Mary Pickford-a wasted life in the limelight?
I have been always fascinated by " rags to riches" tales , so common at the dawn of the movies. Never wondered why, because I know the reason: a secret desire to have lived and experienced the making of a new medium and industry, to have shared moments of creative power and witnessed breakthroughs in first hand. But it was not to be, and I must say I am glad I live in the present. Cannot give up rock n roll, not even for a shot at the Jazz Era.
The Pickford saga, from abject poverty in Canada to worldwide stardom, is nothing short of sensational. I admit I don´t care much for her films ( or Jack Pickford´s for that matter) , but I admire the woman who, more than any other, invented acting for the screen. Her life, her choices and her drama are all to similar to of other women who fought to achieve fame and success. That she frankly thought it would last forever was her personal tragedy, also shared by so many.
Scott Eyman on his esplendid biography " America´s sweetheart" tells it all. She was born on April 8th , 1892 in Toronto to a young couple. Her father died some years later, leaving wife Charlotte, and three children behind. It seems he was an alcoholic, working on a bar of all places. "Momager" Charlotte heard of opportunities in the theater business for children and did not think twice:school out, work in. I never got the sense that Mary regretted having lost her infancy working like a dog on the road to support her family, on the contrary: there was always a sort of pride there, the same one a child who is allowed to eat at the adult´s table for the first time would experience. Later in life she set out to get an education and to refine herself, learning french and travelling extensively, but those were interests, hobbies rather than passion. Her true and only passion was to be irreplaceable , or at least thought of as such, and the stage gave her confidence that she was, in fact, necessary.
The only time in her life, I find, that she showed a sort of devotion for the "art" of acting was when she stalked David Belasco, insisting she wanted to become " a good actress". She did not want to go and get the 5 dollars a day offer to work within the infant movie industry as her mother insisted. She was , in fact, mortified. It was a disgrace for a serious actress, as she now saw herself. But she was, once again, necessary . The future of her family, staying together, through the theatrical off season, depended on her. So she went. And sealed her-and mind you, her family´s- destiny.
Now, the whole thing of playing " little kids" did not kick off until she was a well establish entity, so to speak. She started out as a young woman, playing...young woman. However, I strongly disagree with critics like Jeanine Basinger, who seems to favor Pickford´s portrayal of childhood over Shirley Temple´s. Granted, the Fox movies of the 30´s were problematic even at their time ( ask Graham Greene about it) , but somehow seeing a woman in her late 20´s or 30´s in pigtails do nothing for me. We have to remember that the audiences were, in fact, pleased with the results...but putting things in perspective, they were also pleased with , err, let´s say Theda Bara as a "vampire"; Richard Barthelmess as a " yellow man" and Wallace Beery as a " swedish maid".
It seems she was so effective in playing the so called " little girls" because she was denied her childhood ( see the PBS documentary on Pickford on this) and she had a sort of "second chance" in front of the cameras. Sounds plausible. And, to be fair, as far as I know, middle-aged women gave good performances as Peter Pan. On stage. On film it is very difficult to pull it off. One thing, though, nobody can deny: Mary playing children is never a caricature of children. She is far good actress and she respected her audience far too much to simply not give a sincere performance. The problem is, simple: she was, obviously, a very sexually charged woman, very attractive and self-pleased, qualities that do not translate well in this case. Maybe audiences were more sophisticated than I think and they did not associate the character to the actress, but somehow I could not overlook it.
Her fate was to be the first: the first Super-Star; first CEO of her brand; she was in the first Power Couple. She even managed to be some sort of "Cougar", marrying Buddy Rogers, more than 10 years her junior. Was she happy? The simply answer was : No. As she said, she was "thankful". But this I would also like to put in perspective. Some people do not know how to age, how to let go of things. She was definitely one of those. No matter what they do, what they achieve, how they lived, there is always a bitter taste in the end.
