He's Got Rhythm: The Life and Career of Gene Kelly (Screen Classics) Read online

  From its beginnings, Pittsburgh was a magnet for those with boundless ambition and a remarkable scope for imagination. Before the construction of canals and railroads in the mid- to late nineteenth century, the Ohio and Mississippi rivers acted as highways to the city, opening it up to America’s heartland. Exporting precious natural resources such as wood, coal, limestone, and sand enriched the area. From 1870 to 1910, Pittsburgh experienced an economic golden age thanks to a proliferation of entrepreneurs, most notably J. P. Morgan and Andrew Carnegie, who made the city an international power through the creation of U.S. Steel.

  The late 1800s and early 1900s saw not only an influx of industry in Pittsburgh but also of immigrants, primarily Irish. Because of Pittsburgh’s booming industry, it seemed there would be plentiful work opportunities for all. The area around Fort Pitt Blockhouse became known as Little Ireland. More Irish communities developed in the South Side, Strip District, North Side, Oakland, and Lawrenceville. The majority of these settlements were cramped and very poor, leading to an intense distrust of Irish immigrants among politicians and employers. Many factories sported “Irish Need Not Apply” signs on their doors.4

  Discrimination against the Irish did nothing to dampen the spirits of Gene Kelly’s grandfather, a “wild Irishman called Billy” Curran.5 Billy had immigrated to New York from Londonderry in 1845 after experiencing a brush with the English authorities. He worked sweeping the porches of general stores until he decided to move to West Virginia, where he hoped to make his fortune as a coal miner. However, ignorant of geography, Billy instead found himself stepping off a train in Huntington, Pennsylvania, where there were, ironically, no coal mines. He did not regret landing in Huntington; there he met the young Mary Eckhart, whom he made his wife after a brief courtship. The Eckharts, heralding from Alsace-Lorraine, were financially secure. Now with enough money to pursue the mining career that had been his original intent, Billy headed with his wife to Houtzdale, Pennsylvania. There he promptly discovered the presence of coal. He bought the piece of land but, oddly, rather than mine it, he opened a general store. The enterprise flourished, as did his offspring, one of whom was a fiery, dark-eyed girl named Harriet. Harriet was unlike Billy in one distinct aspect—she was a devout Catholic who strove to live as clean a life as possible. Gene later explained that Harriet often spoke with more pride when referring to the Eckhart side of her heritage and alleged that her family had a connection to the first US Catholic bishop, John Carroll.

  After saving enough money, the family moved to Pittsburgh and opened a saloon. It was a respectable establishment, but Harriet loathed her father’s choice of business, feeling that it represented all that outsiders disliked about the Irish. At times, she even refused to admit that her father was the son of an Irishman. Harriet, now nearly twenty years old, continued to build a refined life for herself, pursuing music, dancing, and the theater. She relished performing in local stock productions and singing in a chorale group. In 1906, just as the Currans reached the peak of their success, Billy, walking home one night with his pockets full of the night’s receipts, was brutally attacked and robbed by two reprobates. He lay in the gutter for hours before being discovered and died of pneumonia days later. Though his exact date of birth remains vague, Billy was in his eighties at the time of his death.

  He left behind him nine children. Each received a $50,000 inheritance ($133,202.99 in 2015 dollars). However, the children all lost their fortunes through inadvisable investments or alcoholism. Harriet lost hers during the Panic of 1907 when the New York Stock Exchange fell 50 percent from the previous year. The loss of her money came at a most inopportune time—she had just married James Kelly the year before.

