Maria Montez - Mysteries & Scandals

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Maria Montez - Mysteries & Scandals
Transcript
00:00Maria Montez, with her jet black hair, pouty red lips, creamy skin and vivid personality,
00:15Montez became Hollywood's reigning queen of Technicolor in the 1940s.
00:20Maria was a star, a star if there ever was one.
00:24Not only a star, but she was a diva.
00:26And that was her on the set, in private life, and in the roles that she played.
00:32She was always a star, a diva.
00:34Actresses are made, but stars are born.
00:37And man, was Maria Montez ever born to be a star.
00:40She told someone once that you must always act as if you are the most beautiful and desirable
00:47woman in the world.
00:48You must demand to be treated as a queen, and you must not let any directors intimidate
00:55you because the public has the last word.
00:59On this episode of Mysteries and Scandals, we'll examine how Maria's single-minded determination
01:03made her a Hollywood great.
01:05She was her best publicity machine.
01:07It is known that when she was not still famous, she created something called Montez's Club
01:14for the Stardom, and they said she write to herself the first letters until the real ones
01:22came.
01:23We'll also examine how this Dominican diva became obsessed with her own beauty.
01:28One of her most famous quotes is, when I look at myself, I am so beautiful, I scream with
01:33joy.
01:34And we'll reveal how that obsession may have led to Maria's unusual and untimely death.
01:39The DeGrazia family, what we inherit is both grace, beauty, and intelligence, and a lot
01:45of gifts.
01:47And on the other side of that, almost as if we have to pay a price for it, there comes
01:52this sense of fate or destiny, which means that we can die early.
02:00She was sorry that she was leaving her behind, that sooner or later they would be together
02:08again, but that she just didn't want to get old.
02:13They never do.
02:14I'm A.J.
02:15Benza.
02:16It was at last.
02:17After a Hollywood career that had more sizzle than a hot summer day, Montez said farewell
02:21to the world in an uncharacteristically unexciting way.
02:25Movie historian Maria Ciaccia.
02:28Maria's two sisters were visiting her in her home in Paris, and of course Maria was known
02:33for these long baths in very hot water, apparently feeling that this helped her weight stay down.
02:40She did go and take a bath, and apparently after a certain point her sisters got a little
02:47worried because she'd been in there an awfully long time.
02:51They broke in, and she had apparently looked like she had drowned in the bath.
02:58Drowned in a bath?
02:59Come on, that sounds a little suspicious.
03:02It's hard to say if that was true or not.
03:05No one will ever really know what happened to her.
03:07It was very tragic.
03:08A tragic ending, yes, but just the beginning of our story about the mystery of Maria Montez.
03:15Vivian Perez profiled Maria.
03:17She was born on June 6th, 1912 in Barahona, a town at the south of Dominican Republic.
03:25She was the second daughter of ten brothers and sisters.
03:30Maria from the very beginning wanted to be an actress, and in the area in which she lived
03:37she was someone who was thought of as quote-unquote having the calling.
03:42Peter Ruby is the co-author of Hispanics in Hollywood.
03:45The story is that she taught herself how to speak English, reading magazines, and listening
03:50to American pop songs.
03:52The starry-eyed beauty met and married Irishman William McPheeters in 1932.
03:57He worked at the National City Bank in Barahona.
04:01I think she felt lonely.
04:03She was already in her twenties, and it was not very weird in those times to get married
04:07very young.
04:09But it was something that would not last because she still had that dream of being a movie
04:14star.
04:15Maria got the seven-year-rich right on schedule in 1939.
04:18She dumped her husband and decided to move to the U.S.
04:21She arrives in Manhattan, and she decides to become a model, and she gets her picture
04:26on the cover of a magazine.
04:29Everything she did, she did as a star before she even became a star.
04:35She had a wardrobe specially made for her.
04:38She had a maid, two maids to take care of her wardrobe.
04:42She had fabulous jewels.
04:45Everywhere she would go, she would always have at least 14 bags with all the things
04:50that would be necessary for her.
04:53Montez was more than ready for her close-up.
04:55The only thing she needed to do was catch the right eye.
04:58No problem.
04:59See, Maria had a knack for making a big splash wherever she went.
05:03Margarita Vicenz de Morales is the author of Maria Montez, Su Vida.
05:07Copacabana, a store club, Luciana Purchase, was a very famous nightclub at that time.
