: ” “of the obituary died almost two

oe naturally on top of the news, the

4 - Friday, January 1, 1993 = ‘Norin Shore News

In anguish over has-been star’s obscure end

HERE IT is the first day ofa bright new year, and not a
moment too soon to put.the old shoulder to the wheel ofa

columnist’s main job: to crush simple j joy.

Q And phat could bea better

levice for that than ano ituary?
Trevor .
Lautens

But this is no ordinary obituary.
‘It is certainly among the most
- extraordinary I’ve ever read ina,
long life of obituary-reading. And
for that matter obituary-writing,
, Since that was my first assignment

‘> as a reporter, and indeed Thad.

the anguished task of writing the
obituary for my girlfriend who
died at age 25.
“Not dispirited by now; are re you?’ i
Thope not, because you might
stop reading this and despairingly -
“turn to’ pouring ‘yourself a stiff:
eggnog, thus missing an accoun
_ of this astounding obituary.
It appeared two’or three weeks a ay d
ago in the New York Times, °: a :
“So far, nothing astounding.:!° -. GARDEN .OF BIASES
Well, here it.comes: the subject . : .
because frankly 1 don’t know of
any movie star whose name is on
‘my lips, for example: But then,
my lips are extraordinary. (Kiss
me, you fool.)).
- Sorry to interject that frivolity.
“Phis i is sad business, and i plan to
_ ‘get back to it."
This. woman had been a ‘star.
She was a Hungarian who came to
"Hollywood in the 1920s and

years ago.) ;
You will concede, reader, that
“this i is somewhat uncommon, ‘
. The Timies is almost super: a

bigger the, ‘better. Typically; when
the space iaissile Challenger, ex-’
ploded 73 seconds after takeoff in ®
1986, the Times briskly’ produced
pages of stories and detailed
_ charts within hours, and delivered : played opposite big male leads.
it all tO Vancouver subscribers j in What was it that Gloria Swan-
its early edition. i eR os son, Portraying, ‘the former silent
Yet this: obituary took the . movie queen that she was in real
prestigious Times about 22. “ia life,’said so unforgettably in
months to report. me Sunset Boulevard?.
You'll remember that William

Now, here is the poignaiit par
iThe! death was that of a once- “Holden stumbles upon a decaying |
mansion, where he finds her living’

“famous movie star — her naine as
familiar in her.time as, well, that in a vain and arrogant dream-~
_ of any star today whose name is * an world buried in the ashes of her

“ron everyone’s lips. 7, |,

Notice. I have fudged this,

The:

who she is: “You used to be big!’’
he blurts out:

Swanson looks at him wither-
ingly. ‘I am big,’’ she replies.
“It’s the pictures that got small.”’

(And, speaking as a man who
no longer goes to the pictures, I
think she was right.) /

But back to the obituary. This

" woman had been a name, fit to be:

uttered in the same. breath as

Clara Bow, Pola Negri, Norma /
: Talmadge, Edna Purviance (more

than a friend of Charlie Chaplin,
' whose film biography has just
been released —'ha, and you
‘thought I wasn ‘Las up-to-date, as
the latest edict of political cor- '
rectness.) :

She had glamor. She had adula-
tion. She had her name in lights.

Then the movies began to talk.
That was the late 1920s. Her...
Hungarian accent didn’t survive
the transition. u

Around the time { was'born —
exactly the same day as Brigitte
Bardot; by the way, though the-

f

"year is shockingly incorrect under ©

Bardot’s entry in Halliwell’s
Filmgoer’s and Video! Viewer’s
Companion, ninth edition, should
you be.tempted to scurry off. and
check up'on Bardot and-me

’ this’ famous star of the silent films :~

“was out of work. ,
-And soon forgotten: Seu is

Forgotten. What a terrible word :

that must be for those who once
entertained milliéns, -

-Thase of us who are obscure a

“can scarcely understand the terri:
-ble psychological biow of being
forgoticn, since’ few people knew
who we were in the first place.

We can scarcely appreciate the
 beriélit of living of lives in almost
total neglect, with even our mates:
not bothering about us an awful
Hot. ae

North. Shore has a weal th of family) run. pusinesses. Proud.

operators, some spanning generations and, others: with, different

a “generations all poste i one time: :

Times ran the'abituary — right at
_the top of the obit page, as if ~;
ashamed and trying to makeup... ~
for the oversight — just a
of weeks agoy;-5~-

But for this famous star — her
name well known to me, because
my mother was star-struck and
made the great actors and ac-
tresses of her youth (here comes “
that phrase again) household
names — for her, the fall from
fame’s shaky pedestal must have
been deeply humiliating.

The fickle public:

Yet she lived on, into old age.
And she became ill: And —*’
reader, if | were one of those men

of weak character who pour :

themselves a drink in such times
of distress, I would do so'=-'the
dreadful thing is that not'a single
person came to visit her. .

For something like five years.

. She, whose name was once a
household word. _

“She finally died, at age = 90 0 or 92
— like so many stars, her birth
date is in dispute - in February -,
1991,

She was so bitter that absolutely
no one had visited her, said her
lawyer, that she ordered that no _
funeral service be held. —. -

‘And that is why the New York
Times, perhaps the greatest news ©
enterprise in the world, failed
altogether to report her death.

The Times carefully explained:

‘::to its readers that an obscure

pubdlication for movie buffs had
mentioned her death in 1991, and

the’ news had straggled into one or
tio other. publications. © | .,

But there had been no
uthoritative report of it until the

couple :

If, by now, ‘Thave failed to

-make you grieve for that once-

beautiful, once-desired old
woman, dying a lonely death

| Ned Year,

without so much as a visitor, then |
(a) the Tin Wood man has a heart
as big as all indoors compared to
you, or (b) ! better brush up my -
technique for moving you to tears,

For my cewn part, I was so
shattered by the Times obituary
that I cut it out, and resolved to
bring this pitiful story to your at"
tention. .

And now, I have a confi ession ;
to make.

I put that clipping in'a promi-. ;
nent place, on, or near, one of my
two desks. Or'the coffee table in ~
my office. Or in the heap of :
papers on my bedroom floor. Or ..
in the heap — not much smaller ~:
— on iny bed itself. Or in my
briefcase. Or on the edge of the’
loveseat that is behind me as I
write. 7;

Or somewhere.

I’m not exaggerating when I. ;
say: 50 help me as I’m writing this

iat 3. a.m.,.1’ve spent a total of at’
least four hours in the past few
days looking high and low for:

.. that clipping.

Yet, I planned to go to the.
‘public library to photocopy it ”
from the Times, but my plans:
were unavoidably foiled.

. For desperately wanted to.

. show that somewhere out there, a
human being, though nothing...”
‘more than a poor scribbler, felt'a
deep and heartfelt compassion for,:
that once-famous star.

Whose name, dammit, Pp

“For your valuables
and. peace of mind:

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