JOHNNIE RAY IS SHOCKED BY DOROTHY'S DEATH : HE MUST GO ON - THE ROAD, IN LIFE

Once Johnnie Ray and Bill Franklin were a couple and in a star-manager relationship, and Johnnie's health began to restore, the two of them went to live in Torremelios, Spain,  not yet a resort, and lived a simple and affordable life. Johnnie had wanted to quit the show business treadmill he was on.  At this point he was 38 years old and had given up drinking knowing the cirrhosis could kill him. Actually most people would have died as much as he drank.

"That he was still unable to sleep even after this average daily elbow bending and pill popping regimen is an ugly insight to the myriad tensions, pressures, anxieties and mental snares that assailed him.  Johnnie's life was an exercise in extremes, unimaginable emotional zeniths, the rise and plunge of glorious rapture and shattering torture.  His anguish, like his capacity for intoxicants, was beyond comprehension. (page 313).

"Like New York, Dorothy Kilgallen had also changed.  Johnnie was shocked when they met face to face.  Dorothy was obviously deteriorating - her face was puffy, her figure was shot.  She had gained quite a bit of weight and seemed weak; her bearing and gait were stilted, her speech was no longer the tuneful silvery voice of Broadway, but closer to labored, thick-tongued voice of the Bowery.  Dorothy's passion and principals ranj as high, true and clear as ever, but her mental clarity and standards of practice were also degenerating.  (Page 318) 

She had also taken up with a new lover, the one that author Mark Shaw thinks may have cooperated with the Mafia to murder Dorothy.

Johnnie was trying to make a return (ie. not called a comeback) changing his show song list.  When he restarted his return with a show at The Latin Quarter in 1965, Dorothy was back stage for every show. After this success, bookers will calling from all over, and Johnnie agreed to perform in Las Vegas at the Tropicana. He was now mod in his appearance, upgrading to the 1960's with tossled hair and the picture of health.

Dorothy and her husband were also experiencing financial problems like never before.  So she took a paid "press junket" to Vegas in order to see Johnnie perform there.  It was important to Johnnie that she be there to show her support.  At the same time she was, as an investigative journalist, independently investigating the President John F. Kennedy assassination.

Bill Franklin took her calls and said she was using a "Little Girl Lost" voice.  He thought drugs were taking over her life. (Page 423-324)  Still, she arrived dressed beautifully to hear him sing and show her support.

"Dorothy spent four days in Las Vegas.  Between her boundless passion and limited time, Bill felt even more uncomfortable that he had as part of a trio in New York. "We all saw a lot of each other, and there were times when Johnnie and she went out alone.  She would come out to the house one night, Johnnie would go to her hotel the next," he said.  "I kind of felt in the middle there... a lot in the middle.  That happened a lot with her anyway, but it seemed she was feeling like maybe Johnnie didn't love her like she thought he should."  (page 326)

After the success of The Tropicana, Bill still had to search out more bookings for Johnnie.  On the night that Dorothy died, Johnnie wanted to watch "To Tell The Truth," another television game show on which there were mystery guests. Dorothy was one of the mystery guests and the show had been taped previously.

"We had lunch on the Sunset strip," Jimmy Campbell recalled.  "And John picked up the newspaper, opened it up and there was the headline: 'Dorothy Kilgallen Dies In Her Sleep.'  Jesus Christ -- he almost fainted on the spot.

He said, 'Wait a minute now ... and started crying like a baby.  He cried for real. She was a good lady, man.  Good to him, good to me, good to all of us," Campbell's voice tapered to near silence with the recollection.  "We got back up to the house, we're both crying now, and John says, 'Give me a drink.' We got drunk.  They were close, man, really tight.  She was one of the best friends he had.

"After he got done crying about it, he got pissed off." Campbell said, "John didn't believe she died of natural causes.  He said, 'I ain't gonna tell you everything that I know about what Dorothy knows, but I don't believe she just laid down and went to sleep like that.' He didn't tell me the whole story though.  Never would.  I asked him that day and he just said, 'It's dangerous to know what Dorothy knows." (pages 332-333)

Dorothy's funeral in New York in 1965 took place at St. Vincent Ferrer, the same Roman Catholic church she had been married in. A couple thousand New Yorkers showed up. Johnnie watched the news coverage on television and cried.