05:15Her entrances in that places become very famous.
05:19She had a rather high profile, would walk into the restaurant, you know, magnificently
05:26dressed, flirting with everyone there.
05:29And it wasn't long before a talent agent from RKO saw her, and she was signed to RKO.
05:37Later on, Universal saw the test and made her an offer, and she decided that their offer
05:43was better, so she went to Universal.
05:46Montez arrived in Hollywood during the summer of 1940 and went straight to work on becoming
05:50a star.
05:51Photographer Tom Zimmerman is the author of Light and Illusion.
05:54They started off by doing the still portraits of her.
05:58The studio was able to promote these because she was just so fantastically beautiful.
06:04People put the Dominican diva in a couple of B-movies, but her career took off at another
06:07studio across town.
06:09She was loaned to 20th Century Fox for being in a movie with Carmen Miranda, Donna Mesh,
06:15and Alice Faye, named That Night in Rio.
06:18But when Life magazine went to interview the stars of that movie, she got several pictures
06:25of her in Life magazine, and she was only there, I think, not even one minute in the
06:30movie.
06:31The up-and-coming actress was a one-woman PR machine.
06:34She started her own fan club and would write to the studios demanding to see more of herself.
06:41Apparently, they didn't check the handwriting and the letters too carefully, since she was
06:46the one writing the letters.
06:47Maria might not have been the world's greatest actress, but she was bound and determined
06:50to be Hollywood's greatest star.
06:52Up next, Montez becomes the reigning queen of Technicolor and turns a world war to her
06:57own advantage.
07:04Aspiring actress Maria Montez arrived in Hollywood in 1940 and instantly became a legend in her
07:09own mind.
07:10You see, from the very beginning, Montez knew she was made to be a movie star.
07:15Actor Cherhan Bey.
07:18Maria was known to carry herself like a princess.
07:23Anybody who can see her pictures and has seen her walk knows that this woman could not enter
07:29any kind of a room without calling attention to herself.
07:33Maria had a flair for the dramatic.
07:36Even reading the newspaper became an event.
07:38The resourceful actress dined at restaurants frequented by studio execs and served up her
07:43theatrics as the entree du jour.
07:46She sit down, very well dressed, and read the newspaper, and everything was so emotional.
07:54One waitress understood what she was doing and said, darling, they do not come here after
08:011 p.m.
08:02So she just get out there.
08:05And after 1 p.m. she came back with another clothes, very well dressed, doing the same
08:09number.
08:10A reporter for the Saturday Evening Post, a guy called Pete Martin, was reported to
08:15have said that when news was slow, Los Angeles editors would shout to their reporters, go
08:22to Beverly Hills and see what Montez is doing.
08:25And you can bet that Montez was always doing something.
08:28She was very sick one time and she let the press come into the infirmary, you know, and
08:32she was, you know, extremely ill.
08:35But talking to the press, they loved her.
08:37Universal cast La Montez in the 1942 blockbuster hit, Arabian Nights.
08:43That was the one that made her famous.
08:44If you see the movies, the beginning of Arabian Nights, it says John Hall, Maria Montez, and
08:49Sabu.
08:50But at the second movie, it was Maria Montez, John Hall, and Sabu.
08:56All the movies were Maria Montez first because she was the moneymaker.
09:00Journalist Bob Thomas.
09:01Nearly all of Maria's movies were in Technicolor, which was not very prevalent in those days.
09:08She was called the Queen of Technicolor because she was so stunning in color.
09:13When she was in Arabian Nights in 1942, one critic had a description of her that I think
09:19is perfect.
09:20Maria Montez comes through ably in a role that consists chiefly of looking ravishing
09:24in scanty oriental costumes.
09:27This is also the movie which has got probably one of her most famous quotes, and there are
09:31quite a number.
09:32And this one is, when I look at myself, I am so beautiful, I scream with joy.
09:37Unfortunately, Maria's fitness regime must have made her scream with agony.
09:41Maria Montez was extremely obsessed with her beauty.
09:44She had two masseuses who would work on her at once, and she would take scalding salt
09:51baths to keep her weight down.
09:54She got a hand into the lady.
09:55She really knew what she was doing.
09:57When World War II broke out, the seductive actress became a favorite of the sex star
10:01of enlisted men.
