With her sisters Polly Ann at Metro, Sally freelancing, and youngest sister Georgiana now in school, and Loretta herself under contract at Warners, their mother Gladys had some time of her own With Loretta's financial help, she bought a lot near Bel Air for $5,000 and hired a famous architect, Garret Van Pelt, to build on it. The finished mansion was a luxurious and elegant testimony to Loretta's growing stardom, and her mother's design talent.
The Young's all moved into the "Sunset House", located across the famous boulevard from today's UCLA. There, assorted friends and guests were always welcome. "We loved the house, and our new lifestyle had come so gradually that it seemed perfectly natural, and we took it in stride - as we did everything," Loretta recalled.
In the early '30s, it seemed almost impossible that movies and theater would ever meet. Broadway actors looked down on screen people as "hacks." But movies were attended by far more people than plays, so Hollywood was where the money was. If one was up against it financially, California was the place to go.
So decided Spencer Tracy, whose career had started in summer stock and then the Broadway stage in the early '20s. Brash, arrogant, and Irish Catholic, Tracy had married a fellow stage actress, Louise Treadwell, in 1923. A year later, Louise had given birth to a baby boy, Johnny.
To make as much money as possible to support his young family, Tracy began to accept movie roles. By 1933, the Tracys had moved west and Spencer's income had gradually increased. That same year, he was cast opposite Loretta in Man's Castle. She was 20, and he was 33. It was his first leading role; she had been in over forty films.
As Loretta and Spencer went to work on the movie, it was obvious to onlookers that they were making a personal connection as well. On the second Saturday after filming began, Loretta brought Spencer home for dinner. Everyone liked him immediately.
It's doubtful that Spencer saw much of his wife during this time, because both Loretta and Tracy occasionally dated others. For Loretta, however, it was a time of romance unlike anything she had ever experienced.
When the picture with Spencer was finished, she could hardly wait to read the critics. She believed Man's Castle was the best film she'd ever made, and she wondered if anyone else had noticed. As the first review circulated on the set of her current picture, she had to keep herself from literally ripping the paper out of the hands of other actors. Finally, breathless, she scanned the review.
"After praising the director and writers, the reviewer complimented Spencer for another paragraph or two," she recalled. The last line held the sole mention of Loretta: "Miss Young is beautiful, as always." Although not an insult, Loretta felt the words like a slap in the face.
Loretta would act with Spencer again, and see him socially, but on October 24, 1934, she issued a quiet statement to the press explaining that she and Spencer could not hope to marry because of their religion, they had agreed not to see each other.
He went home to Louise, his wife, who - it was said - never mentioned the situation.
Spencer Tracy would go on to an illustrious acting career of his own. Although he and Louise eventually lived separate lives, they never divorced.
"Acting was easy for him," his longtime friend Katherine Hepburn remarked years after his death. "Life was the problem."
Next: The Call of the Wild
Excerpts © copyright 2000 Joan Wester Anderson. All rights reserved.
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