
Five Days For Jean Simmons
“The first problem,” said Stewart Granger as he embraced his wife tenderly, “the first problem is to pork you up a bit.”
Through the four months he had been away in Pakistan this huge man who frets and buzzes and busies himself caring for his girl (whenever his travels permit) had been worried about Jean. (And she enjoys every minute of his concern.) What he had anticipated had happened—her assignment in Guys And Dolls, which required her to sing as well as act in such heady company as Marlon Brando, Frank Sinatra and Vivian Blaine, was taking too much out of her. In London, where the last scenes of Bhowani Junction were being filmed, Jimmy (Stewart’s real name) had heard she was ill. Jean was losing weight, missing her sleep and eating poorly. Mr. G. begged for five days leave and now he was home to put things in order.
Jean ate better, all right. Jimmy took charge of the kitchen—his favorite domain—right away. He is, by the way, one of the greater chefs of the century. Jean rested better, too. Jimmy not only played nurse at home—he went to the studio with her every day to make sure that she didn’t overwork. Which must have pleased Mr. Goldwyn’s production staff no end. There was another reason for his wanting to go to the studio as well. When the two of them had discussed her chance to play in Guys And Dolls, he had been worried about the wish of the director, Joe Mankiewicz, that she do her own singing instead of using the voice of a professional artist. As if to convince Jimmy that she could do it, Jean had taken to singing around the house.
One morning she went through the whole song that would be hers in the picture, “If I Were A Bell I’d Be Ringing,” while taking her morning bath, and she sang it full voice to make sure that Jimmy would hear her. When she came out she looked at him quickly for a verdict and he gave it.
“Wonderful, darling,’ he said. “It sounded good. But only in the bath, not in the studio!”
By coincidence, the scene due to be filmed the first morning Jimmy accompanied Jean to the studio was the Havana night-club number in which she sings this song. The song itself had already been recorded and would be played back as Jean mouthed the words in the course of her acting. As the scene began and Jimmy heard her voice coming over the loudspeaker system he stood agape.

“I not only couldn’t believe that it was you singing that well,” he told her later, “it was your accent, your American accent that astonished me. Getting that right would seem harder to me than working up a good vocal tone!”
And true to Jimmy’s stubbornness, he contended that this still proved she was a better actress than a singer. Quite all right with Jean.
But there was more to the studio visit that morning than the surprise of her singing. Jimmy’s eyes chanced to fall on her left hand when they were about to start for home, and he pointed to it.
“You’ve forgotten your wedding ring in the dressing room somewhere,” he said. “I know you don’t wear it in the picture, but where did you put it?”
“I didn’t bring it,” Jean told him. “I never wear it when I go to the studio for fear I might forget it and lose it.”
Jimmy said nothing but his mouth tightened purposefully. Later that day he left her home and took off for an hour in the family Mercedes-Benz. When he came back he marched up to Jean and laid six wedding rings down before her.
“Here,” he said. “Hereafter wear your ring whenever you go out. If you lose one, all right—put on another one. You’ve got spares now.”
Jimmy had come back for only five days. But when the five days were up, he cabled for an okay to stay on for a few days more, and when these were past he stayed on. There was too much to catch up with, too much to say. Including telling Jean about Ava Gardner’s little joke played on him in mid-air.