10:02The Warriors were very good for publicity because pin-up girls, Rita Hayworth, Betty
10:09Crabill, all of the major sexy stars, including Maria, were wanted by the G.I.s to pin up
10:17on their lockers or in their foxholes.
10:20So that was a great push for publicity.
10:23Maria lent her fabulous form to the war effort, but she gave her heart to a young Frenchman.
10:28She met Jean-Pierre Amon, that was a French actor in Hollywood.
10:35It was love at first sight.
10:38She met him, I believe, in October of 1942, and it was a whirlwind romance.
10:44They both were absolutely insane about each other, and they got married.
10:47When she said that the day that will be the wedding, she was according to the astrology.
10:57Less than a year later, July of 1943, he had to leave almost immediately because he was
11:03with the French Free Army, but it was a very great romance and apparently a very great
11:11love.
11:12With her husband away, Maria got a case of the wartime blues.
11:15To remedy her unhappy mood, Montez stormed into Universal with a scheme to get some press.
11:21So they figured out to get a young, ambitious, slightly crazy reporter to have a date with
11:32her.
11:33So I picked her up in a limousine supplied by the studio.
11:38We went to Romanos, then we went on to Trocadero, which was the main nightclub on the strip.
11:45But when Universal's accountants saw the bill for that one evening, they just went crazy.
11:54But it was good publicity, and she got her picture taken by the fan magazine, and everybody
12:01turned out happy, especially.
12:05World War II made Maria Montez a star.
12:08Her seductive pinup photos were an inspiration to U.S. troops fighting overseas, while Maria's
12:13fantastical feature films provided some much-needed relief to the folks at home.
12:18She became really the queen, first of all, of Technicolor, but secondly of the sword
12:23and sandals epics, and she went on to have quite a string of successes with them.
12:31She usually co-starred with John Hall, with Cherhan Bey, with Sabu, and they made many
12:38films together, Alibaba and the Forty Thieves, White Savage, Cobra Woman.
12:44Well, many of our films that we made together, if not all, were escape films.
12:51They were far away from reality.
12:55After two years of fighting for the French Army, Maria's husband, actor Jean-Pierre
12:59Aumont, returned home in 1945.
13:01The couple wasted no time starting a family.
13:04They have one daughter, Tina Aumont.
13:07She was born as Maria Cristina Aumont in 1946.
13:13Montez enjoyed motherhood, but she wasn't crazy about the fact that her movie career
13:17was in a slump.
13:18Still the eccentric actress managed to keep her name in the papers.
13:22One of the last involved a movie called The Exile, with Douglas Fairbanks Jr., and she
13:27didn't realize that he was being promoted as the star of the film, and she was only
13:32on screen for 20 minutes, and she sued Universal.
13:37Maria had it in writing from Universal that she was to get top billing on all her films.
13:42And even her fans, when they went to watch her movie, they were disappointed, saying,
13:46what happened?
13:47Her name appears in the beginning of the movie when you see it, and she only has 20 minutes
13:54in there.
13:55Then she asked her lawyer to sue Universal Pictures.
13:59They won the case.
14:01The settlement, along with Maria's waning box office numbers, didn't sit too well with
14:05the honchos at Universal.
14:07Maria's career in Hollywood ended rather abruptly.
14:11The kind of films she was doing went out of vogue.
14:15The war was over.
14:16People wanted more realism.
14:18They weren't terribly interested in the frou-frou of Arabian Nights movies.
14:25So Universal dropped her.
14:27She went independent.
14:29And she actually did Siren of Atlantis, her last American movie, as an independent.
14:35After Siren of Atlantis, she went to Europe.
14:38Her husband, of course, Jean-Pierre Amant, was French.
14:41And he was very popular in France.
14:43So they moved back to France.
14:46Needless to say, all the courtroom antics did little to endear Montez to the folks back
14:50in Hollywood.
14:51Well, one of the things that brought her back to the United States is she sued the producer
14:55of Siren of Atlantis because she was never paid.
14:59And the reason she was never paid is because the movie was just a complete disaster at
15:03the box office.
15:04Nobody went to see it.
15:05So the producer lost his shirt on the film and never paid Maria, who was by far the main
15:11star.
15:12Maria Montez also embarked on a third suit in 1948.
15:17She sued Charles Buddy Rogers, who was supposed to produce a film called Queen of Hearts,
15:24which was not made.
