As a sign of respect Gable refused to make another movie until the war ended. He kept his promise by not stepping in front of the camera until thirteen days after victory was declared in Europe. What’s that? The war was still going on in the Pacific? Oops.
Gable did go back to dating, and he dated many women including Dolly O’Brien, who was six years his senior. He was lonely but had no intentions of taking another bride. Because of the emotional tolls suffered, his drinking became out of control. He was behind the wheel of a very public and much gossiped about one-car accident. During a hunting trip he was arrested for shooting more ducks than allowed. As hard as he tried, the women and booze weren’t filling the hole left by Carole Lombard.
During World War II, some tried to make a connection between the names “Gable” and “Goebbels.” Joseph Goebbels (above left) was a prominent figure in the Third Reich. It was rumored that Adolf Hitler loved Gable’s movies.
Gable also continued to make movies, but as he was growing older, the critics were growing less kind. References to his jowls and leathery skin began popping up. Hemorrhoid cream was applied to his face, and the skin behind his ears was taped back in an attempt to make him look younger. His aging really stood out when he was teamed again with Loretta Young, the mother of his secret love child, in Key to the City (1950). Young still looked vivacious next to Gable, whose hard living showed on his face.
Gable needed companionship. Whether because of loneliness or love, he would marry two more times. First he married Sylvia Ashley, a socialite three years younger than Gable. Ashley was also a model and stage actress, who found her stardom fading due to her age. The fourth Mrs. Gable was horrible when it came to her husband’s hobbies like camping, fishing, or hunting. She had no interest for it. Instead she preferred to spend money to maintain a lavish lifestyle. The two may have been great lovers but not ideal husband and wife. One year and five months into the marriage, Gable announced he wanted out, and Ashley filed for divorce.
Gable continued making movies to mixed reviews and uneven box office results. When it came time to renew his contract with MGM, he wanted a percentage of the profits for the movies he starred in. MGM balked at the idea, refusing to get involved in the profit sharing that many freelance actors enjoyed. As a result, Gable walked away from his twenty-three-year relationship with the studio to go freelance. He never worked with MGM again.
Gable still had a talent for wowing the ladies, never needing to be lonely. One of the more notable flings was with Grace Kelly, whom Gable began seeing while working on Mogambo together in 1953. Gable genuinely cared for Kelly and eventually let her go, realizing that, at twenty-eight years her senior, he was too old for the saucy starlet.
At twenty-eight years her senior, he was too old for the saucy starlet.
Clark Gable met his fifth and final wife in Kay Williams, who was fifteen years younger than he was. Williams was a model and an actress who usually obtained small roles. Sparks did fly between the two lovers but not with the same intensity Gable shared with Lombard. Williams loved the outdoors and enjoyed accompanying her husband on hunting or fishing trips. Gable took her and her two children from a previous marriage into his home. He enjoyed the family life and cherished the company. Unlike the previous wife, Williams was not preoccupied with material things. Friends pointed out that Kay had a physical resemblance to Lombard. She could also belt out the blue language, and had a gift for trading barbs with her husband. Perhaps Gable was subconsciously trying to replace Carole Lombard with an imitation. But one thing was clear: Clark Gable loved Kay Williams and made her Kay Gable.
Professionally, Gable didn’t just acknowledge his age, he often joked about it. He wanted to start making movies that better reflected his strong but aging persona. No longer was it appropriate to play romantic leads—especially when the love interest was twenty plus years younger. So, in 1960, Clark Gable signed on for what would be his final performance, playing an aging cowboy in The Misfits. He was paid $750,000 for the sixteen week shoot (which went over schedule, creating additional pay for Gable) as well as profit sharing. It was his biggest check for making a single movie.
During filming, Kay Gable announced she was pregnant. Gable was ecstatic and made his own announcement. The King would retire after one more movie to become a full-time family man. Weeks after completing the most dangerous and physically demanding scenes, Clark Gable was hospitalized, suffering from coronary thrombosis. November 16, 1960, Gable was in the hospital recovering, when he suffered a massive heart attack and died. On the day of his funeral, all the Hollywood studios flew their flags at half-staff.
Kay Gable gave birth to John Clark Gable on March 20, 1961—four months after his father’s death. For the second time, Clark Gable fathered a child who would never know him.
3
Charlie Chaplin Gets the Tramp Stamp
ON SEPTEMBER 20, 1952, THE LONDON Daily Mirror reported that silent-movie star Charlie Chaplin would be detained by immigration officials and “held until he was brought before a court of inquiry to decide if he could re-enter the country” should he attempt to cross the United States border. Chaplin had just finished working on his latest movie, Limelight, and was vacationing with his fourth wife when a wire message was delivered to him. Attorney General James McGranery was revoking Chaplin’s ability to reenter the United States.
Charlie Chaplin was no stranger to controversy. He had been married four times, fathering eleven children. The first wife was Mildred Harris, who was more than twelve years younger than Chaplin. They wed in 1918 when Harris was sixteen and Chaplin was twenty-nine. Their marriage produced one son named Norman Spencer Chaplin, who died three days after his birth. Just two years after the pair said “I do” they divorced. Harris went for Chaplin’s money. Chaplin went for Harris’s reputation, saying she had a lesbian affair.
There was an even greater age difference between wife number two and Charlie Chaplin. Lita Grey was sixteen when she married Chaplin, who was then thirty-five, in 1924. The union produced two sons—Charles Chaplin Jr. and Sydney Chaplin. Not only was the relationship a wreck, but Chaplin was facing troubles related to unpaid taxes. The marriage dissolved into a costly divorce in less than three years. Many claim Chaplin’s relationship with Grey is what turned his hair gray.
Many claim Chaplin’s relationship with Grey is what turned his hair gray
Third in line was Paulette Goddard, who can be seen in starring roles alongside Chaplin in Modern Times and The Great Dictator. Goddard was twenty-four years younger than Chaplin, and they kept their marriage secret to not affect her acting career. The two wed in 1936 when Goddard was twenty-six and Chaplin was fifty. The couple bore no children and divorced six years later under what was described as mutual terms.
Chaplin married his fourth and final wife during an ongoing paternity case. The dispute began in 1943 and went well into 1944. A blood test proved Chaplin was not the father, but the court ruled for him to pay child support anyway. In the midst of the drama, Oona O’Neill became Oona Chaplin on June 16, 1943. Oona was eighteen and Chaplin was fifty-four. The thirty-six-year age difference was the largest of Chaplin’s four marriages. The union provided eight more children for the Chaplin clan, five girls and three boys.
Now, what had started as a family vacation for the Chaplins had become an exile. In the book Remembering Charlie, Jerry Epstein, a friend and worker on Limelight, has quoted Chaplin as saying, “I could have never found success in England. This really is the land of opportunity.” However, a different quote, this one appearing in an issue of the Daily Worker dated October, 25, 1942, gained the attention of the U.S. government. Charlie’s quote in the paper read, “Thank God for communism. They say communism may spread all over the world. I say so what?” That same year, on October 14, Chaplin was the keynote speaker of the “Second