Article and Interview by John O’Dowd 2011
With special thanks to Peter Clark and Michael Barnum
The luscious and provocative Sally Todd made a sizzling impression in a cluster of high-profile TV shows and low-budget genre films in the mid-to-late 1950s, and nearly set the nation’s TV and theater screens aflame in the process. With her gorgeous blonde looks and the kind of killer shape for which the phrase “Dangerous Curves” was coined, Sally put many a male moviegoer’s imagination⎯and libido⎯in overdrive. That her acting career was ultimately so brief, and was essentially over by the mid-1960s, is one of filmdom’s more unfortunate losses.
Born Sarah Joan Todd on June 7, 1935 in Boone, Missouri (but raised in Tucson, Arizona), she was an athletic child and was given the nickname “Sally Jo” by her parents, Harry N. Todd and the former Pauline Gentry. The beautiful, dark blonde and brown-eyed Sally Jo studied drama as a teenager, and at 17, she entered The Miss Tucson Beauty Contest in 1952 and won first prize, which was an all-expense paid trip to Hollywood. Once on the west coast, Sally began modeling for the ladies swim wear company Cole of California, and in the summer of 1953, she made her film debut among several other bathing suit beauties in a Jane Russell film for RKO called The French Line. In June 1954, Sally appeared in similar fashion at the 9th Annual Los Angeles Home Show, and in 1955 she joined models Phyllis Applegate, Theona Bryant and Norma Brooks as the Carson Cuties on Johnny Carson’s New York-based variety show on CBS.
Back in Hollywood in early 1956, Sally was offered a screen test with industry giant 20th Century Fox. As perhaps a possible threat to a discontented (and increasingly temperamental) Marilyn Monroe, the studio quickly signed the newly platinum blonde Sally to a contract with the intentions of grooming her for the type of sex symbol parts Monroe had begun refusing. Fox promoted their new starlet in the L.A. Times as “a young Lana Turner and much prettier than Marilyn Monroe”, and placed her in background roles in The Revolt of Mamie Stover (again with Jane Russell) and The Best Things in Life Are Free.
In mid-1956, Sally was widely touted in the press as being television’s highest paid model, and in June, she appeared in a fully clothed pictorial in Playboy. She was so popular with the magazine’s readers she returned to its centerfold au naturel in February 1957 as Playmate of the Month. (However, rather than posing topless, Sally displayed her shapely naked derriere, in a sexy, over-the-shoulder shot, instead.) Sally’s voluptuous 35-23-35 figure was also featured on several album covers and in countless pocket-size pulp magazines of the day, including Focus and Brief. Throughout the rest of the decade and into the early 1960s, her physical appeal was displayed beautifully on the small screen, where she appeared with everyone from Robert Stack (The Untouchables) and Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. (77 Sunset Strip) to Lee Marvin (M Squad) and Jim Davis (Rescue 8). In 1960, Sally even added an Elvis Presley film to her resume when she played the part of a German bargirl in G.I. Blues, the singer’s first picture after a two-year stint in the Army.
Among Sally’s most serious romantic relationships in Hollywood were her sometimes turbulent affairs with Dragnet’s hard drinking TV mogul Jack Webb and heartthrob actors Vince Edwards and Troy Donahue. She later married millionaire cabaret star Charles Cochran in 1961, but the marriage was short-lived. Soon afterward (and “on the rebound”, according to her), Sally married Bill James, a top amateur tennis player, but that marriage, too, was fleeting.
Sally continued to work in Hollywood during the 70s on TV series like Starsky and Hutch⎯but strictly behind the scenes, rather than as an actor. In 1980, she left Los Angeles and moved to the Santa Barbara area to care for her ailing mother. Thirty years later, Sally is still enjoying the Mediterranean-style climate and posh lifestyle of one of California’s most beautiful and idyllic locales.
These days, Sally is managed by award-winning concert pianist, composer and artist Peter Clark (www.artjazz88.com), and is planning a return to films with the lead role in the Clark-penned screenplay Checkmate: A Saga of Santa Barbara, which will also feature actress Elaine DuPont (best known for the 1960s cult horror film The Beach Girls and the Monster). Sally calls the story “a comedic farce”, while Peter Clark describes it as having “a little sex, a little intrigue, a little blackmail⎯no, a lot of blackmail, actually⎯an accidental murder…all the good things that everybody seems to like in movies.” Clark adds that efforts to finance the project are now underway.
Still stunningly attractive at 75, Sally is delightfully outspoken and honest, and freely admits that her star might have risen farther if her personal life hadn’t always taken precedence over her acting career. Thanks to a chance meeting in Hollywood recently with celebrity biographer Michael Barnum, Sally granted fellow writer John O’Dowd the following interview in 2010. Hopefully, her fun (and revealing) anecdotes here are but a tasty prelude to her upcoming memoirs, which Sally was in the process of finishing in January 2011.
John O’Dowd: After winning the Miss Tucson beauty contest in the early 50’s, I read that you came to Hollywood with your mother. Did you begin your acting career immediately?
Sally Todd: Pretty much, yes. When I first arrived in Hollywood in 1953 I got a job right away in a big picture, which was a great surprise to my agent…and to myself. The first film I did in the summer of ‘53 was The French Line with Jane Russell. The story took place on a cruise ship and it featured dozens of fashion models (of which I was one). It was also Kim Novak’s first picture. Even though I was brand new to the business and the so-called “new girl in town”, I got paid a ton of money to do that film. Believe me, it was a wonderful surprise.
After I did The French Line, I got two television commercials that same summer that were blockbusters, and then 20th Century Fox offered me a contract. I mean, it happened just that fast. Fox immediately put me in another Jane Russell film called The Revolt of Mamie Stover (1956). The film co-starred Richard Egan and Agnes Moorehead and it was all about a bar over in Hawaii that was frequented by all these sexy, call girl types (although back in the 50s they had to call characters like that “hostesses”). I was one of the girls in the bar, and doing the film was a lot of fun. I recently had lunch with Jane Russell and it was great seeing her again after all these years. She’s nearly 90 now, and she is still going strong…she’s amazing.
One of the first TV shows I did as an actress was The Bob Cummings Show (which was later re-titled Love That Bob). I’m sure a lot of people remember it, or at least have heard of it, as it was quite popular at the time. Bob played a fashion photographer who was girl-crazy and he was always surrounded by a group of beautiful and sexy models in bathing suits. It was a wonderful show for me to start my acting career with⎯a very easy, light show, and Bob liked me so much in that first episode, he asked me to come back and do two more shows.
