Good Morning POU! This week we look at some of the scandals from what is considered the Golden Age of Old Hollywood. When the studios pretty much ran like the mafia and the fixers covered up EVERYTHING.
Today’s entry is a mix of Old Hollywood and Old Money.
William Randolph Hearst Tried To Shoot Charlie Chaplin (And Killed Someone Else Instead)
William Randolph Hearst was a businessman, politician, and newspaper publisher. In fact, he was a tycoon with the largest newspaper business in the world, one of the most powerful people in America, and the inspiration for Orson Welles’s masterpiece, Citizen Kane. Hearst was known to be ruthless, hot-tempered, and, occasionally, downright nasty. So it is fair to assume that he would not have taken news of his mistress having an affair lying down.
He believed that Marion Davies was sleeping with Charlie Chaplin. Instead of confronting Chaplin outright, Hearst invited Chaplin and a number of other film people to join Hearst on his yacht. This must have made for rather uncomfortable small talk. Thomas Ince (pictured below) was a Hollywood producer who specialized in Western films. His studio was profitable for a while, but it began to flounder. Looking for investors, Ince boarded Hearst’s yacht, hoping that the trip would change his fortunes. It did.
The official version of the death—certainly the one that Hearst had printed with indecent haste in his newspapers—was that Ince had developed digestive problems which proved fatal despite his swift hospitalization. Ince’s body was immediately cremated.
Despite Hearst’s vigorous attempts to control the publicity surrounding Ince’s death, rumors kept surfacing that Hearst had shot at Chaplin, missed, and killed Ince instead. Although the Los Angeles Times ran the headline “Movie Producer Shot on Hearst Yacht,” it was swiftly pulled and later editions carried no mention of the shooting.
A secretary aboard the yacht was quoted as saying that he had seen Ince bleeding from a bullet wound to the head. Ince’s wife was unavailable for comment as she had embarked upon a sudden tour of Europe.
It is also claimed that famed Gossip queen Louella Parsons earned herself a lifetime contract with the Hearst organization for keeping quiet about a murder she witnessed.