"John went berserk when Dorothy died," Jim Low said. "That just tore him apart.  I''' never forget it.  He was always very high on her, thought the world of her." The loss was a brutal, devastating blow that smashed Johnnie's life apart." (page 347)

Missy here!  This is the only reference to Johnnie's reaction to his lover's death I could find and I'm glad to know that his feelings for her were genuine.

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THE COURTESAN PRINCESS ENDS HER YEARS A DEVOUT CATHOLIC

This is about  Liane de Pougy, married name Princess Anne-Marie Ghika of Roumania, and her later-in-life involvement in Catholicism. 

Born Anne-Marie Chassaigne in 1869, Liane had been born into a Catholic family. After her retirement as a courtesan, due to her marriage to the Prince, she again became acquainted with her faith. She was not especially happy in her marriage as the years went on. She sought some advice on marriage, and she was told that it would be most honorable and spiritual if she stuck with it, though her husband and her were not compatible in important ways. He was younger than she, he was apparently desperately alcoholic and in ill health, and he may also have sought sex with prostitutes. At one point she wanted to leave him and live separate lives.

The Dominican Sisters at Saint Agnes cared for children who were fundamentally disabled.  From her Blue Notebooks, here is an excerpt of how she became familiar with their work. She would chose to fund raise for them and the fashion designer and once-upon-a-time Mistress, CoCo Chanel was a generous donor to the same !

Here is an excerpt:

"We were punctual.  She took us to the playground... and there I saw sixty-seven unhappy creatures between eight and sixteen years old, ... the most inexorable suffering.  I nearly fainted. ... Oh! Those cries!  Those contortions, those grimaces, that smell...  Once you have seen that, never never again can you complain of anything.  I was ashamed of having talked so much about myself to Sister Marie Xavier. I pressed the poor tremulous, rather dirty hands which reached out towards me.  I searched those wandering, fixed or mad eyes for some glimmer of light.  I laid my hand on those foreheads, tumultuous or stunned. feverish, so pale... I gave five hundred francs.  George Ghika (her husband) gave a hundred, and I knew that he was more disturbed than he liked to admit.   (page 219 of The Blue Notebooks)

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THE PRINCESS ANNE-MARIE GHIKA OF ROUMANIA and STAYING IN AN UNHAPPY MARRIAGE

EXCERPTS page 202-203 

It's 1926 and Liane de Pougy has left her husband, Prince Georges Ghika of Roumania. Throughout the book she does have many complaints about the man, who is fifteen years younger than she and seems to be, by my way of thinking, mentally ill, and was alcoholic. Nathalie as below is Natalie Clifford Barney.

October 18

... As soon as I arrived in Paris, in Margot's  charming little flat, I called Nathalie who came to me, affectionate and approving: "You have done the right thing, Liane, I am so glad. You must keep it up....' She held me in her arms, listened, advised, sent flowers, took to the Duchess's, showed me the sweetest and most compassionate tenderness.  My friends rallied around, adorable to me and indignant at Prince Ghika, saying "It's abominable!  How could he fall so low! You were his whole truth.  He will be sorry - but don't ever take him back!  He was such a bore; he got on everyone's nerves' he diminished you." I heard endless versions of this.  In short I was made much of, comforted, smothered in flowers, almost celebrated.  Jean Cocteau came, very shocked, to pour out calming words, floods of healing poetry with which to express my agony.  As he will also come, I hope, to sing my deliverance.

... And Nathalie was there.  I - who am so scared of her thunder and also so afraid of doing her the least harm because through it all I love her deeply - this is what I did or rather had done to me, because nothing was started by me except a loyal and determined struggle in which I was defeated because my Mimy is here, she's asleep in the room next to mine as I write these words and I shall soon be going in to kiss her awake.  (She means Mini Franchetti

Nathalie, sitting  by my bed one day: 'Liane, the one I love is waiting outside. You are so beautiful, you have been so great, so admirable, may I bring her in to see you for a moment so that she can contemplate you, so that you can see her?' - 'Yes,' I said without much interest. 'Bring her in, go and fetch her.' And in she came, tall, slender, white as a magnolia flower, her enchanting gestures so graceful, small, rare, precise, fiery eyes, and almost unreal fineness.  She bent over me, over my cruel suffering. Natalie smiled.  It was Nathalie herself who prepared her own fate.