I played a cowgirl in the first episode and I hated it because all the other girls in the show were in bikinis and there I was stuck in a prim little cowgirl outfit. I thought it was so corny but I remember Bob telling me that he thought it looked cute on me. Bob was a lovely, lovely man and we had a great camaraderie together. He was originally from Joplin, Missouri, and although I was raised in Arizona, I was born in Missouri, so we would sit together on the set for hours while talking about all the little towns back home that he had seen. You would never think that the chic and debonair Bob Cummings, who had acted for Alfred Hitchcock in Saboteur and Dial M for Murder, was actually a corn fed Midwesterner, but he was.
Bob used to have a male masseuse come out to the set every day because he had a chronic back ailment and he would have this guy give me back massages, too. All the other girls in the cast were so jealous of that. What a nasty and bitchy bunch of girls were on that show. [author’s note: according to IMDb, Sally’s co-stars in the episode were former WB starlet Peggy Knudsen, movie serial actress and Columbia Pictures contractee Norma Brooks, and bit players Jeanne Evans and Mimi Doyle.] I think they had a problem with me because I was always so happy all the time, and they weren’t. I would do whatever I was asked to do on the show, and they always seemed to be complaining about something. And I was also a lot younger than most of them. I guess they didn’t like me stealing their thunder.
Before long I felt myself developing a huge crush on Bob, and I remember some of the girls saying, ‘He’s so polite. He must be gay.’ Back then, those sort of rumors were always flying around about someone, and I guess it’s still happening today. I never believed Bob was gay, though. When those other girls said that to me, I just laughed at them and said, ‘Of course he’s not gay. He’s just a prince, that’s all. The man’s a prince.’ (And he was.) If anything, the only reason I got over my crush on Bob so quickly was because his wife showed up on the set one day…with their five children. Bob’s wife was a glamorous blonde in a long mink coat and I could see they were very much in love with each other, so that (and their five kids) kind of put everything in a different light, you know? (laughs)
I loved working with Bob Cummings and I wish I’d had enough sense to keep our friendship intact because I think he would have been a wonderful friend to have. But I didn’t keep it going and it was my own fault. I just wish he had been around throughout my life to be a pal, because he was a dear, sweet man, he really was.
John: Around the same time, you worked with another show business veteran…Red Skelton.
Sally: Oh, he was another dear man. I worked with Red on his weekly TV show over at CBS. Without a doubt, Red was one of the funniest human beings I have ever met. He was as funny during rehearsals and in real life as he was when we taped the show. I had originally auditioned for a comedy skit on the show (and I got it), but then I also read for a commercial for Max Factor, and I wound up getting that, too. Then, during rehearsals they changed the script and added a dance routine and they needed a girl dancer who could also act, so I got that, too. So, I had three big parts in that one half-hour episode. After I did the show, I received three huge checks in the mail…I was absolutely flabbergasted. My paycheck for doing Red’s show was phenomenal and I wound up making more money that week than the main guest star.
John: Although Red Skelton went on record as being totally against the use of off-color jokes on stage, I’ve heard that his humor off stage could be pretty blue. Did you experience any of that?
Sally: Yes, but it was all double entendre stuff…it really wasn’t that dirty. He would get just blue enough, you know, to get us all roaring. I was hysterical the whole time (in fact, I barely made it through the show). Rehearsing with Red was always a blast because he would slip that material in when we weren’t expecting it. Red Skelton was a fantastic ad-libber…probably one of the world’s best, in fact.
As everyone probably knows, Red always had a special place in his heart for children. He really loved kids and he donated a lot of money over the years to several different children’s hospitals and organizations.
I was very fortunate to have met and worked with people like Bob Cummings and Red Skelton. I thought my career was off to a really good start when I got those shows.
John: In the mid 50’s, you dated a handsome young actor named Rad Fulton (later James Westmoreland). In photos from that period, he kind of resembles a young Elvis Presley. Was that a serious relationship?
Sally: We dated exclusively for four or five months, and yes, during that time we were very serious about each other. “Jim” and I were two gorgeous and red-blooded young kids and we had an extremely physical relationship. In fact, we couldn’t keep our hands off each other! (laughs) Our life back then was going to one exciting Hollywood party after another, and we spent nearly every waking moment together. Jim and I met through his agent, Henry Willson, who also handled Rock Hudson and Tab Hunter and Guy Madison (among several other hot young actors). Henry was also my commercial agent, and he was one of the most colorful characters in town. He was gay and outrageous and I think he had a bit of a crush on Jim, because he was highly offended when Jim later told him that he wanted to leave his agency. Henry demanded that Jim immediately stop using the name of Rad Fulton, to which Jim replied, ‘No problem…you can have your lousy name back.’ (laughs)
John: Not long ago, you and Jim Westmoreland had a reunion after not seeing each other for nearly 50 years. What was that like?
Sally: It was wonderful. Jim writes books now and teaches golf, and he still looks great. It was amazing to see him again, and he is just as sweet and lovely as he was back in the 50s. He calls me several times a week and we have resumed a beautiful friendship. It is absolutely terrific.
John: You have an interesting story about working with Jerry Lewis, don’t you?
Sally: Yes, that was before I heard about his somewhat legendary reputation with the ladies. (laughs) In the summer of 1955 I signed a contract with NBC to do six weeks work on the Colgate Comedy Hour (which had undergone a name change to the Colgate Variety Hour). Though the show was hosted by several different comedians, I was thrilled to learn that I would be working that summer with Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. Even though they were feuding with each other by then, I still was very excited because they were still enormously popular as a comedy team. Jerry and Dean were so much fun to be around.
The Colgate Comedy Hour was broadcast live each week which meant that I had to join the AFTRA union, of which I had not been a member previously. Well, Jerry evidently took a romantic shine to me as soon as he met me and he offered to pay for my union card, which I thought was kind of unusual, but I took him up on it as I really wanted the job.
The shows I did with Dean and Jerry were great. We would do different comedy skits each week and I would play a sexy nurse one week and maybe a secretary the next week and a girl in a bathing suit the following week. And, sometimes, there would be four of us girls introducing Dean and Jerry to the audience at the beginning of the show (just like Jackie Gleason would do later on in the 1960s, when he taped his TV show from Miami Beach).
