening eyes. “Thank you all very much.”

  She fled the studio—but not before she’d grabbed the voucher Mr. Griffith handed her and collected her three dollars (oh, how she cursed herself for ruining that first take!) from the cashier. But she hadn’t stopped to scrub off her makeup, and she knew that people were staring at her on the streetcar. When she reached the boardinghouse, she ran straight to her room and shut the door.

  Would she return tomorrow?

  Yes, she would. If only to see her new “friend”—a friend she knew she could not tell Mama about. Not yet, anyway.

  —

  Mama, I made a friend.

  When she left the studio this evening, after talking to Frances Marion, Mary went home. Not to Owen, but to Mama. Even after three years of marriage, Mama still meant home.

  Three years of marriage, five years of making pictures. Mary Pickford was now the best-loved actress in the movies, she was told; her face was in Photoplay nearly every issue, she was making a thousand dollars a week, the highest-paid actress in the world. Her last feature, Tess of the Storm Country, was an enormous success, her biggest to date.

  And every night, after she closed her eyes, Gladys Smith reminded herself that it could all go away in an instant. Audiences were fickle. Tastes changed monthly, even weekly, in these modern, sped-up times. Her looks could fade. She could get fat like Mama. Then she’d be back where she’d started, playing bit parts in low-rent touring companies, and Jack and Lottie and Mama, always, always Mama, wouldn’t have enough to eat or a roof over their heads. And it would all be her fault.

  For now, anyway, she was a star. A married star, with an actor husband who couldn’t stand it that her career was ascending faster than his. A drunk actor husband who wasn’t very good, she had to admit to herself—that first encounter had been pure animal magnetism. Never again had she witnessed Owen Moore acting a scene so convincingly—and so she couldn’t respect him, and he knew it. He took it out on her by belittling her in public, reminding one and all that he’d been in the movies first, he was the bigger star than she was then, and he’d taught her everything he knew though obviously it wasn’t enough, but who could account for the public’s taste?

  There were other ways he took it out on her, too.

  So Mary sought refuge in Mama’s apartment most evenings, instead of the boardinghouse where Owen resided, and happily let Charlotte fix her warm stews, hearty casseroles—the plain food she still preferred after all those years on the road—and after supper, she’d sit while Mama brushed out her curls, winding them up again for the night, so they’d be shiny and sleek in the morning. She was doing just that, sitting in a rocking chair, eyes closed w
hile Mama’s hands brushed and twisted and gently smoothed, when she murmured, “Mama, I made a friend today.”

  “Did you, love?” Charlotte cooed.

  “I did. A young woman, an artist. She said she wanted to work in pictures. Not as an actress,” Mary added hastily as Charlotte stopped brushing. Mama had warned her, years ago, that she could never truly be friends with other actresses. “Jealousy, competition—it will always be there,” she’d said. “Even with Lillian. You two will inevitably compete for roles, and then how will you be friends? Actresses will pretend to be your friend to get favors. Then they’ll stab you in the back the moment you have a flop or you gain an ounce of weight.”

  “Are you sure?” Mama asked now. “A young woman who doesn’t want to be a movie actress? I’ve never heard of such a thing! She must not be very pretty.”

  “No, she is pretty, actually. Tall, so tall and slender!” And Mary sighed; as short as she was, she knew there’d come a time when she’d invariably put on weight. “Her name is Frances. Frances Marion. She—it’s hard to explain, but somehow, she seemed to understand me. Something she said, about husbands—”

  Charlotte put down her hairbrush.

  “What’s he done now? Did he lay a hand on you? So help me, I’ll—”

  “Nothing. Nothing new. The usual. Oh, Mama, I made such a mistake!”

  “Yes, you did, dearest, and I won’t sugarcoat it. You made the worst decision in your life. And there’s nothing you can do about it now, all because you didn’t listen to me, did you? I told you not to see him anymore but then you had to go and marry him. That was my fault. I should have known better than to tell you not to do a thing, because you’re as stubborn an Irish lass as I am.”