INTERVIEW WITH DAVID STENN
PART III: JEAN & MOTHER JEAN
A DOMINANT INFLUENCE IN JEAN HARLOW'S LIFE: MOTHER JEAN. SHE'S
ALSO BEEN REFERRED TO AS MAMA JEAN. WHICH IS CORRECT?
"Mama Jean" seems to have been invented by Irving Shulman. Prior 
to
that, no one ever called her "Mama." She wouldn't have stood for it. I also refer
you to surviving letters Jean Harlow wrote her mother, which are always addressed
to "Mother" or sometimes "Mommy," but never "Mama." Shulman came up with "Mama
Jean," and it stuck. I felt it was hypocritical to slam Shulman, then continue
using a name he created.
INTERESTING THAT JEAN HARLOW USED HER MOTHER'S MAIDEN NAME AS A
SCREEN NAME...
It's more than interesting, it's metaphorical. There's a reason why my text
begins "The real Jean Harlow differed from her daughter..." I mean, Mother
Jean was the real Jean Harlow. Literally and figuratively. I suspect
the woman that Jean Harlow played on screen was a parody of her mother, a vulgarized
version. That pushy, grating... Mother Jean knew how to play the lady, but
she was a domineering, driven woman. Today she'd have a career. But her own
era stifled her, and the only way to express her own drive was through her
daughter. This was not unusal. Ginger Rogers had a "Mother," Mary Pickford
had a "Mother," Lillian Gish, Lana Turner, Judy Garland...there were so many.
Dominant mothers, absent fathers.
In Jean Harlow's case, there was a further factor: by all accounts
including George Hurrell's, Mother Jean was the beauty, not her daughter.
So I tried to be sympathetic to that. I mean, imagine what it must
have been like for this woman: a great beauty with intelligence and
ambition, forced by her father to marry a dentist and play housewife.
DID YOU EVER TALK TO ANYONE WHO HAD SOMETHING NICE TO SAY ABOUT
MOTHER JEAN?
Sure. There were people who thought she was a classy, dignified woman -- and,
believe it or not, an excellent mother. Think about it: even her worst enemy
couldn't say she didn't care about her daughter. Mother Jean may have cared
for all the wrong reasons, but you could never call her neglectful. Ironically
a little more neglect would've helped.
It's easy to demonize Mother Jean. It's also unfair. I mean, let's
face it: without her, you wouldn't be talking to me because there wouldn't
be a Jean Harlow to talk about. Mother Jean pushed her daughter into
a career, and although she inflicted great personal damage, she also
gave the world Jean Harlow. For that alone we should be grateful.
IF YOU HAD THE OPPORTUNITY TO TALK TO JEAN HARLOW HERSELF, WHAT
WOULD YOU WANT TO ASK?
If she were alive I wouldn't be writing a book about her. I don’t believe
in doing a biography of a living person, because I don't think the life is
complete.
WHAT WOULD SHE THINK ABOUT YOUR BOOK?
I’m sure she wouldn't like it . I'm sure she wouldn’t like any book
about her. She was a private person. Her verifiable interviews are pretty bland,
and even people who claim to have known her well admit she kept her most personal
thoughts to herself. That's how I judged a source's truthfulness: I'd ask if
Jean Harlow ever discussed Paul Bern, and if someone said, "Absolutely not," I
knew they were being honest. Because she didn't. Never, never, never.
Even the animosity she felt towards her mother at the end of her life
was expressed indirectly, in drinking binges that she wouldn't remember
the morning after. By that time she was literally drowning her sorrows
-- and was murderously angry at her mother. I got some letters saying
Jean Harlow didn't drink, how dare I intimate she was an alcoholic?
I don't know how to respond to this. Should I call Myrna Loy a liar?
Rosalind Russell? Her cousin Don Roberson, who worked with her at MGM?
These people were there, and they loved Jean Harlow. They aren't
Irving Shulman. They're just being honest. And does alcoholism make
her any less loveable, less human?
YOU POINT OUT IN YOUR BOOK HOW SHE DIDN'T LIKE TO WEAR UNDERWEAR
AND SLEPT IN THE NUDE -- THAT THIS WAS JUST HER WAY. SOME PEOPLE
MIGHT FIND IT SHOCKING FOR THAT ERA.
Because they give it a sexual slant, when in truth it was childlike. Maureen
O'Sullivan told me -- it's in the book -- this adorable story about Jean Harlow
sleeping "in the raw," as Maureen put it, and then bunching up her nightgown
so that the maid wouldn't know! It's not brazen or provocative, it's like a
little girl: "Don't tell anyone I sneaked and didn’t wear my nightie!" People
who knew her were charmed; only strangers were shocked. And who calls a sex
symbol "The Baby"? Everyone I interviewed stressed that she gave off a childlike
quality offscreen.
SHE COMES OFF AS SEEMING SO MUCH OLDER THAN 26 ON FILM.
And 26 when she died! How about when she was 21 in Red Dust?
I audition hundreds of actresses every year and I have yet to see one with
that kind of poise, that grace. The physicality of Jean Harlow's performances,
the comfort she has with her body, you don't see that today because actresses
don't learn it. You only see it in someone like Sharon Stone, who's pushing
forty and started out as a model.
I think that contributes to Jean Harlow seeming older than her years.
There's no physical awkwardness. None.
And the conversation continues...
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© Lisa Burks - March 30, 1997