As time went on, I noticed during rehearsals that Jerry was becoming more and more attentive towards me. But, I didn’t mind it too much as I was learning how to flirt with a man and then how to run away as quickly as possible afterwards. (laughs) I knew I had to escape him because I still had a couple more shows to do and I didn’t want to lose my job over something stupid like a false rumor going around that I was having an affair with Jerry Lewis. I mean, I knew I could be replaced at any time if people started believing that.
So, I always managed to outrun him and still have fun on the show and then on the last week of work one of the other girls came up to me and said, ‘Jerry is looking everywhere for you.’ At almost the same time, the assistant director came over to me and said, ‘Sally, we were all looking for you. Jerry wants to talk to you about your AFTRA card.’ Um…okay. I don’t know if Jerry Lewis expected me to show up in his dressing room with a check in hand, or what, but obviously, I didn’t go. You know, I never heard another word from him after that. (laughs)
A few months later, there was a big call over at Paramount for dozens of background girls for a new film that Jerry and Dean were starring in, called Artists and Models. Even though my agent knew what had happened between Jerry and me, he sent me over there for an interview. Well, I heard that Jerry took one look at my name on the call list and said, ‘In no way, shape or form is Sally Todd to work on this picture.’ And, needless to say, I didn’t.
So, that’s the story of my almost-romance with Jerry Lewis. He’s still around, God love him.
John: When I think of Jerry Lewis, I always think of Dean Martin, and when I think of him, I think of the Rat Pack. Did you ever date any of them?
Sally: Yes, I went out with Peter Lawford, off and on, for about a year. I first met him on the set of his TV show Dear Phoebe, in which I had a small part, and we hit it off right away. Peter was a great guy⎯he easily had the best sense of humor of anyone I have ever met, and he was gorgeous, too. Peter was warm and generous, and I still miss him. After he married Pat Kennedy, our relationship evolved into a close friendship, and a few years later he got me another acting job on his TV series The Thin Man. It was through Peter that I got to meet President Kennedy. That was an amazing experience for me and I’ll tell you that story a little bit later.
You mentioned the Rat Pack and I do have a pretty outrageous story about Sammy Davis, Jr. that I think you’ll find interesting. During the time that I worked with Dean and Jerry (mid 1950’s), Sammy was opening one night at the famous Mocambo nightclub on the Sunset Strip, and I attended his show. My date that night was a young guy from UCLA and although neither of us had ever met Sammy, we were invited to sit at his private table. We were joined there by actress Jackie Loughery, who had won the first Miss USA contest a few years earlier, and a few other celebrities, including actress and singer Polly Bergen. At the time, Jackie was dating actor Vince Edwards, who, of course, went on to play Ben Casey. (Vince was not with her at the Mocambo.)
Sammy sang beautifully that night and afterwards he invited my date and me to attend a very intimate party at his house for just a few select guests. So, we’re at the party, and while everyone else was eating and drinking and having a great time, I noticed that Sammy was acting very weird. He had gotten real quiet and moody and was pacing back and forth. He was extremely nervous, and when I asked someone about it, they told me that Sammy had secretly made a date that night with Jackie Loughery for after the party, and that Vince Edwards had found out about it. Now, at the time, Vince was notorious in town for being one of the most jealous and most hotheaded guys alive. He was an Italian bodybuilder from Brooklyn, and he was very buff and very dangerous. So, needless to say, before long, Sammy was having definite second thoughts about dating Jackie. (laughs) He was scared to death thinking that Vince was going to crash the party and kill him, or at the very least, beat the crap out of him.
John: What were you doing during all this drama…comforting Sammy?
Sally: No, the rest of us were unaware that our host was absolutely losing it right before our eyes, so we kept right on partying and carrying on. I remember Polly Bergen and I were drinking champagne like there was no tomorrow and at one point during the evening we even switched outfits with one another. I guess were both vying for the title of ‘Queen of Sammy’s Party’. (laughs)
Eventually, Sammy holed up in his bedroom where he continued pacing back and forth. At some point he saw me out in the hallway and he grabbed me and brought me into his bedroom with him because he didn’t want to be alone. I remember him saying to me, ‘Sally, I just know that Vince Edwards is going to show up here tonight and kill me.’ Once he explained to me what was going on I told him he was a damn fool. Everyone knew that Jackie Loughery was a big flirt, and you can’t get someone like Vince Edwards mad at you and not expect trouble as a result.
When I was in his bedroom, Sammy opened his dresser drawer and pulled out a gun which he started waving around. I was absolutely terrified. I had seen guns in person before, but never in that context. I’ll never forget Sammy crawling up on his bed and crumbling into a little fetal position and just rocking back and forth while cradling that gun. Here was a man who, just a few hours earlier, was totally together onstage, and now he was crumpled up like a baby. It was insane.
Finally, Sammy said he was going to call the police. At that point I felt it was time to leave, but since I had already gotten rid of my date, I wound up getting a ride home from Polly Bergen. She called me the next day to say that she had heard the police had indeed come out to Sammy’s house after we left, but that Vince never showed up. So, Sammy escaped death that night after all. (laughs)
John: Wow, I guess Sammy found himself in hot water quite a lot in those years. I heard that when he dated Kim Novak, her boss Harry Cohn had threatened him with bodily harm, too.
Sally: Yeah, the poor guy. I remember hearing from Polly or somebody that right after that whole fiasco with Vince and Jackie, Sammy went right into therapy. (laughs)
John: Didn’t you date Vince Edwards, too?
Sally: Yes. A few months after Sammy’s party, I met Vince at a job interview and he asked me out. We started dating, and eventually got engaged. Jackie had moved on by then and was dating Jack Webb, but then in 1958, Jack hired me to do some episodes of Dragnet, and then we started dating.
John: Whew…what a wild Hollywood story!
Sally: I know, isn’t it? I later became engaged to Jack but it didn’t work out and he not only went back to Jackie, he also wound up marrying her. Poor Sammy lost out all the way around!
John: Did you keep in touch with Sammy after that infamous party of his in the 50s?
Sally: No, I didn’t see him again in person until the mid 70s, when some friends and I attended one of his shows at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead, but Sammy was just a holy mess that night. I don’t even know if I can say for sure that he was drunk, but he was definitely on something. Sammy wandered around the stage lost, almost like he was on a different planet. The audience didn’t boo him, but they were shouting out to him to sing something because all he was doing was pacing the stage and mumbling to himself and looking around the room like he didn’t know where the hell he was. Sammy just stared at the crowd with this confused and tortured look on his face and I’m sure he didn’t know what they were even yelling about. My God, it was so sad. It was not one of his best performances, by any means. After watching him for a while in this downright pitiful state, my friends and I got up and left because we just couldn’t bear to see him so out of it. Remembering how electrifying and in control Sammy had been all those years earlier at the Mocambo, seeing him so wiped out like that at the Sands just broke my heart. Thank God, though, that he evidently got his act together in the 1980s before he died, and stopped doing whatever he was doing. [author’s note: Sammy Davis Jr. passed away on May 15, 1990 at the age of 64, as a result of complications from throat cancer.]
