My Day: “I Said Yes to Everything”

I am not sure what led me to read Lee Grant’s memoir, I Said Yes to Everything, especially because I could not have identified Lee Grant, if asked.  I might have remembered that she was an actress, and I would have guessed she is not currently 25 years old, but that would have been it, I think.  In fact, Grant is an actress, and is still alive in her early 90s.

Her book, published 5 years ago, is fascinating.  She was raised in New York City; her mother a recent Jewish immigrant, and her father, who was the son of immigrants, was a Columbia graduate and the Director of the Bronx YMHA. Her given name was Lyova (something she seemed to detest) Rosenthal,.  She lived most of her childhood with her mother and her aunt, both of whom were characters and who had big plans for Lee.  She got into theatrics, and before you knew it, she was on her way to being a star.  In her first film, for example, “Detective Story” (1951), she won “Best Actress” at Cannes, and was nominated for an Academy Award as Best Supporting Actress.

She was married at an early age to writer/director Arnold Manoff (I had never heard of him, either).  It clearly wasn’t the best marriage in the world (and fidelity wasn’t a major part of it), but it changed her life in that Manoff was involved, as were so many writers, in the Communist movement and was a party member and at one point convinced his young, apolitical wife to join up.  She did. Their marriage lasted eight years – and five years after that Manoff died.  The marriage resulted in one daughter.

This meant that she was involved in the Congressional hearings that led to the black list and, at the height of her young career, she was blacklisted and not able to obtain additional roles.

So, now we have (1) growing up in Jewish New York in an eccentric family, (2) becoming an actress with all that entails, (3) early success, (4) marriage, and (5) and abrupt stop to her career. As to this last point, the description of the effect of the blacklist on many people she knew, and the blacklisting process, is fascinating.

Her blacklisting lasted 12 years.  She clearly was not a political person, and eventually met Max Kampelman, who became her lawyer.  Kampelman called her one day and told her she was off the blacklist.  How did it happen?  A senior Congressional staffer wanted a favor from Kampelman.  He said “OK, if you can take Lee Grant off the blacklist.”  That was it.  Nothing more.

She is known as perhaps the only actor who was able to restart and rebuild her career after being blacklisted.  Of course, she was only in her early 30s.  She was also, by then divorced, a single mother whose only real responsibility was to her daughter.

Her career went into full swing – most of the time she was now living in California.  She also found a replacement for Manoff, a young actor named Joseph Feury, ten years younger than Grant.  Her parents hadn’t been very happy about Manoff and his effect on their daughter. You can imagine what they thought about young Mr. Feury (who, by the way, along with everything else, was not Jewish).

How did this part of the story end?  Well, 57 years after they were married, they remain married.  This does not mean that their relationship did not have its share of ups and real downs, of shifts and changes.  And it does not mean that life with Grant’s daughter was a piece of cake (she grew up in Malibu in the middle of young people with money whose only interests were apparently drugs and sex); but don’t worry, that turned out all right, too.

So, Lee Grant’s career continued.  You may remember her from Peyton Place, the TV series where she won an Emmy.  Or from the film, “Shampoo”, where she won an Academy Award or elsewhere.  And her relationships (all kinds of them) continued as well.

But surprisingly, her career took an additional turn and, in her later years (which were themselves years ago), she became a TV film film director, something she had no experience with, but was very successful doing.  This part of the book – also very interesting.

So…..the book is fascinating, and Lee Grant is a fascinating combination of things – obviously very talented, very smart, very well organized, very clever, and (if you can believe herself) a nice person.  And, when she was in school, and living with her unusual parents and aunt, you never would have guessed that this is the way it would have turned out.