At least twice in the past couple of weeks the classic movie channels have aired showings of films by the beautiful, sexy and talented Tuesday Weld, a former ‘60’s Hollywood bad girl, better known for her off-screen antics than, sadly, for her acting skills. Watching her magnetic performances, I wondered if the sudden interest in her films had anything to do with the tumultuous love affair the public conducts with today’s troubled stars. Lindsay Lohan, whose party pal mom and jailbird dad epitomize family dysfunction, and Britney Spears, who famously denied her mom access to her kids (before a judge did the same to her) come to mind asI read of Weld’s difficult relationship with her own mom. Mama Weld was a stage mother who makes her successor, Brooke Shields’ notoriously controlling, boozing mother Teri look like a cream puff.

 

In 1969 Tuesday opened up her pretty, pouty mouth and announced to a reporter, "I hated Mama. I didn't feel really free until she died. Otherwise her death didn't really affect me much.” Cold, yes, but given Tuesday’s troubled history as family breadwinner since age three, when her widowed mother realized her blond, doe-eyed daughter’s money-making potential in show business, destroying her chances at a normal childhood, the controversial comment made some sense.

 

Well, sort of.

 

"I wasn't really mad at Tuesday until she started telling everyone I was dead. I didn't like being called dead," stated Weld’s mother in l971.

 

Ha! Top that, Spears!

 

Head-shaking social observers tsk-tsk the current crop of controversial stars, expressing concern over their influence on young girls, and announcing a disturbing “trend” of wild behavior. These clucking mother hens conveniently forget that in their time, contemporary role models included sultry Ava Gardner, whose famous adulterous dalliance with Frank Sinatra led to his long overdue divorce from his saintly wife and the mother of his children, and violet-eyed Elizabeth Taylor, whose multiple marriages and affairs remain unrivaled—but not by much—by other film sirens. Shelley Winters, a good-time gal and top boozer, made headlines with her numerous trysts, and publicity-hungry Jayne Mansfield fell out of her clothes when she craved the headlines.

 

Sweet Sandra Dee, for whom Weld had once been mistaken by a hapless makeup artist, suffered from eating disorders before anyone even heard of the terms “anorexia” and “bulimia,” and neither her shrinking frame, alcohol abuse nor crumbling marriage damaged her squeaky clean, “lousy with virginity”  image. Before her, when Marilyn Monroe had been discovered to have posed nude in her struggling days as a cheesecake model, the public chuckled at her admission of having had “nothing but the radio on.” And before her? Rumors of a mysterious “blue movie” starring a then-unknown Joan Crawford surfaced and have stuck around until today. 

 

By the way, Crawford was rumored to have had a lesbian fling with Monroe, a story which Marilyn herself substantiated in audio tapes made during her therapy sessions with her psychiatrist, transcripts of which were released and printed in Playboy magazine in 2005.

 

The list of actresses who publicly engaged in casual sex, adultery, drinking, drugs, and general dysfunction goes on and on. While the studios protected these stars and many stories were concealed, many others were public. Our mothers and grandmothers also viewed these hard-living women as “role models,” and our "mamas" and "meemaws" have come out fine.

 

Frankly, I think these women of Hollywood past did their thing with more style, class and discretion than today’s kids. And, let's admit it, none of today's bad gals have the charisma or talent of Golden Hollywood's alluring ladies.