John: You mentioned earlier that you have a story about meeting JFK through your friendship with Peter Lawford.
Sally: Yes, JFK had been elected President by that time and being that Peter was his brother-in-law, he often had parties at Peter’s beachfront house in Malibu. One day I called Peter’s office and I said to him, ‘I want to meet the President and I want you to arrange it for me.’ He said, ‘Sally, I would love for you to meet him, but he’s very busy this weekend.’ Peter went on to tell me that JFK was getting ready to address California governor Pat Brown and several hundred other people at the Century Plaza Hotel and he said that he had to knuckle down that weekend to work on his speech.
Well, I wasn’t about to let a little thing like that stop me. (laughs) I said to my cousin, ‘I am going out to Malibu Beach this weekend and I am going to meet the President. You wanna come?’ So she and I drove out there in the morning and we parked ourselves on our beach blankets right outside Peter’s property, and we just stayed there all day. I had on these really tight hip-huggers, and I was brown as a berry, and let me tell you, I looked great.
Eventually, a huge crowd formed on the beach, and it included dozens of cops and FBI agents and security guards. Finally, JFK and Peter came out onto the beach to say hello to the crowd and the President turned his head and looked right at me. Peter said, ‘Sally!’, and I went, ‘Hello!’ He and JFK talked secretly for a little bit and then Peter gave me a sign to wait around until the crowd left. I turned to my cousin and said, ‘See…?’ (laughs)
The head of the President’s security team came out to the beach later on and escorted me up to Peter’s house. No one else was there other than JFK, Peter, and a few security people. It was obvious right away that the President was smitten with me…he was charming, and very complimentary. At the time I had been rehearsing a sexy dance routine which Peter knew about, so he said, ‘Sally, why don’t you do that dance of yours for the President.’ And would you believe that for the next five hours that’s just what I did? With the help of lots of champagne and a very enthusiastic “audience”, I danced non-stop for JFK until about one o’clock the next morning.
John: I have to admit that the image of you dancing privately for President Kennedy for five hours straight is quite evocative and fascinating.
Sally: Thanks. And I never even got tired! (laughs) He was clearly enthralled with me, that’s for sure, and we had a great time. In fact, JFK enjoyed it so much that he arrived at the Century Plaza two hours late for his speech with Governor Brown. Before they left, Peter said to me, ‘Don’t leave until I get back because we have to talk. The President is absolutely crazy about you.’ Later, Peter had a driver bring me home, and the very next day I received two dozen American Beauty Roses from…guess who? Then, Peter’s agent called me and said, ‘Sally, would you be available to drop everything in the next few days if we contact you and ask you to fly to Washington to visit the President?’ I said, ‘Are you kidding me? Of course I would!’ There’s a lot more to the story, but I’ll save the rest of it for my book.
John: Wow. I know a lot of people out there are going to want to hear more about you and JFK.
A few years prior to dancing for President Kennedy, and in the midst of her jam-packed Hollywood social life and busy modeling career, Sally landed an acting job in what would be the first film in her (now legendary) horror/sci-fi trilogy: the John Carradine/Allison Hayes/Tor Johnson freakfest, The Unearthly. Though widely perceived through the years as a dull and moth-eaten version of the mad scientist and mutants plot seen one year earlier in the period piece The Black Sleep (Bela Lugosi’s last completed film), The Unearthly has, in recent times, somehow developed a small, but loyal, legion of fans. Produced independently (and cheaply) by the movie outfit AB-PT Pictures Corporation in the spring of 1957, and distributed by Republic Pictures as one of its last releases, The Unearthly was originally co-billed that summer with the Peter Graves/Peggie Castle marauding grasshoppers film, Beginning of the End. However, while the latter picture seemed relevant in 1957, with its plot of atomic-age insects gone amok, The Unearthly was a bleak and dated affair whose mid-1940’s, PRC-like ambiance seemed conspicuously obsolete by the late 50s.
Shoehorned into John Carradine’s massive filmography between the similarly rancid The Incredible Petrified World and the overblown, Technicolor spectacle, The Story of Mankind, 1957’s The Unearthly truly seemed to be an unearthly experience at the time for Sally, then just 22. While the film’s plot freewheeled through a world of tortured and twisted souls, the on-set shenanigans of some of its stars remains vivid in her memory.
To those who appreciate it’s dubious merits, The Unearthly does have its interesting moments—from the propulsive opening scene of a terrified woman clawing at the face of a drooling and cretinous Tor Johnson, to John Carradine’s many bizarre rants⎯each of them crisply enunciated in his imposing, booze-burnished voice⎯to the film’s final, fleeting moments in a basement dungeon where the viewer is treated to the sickening sight of several grunting freaks chained to a rotating maypole. Nearly saved by film composer Henry Vars’s dramatic musical score that tries (albeit, in vain) to create a Daliesque aura to the proceedings, The Unearthly is a true, “bad-movie” lover’s delight, and although Sally’s role in the film is brief, it remains memorable.
John: In 1957, monster movies came back into vogue and you made your first appearance in the genre with your co-starring role in The Unearthly. You’ve told me that you were dating Vince Edwards when you made the film.
Sally: That’s right. As I said before, he was a very jealous and possessive guy, so my life that summer was never dull. We shot most of The Unearthly in an old house on Western Avenue in Hollywood, just off Sunset Boulevard. Well, Vince would drop by the set every day to check up on me because he knew I was working with Myron Healey, who was a very handsome and debonair man. Myron was probably about 35 years old at the time, and even though I was a very young 22, I still found him to be immensely attractive. He was also a very friendly guy, but believe me, our relationship was strictly professional.
Anyway, Vince always wanted me all to himself and before long he had become almost a permanent fixture on the set. He would pull up in his beautiful brand new Lincoln and people would come running up to me, whispering, “Vince is here! Vince is here!” (laughs) And I’d go, “Yeah…so? What do you want me to do about it?” I was there working. I certainly wasn’t doing anything wrong.
Vince had a really bad temper, and our relationship, as a result, was pretty passionate. I’ll probably talk more about that in my book.
