My Life as a Mankiewicz by Tom Mankiewicz Read Free Book Online

thanks a lot,” Willie replied. “But there's a guy right behind you who might disagree.”
    I turned. It was Frank Robinson. They were eating together. When they finished and started to walk out, the entire restaurant gave them a standing ovation.
    Meanwhile, at Home
    At home there were frequent fights between Mother and Dad now, all of them at night, complete with yelling and slamming doors. And then, the next morning, the skies cleared and no one mentioned a thing. It was like living simultaneously in two parallel universes, and it instilled in me a grim determination to one day be independent from all of it, to have my own, private safe place, which I would create for myself. But there was worse yet to come. Much worse.
    The Barefoot Contessa
    (Nights of terror, a drink from Bogie, I meet a killer and take Ava Gardner to the movies)
    Dad made The Barefoot Contessa in Italy in 1953, directing his own screenplay. It was the first film he made for his recently formed independent production company (Figaro) and starred Humphrey Bogart and Ava Gardner. Dad was nominated for his writing. Edmond O'Brien won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Dad and Mother had decided to take me to Rome with them. I was going on twelve. Chris was almost fourteen and would go to Lawrenceville prep school, which had an eighth-grade year. He would join us on vacations.
    We moved into a beautiful apartment on the Via Bruxelles. I was tutored by an American teacher every day, keeping up with the academic requirements of St. Bernard's, and had plenty of time to explore the wonders and beauty of Rome, a city with which I fell in love. Little did I know then that I would return to shoot films there twice in my life. Many of my childhood excursions were taken inside a tiny Fiat “Topolino” (Italian for Mickey Mouse) driven by Rosemary Matthews, a young Englishwoman in her twenties who had signed on to the movie as an English coach for Rossano Brazzi. The Italian actor was making one of his first appearances in an American film. Rosemary was smart, fun, spoke fluent Italian, and proved invaluable to Dad on the film as her responsibilities increased. If you'd told me then she'd later be married to him for more than thirty years, I'd have thought you were nuts. Looking back now, I'm sure they must have had an affair during that time, but neither one was forthcoming about it during their lives, and I never asked.
    The city and apartment had changed, but not the relationship between my parents. There were the same screaming fights at night, not every night but too many nights. This time, Dad was actually shooting a film, working fourteen hours-plus a day. Sometimes he took off in the middle of the night for somewhere unknown to get some sleep. But, thank goodness, I wasn't alone. Mother's mother (“Gross”) had come down from Austria to stay with us and proved a godsend for me as my protector whenever Mother made an unscheduled visit to my room late at night. Gross was devoutly Catholic. She was terrified by and heartbroken at her daughter's condition, but she was a staunch defender of mine, yelling back at Mother every time she castigated me. Those nights were scenes from a true horror movie. Mother yelling, Gross yelling back, then dropping to her knees, making the sign of the cross and praying loudly in German to God and Jesus while I put an oxygen mask over my mouth from a tank that sat at my bedside. One night I had desperate trouble breathing. Dad called a doctor, who came around and gave me a shot of adrenalin directly over my heart. Decades later, while shooting a film in Europe, I drove to Bad Gastein, Austria, where Gross lived. She was quite elderly but thrilled to see me. We both cried when we hugged. I took her to lunch, and she knew the names of the films I'd done. Someone must have given them to her—I couldn't imagine Gross was much of a James Bond fan—but she was so proud of me.
    The nights of terror