  James Patrick Kelly was more like her father than Harriet liked to admit. The grandson of a poor blacksmith, he was born in Peterborough, Canada, and grew up in Ontario. James’s father was a landscaper who owned several acres of land—though the veracity of this story is questionable and may have been invented to lead Harriet to believe she was not marrying a “shantytown” Irishman. James became an American citizen at age twenty-eight and worked on the East Coast as a traveling sales executive for Thomas Edison’s Columbia Phonograph Company. He eventually settled in Pittsburgh, where he met Harriet in 1905 at an amateur concert in which she was performing. Gene later called his father a “doll of a man” and his mother “an artist” and a “frustrated actress.”6 Gene’s first wife, Betsy Blair, wrote, “I think Gene’s ambition and a lot more of his character came from [Harriet] . . . but his charm definitely came from Pop.” Betsy claimed that James “was an alert and quiet man. He was like an old wood burning stove, radiating warmth at the heart of the family.”7 James and Harriet did share one character trait: they were both loose with the truth, particularly when it came to their ages. Harriet never revealed her true age and therefore never wished James to reveal his for fear that people would be able to estimate hers based upon it. Though born in 1875, until his death, James would always reply, “Sweet sixteen” when asked his age.8 Harriet was born somewhere between 1887 and 1891.

  After honeymooning in Ontario, the newlyweds moved into a house on the corner of Portland and Bryant streets in the Highland Park area of Pittsburgh. There Harriet Joan (nicknamed Jay) was born in 1910, and James Kelly Jr. followed in 1911. Harriet raised her family alone most of the time; James was gone five days out of the week traveling from city to city selling phonographs. “My mother was proud he wasn’t a blue collar worker,” Gene reflected.9 But he wasn’t exactly a white-collar worker, either. His earnings fluctuated, ranging from $75 to $125 a week, a tidy sum in this era. According to Fred Kelly, Gene’s younger brother, James became the top salesman at Columbia. “He made the largest single sale in music that ever happened. He went out to the Midwest and sold the first phonograph ever in the state to the governors of Missouri, Nebraska, and Kansas. . . . These were the first phonographs ever to be [sold] on the other side of the Mississippi. It was the arts coming to the Wild West.” Fred claimed that as a child, he thought the story was “blarney,” but later he found newspapers with front-page spreads telling about the one hundred trains and one hundred boxcars it took to ship all the phonographs and records James had sold.10

  With James’s career on the upswing, he and Harriet saw no reason why they should not expand their family. Their second son, Eugene Curran Kelly, was born on August 3, 1912. For a man whose life and art were defined by rebellion, rhythm, and creativity, there could have been no year more fitting than 1912 in which to be born. The Progressive Era, a period characterized by sweeping improvements to workers’ rights, sanitation, and civil liberties, was still very much in evidence. Suffragettes marched down the streets of New York, fighting for the right to vote. In August, the month of Gene’s birth, dissident Republicans formed the Progressive Party and nominated Theodore Roosevelt as their presidential candidate. Though Roosevelt did not win, the Progressive Party took enough votes away from the incumbent William Howard Taft to result in democratic candidate Woodrow Wilson winning a landslide victory. On the international front, the year’s big news centered on the tragic sinking of the RMS Titanic on April 14, 1912, in the North Atlantic. The ship’s foundering served as a sort of symbol that the once all-powerful United Kingdom was not unsinkable. America was fast emerging as the dominant world power.

  However, Gene Kelly’s year of birth was most appropriate for one very special reason: it ushered in a new, innovative era of dance called ragtime. Ragtime, influenced by the syncopated rhythms found in St. Louis or New Orleans African American dance clubs, was accepted by all sectors of society after the 1912 publication of Irving Berlin’s song “Alexander’s Ragtime Band.” Ragtime was among the first styles of music and dance to originate in America, completely free of European influence. The dances that accompanied “rags” were accessible because they required no formal training and encouraged individual movement.

  The entertainment industry was also undergoing massive growth. Carl Laemmle founded
Universal Studios and Mack Sennett formed Keystone, which specialized in slapstick comedies. Director D. W. Griffith created several short subjects, many starring a girl with blond curls and a rosebud mouth named Mary Pickford. On the stage, large-scale spectacles exemplified by the popular Ziegfeld Follies drew eager audiences. Among the most popular entertainers of the time was a first-generation American son of Irish immigrants, George M. Cohan. In 1912, he produced seven Broadway shows, including a revival of his famed Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway.