John: Let’s get right to John Carradine. The man is an acting legend, but he was also a certifiable character, and I’m wondering how the two of you interacted.
Sally: I thought Mr. Carradine was a lovely man. He was just wonderful to watch as a performer because he knew so much about acting. To this very day, I consider it a great honor to have gotten the chance to work with him.
Unfortunately, as most everyone knows, John Carradine had a real drinking problem that went on for many years, but the amazing thing to me is he would spend hours upon hours drinking with the film’s director, Boris Petroff, and Myron Healey (who also liked to have a few belts), and yet it never once affected his work. Just like the true Shakespearean actor that he was, the man was always letter perfect. Petroff never had to do a second take with John⎯ever. This man was unbelievably fantastic. But, my God, did he and the other guys drink. In fact, I don’t know how they drank as much as they did and yet were still able to do their jobs. I couldn’t have done it, I know that. [author’s note: In a 1988 interview, featured player Arthur Batanides, now deceased, admitted that he was inebriated throughout most of the film, as well.]
John: John Carradine’s sepulchral tone and over-the-top performance in the film brings new meaning to the word “hammy”. I read somewhere that he once said, “Directors never direct me…they just turn me loose.” Did Boris Petroff turn Carradine loose, too?
Sally: Well, none of us were directed in the film. In retrospect, it was the same type of experience I would have later on when I worked on Viking Women and Frankenstein’s Daughter. Boris Petroff was exactly like (directors) Roger Corman and Richard Cunha in that none of them gave their actors any real guidance or encouragement to do a good job. In all these films, you were basically just left to your own devices—it wasn’t very inspiring, I’ll tell you that. I’m sure that John gave the part what he felt it required. The man was a veteran…he knew what to do.
John: You had only one scene in The Unearthly with Allison Hayes, who was another popular scream queen of the late 1950s. Did you get along with her on the set?
Sally: Allison was a very beautiful and voluptuous woman, but no, we weren’t friends. She was a quiet and moody person and I really didn’t get to know her. For some reason, she wouldn’t talk to me. Looking back now, I think that was because I was the popular girl on the set⎯you know, always laughing and smiling and happy. I was young and blonde and people seemed to gravitate more toward me than to Allison, and who knows, maybe that bothered her.
John: I have always read that Myron Healey was a great person and that he was always very professional. He was a real workhorse, too. He did a lot of stuff in the 50s and should probably be a lot better known outside the genre film world than he is. You mentioned earlier that he was a nice guy.
Sally: Myron was a total delight. We had two scenes together and he was very helpful to me when we rehearsed them. He made suggestions to me and was really like my acting coach during the shoot because I got nothing from Boris Petroff. Myron was a very experienced actor and even though he tilted the bottle, shall we say, he was never rude to anyone, or unprofessional, and like I said, he helped me. Just like John Carradine, Myron Healey was never late for work, or unprepared. He knew what was expected of him (a decent acting job), and he delivered it.
John: On to Tor Johnson, whom I’m sure was christened “Lobo” in another life. In her autobiography, A Fuller Life: Hollywood, Ed Wood and Me (co-authored by Stone Wallace and Philip Chamberlin), former actress Dolores Fuller writes: “I have fond memories of big Tor Johnson, who despite his enormous size and intimidating presence, was a kind, soft-spoken man⎯though with a Swedish accent so thick it was often difficult to understand him.” What can you say about this beloved cult figure that hasn’t already been said (or written)?
Sally: That’s a tough one. He’s been an icon for years and I’m sure by now his fans know most everything there is to know about him. Well, he was asthmatic, how about that? Tor had really bad asthma that clearly impacted his breathing, and you can actually hear him wheezing in the two or three scenes that we had together. In all honesty, there were times that Tor’s condition made me fear for my safety. In the scenes where I am supposedly unconscious, Tor had to carry me around this rickety old house from one room to another, and he would always start wheezing after a while, like he was really struggling to breathe. I weighed about 115 pounds at the time, so obviously it wasn’t that I was too heavy for him. Tor had a ravenous appetite, and I would say he easily weighed 350 pounds. As a result, I don’t imagine he was all that healthy.
In one scene that we filmed, Tor picked me up and started down this long staircase and I really had the feeling that he was going to drop me down the stairs or maybe even fall on top of me. Every time the poor thing picked me up I would start shaking. At the time, it was very frightening.
John: I would really be remiss if I didn’t ask you what you thought of Tor Johnson’s now legendary line in the film, “Time for go to bed?”
Sally: Well, it’s absolutely unbelievable and hysterical⎯just like the rest of the film. (laughs) My God, is that too much, or what? What were we all thinking? I wasn’t in that particular scene so I’m not sure who noticed it at the time (if anyone), but since then that one line of dialogue has definitely taken on a life of its own. Working with Tor Johnson⎯strange Swedish man that he was⎯is something I will never forget. Even though I was intimidated by his gargantuan size, he really was a fun guy and a very kind person (just like Dolores Fuller said in her book) and I know that he would have never, ever, intentionally hurt me.
John: The theatrical trailer for The Unearthly hinted at what was in store for your character: “What this gland does to this blonde when it’s electrolated into her body is an experience in horror that is almost unbelievable!” Tell us, what was it like being electrolated?
Sally: (laughs) As you can imagine, pretty rough. You saw the movie, so you know the outcome.
John: Yes, unfortunately, I do. After John Carradine injects your character with that infamous “17th gland” he has discovered⎯which looks more like a prehistoric fish, or a stir-fried snow pea⎯you undergo a very heartbreaking metamorphosis. I say “heartbreaking” because your character in the film is basically very sympathetic. Kind of a tough-talking airhead, maybe…but still sympathetic (especially toward Lobo). I can imagine movie audiences in 1957 screaming and jumping out of their seats when your character, Natalie, turns toward the camera and reveals that…face.
Sally: It was pretty horrific, wasn’t it? When I first heard that I was going to have to be made up to look so ugly and frightening, I panicked, but thank God for (makeup supervisor) Harry Thomas. I didn’t know it at the time, but he was just a top-notch makeup man⎯the best in his profession⎯and he absolutely saved me.