15:25And she was entitled to a certain amount of profits and a great salary and didn't get
15:32either one, obviously, because the picture wasn't made.
15:34So she sued for $400,000, alleging that she was entitled to all of this.
15:41Still, Maria won 38 grand from the film's producers in 1951.
15:45But courtroom victories would not keep Maria from the tragic destiny.
15:53On the last day of Maria Montez's life, the 39-year-old actress was at her Paris apartment
15:58with her sisters, Teresa and Ada.
16:00Late in the morning, Maria retired to her bathroom to take one of her infamous hot salt
16:03baths.
16:04They made their own breakfast and they agreed to go shopping.
16:09So they went to separate ways to get dressed.
16:13When Teresa and Ada were ready, they said, why, why Maria's not here?
16:18So Ada finally decided to check what was happening to her.
16:22And when she opened up the door, they said that they only see her forehead up from the
16:29water.
16:30From the forehead down, she was totally under the water.
16:35And they called the paramedic and they tried to revive her, but it wasn't possible.
16:44Maria Montez was declared dead.
16:47Nobody is quite sure what happened because there was never an autopsy.
16:50She'd been known to have fainting fits.
16:51So either she passed out in the bath and then had a heart attack and drowned, or the
16:58heat itself from these schooling baths induced some kind of heart attack and she had a seizure
17:03and drowned.
17:04There was also the rumor, which as far as I know was never substantiated, that she had
17:10slit her wrists as well.
17:12I couldn't believe that for an instant.
17:15She was too full of life.
17:16She was, she loved life.
17:18Her close family friend, actress Linda Christian, says otherwise.
17:22Maria lost her life because she didn't want to get old.
17:28Actually, it was Tina Amon, her daughter, who came to visit me in Rome and showed me
17:35the letter that Maria had written to her just before she was going to leave this world.
17:41And it really touched me so deeply.
17:46It said that she was sorry that she was leaving her behind, that sooner or later they would
17:53be together again, but that she just didn't want to get old.
18:00I guess when your face is your fortune, Father Time becomes enemy number one.
18:04But most observers insist that Montez would never take her own life.
18:08Maria's niece, Raina Paris.
18:11Why would a woman who's starting a new life, who's in love with her husband, just had a
18:15new baby, would want to commit suicide?
18:17It doesn't make sense to me.
18:19I was shocked because she was very young.
18:22We'll probably never know what really killed Montez.
18:25The only thing we can say for sure is that she was a lot of fun to watch while she was
18:28still around.
18:30Maria Montez was a very powerful, passionate, spontaneous woman who was very driven.
18:38She was a very soulful person.
18:40After her death in Santo Domingo, they showed her movies on the screen, and before the movie
18:46was shown, they stood up and remained one minute in silence.
18:52Several years later, I think it was in 1996, the president, Joaquin Balaguer, named the
18:59airport of Barahona as Maria Montez International Airport.
19:04I think her place in Hollywood is in these sort of sword and sandals films.
19:10She went in like a star.
19:11She went out like a star.
19:13Didn't matter what anybody did or said.
19:16She demanded star treatment, and she pretty much always got it.
19:20As I described her as a great personality, as a great star, that you could not take your
19:25eyes off when she came into a room, and that you'll certainly never forget.
19:30Those pictures that people put on her grave, it was not for a movie star.
19:35It was for a friend.
19:37That was the quality she gave to them.
19:39And if you ask me, she was still Maria Africa, that little girl put on a stage, and thinking
19:47she's a diva.
19:48She is not a diva, but she thinks she is, and that's what the people was watching.
19:54She was like a little girl playing to be a famous actress.
19:59That was her charm.
20:00Maria Montez was completely unpredictable right up until the end.
20:03Though she was never a great actress, it's a testament to Maria's star power that we're
20:07still talking about her five decades after her final exit.
20:11Maria be proud.
20:12I'm A.J. Benza.
20:13Join me the next time we meet in a state of mind called Hollywood.
20:22Mr. Harris, I, my sweet...
20:30What is this?
20:31They are calling for you, my customers.
20:33Let them call.
20:34I'll come when I'm ready.
20:35Get out.
20:36Get out.
20:37Allah defend me.
20:38First, it is that son of Satan, Ali, and that...
20:41I'm going.
20:42Look, I'm going.
20:43Goodbye.