Gregory Peck- A Charmed Life by Lynn Haney

Author:Lynn Haney [Haney, Lynn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Entertainment & Performing Arts, Autobiography, Biography, Non-Fiction
ISBN: 9780786737819
Google: 9MbEOmfg4PcC
Amazon: B009K448XW
Publisher: Robson
Published: 2005-03-24T00:00:00+00:00

,small>CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Wrestling with Demons

‘Peck’s name on our marquee is the best box-office insurance we can have. Thousands of women in this neighborhood, I guess and every neighborhood, feel that here is one guy who would sooner chop off his right arm than cheat on his wife.’

Los Angeles Theater Owner

‘I was like a bear in a log,’ Greg said. ‘I just felt awful about the boys.’ He remembered the dark time of January 1953 – the sudden break with his family that put them on one side of the Atlantic and himself on the other – as one of seclusion and retreat. He claimed not to have left the Hotel Lancaster for two weeks except to walk the streets of Paris at night. But unhappiness has a way of blurring memory.

In reality, professional obligations forced Greg into the spotlight. Two days after his family sailed from Le Havre, The Snows of Kilimanjaro opened at the Park Theater in Stockholm. Such a wild commotion! Greg’s arrival sparked a near riot. An estimated crowd of 3,000 people – a good many of them screaming teenagers – jammed the streets trying to glimpse the world-famous movie star.

A dozen mounted police and at least 20 foot patrolmen held the crowd at bay. Fans tried to tackle Greg as he made for the back door of the theater. Inside, Swedish actress Signe Hasso introduced him to the premiere’s audience of 400. Amazed at the melée outside, she said: ‘I’ve never seen scenes like these, even in the United States.’

In Copenhagen and Oslo, the reaction was much the same. But in Helsinki, the welcome was more personal. Greta was a Kukkonen (shortened in America to Konen) and this large family traced their genealogy back for hundreds of years. The descendents kept in touch with each other. In fact, many of her relatives welcomed Greg and threw a party for him in which they made him a present of five Scandinavian knives. When a reporter asked what his concept of the ideal woman was, he replied, ‘My perfect Finnish wife.’

Back in Paris, the ‘log’ or hotel where he ‘holed up’ wasn’t exactly Spartan. Just off the Champs Elysées on the Rue de Berri, the Hotel Lancaster was nicely situated in the heart of Paris – and conveniently located close to Veronique’s mother’s apartment on the Avenue Franklin D Roosevelt. It was run like a luxurious private home, filled with a fascinating collection of furniture, antique clocks, paintings, chandeliers, lamps, tapestries, velvets, silks and damasks, crystal and porcelain. Its courtyard, once the stables of a private house, was one of the prettiest in Paris.

Vigilant about its low profile, the hotel prided itself on being one of France’s best-kept secrets. The clientele of the Lancaster was international and highly select, its rooms serving as the Parisian home of Joseph Kennedy, Greta Garbo, Clark Gable, Alec Guinness, Marlene Dietrich, Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy and John Huston.

Any lonesome American could just wander across the street to the Herald Tribune building. From 11.30 p.

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