We talked. I told my pitiful story to Mimy. She didn't say a great deal. Nathalie wanted them both to carry me off to the country....

______

Liane and Mimi got involved with each other, and Nathalie became jealous.

______

EXCERPT: Page 213

Mimi Franchetti was dreadfully unhappy when I left her.  I was unhappy,  Our sensuality had its dear little habits.  I tore all that up in one minute.  ______

Liane's divorce proceedings continued.  

EXCERPT: Page 215  ... 

"Georges tells me that he adores me, that he can't look at me without wanting to burst into tears (and there are tears in his eyes), and that he is unable to control himself any longer.  He begs me to shut him up in a mad-house, or to kill him,  It is a complete disaster.   ______

My notes: It seems that sex is part of their problem.  He wants to have an open relationship and to have other women, including going to prostitutes.

Liane, who had been raised Catholic, returned to the faith of her upbringing in her later years.  Her connection with Mother Marie-Madeleine of the Faithful Company of Jesus had a long history to it. The Nun had known Liane, then Anna-Marie, since she was an eight year old. The aging Courtesan had confided in Mother Marie-Madeliene that she was miserable in her marriage and the nun advised her that taking back her husband was the best thing to do because it was a renouncement of self.  In 1928 Mother Marie-Madeleine died. 

Liane became an active Catholic, doing confessions and communions. Prince Georges was a non-believer.  However in 1935 the couple celebrated their 25 years of marriage, a Silver Jubilee. The Prince died in 1945 and the Princes outlived him about five years.

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All Rights Reserved Including Internet and International Rights.

Note October 17th... Alas, sometimes editing does not work...  At least we noticed it fairy early into this post...

16TH CENTURY ITALIAN MUSIC

Tullia might have enjoyed concerts like this! 

Perhaps you can listen to this while you read about her!

COMING UP : TWO ACKNOWLEDGED MISTRESSES OF A SPANISH KING

In the English speaking world, and I hate to say this, even with so many Hispanic immigrants to the United States, even with some parts of what is now the United States having had Spanish or Mexican settlements before they were the states we know now, it's as if the Spanish world does not exist. We rarely seem to get news out of Central American or any of South America on main stream media other than the incoming illegal immigrants or a major crisis. I also find the information I need for MISTRESS MANIFESTO BLOGSPOT hard to get. 

One of the Spanish language publications I enjoy paging through when I go to the library is Hola Magazine where royals and aristocrats are the celebrities. In that publication they are often photographed in splendid clothing in their gorgeous houses. It would seem that in the Latin world there is still great interest in people of nobility and how they live. 

In May of 2015, our Mistress of the Month was Marita Lorenz who was the Mistress of Fidel Castro (Cuba) and then General Marcos Peres Jimenes; She was a European born daughter of a ship captain based in New York. She turned into a CIA collaborator after having a very difficult time with Castro in particular and men in general. Other than that I have barely touched on Latin culture or people living in it or coming from it. However, I've long wanted to include modern Spanish Mistresses (or Mistresses in Spain).

I'm aware of what's happened with more recent King Juan Carlos I, who abdicated so that his son Felipe VI could take over. Felipe's role has been extremely public. That story is all over the media. Alphonso XII de Bourbon of Spain was the father of  King Juan Carlos and the grandfather of King Felipe VI. It would seem that there has been a tradition of fathering extramatrimonial children for generations in the family.

Despite that, the Spanish macho culture seems to have higher expectations of women for loyalty and faithfulness than for the men. There has been a tradition of Mistresses in Spain despite the  influence of Catholic culture which emphasizes the family and women as the nurturers whose main job is to raise the children. Wives are expected to be faithful and loyal to their husbands and to be with only one man in a life time or the loss of their reputation could be devastating. I believe there is still an emphasis on virginity until marriage for women in Latin culture. Men - not so much. (What's happening in gangs here in the United States is an aberration but that's another story.) 

There has been a tradition of the Wife with the Big House and the Mistress with the Little House which is more civilized than abandoning a woman who might otherwise be put out. Of course we are talking about men who can afford to support two families. In macho culture women remain in traditional roles, though there have been rapid changes in recent years, that was not the case in the late 19th and early 20th century.  

Check back with me tomorrow when I'll begin with our Mistress of the Month!

Missy

HE WAS A GOOD BOY...