I'm always fascinated about how certain anecdotes take on lives of their own and get embellished and changed and retold. In the commentary track of the forthcoming Criterion release of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, you'll hear one of my co-commentators, Mike Schlesinger, speak of a famous (in Hollywood) incident that occurred during the casting of that film. There was talk of hiring the great character actor, Ed Brophy, for a role. A prominent agent and/or casting director promised Director-Producer Stanley Kramer he could deliver Brophy…and a whole series of incidents ensued as the agent and/or casting director discovered Mr. Brophy had died several years earlier and without telling Kramer this, tried to convince him to book someone else.
In the commentary track, Mike relates two of the many variations on this story — I've encountered a few others — though they all end with Kramer yelling at the guy, "You sold me a dead actor!"
Here's one that intrigued me. In his autobiography, Rewrites, Neil Simon writes glowingly of his friend and frequent hire, Maureen Stapleton. Ms. Stapleton had a fondness for alcohol and a tendency to say outrageous things under its influence. In one section, Simon says…
Maureen was a star on Broadway by virtue of appearing in outstanding supporting roles for years, and then finally with her name above the title as everyone recognized her superb talent. She was equally at home in comedy or drama. She was also one of the funniest women offstage that I ever met. Outrageous sometimes, belying the soft-spoken, warm, and caring woman she was. She costarred in the film of Bye Bye Birdie with Ann-Margret, in Ann-Margret's first major screen role. Legend has it there was a large wrap party at the end of shooting and one of the executives got up and made a toast to Ann-Margret, predicting she was going to be a major star. This was followed by similar toasts by others involved with the production, all men and all mentioning Ann-Margret. Then they asked Maureen to get up and say a few words. After much appreciative applause from the crew and company, Maureen said, "Well, I guess I'm the only one here who doesn't want to fuck Ann-Margret."
First time I read that, I wondered if maybe Simon — who, let's remember, was not present at the event — got it wrong. It's a funny line but wouldn't it have been funnier if it had been uttered by her co-star in that movie, Paul Lynde? Later, in some other book, I read that it indeed was Paul Lynde who said it. Well, maybe that book was wrong. When anecdotes evolve into other versions, they have a tendency to go from accurate to funnier. Just because it's a better story with Paul Lynde doesn't mean it was Paul Lynde.
So at a dinner a few months ago with Dick Van Dyke, I toyed with the idea of asking him about it. I mean, he was the star of the movie. He was at that event. He is the nicest person in show business, apart from me. (Okay, you're right: He's nicer.) I figured, if you could believe anyone about this, you could believe Dick Van Dyke. As it turned out, we got to talking about that movie and before I could ask him, he told the story on his own…and he said it was Paul Lynde. So as far as I'm concerned, it was Paul Lynde.
Dick did tell a couple of other stories about things Ms. Stapleton said whilst inebriated. They could make you understand why Neil Simon believed she'd said the line about Ann-Margret.