January 2, 1900– William Haines:
“One could be forgiven for illiteracy, but never for lack of good taste.”
Check out the great biography Wisecracker: The Life Of William Haines: Hollywood’s First Openly Gay Star (1998) by the great chronicler of Hollywood history, William Mann. Haines’ story is simply delicious.
As Billy Haines, he was one of MGM’s biggest stars of the late 1920s, playing cocky yet sympathetic wise guys in popular films like Brown Of Harvard (1926). In the early 1930s, Haines was the number one male box-office star, although few fans remember him for his film work now. But, Haines was a talented, handsome, assured, romantic leading man. Off-screen, he was gay, gay-gay, way gay, openly gay.
Haines’ story remains particularly intriguing because he took on Louis B. Mayer and the MGM brass by refusing to act the part of a straight guy for the studios’ publicity departments. He chose to be open about his life and his partner with a certain disregard for fame and fortune.
For the film-going public, Cary Grant and Randolph Scott played it coy with their relationship. When his openness spelled ruin for his acting career, Haines simply switched careers and became even more rich and famous as the interior designer of choice for Hollywood stars. Haines managed to remain in the spotlight without ever having to stand before the cameras again.
Haines had never set out to be a movie star or an interior designer. He was a smart, appealing young man with a talent for grabbing each opportunity that presented itself. He lived by his wits, always seeming to make the right moves. He managed to reach the very apex of success in two difficult careers for which he had no training.
When Haines was just 14 years old, he ran away from a small town in Virginia and ended up, as so many resourceful boys do, in New York City. A tall, exceedingly handsome young man, he found an older gentleman to help him make ends meet. He lived in an apartment in Greenwich Village where he became friends with Archie Leach, who would later change his name to Cary Grant, and the young costume designer Orry-Kelly.
With his All-American good-looks, Haines became a model. He sent his photograph to producer Samuel Goldwyn‘s New Faces Of 1922 talent contest and won. A screen test followed, and then Haines moved to Hollywood, where he was given good roles in a string of popular silent films. Upon arrival in Hollywood, Haines met another rising star who would become his lifelong best friend: Lucille LeSueur, later named Joan Crawford. Crawford thought her new name sounded like “Crawfish:,” but Haines advised” “They might have called you Cranberry, and served you every Thanksgiving with the turkey”. For the rest of their long association he called her “Cranberry”. Haines was a much bigger star than his best friend Joan Crawford. He appeared in more than 50 films in his short career, and he was the first MGM star to have a speaking role.
The “Billy Haines” persona was the wisecracking college kid who finally becomes a team player in time to win the game and get the girl. After his first year under contract at the studio, he was receiving more fan mail than any other star at MGM except John Gilbert, and he began making a string of formulaic, but wildly popular films based around his “wisecracker” character.
With Page in Navy Blue, 1929, via YouTube screengrab
“I didn’t have to act. I was just myself. I am…kind of lazy, good-natured, wise-cracking.”
Although Haines became a huge heartthrob, many of his performances seem bravely queer for the era, swishing hips with limp wrists, and tossing off bitchy remarks that went over the audience’s heads at the time. Watch this clip from The Smart Set, (1928) where camps it up with co-star Alice Day.
With Marion Davies, he made his best film: King Vidor’s satirical Show People, which punctured Hollywood’s pomposity at the end of the silent era. Many stars didn’t survive the transition to sound, but Haines made the move gracefully, starring in MGM’s first talkie film. He starred with Marion Davies, in his best film: King Vidor’s 1928 satirical masterpiece Show People, which punctured Hollywood pomposity at the end of the silent era. Many stars didn’t survive the transition to sound, but Haines made the move gracefully, starring in MGM’s first talkie film, Alias Jimmy Valentine (1928).
In those crazy 1920s and early 1930s, there was a rich gay subculture in Hollywood. This was before the Hays Production Code and before studio executives’ intimidation led to the establishment of the Hollywood closet, an institution that runs strong to this day. Haines refused to go on “studio dates” with female stars, even making a joke of it by leaking to the press that he was in having a romance with his pal Polly Moran, a middle-aged character actor.
In 1930, Haines was arrested for having sex with a sailor in a Los Angeles park. MGM kept it out of the papers. Louis B. Mayer, MGM’s powerful studio boss was furious, but Haines was the biggest male box-office star in Hollywood. But then, the gossip threatened to ruin Haines’ leading man image, Mayer gave him an ultimatum: lie about his gayness and get married, or lose his contract. Haines refused. He never worked in films again.
Haines dropped the Billy, renamed himself “William Haines“, and as easily as he became a top movie star, he became the town’s top interior designer. His first client was his pal Crawford, but others soon followed: Claudette Colbert, Jack Benny, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Carole Lombard, William Powell, Lionel Barrymore, Marion Davies, Douglas Fairbanks, studio head Jack Warner, and gay director George Cukor. His social standing was decidedly A-list. He worked for and socialized with Frank Sinatra. Ronald and number-one fellator Nancy Reagan were his frequent guests at his lavish home.
In 1969, he designed the interiors of Winfield House in London, the official residence of the American Ambassador. That commission brought Haines international acclaim and new clients from around the world.
Self-taught, Haines offered an alternative to the fashionable Art Deco interiors that were made even trendier by the films of his era. He gave birth to the California Style still celebrated in the 21st century. That look became known as Hollywood Regency and it represented a contrast to the stark minimalism of the modernist movement. With roots in 19th century England, Haines’ style combined English and French Regency with Greek Revival, plus a dash of the glamour of Old Hollywood. Hollywood Regency is the very opposite of my own house, which owes its look mostly to squatter shacks, camp cabins, beach cottages, and boys’ forts. But, I still appreciate it.
His career lasted until Haines left this world in 1973. William Haines Designs remains in business to this day, with main offices in West Hollywood and with showrooms in Manhattan, Denver and Dallas. His original furniture designs are still produced for the top end design trade.
I admire that beginning in 1926 Haines lived openly as a couple with Jimmy Shields, a film extra. Haines refused to give up Shields for the sake of his film career and their relationship lasted until Haines’ passing. That was 50 years, together through it all. Crawford called them: “The happiest married couple in Hollywood”.
Haines was taken by that damn cancer when he was 73 years old. A few weeks later, the grief-stricken Shields put on Haines’ pajamas, took an overdose of sleeping pills, and slipped away in his slumber at the beautiful Hollywood Hills house that they shared. He left a note that read:
“Goodbye to all of you who have tried so hard to comfort me in my loss of William Haines, whom I have been with since 1926. I now find it impossible to go it alone, I am much too lonely.”
Their ashes are interred next to each other at Woodlawn Memorial Cemetery in Santa Monica. Haines has a star on The Hollywood Walk Of Fame in front of the famed Roosevelt Hotel, site of the very first Academy Awards ceremony in 1929.
