79Life storiesPHOTOGRAPHS BY GETTY IMAGES, ALAMY, EYEVINE, STELLA MCCARTNEY/TWITTER
‘THEREI WAS ONSCREEN, A HOLLYWOODPURSEMADE OUT OFlacquered Hollywood purse made out of A CINCINNATI SOW’S EAR’
a Cincinnati sow’s ear.’ Audiences loved her,
though. She signed with Warner Bros, and
over the next seven years made 17 films. These included 1953’s
CalamityJane, for which her trackSecret Lovewon the Oscar
for Best Original song and became her fifth number one.
Almost every character Day played was the same: winsome,
joyful, a perpetual virgin. Yet privately she smoked, drank and
hadlovers. ‘My public image is unshakeably that of America’s
wholesomevirgin, the girl next door, carefree and brimming
withhappiness. An image, I can assure you, more make-
believethan any film part I ever played,’ she once said.
Working in Hollywood meant being reunited with her son
at last. Terry had stayed with his grandmother in Cincinnati
while Day toured as a singer, and was eight when she bought
a house in LA for them. It wasn’t an easy move for him. ‘I recall
seeing my mother only once before I came to live with her,’
said Terry, who later was a producer for bands like The Byrds.
In 1956, Day proved how adept she was at dramatic
roles, too, in Alfred Hitchcock’sThe Man Who Knew Too
Much, about a couple whose child
goes missing. One scene required
her to sing, and the track Que
Será, Será (Whatever Will Be, Will Be)
becameher trademark tune.
Following the end of her Warner
Bros contract, Day took on more
diverse roles and experienced her
most successful period on screen.
‘Everything Doris does turns to box-
office gold,’ said James Garner, who
starred with her in 1963’sMove Over,
Darling. Other co-stars included
Cary Grant, Frank Sinatra and the
late US president Ronald Reagan.
Yet it was her partnership with Rock
Hudson for which she is most
remembered – they created true box-
office dynamite. Their first outing
together in 1959’sPillow Talk, about a
couple who meet when they sharea telephone party line, saw her nominated for the Best
Actress Oscar. Next cameLover Come Backin 1961 and
Send Me No Flowersin 1964. When Hudson died of AIDS in
1985, one of the first high-profile stars to do so, Day
remained unflinchingly devoted to him. ‘All those years I
worked with Rock, I saw him as big, handsome and
indestructible,’ she said after his death.
By the late 60s, Day’s appeal was waning. Society was in
the grip of a sexual awakening and her ‘world’s oldest
virgin’ skit seemed trite. After turning down the lead role in
The Graduatein 1967 – ‘it offended my sense of values’- she quit films a year later. However, she wasn’t able
to give up performing entirely. In 1951, she’d married her
third husband Marty Melcher, a
producer, who took care of her
money. When he died suddenly
in 1968, she discovered he’d not
only misappropriated her entire
£18 million fortune, but also left
her owing £ 355,000 in unpaid
taxes.Additionally, he’d signed
afive-year contract for Day to
headline a TV show; something
she would never have agreed to.
She was forced to honour the contract to pay off her debts, but in
1974 recouped her fortune when she received a record £18
million settlement against her late husband’s business associate
and lawyer, Jerome B Rosenthal. A year later, Day officially
retired aged 54. By this time she was deeply involved with
animal rights, and in 1978, while living in the California coastal
town of Carmel-by-the-Sea, started her animal foundation.
Two years earlier she’d got married a fourth time, to maître
d’ Barry Comden, but they divorced in 1982 because, he
complained, she was devoted more to animals than him. ‘I’ve
never met an animal I didn’t like and I can’t say the same thing
about people,’ she later famously remarked. Carmel suited
her, allowing her a level of anonymity Hollywood didn’t. She
would make public appearances to support her foundation,
and in 1989 accepted the Cecil B Demille Lifetime
Achievement Award at the Golden Globes. But when her son
Terry died from melanoma in 2004 aged 62, she withdrew
from public life, declining to
attend the ceremony in which
she was given the Presidential
Medal of Freedom award – the
highest honour a US citizen
can receive.
Day’s dying wish was that
there would be no funeral or
memorial for her and her
grave left bare. Not the kind of
send-off one might expect for
an icon of her stature, but
very much in keeping
with the woman who
walked away from fame
and never looked back. As
Day herself once said,
‘I know what brings me
joy. I know what has value
and what doesn’t. I know
how I want to live.’■
Clockwisefrom
right: Day and
fourth husband
Barry Comden
in 1976; with son
Terry, who died
at the age of 62;
with friend and
fellow animal
rights activist
Stella McCartneyStarringin some of her most
famous films (clockwise from
top):Calamity Jane; Alfred
Hitchcock’sThe Man Who
Knew Too Much;Pillow Talk
with Rock Hudson