SEARCHING FOR LOVE
Archie got there in 1931, changing his name to Cary Grant when he signed with Paramount Pictures — but he couldn’t put his old life behind him so easily. On his deathbed, Cary’s father confessed that his mother, Elsie, was still alive and in a mental institution. “It rocked his world,” explains Eyman. “He got her released and set her up in an apartment in Bristol.”
Cary supported his mother until her death in 1973. He called her every Sunday, sent gifts and visited, but Elsie’s affection and attention remained elusive. “She never responded to anything [Cary] said,” says Eyman about a visit witnessed by a friend of the star. “It was like she was profoundly autistic. He could never get what he needed from her as a son.”
KEEPING HIS DISTANCE
“I pretended to be somebody I wanted to be.”
— Cary Grant
Cary’s career blossomed with his first big commercial success, Topper, a 1937 comedy in which he plays a dapper ghost. Along the way the actor learned to project an image that lived up to his new name, but he often felt like an imposter. “The difference between who he was and what he played was the cause of a lot of anxiety,” says Eyman. “He could act suave, but at his core he was still Archie Leach. He was always afraid of what could go wrong and tended to emphasize the negative.”
Superficially charming in his work relationships, Cary maintained only a very small circle of real friends, like playwright Clifford Odets. “He liked writers,” says Eyman. “He liked people who he thought could teach him something.”
His relationships with women also suffered. A serial monogamist, Cary married five times — including his 1942 union with Barbara Hutton, one of the wealthiest women in the world. Derisively nicknamed “Cash and Cary” in the press, they split after just three years.
It would take decades for Cary to become comfortable in his own skin. Along the way, he became one of Hollywood’s most legendary leading men, starring in classics such as The Philadelphia Story,
Notorious and His Gal Friday. “He had an ability to alternate between wild slapstick to sophisticated comedy to dramatic work in some very serious movies,” says Eyman of the star, who was given a lifetime achievement award by the Academy of Motion Pictures in 1970.
Upon the birth of his only child, Jennifer, in 1966, Cary retired from films to devote himself to fatherhood. “He really liked kids and always wanted them,” says Eyman. It took a little longer for him to find romantic happiness, but his marriage to his final wife, Barbara Harris, was his happiest. She was “devoted completely” to Cary, says Eyman. “She became mother, wife, mistress and lover to him, all in one.”
Cary didn’t wear his heart on his sleeve, but the star, who died in 1986 at the age of 82, was justifiably proud of how far he’d come in life. “He worked the name ‘Archie Leach’ into several of his movies,” notes Eyman. “It’s a funny name. Archie Leach sounds like a working-class guy who changes your tires. Cary knew that and got a big kick out of it.”