Harry had to make me up to look about 200 years old and he used a sticky gel, tissue paper, and a hair dryer to create the effect. Then, to finish the process, he put a layer of another substance (some sort of makeup, I think) on top of all of it, and then he let everything air dry. Well, he did such a magnificent job I wound up looking like I had the worst skin disease of all time. I sort of looked like a leper and leprechaun combined, you know? (laughs) Oh, it was horrible. But Harry Thomas was such an expert at applying and removing monster makeup I never experienced any discomfort. Harry made sure to put a thin layer of base on my skin underneath all the tissue paper and glue and that protected me beautifully. When he removed everything, I didn’t have any redness or irritation anywhere on my face. The man was a genius, and I was very happy to see him again the following year, when we worked together on Frankenstein’s Daughter.
John: In The Unearthly, how long did it take Thomas to apply your monster makeup?
Sally: About two hours. Layer after layer (after layer) of it, clear down to my neck and also on one of my hands. When I looked in the mirror and saw what he had done to me I was nearly scared to death. Fortunately, I only had to wear that monster makeup for a day and a half. I don’t think I could have stood it any longer than that.
John: The last scene in the film (where we see all the freaks and mutants in the dungeon) is so creepy and unexpected, it’s almost surreal. With all those hairy, misshapen faces, the growling, and the lumbering around, it was like the world’s most horrifying sideshow, or like something out of Island of Lost Souls or The Sentinel. To me, that scene is still very disturbing, even though I have watched the film several times.
Sally: I know. The scariest part for me was when they threw me in that room with all those guys. For a minute, I forgot they were actors and I was afraid I wasn’t going to get out of there alive. Ha…that’s why you heard me screaming in the background.
At this point, Sally’s manager, Peter Clark, interjects: “Hey, Sally, didn’t the producers of the film recruit all those freaky guys from your apartment building in the Valley?”
Sally: (laughs) That is a big, fat lie! The man is a liar, John. Don’t believe a word he says. He’s just jacking us around. (laughs)
John: Hey, you two have a really great rapport. But who exactly were the guys that played the mutants? Professional actors? (I know that Tor Johnson’s son Karl played one of them).
Sally: That’s right…I had forgotten about that. But aside from Tor’s son, I think the rest of the zombies in that scene were just some old, washed-up Hollywood stuntmen and alcoholic extras the producers had somehow gotten hold of. They were a rough lot, I’ll say that for them. All their masks were so lifelike and horrible I just wanted to stay away from them (and I did).
John: I have heard that the freaks were supposed to be a bigger part of the film and that Harry Thomas was extremely disappointed when they were relegated to that one brief scene at the end. Here he had spent many hours designing those monster masks and they’re seen only fleetingly, for like 30 seconds or so.
Sally: Well, if that’s true, then I can understand why he would be upset by it. The original title of the script was The House of Monsters so I think the freaks were supposed to be in the picture a lot more than they actually were. I don’t know why that changed. Imagine if they were allowed to run wild in the house throughout the entire film? Wow, that would have been really scary!
John: Your next film, The Saga of the Viking Women and Their Voyage to the Waters of the Great Sea Serpent (AIP, 1957), is on many bad film aficionados lists as one of their favorite Grade-Z films. It was Roger Corman’s nineteenth film credit in three years as a director and producer and I’m curious what you thought of his directing style.
Sally: What an amazingly screwed-up picture that was. Whoever wrote the script of that thing obviously owed Roger Corman some money, because the film was just a rotten mess. [author’s note: the screenplay was written by Louis Goldman, from a story by Irving Block.]
Oddly enough, Roger had a pretty good name at the time. He was putting out a lot of product that was popular with the country’s teenagers, but sometimes he would be on the set and other times he wouldn’t. And, you know, when he was there, it was all about, ‘Ready, set, go. Horses…go. Actors…run. Look good, don’t stop…keep going!’ That’s what was important to Roger Corman. Work fast, and look good. Not the quality of a film, by any means.
John: Were all the beach scenes in the picture filmed at Malibu?
Sally: Most of them were shot at Zuma Beach out in Malibu, yes. We also shot some scenes in Santa Monica. The rest of the movie was filmed at Bronson Canyon and at the Iverson Ranch in Chatsworth, which was an absolutely horrible place to shoot a film. It was like 120 degrees in the shade and we were surrounded by horses and wild boars and other smelly things. It was smelly and hot and actually pretty gross.
Just like the “freaks” in The Unearthly, the bad guys in the film were all these over-the-hill, punch drunk wranglers who were loaded and carrying on the whole time they were on the set. So there we are out in the mountains in this god awful heat, being chased by these drunken guys on horseback. As you can imagine, I was panic-stricken the whole time.
John: Given the rough conditions on the set, did anyone get hurt?
Sally: We all did. However, out of a group of about ten or fifteen kids in the film, I’m pretty sure I got the prize for suffering the most injuries. It seems I was always being bumped around by the horses, or falling down cliffs and into mine shafts. I’m not normally a klutz but the staging on that film was unreal. Everyone was expected to do their own stunts and everyone got hurt. We were running down shale rocks and being pushed and grabbed and thrown down to the ground…it was a very tough show to work on. Not to mention that Corman was always very low-key when it came to showing an interest in his actors safety. He just seemed unconcerned, like he didn’t give it much thought. He would say something like, ‘See this cliff here? Well, you’re gonna run straight down this 20-foot cliff and then when you get to the bottom, we’ll do a great close-up of you and it’ll be fantastic.’ And I would look at him and go, ‘What? What do you want me to do?’ The guy was a real slick talker, let me tell you. And we were all kids, so what did we know? Most of us were in our early 20s.
I remember I started out at the beginning of the film in this cute little leather outfit⎯you know, this short, sexy, Viking kind of costume⎯and by the end of the picture, it was just a bunch of rags and ratty strips of fur. I had them tied around my knees, my elbows, my fingers…you name it. (laughs)
John: Do you remember a specific incident of getting injured on the film?
Sally: Oh, sure…several. There was a scene near the end of the film where the entire cast was on horseback. The bad guys were chasing us girls on their big, fat horses through this very narrow canyon out at the Iverson Ranch and they were going to corner us against the side of a mountain. Well, I remember thinking that there was something about the staging of the scene that just didn’t seem safe to me. I had the feeling, and I don’t know why, that the horses were going to rear up and throw us. I mean, I had a real strong vision of being trampled.