  Harriet kept herself far more abreast of developments in entertainment than politics. One of her favorite pieces of advice was: “Never talk about politics or religion, and never ask anyone their age . . . it only ends in argument.”11 Still, Harriet could have been a suffragette. Indeed, she wore the proverbial pants in the family and was the primary decision maker when it came to raising her children. This can partly be attributed to the fact that James was traveling much of the time and that he had a more retiring nature than his wife. Harriet was determined to involve her children in the arts during their formative years. But in 1914, the Kellys’ mounting expenses left little chance for the children to dabble in the world of fine art. The family moved to a more affordable home at 722 Mellon Street, where they lived until 1924. Two more children were born shortly after the move: Louise on July 6, 1914, and Fred on June 29, 1916. To help with expenses, Gene later explained, “a spinster aunt and a bachelor uncle shared the house [on Mellon Street]. Both were in full time employment.”12 The crowded home on Mellon Street was located in the East Liberty District, which was not as upscale as Highland Park.

  Mellon Street was an active area where people got to know each other whether they wanted to or not. The street was lined with homes so close together that one could carry on a conversation with a neighbor through a facing window. The homes had little in the way of front lawns, leaving the children to use the street or nearby parks for play. Gene claimed East Liberty was known as “a ghetto,” partly due to its high Jewish, Polish, and Irish population.13

  James Kelly made the most of their humble property. Each winter, he flooded the backyard in order to transform it into a miniature ice-skating or hockey rink. “A lot of people look back on their childhoods as unhappy. I had a marvelous one, and the utmost care and attention and good will paid to the children. But also our duties and obligations were clearly felt,” Gene remembered.14 Despite James’s tendency to drink and his frequent business trips, he instilled decent morals in his children. Both he and Harriet were regular churchgoers at Sacred Heart Parish. James did not allow anyone to return to the dinner table if he or she left it and insisted on immaculate fingernails. He took every “No Trespassing” sign literally, even if it meant walking an extra mile home instead of cutting through an obviously abandoned lot. One law he did not abide, however, was Prohibition. He managed to keep liquor in the basement throughout the country’s dry years. One Christmas, all of James’s sons gifted him a case of beer. Harriet wagged her finger at him and cried, “See what your sons think of you?” Though he deeply respected his father, one rule that Gene did not later follow was James’s edict that formal attire was mandatory at the dinner table. Throughout Gene’s adulthood, he could be found at home in khakis and a sweatshirt looking, as he admitted, like a “walking slum.”15

  Gene’s preference for informal attire may have been acceptable at the Fulton Grammar School on Mellon Street, but at the St. Raphael Grammar School, he was required to dress like a little gentleman. A brand-new structure built in 1915 in the East End of Pittsburgh, the school was led by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Baden. Though Gene had spiritual doubts throughout his entire life, the virtues of justice, peace, and reverence instilled in him at St. Raphael remained with him, particularly justice.

  Peers and teachers alike at St. Raphael held great esteem for Gene and his siblings. “We were a very orderly group. Not that we didn’t fight a lot . . . [but] we never thought of disobeying our parents. . . . It was an old-fashioned bringing up,” Gene explained. In a 1991 interview, Gene stated that he never wished to be an only child. He liked sharing—including the responsibilities of chores. “Everybody had their turn. One day, someone did the dishes, and the next day, someone made the beds,” he recalled.16

  St. Raphael provided the Kelly children with “old-fashioned” education, but Harriet felt it would not be complete without added lessons in the arts, especially dance. Harriet sent her children to Blinsky’s Dancing School at Sixth and Penn streets beginning when Gene was seven. “My brother and I went to dancing school because my mother—a far-seeing woman well ahead of her time and, incidentally, my Inspiration—sent us,” Gene told Hedda Hopper in 1954.17

  Dancing school meant budget cuts elsewhere; Gene especially noticed the lack of desserts at the dinner table. He had a remarkable sweet tooth—as an adult, he often had candy bars for breakfast. Like many children, he loathed vegetables. Aside from sweets, he liked sandwiches with bologna and cheese, potato and onion, or even the unlikely combination of pickle, cheese, liverwurst, and peanut butter. He enjoyed steak and potatoes; in general, the simpler the food, the better. Gene’s sweet tooth was only fully indulged on his birthday. In the Kelly home, Harriet made it a tradition that on each of her children’s birthdays, the child could decide on the family’s dinner—no matter how unbalanced it might be. Gene’s birthday dinner of choice was course after course of cakes.

