In 1951, roughneck B-actor and star of Detour Tom Neal gave Franchot Tone a wild beating that left Tone in a coma for eighteen hours. They had been fighting over actress Barbara Peyton, who later married Tone but was eventually divorced from him when he discovered she had never stopped seeing Neal! Throughout all of this, there was an invisible character whose only role was to cash everyone's cheques: lawyer Milton Golden.
Golden's tell-all book Hollywood Lawyer is cleverly written but doesn't spill enough beans! Most of the little morality tales are "blinds," which leaves readers guessing who the identity of Mr D- or Miss X. may be. Maybe back in 1960 it was possible to sniff out who was who, but I was just left scratching my head. (I wonder if our modern day equivalent, entertainment lawyer Enty from the gossip site Crazy Days and Nights http://www.crazydaysandnights.net/ can help!)
Here's a sample: What male Hollywood actor (Golden calls the couple Bob and Cecile De Young) adopted a baby girl only to unknowingly re-adopt the same child seven years later? Golden says this was sometime prior to World War II when babies were the "must have" accessory du jour. Bob divorced Cecile, and his next wife "Estelle" retained custody of the child when she then also divorced Bob. When Estelle was killed in an airplane accident, her new husband gave the child up to his next wife "Shirley," who eventually married Bob De Young! .... Is Golden trying to tell me this is Clark Gable?
From the August 18, 1961 Deseret News.
Milton Golden (R) and his client, Tom Neal (1951).
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