Granger’s Hollywood-bound plane had barely taken off from the London airport when Jimmy was suddenly suffused with a terrible wave of airsickness. It happens regularly to Jimmy in spite of his many trips by air. He downed some dramamine and settled grimly back to fight the dizziness when suddenly the three stewardesses marched down the aisle carrying a huge, nauseatingly pink cake and gaily singing “Happy Birthday.” Ava, his costar in Bhowani Junction had remembered two things about Jimmy—that it was his birthday and that he is a notoriously poor air traveler.
He had arrived in Hollywood late in the afternoon after 6,000 miles of unjoyous flying and two days without sleep, but Jimmy hadn’t gone straight home. He headed for Magnin’s, one of Beverly Hills’ smart shops and asked to see lingerie. He couldn’t decide among the negligees
and bought six filmy pink and white ones. As an afterthought he added three pairs of matching satin mules.
There is a standing joke in the Granger household that Jimmy can never buy one of anything. Apparently word had reached even the enterprising gift dealers in Pakistan. Each morning when Jimmy woke up in his hotel room the dealers would already be there, squatting on the floor around the bed.
And when he opened his eyes they began their spiel—holding up beautifully fashioned native jewelry, wonderful oriental carvings and richly woven saris, the brilliant wrap-around costume of Pakistan and Indian women. Jimmy would then sit up in bed and make his selections. He came to accept the idea of having his room converted into a bazaar, and gravely deducted a portion of the price as the rental he charged for the use of the hall. And just as gravely this was accepted as perfectly proper procedure.
He came home with a dozen saris. Jean can count herself one of the best-dressed women in Pakistan when and if she gets there.
Not until Jimmy had been home two weeks did he finally start back to London. Joe Mankiewicz broke down and gave Jean the second week off, too, and there were wonderful nights with old friends at home, the way it should be. Liz and Mike Wilding brought over their new baby. The David Nivens came and brought the gay banter of joy that always surrounds them. The Bert Allenbergs, the Mankiewiezes and the Michael Kidds. It was good for
them, this week of domesticity. And before he left, Jimmy and Jean came to a decision. Never again, she decided. Never again these long months of separation. No more goodbyes.

Jimmy is home again and as you read this story, Guys And Dolls is in the can. Jean has decided to refuse any more roles for a while, at least long enough so she can go with Jimmy on his next junket. Jean can afford to be independent—she can pick and choose her pictures since she became a non-contract star. Jimmy’s contract has fairly large print that stipulates he is to work when and where MGM orders.
Current orders send him to South Dakota, and as of today, Mr. and Mrs. Granger should be somewhere on the plains of the great northwest on location for The Last Hunt, with Robert Taylor and Russ Tamblyn.
After that they’re fancy free, both of them, to start doing things together.
They may go on a shikar, a hunting expedition in India. While in Pakistan Jimmy took time off to shoot a renegade tiger and a black panther. For a long time he has wanted Jean to go along with him on such a trip. In preparation she has been holding target practice sessions with a .22 calibre rifle in the courtyard of their hilltop home in Beverly Hills.
They may decide on an African hunt instead. Jimmy has already been on two big game safaris, but he’s convinced if she comes along this time it will all seem new to him again.
They may cancel hunting plans and just go to Switzerland to live for a few years because Jimmy thinks it is an ideal location, central to many picture-making centres in Europe—London, Rome, Paris—and close to their families in England. Jean has a mother, two sisters and a brother in London. Stewart’s mother, Mrs. Frederica Stewart, lives not far away from London, in Bournemouth, and is quite elderly.
They may go on an extended deep-sea fishing expedition. Jimmy is the only sportsman in the world, according to his friends, who not only mounts trophies of the game he shoots or catches, but also has models of the game he hopes to catch. On the wall of his den are the species of fighting sea fish, marlin, barracuda, giant tuna he is still after.
Or, and this is probably most likely because they have always been two hardworking people, they will return to Hollywood from South Dakota and resume their careers there. On the day Jimmy spoke about Switzerland and how serene and colorful it was there, and also tried to give Jean a feeling of the mysterious, romantic quality of Africa, he also looked around at their home and let drop the opinion that he thought they were perhaps already in the most beautiful place in the world. There was good reason for him to say this. Three years ago when he and Jean bought the house it was Jimmy who did most of the landscaping. Yet not once since then, until his recent visit from London, had he ever gotten a chance to enjoy the fruits of his work, to see it when southern California’s flowers and shrubs bloom their best, in the early spring. For both the first two springs he had been away.
He enjoyed looking at his home when he got back, and he enjoyed it most when he could maneuver Jean into the immediate foreground.
To tell the truth they both think they have been living too much in the background of each other’s.lives ever since their marriage, Christmas of 1950, far too often apart than not.
As Jean sees it, there has been “Too much here and there” in their lives. “I here and Jimmy there,” she went on. “From here hence it’s to be both of us here or both of us there!”
THE END
It is a quote. MODERN SCREEN MAGAZINE SEPTEMBER 1955