  Gene’s hearty appetite gave him ample fuel to pursue all manner of sports. James’s determination to make sportsmen of his sons matched Harriet’s to make them artists. Harriet predicted that Fred would be the star in the family. Gene showed less potential as an entertainer in Harriet’s eyes due to his overarching interest in sports and his tendency to catch every illness that came to the neighborhood, even those that passed his siblings by. His illnesses did not, however, affect his ability to master sports. Ironically, he could thank his sickliness for some of his athletic prowess. He suffered for many years with sinus issues and, at age seven, developed a near-fatal case of pneumonia. Harriet’s brother Gus suggested that Gene try gymnastics to strengthen his lungs after he recovered. Gene took the suggestion and, as with every pursuit, dedicated himself to it wholeheartedly. No physical ailments could keep the mischievous boy out of trouble. As well as being the sickliest, Gene was the most accident prone of the Kelly children.

  The enumeration of Gene’s youthful mishaps reads like the story of an Irish American Tom Sawyer. In one instance, Gene, inspired by the trolleys running up and down the streets of his neighborhood, constructed one himself (likely modifying a tricycle or wagon). On the “trolley’s” maiden voyage, an enormous truck came barreling down the street. Gene, riding the little trolley, disappeared beneath the truck’s wheels. He and the trolley emerged, miraculously unscathed, out the back. Another time Gene fell and broke his arm. This occurred during a brief period when Harriet had decided Gene would become a violinist. Gene considered the broken arm a blessing in disguise. “There’s something about a boy carrying a violin case in a poor neighborhood that brings out the very worst in every kid,” he later said.18

  Though Gene could be the target of bullying on Mellon Street, at other times, he and his siblings were the ones bringing mayhem to the neighborhood. According to Gene, “In a family with three boys and two girls anything can happen—and did.” He recalled that when he was six, he received a BB gun for Christmas, “and we Kelly kids took Pittsburgh by storm. One of the neighbors finally called the police. Luckily, the police got the wrong address and instead of coming to our house, arrived at the Doyles’ next door . . . the BBs were donated—much against our will—to a society for the Improvement of the Poor.”19

  One neighbor, a mailman, was not as patient as the Doyles. Gene recalled that the man had had enough of the Kelly children after they pulled a Halloween prank. He “whacked” them, leading James to march next door and punch him hard enough to account for every slap he had given Gene and his siblings. “That was ve
ry Irish, no one could lay a hand on your kids.”20

  Gene was the primary instigator in another incident that caused the neighbors grief. It began when the Kelly children constructed a three-story shack in their backyard. “We . . . had it for several weeks, meeting every day like conspirators to make plans. Don’t ask me plans for what. Just plans,” Gene reminisced. When winter came, the children hung burlap on the walls for warmth. During one of their “planning” sessions, one child held a candle too near the burlap. The “place went up like tinder” and the flames traveled to the backyard fence. “Men, women and children rushed out to form a bucket brigade and we finally managed to get the blaze under control, just about the time the fire department arrived. After that we were limited to one-story shacks.”21

  The only childhood mishap to leave Gene physically damaged for the rest of his life took place when he was, by his account, age five, but others’ accounts suggest he was seven. While riding his tricycle with no handlebars, he fell forward into an exposed piece of cast iron, which punctured his left cheek. The accident sent the entire family into a state of panic, and Gene was left with a noticeable slightly curving scar to the left of his mouth. According to one reporter in 1943, the scar “still turns white when he gets fighting mad.” When Hollywood columnists asked about the scar in his adulthood, Gene wryly replied: “I’d love to ascribe that scar to some great dramatic event . . . but actually I fell off my tricycle when I was a sprout of five.”22