By this time, I had totally had it with the stunts. I thought, ‘If I come out of this film alive, it will be a miracle.’ So, I’m looking at the set-up of this scene where the horses are going to race us right into this narrow, dead-end area of this canyon and I thought, ‘Uh huh. No way.’ The horses are going to be rearing up. They’re going to be confined and it’s going to make them crazy and they’re going to respond by piling up on us. It didn’t make any sense to me at all and I was scared to death. So, I said to Corman, ‘Roger, I am not doing this scene.’ He got really mad and yelled at me, but I didn’t care. There were some girl extras on the set who weren’t featured players like Susan Cabot and Abby Dalton and me, and he wound up using one of those girls to replace me on the horse. And she just happened to be Abby’s kid sister. Roger slapped this long blonde wig on her head so that she would look more like me, and then he put her up on the horse, and guess what happened? The horse reared up and flung her to the ground and she had to be carted off to the hospital with a brain concussion.
I mean, that was my horse that threw her. Do you see why I’m glad I was always such a rebel? It might not have been good for my career, but at least I’m still alive.
John: Were there any other serious mishaps on the set during filming?
Sally: Yes…like when the boat we were on completely broke apart out in the ocean. All of us girls in the film (Abby Dalton, Susan Cabot, June Kenney, Lynn Bernay and Betsy Jones-Moreland) were on this rickety old wooden boat that was supposed to be a stately Viking ship. You know, it had the big mast and lots of barrels and all the Viking shields along the sides…it was supposed to be really impressive, right? So, one weekend out at Malibu we’re working on this scene of the six or seven of us in this so-called Viking boat, and it’s high tide⎯the worst day in the world to take this pile of junk out into the surf. But Corman said, ‘We have to make this shot. Come on…let’s go!’ I mean, just try to picture it: high tide at Zuma Beach, and it’s a rip tide, to boot. We weren’t even supposed to be out there.
So, we’re in the ocean, and the waves, which seemed to be like 30 feet high by then, started crashing down on us. Within minutes, the boat broke in half and all of us girls went flying into the surf. I got hit in the head by one of the barrels and actually broke one of my pinkies. The rip tide started pulling some of the girls out to sea and when Roger saw that, he hollered for someone to call the Coast Guard.
Abby Dalton and I were the only good swimmers in the group and we somehow got past the rip tide, but it pushed us sideways into this huge cliff that was jutting out into the water. By this time Abby and I were screaming and flailing our arms because we were both being body-slammed into the side of this mountain. We decided we should try to get out of there if we could so we began climbing the rocks that were at the base of the cliff. You would think that Roger Corman would know enough to film all this, right? I mean, this is good, dramatic stuff. But instead, he turned all the cameras off, the jerk.
Abby and I wound up with cuts and bruises all over our hands and arms because the waves kept knocking us off the rocks and bashing us into the side of the cliff. This went on for several minutes and we must have drifted 20 or 30 feet before we were saved. It was a total nightmare. Finally, the Coast Guard showed up and I recall them being very angry with Roger. I mean, they really came down on him…big time. It could have been a real bloodbath…there were bodies everywhere, and a few of the girls had drifted pretty far out. But, true to form, Roger underplayed the whole thing. It was, you know, on to the next scene, and that was that. A lot of people nearly lost their lives making that stupid thing and if Roger Corman had only filmed what really happened he would have had a very harrowing movie.
John: According to the book, Faster and Furiouser: The Revised and Fattened Fable of American International Pictures by Mark Thomas McGee, the film’s sea serpent was actually a hand puppet worn by special effects expert (and writer of the story) Irving Block. What were you thoughts on its appearance?
Sally: Oh, God, that thing. It was so embarrassing. I seem to remember it was made of paper mache. When the film showed it coming up out of the ocean and attacking the boat⎯all that stuff, of course, was done on a sound stage. I remember a lot of us being on the set that day, watching that particular scene, and we all left the stage at one point because we couldn’t believe what we were seeing. It was just so ridiculous and embarrassing.
John: Do you remember if there was a big world premiere for the film?
Sally: (laughs) I don’t know where the film premiered, but I’m sure it wasn’t at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre! It wasn’t the type of film they would have rolled out the red carpet for. I was just happy I had gotten paid for the thing and that the check didn’t bounce.
John: What are your memories of your fellow cast members in the film?
Sally: The leading man was an actor named Brad Jackson, who, I hear, later had a nervous breakdown and then killed himself. Looking back now, I believe he suffered from anorexia nervosa. Of course we didn’t know anything about the disease back then, but Brad wouldn’t eat. He just wouldn’t eat, and he was so thin. We all thought he was just depressed, but in reality, he was starving himself. It was a very unfortunate thing.
Susan Cabot was a good actress and, as a lot of people know, she also had a very sad and tragic death. She did a lot of good work, she really did, but she was an extremely strange person. I think most people know how Susan died. Her son was a little demented and he killed her. Killed his own mother⎯can you imagine? That happened many years after we did the film, though…maybe 20 years, or more. [author’s note: Susan Cabot died on December 10, 1986 at the age of 59, while her son, Timothy Roman, died on January 22, 2003 at age 39.]
Apparently, Susan had a very unhappy life. She could never hold on to a man, I understand, and she had a very strange and dark personality. None of us could get next to her on the show. She wasn’t really normal, even back then. Just a very moody, weird girl.
Abby Dalton, on the other hand, was terrific. She was a lot of fun and she was a hard worker, too. Another girl, June Kenney, was a very cute, very pert little blonde. She didn’t go too far in her film career, but she really was a nice girl.
In all, there were probably 15 or 20 young actors in that film, and I had already worked with several of them on some TV projects. Roger had promised me and a few of the other players a lot more work after the film but I didn’t get anything else from him, that’s for sure. I really didn’t mind, though. The way Roger Corman did things back then was just so screwed up. For instance, the dialogue coach on Viking Women was Roger’s gardener, or something. And there wasn’t a stunt coordinator on the film…Roger had an actor filling in. He was too much.
John: Do you think the dialogue in the film was authentic?
Sally: Uh…no. (laughs) It was unbelievably hysterical and we all had a hard time saying our lines. Someone had written the dialogue to mimic how they thought a Viking would speak, and it was ridiculous. Instead of sounding Norwegian, it sounded Hebrew. You know: ‘Smelman! Irving! Magma! Already the storm god licks his lips at the coming feast!’ That kind of thing. How can you say stuff like that without cracking up? (laughs) Trust me, the only thing that kept us from laughing all the time were all our injuries. Everyone was always bleeding and/or limping from the scene they had just filmed.
John: Your next picture, Frankenstein’s Daughter (Astor, 1958), is probably your best known horror film, and many genre film fans love it and still hold it dear to their hearts (including this interviewer). How do you feel about the film?
