Mary Pickford by Peggy Dymond Leavey

Author:Peggy Dymond Leavey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dundurn Press Limited
Published: 2011-09-08T04:00:00+00:00

8

The Marriage of the Century

By early 1918, Beth Fairbanks had begun to suspect that husband Douglas was having an affair. If this is true, she must have been the last one to hear the gossip. While Douglas kept affirming that he loved his wife, he and Mary had been carrying on a relationship for three years. They might have thought their affair was a secret, but lately they’d been riding around Los Angeles in an open car and were “disguised” in goggles and dusters.

Beth and her son were staying in a New York hotel in April 1918 while Douglas was taking part in the Liberty Loan drives. When he arrived in town and booked a room in another hotel, Beth’s suspicions were confirmed.

She went public with her humiliation, informing the press that all the rumours they’d been alluding to were true. She did not, however, mention Mary’s name, saying only that the “mystery woman” had a business connection to Douglas. It didn’t take Owen Moore long to fill in the blanks for everyone.

Beth Fairbanks filed for divorce on October 22, 1918. At the hearing, two witnesses testified to some of Douglas’s other “indiscretions,” and Mary’s name was kept out of it. The court decided that Douglas Jr. would remain with his mother, which was just as well, because Doug Sr. had never paid much attention to the boy anyway.

In the early part of the twentieth century, society held a dim view of divorce, and because of the stigma attached to it, Mary resisted cutting Owen loose. She was terrified that the bad publicity would ruin her career, that no one would ever want to watch her movies again.

Because the Pickford family’s wealth was dependent on Mary’s career, Charlotte tried to get Owen to refuse to give Mary a divorce. Like Charlotte, Adolph Zukor, too, was opposed to the divorce. He told Mary she would be letting millions of people down if she went ahead with it. No wonder Mary dithered.

But Fairbanks’s patience was wearing thin. He wanted to marry his sweetheart, and he was willing to risk losing his career over it. When Mary asked him, “If the world doesn’t approve, will our love be sufficient for our future happiness together?” Douglas assured her that it would. He only wanted Mary for herself.

She described this as “a black and indecisive period” in her life. To make matters worse, Owen had asked for another reconciliation. “I’ll even be nice to your mother if you take me back, Mary,” he promised. But it was several years too late for that.

In the end, Charlotte suggested that Mary follow her heart, and Owen Moore agreed to a divorce. For a price. He required a settlement of $100,000 dollars. Charlotte herself went to the bank to get him his money.

In February 1920, Mary and her mother travelled to Nevada, where the divorce laws were less strict than those in California and where she would not have to wait a year before remarrying. Mary Pickford and Owen Moore were divorced on March 2, 1920.

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