5/21/2023 0 Comments Cary Grant by Marc EliotThe author is sharper about Grant’s business affairs. Heavily implying that Grant’s first two marriages were asexual doesn’t answer the underlying question, especially since third wife Betsy Drake is on record that they had plenty of marital intercourse and fourth spouse Dyan Cannon had his baby. It’s disappointing that Eliot makes no attempt to figure out why Grant apparently moved on to heterosexual relationships after Scott. Stingy? Well, he certainly was careful with money, and the author reminds readers that Grant’s gutsy decision to go freelance beginning in 1936 meant he reaped far greater financial rewards from his work than actors under studio contracts did. Yes, Eliot concludes, Grant probably did spy on second wife Barbara Hutton for the FBI, which may explain why the staunchly liberal actor could publicly defend Charlie Chaplin in 1953 without prompting a HUAC subpoena. There’s no question, in this biography, that Grant and housemate Randolph Scott were lovers and that he had at least one male partner before that. The implication that he was not precisely what he seemed onscreen prompted persistent rumors - he was gay, he was stingy, he was an FBI agent - and the primary distinguishing feature of Eliot’s book is that he matter-of-factly accepts these rumors, which once seemed so scandalous, and moves on.
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