Sally: I appreciate it that some people enjoy the film , but come on…the movie is terrible. The script was unbelievable and the direction, just like with the Corman film, was almost completely non-existent. In fact, I really believe the director, Richard Cunha, was a myth. I don’t think the man ever even existed. (laughs) I didn’t know who he was…he was always hiding in the shadows. The other actors and I would come on the set and we would hear a voice in the darkness, yell ‘Action’, but we never quite saw who was saying it. Let me tell you, any one of us could have written better lines than what we were given. Every day, he (Richard Cunha) would change our lines and then he would run away. The cameraman would say, ‘Stand here. Do this. Do that.’ And that was the extent of our direction.
John: I know a lot of the acting in the film has been criticized through the years, but I kind of like everyone’s performances—even Felix Locher’s (who played Uncle Carter). What memories do you have of your co-stars in the film?
Sally: I thought they were all talented, it’s just that the movie stunk. The film’s lead, of course, was John Ashley, whom I dated that summer. John and I stayed friends even after we stopped seeing each other. We had fun together on the film because we made fun of it, you know?
Sandra Knight was the other girl lead and she married Jack Nicholson a few years later. Sandra was a very talented young actress and although she made a few more movies after Frankenstein’s Daughter, her acting career never quite went anywhere. It’s a shame, too, because she was a good actress. I heard some time ago that after she divorced Jack Nicholson, she remarried and moved to Hawaii.
We filmed Frankenstein’s Daughter during a really bad time in Hollywood. The studios had fired most of their contract players and film jobs were scarce. The industry was putting out all these junky monster movies and a lot of us who did them were not able to move past them to get some good work in good films. It didn’t just happen to me⎯it happened to a lot of us at the time.
I worked alongside two sons of famous actors in Frankenstein’s Daughter. The kid who played my boyfriend was Harold Lloyd, Jr., the son of the famous silent screen star Harold Lloyd. And the detective was played by a very good-looking young man by the name of Robert Dix, who was the son of Richard Dix, a big film star at RKO in the 1930s. I felt so sorry for Harold Lloyd, Jr. I played a real sexpot in the film; you know, a loose and sexy bad girl, and Harold and I had some necking scenes. Well, in real life the poor guy was gay, and he didn’t know the first thing about kissing a girl. Back in those days, people were still hiding being gay and Harold was very gay and trying very hard to hide it. But we all knew. Oh, God, he was so awkward. I had to show him how to hold me when he kissed me. He didn’t know how to hold a girl, or where to put his hands, or how to embrace me. I thought the poor kid was going to have a heart attack, I really did. I had to be the initiator, the composer, and the choreographer of our love scenes. It became very traumatic for me after a while because I was thinking, ‘Oh, Christ, if this guy doesn’t get it by now.’ But anyway, we finally got through it. I remember looking over and seeing John Ashley and Sandra Knight standing off to the side and kind of laughing at Harold and me trying to ‘make out’. (laughs) It was obvious I was kind of attacking him because he just didn’t know what to do. Poor baby, he didn’t make very many films after that and I know he died young. [author’s note: Harold Lloyd, Jr. died on June 9, 1971, due to complications from a massive stroke he had suffered a few years earlier. He was just 40 years old.]
We shot some of Frankenstein’s Daughter at Harold Lloyd Sr.’s house, so I think maybe that’s how his son got cast in the film. Who knows, maybe Harold Lloyd Sr. had even invested some money in it.
All in all, I have to say that I did have a lot of fun making Frankenstein’s Daughter. We were all either going to have fun, or cry a lot.
John: During the time you made these horror films, I know you were also guest-starring on several TV shows. Among your television credits in the late 50’s, you acted in a few episodes of Dragnet. You told me earlier that you also dated its star, Jack Webb, in 1958. What can you tell us about him (and your relationship)?
Sally: That was quite an eventful period in my life…both personally, and professionally. I went in for a reading to play a teenager on the show and I got the part⎯it was that easy. I was thrilled that I was going to be working with Jack Webb because he was a very powerful guy at the time. Jack was also known for using many of the same actors over and over again on his show so I was looking forward to being asked back if I did a good job. (And I was asked back to do another show, in 1959.)
Well, about halfway through the first show, Jack asked me to have dinner with him. He had a beautiful suite right above the executive offices at the studio that was almost as big as a sound stage…it was fantastic. I remember I wore a lovely black dress and Jack seemed very attracted to me. We had a wonderful, relaxing dinner there with a few other guests (including the famous songwriter and conductor Ray Heindorf, and his wife), for which I was grateful, as I was a little nervous. Not that nervous, but Jack was a lot older than me, and at first I felt a bit threatened by that.
Jack had a Filipino houseboy who was supposed to be the best cook in the world and I think he was. The meal he prepared for us was absolutely delicious. Jack always had all his meals served to him in this suite above the studio and sometimes he even had them catered by Chasen’s. He threw some terrific parties up there. Anyway, we had a lovely dinner that night.
The next day I was back to work on the set of Dragnet and a delivery boy brought me a huge bouquet of flowers. And that was the beginning of my little courtship with Jack Webb, which actually quickly became a big courtship. The following weekend he took me to the world premiere of Around The World in Eighty Days, which was fabulous. Earlier that evening, he had sent a messenger over to my apartment with a gorgeous cocktail dress he wanted me to wear. Jack absolutely took over my life but it was fun and exciting to me as I was still very young and naive. I was at his house almost every night that summer. His friends dropped in constantly and I was really impressed with him as it seemed like he knew a million people and they were all at his beck and call.
Jack was charming and witty and intelligent, but it didn’t take me long to see that he drank a lot. And unfortunately, before you knew it, I was drinking a lot, too. So, it was pretty much always party time when we were together.
Everything was going along fine and then he insisted I move closer to the studio so that he could see me whenever he wanted. He wound up getting me an apartment right across the street from the studio, and it was beautiful. We furnished it with this very expensive imported stuff from an antique store on Sunset Boulevard. Jack had great taste⎯whether it be in fine art or furniture or music.
After a while, I learned that there was a very private area in Jack Webb’s suite that I was not allowed to see. He told me the area was ‘off limits’ to me, which, of course, piqued my interest even more. I guess you could call it a ‘secret room’ as it was always locked⎯and I later found out why.
But that story is best saved for another time!
To read more about Sally’s amazing experiences in show business, look for her upcoming autobiography. John O’Dowd wishes to thank Sally and her manager Peter Clark for their graciousness, as well as fellow writer Michael Barnum, whose kindness and generosity in arranging this project with Sally is deeply appreciated.