The Golden Age of Cinema was lead by the world’s first superstar at what was called the Versailles
of Hollywood.
Hi everyone ken here, welcome to "ThisHouse".
Today we are exploring the Jazz Age party house of Marion Davies in Santa Monica, California.
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In 1897, the star who would become Marion Davies was born Marion Douras.
She was the daughter of a New York Lawyer and grew up in a strict household.
By the time she was school aged, she had been sent off to live in a religious convent, far
away from any distractions.
Regardless of her parents efforts to keep her on the straight and narrow, she had ambitious
dreams of becoming famous.
She ran away from the convent and changed her last name to become a chorus girl, and
as a teenager, saw her star role in a broadway musical.
In 1916, at the age of only 19 years old, she caught the eye of William Randolph Hearst
who was 54 years old.
The eccentric media mogul fell madly in love with the young star.
He attended her shows every night for eight weeks straight, sitting in the front row and
sending her gifts backstage.
Even though Hearst was married, he had to have Marion, but not just for love, he wanted
her talent.
From this point on, Marion would become Hearst’s mistress for the rest of his life.
He moved her into a palatial mansion in Manhattan to carry on their affair, but his meddling
did not stop there.
Hearst seized Davies career, founding Cosmopolitan Pictures to create more roles for her on the
silver screen.
He hired paparazzi to follow her around and write about her day to day activities for
his newspapers and bought up billboards to plaster her face around Times Square.
By 1924, she had become the number one female star in the box office.
In just a few short years she had gone from a runaway church girl to the biggest star
in Hollywood.
Her time in the spot light led to her earning a fortune.
With her new found wealth, she set out to build what would be called “the Versailles
of Hollywood.”
Under the direction of Architect Julia Morgan, the same architect who had designed Hearst
Castle in San Simeon, a sprawling 110 room party house was constructed on Santa Monica
Beach.
With 55 bathrooms, guest wings, and several dog kennels, her ocean front pad became the
center of the social scene during the Jazz age.
Marion had a love for historic styles and made sure her home reflected the best of the
past.
Walking inside, you would be greeted by a grand hall with two staircases mirroring each
other behind fluted columns, turning at their landing to converge on the third floor with
large windows overlooking the surf as each sunset flooded the stair hall with golden
light.
Her library was finished out with wood paneling concealing built in book cases with overstuffed
furniture mirroring the patterns found in the ceiling’s ornate plaster work.
Her parlors were gilted with gold accents delicately placed on wood paneled walls above
a chevron floor holding enough antique chairs to ensure every guest had a place to rest.
Her parties would spill out onto the beach with hundreds of guests being catered to by
a permanent staff of 32 people.
Regularly entertaining such large crowds required a remarkable amount of space for servants.
She had several kitchens and pantries in each wing of the house such as this one where we
can see her fine collection of china behind glass cabinets.
But the feasts were primarily prepared here under the direction of her private chef using
state of the art appliances in a room that Marion probably never set foot in.
Despite such lavish amenities, the dining room was meant to be a more intimate space
for entertaining only a hand full of close friends.
Perhaps the most famous event to ever happen at her house was when William Hearst rented
a carousel from Warner Brothers.
When it arrived at the house, it did not fit where it had been planned to be placed so
Hearst instructed that several walls of the house be removed, offering to have them rebuilt
after the party.
As time went on, William Hearst attempted to divorce his wife so he could marry Davies,
but his wife would not allow it.
The two came to an agreement for the affair to carry on, and so it did.
William became increasingly more possessive of Marion even though she occasionally carried
on relations with other starts such as Charlie Chaplin.
Hearst’s jealousy became so intense that he would rewrite portions of her films so
that she would never have any kissing scenes nor loving embraces.
This left Marion furious, because he was now holding her back, but she loved him and ended
up not fighting him on such issues.
She once wrote to her close friend Lita Grey, Charlie Chaplin’s second wife,
“God, I'd give everything I have to marry that silly old man.
Not for the money and security—he's given me more than I'll ever need.
Not because he's such cozy company, either.
Most times, when he starts jawing, he bores me stiff.
And certainly not because he's so wonderful behind the barn.
Why, I could find a million better lays any Wednesday.
No, you know what he gives me, sugar?
He gives me the feeling I'm worth something to him.
A whole lot of what we have, or don't have, I don't like.
He's got a wife who'll never give him a divorce.
She knows about me, but it's still understood that when she decides to go to the ranch for
a week or a weekend, I've got to vamoose.
And he snores, and he can be petty, and has sons about as old as me.
But he's kind and he's good to me, and I'd never walk out on him”
They never did get married, and by the time Marion was in her 40s, she had retired from
the silver screen to spend her time taking care of Hearst and providing him with companionship.
In 1945, she sold her beach house for just 500,000 dollars just to get rid of it, though
that value alone was less than she had paid for the imported fireplaces and antique wall
panels which decorated the rooms.
When Hearst died in 1951, he left her a controlling stake in his company, but she did not accept
her inheritance.
She approached Hearst’s widow and offered to sell her the millions of dollars worth
of shares for just one dollar.
After Hearst’s death, Marion felt lonely, having lost the love of her life while she
still had so much more life to live.
She developed a terrible drinking habit, almost never having a sober moment.
This drove many of her friends away.
On a wild night, 11 weeks after losing her lover, she eloped with a sea captain named
Horace Brown in Las Vegas.
She filed for divorce several times, but Horace refused to sign the papers.
This was a major wakeup call for her and She began to look for purpose again, her youth
had escaped her and she couldn’t return to the spotlight, so she went into realestate
development, building hotels and office buildings from coast to coast, increasing her fortune
far beyond what she ever made as a movie star.
It’s said that for every one million dollars she made, she gave away 2 million.
Never having any children of her own, she felt called to support underprivileged and
sick children, donating to childrens hospitals and even establishing the Children’s Clinic
at UCLA which is known today as the Mattel Children’s Ward.
All this time, Marion had never put down the bottle, drinking in excess every night until
she had a stroke in 1956.
She was never the same after the stroke and many of her old friends claimed the Marion
they knew was no longer to be found in her drifting gaze.
Her health began to take a steep decline, 3 years later she was diagnosed with cancer
and began to whither away.
In 1961, she had an emergency operation to remove her bone cancer in an attempt to save
her life, but her now frail body couldn’t recover, and she died just a few months later
in September of 1961.
Though she had made an attempt to give away all of her money before she had a stroke,
she ended up leaving over 20 million dollars, or the modern-day equivalent of about 200
million dollars to the Sea Captain she married while drunk in Vegas.
The beach house which saw the biggest parties of hollywood’s golden age was used as a
hotel for a short while.
But with changing times meant changing fashions, and the house was demolished for a newer building
to take its place.
Today, the surviving guest house and pool where Marion Davies once entertained some
of hollywood’s first super stars can be visited by the public as part of the Annenberg
Community Beach House.
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