Burt Lancaster’s daughter shares warm memories of her legendary dad.
THE FILM ICON STOOD STRONG PERSONALLY AND PROFESSIONALLY
Burt Lancaster didn’t just play tough guys on-screen; he was a tough guy. Having grown up in roughand-tumble East Harlem, served in World War II and traveled as an acrobat before becoming a movie star, “he was fearless — he didn’t seem afraid of any physical threats,” daughter Joanna tells Closer. “I always felt like we were safe with Dad around.”
He wasn’t scared to take chances professionally, either. Instead of trading on his classically handsome looks, Burt explored the ugly side of characters like the heartless journalist J.J. Hunsecker in Sweet Smell of Success or the titular charlatan in Elmer Gantry. “He kept breaking the star mold,” Kate Buford, author of Burt Lancaster: An American Life, tells Closer. “He wanted to stretch himself constantly.” Burt also took daring stands on issues like civil rights and worked progressive messages into many of his films, like Judgment at Nuremberg and Seven Days in May. “He was proud of always sticking up for the underdog,” Joanna says. “That kind of thing mattered very much to him, and he could hold his head up.”
SWEET SUCCESS
While he strove to uphold his values at home, Burt sometimes fell short. He was married three times and had five kids with Norma, his second wife from 1946 to 1969. “He was under constant temptation from other women,” says Buford. “He was pretty crazy about Shelley Winters, with whom he had an affair in the ’50s.”
Still, he was a devoted father, often rearranging production schedules so he could take his family along with him to film sets. “We all went with him to Paris when he made Trapeze,” recalls Joanna, who was 4 when the 1956 film was shot. “We were looked after by clowns, jug- glers, fire-eaters and little people — it was really fun and magical.”
Burt insisted on having family dinners every Sunday night. “It was often pretty volatile,” Joanna says. “We’d all get into big arguments, and we’d complain bitterly because my mother did the cooking, and she wasn’t much of a cook.” Her husband, on the other hand, was an excellent chef and even took culinary lessons late in his life.
As the father of three daughters, Burt cut an imposing figure. “When I was 18, I stopped by his office with my boyfriend,” Joanna recalls. “My dad had a rope that he would use to work out. He made my boyfriend climb the rope, and then it was like, OK, he could go out with me.”
Burt remained at the top of his profession when he died of a heart attack at 80 in 1994. “He showed how a star could take control of his own work,” says Buford. “He paved the way for stars to come.”
— Bruce Fretts, with reporting by Katie Bruno