John Agar On Trial

Not very long after Shirley Temple marched into court and told of his excessive drinking, John Agar, tall, thin, and turning 30, was booked at the Sheriff’s sub-station in West Hollywood on a misdemeanor drunk driving charge.

Agar was beside himself with fury. “I don’t know why you’re doing this,” he cried to the officers. “I haven’t done anything. I don’t belong in jail. This is going to ruin my career.”

“You know you’ve been drinking,” one of the officers said to Agar. “It’s not safe to drive when you’ve had one too many.”

“Please,” Agar pleaded, “I may have had a drink or two. But I’m all right. Please, let me go home. I have an 80-year-old grandfather. He’s home all alone.”

He was released on $150 bail, and the news of his escapade was smeared over the front pages of the nation’s newspapers.

Sgt. E. L. Hoover of the California Highway Patrol, described the incident: “Two motorists drove up to me and said, ‘There’s a car behind us that keeps bumping into us. It’s been bumping us ever since Sunset Boulevard. The driver must be loaded.’ They pointed out the car to me, and the fellow behind the wheel turned out to be Agar. The kid didn’t seem to be drunk, but I called over a couple of other officers, and they decided to book him.”

As was later proven in court, John Agar wasn’t drunk the night he was arrested on that charge.

The public, however wasn’t particularly interested in the truth. The newspapers said that Agar had been arrested for drunken driving and that seemed proof enough. It’s the news that counts, the accusation that makes the front page. Denials are always saved for later. And what does it matter if a young man’s life is ruined, his reputation soiled, his peace of mind shattered? The public wants its news hot, and that’s the way it’s dished out, especially where Hollywood actors are concerned.

When Jack Agar returned to court on that drunken driving charge, he pleaded guilty to reckless driving. However, Judge Henry H. Draeger weighed all the evidence, everything Agar had to say and everything the California Highway Patrol offered as proof, and he announced, “I am going to dismiss the drunken driving charge against the defendant on the grounds that the evidence at hand is insufficient. The defendant is sentenced to 30 days in the county jail. Sentence suspended for a year providing there are no further reckless or drunken driving violations.”

Agar paid his fine, kept his mouth shut, went out to Warners where he began studying his role for Breakthrough. He made it a point to stay out of the limelight, to frequent no night clubs, and when he dated actresses like Ruth Roman or Gloria De Haven, it was only for publicity or preview purposes. The requests had come from the studio’s front office.

Agar tried to stay out of trouble, but on January 14th of this year, that old bugaboo, drunken driving, caught up with him again.

Two motorcycle officers, M. M. Schwab and R. R. Stein, arrested Jack “after we saw him cross the double line on Wilshire Boulevard near Manning Ave. We wanted to give him a sobriety test, but he refused to complete one.”

Agar insisted that he was innocent, and demanded a trial by jury. He knew that if convicted he would be subject to a 30-day county jail sentence.

The results of his trial should be old news by the time you read this—unless, of course—the trial keeps being postponed.

Regardless of its result—John Agar will remain on trial with the American public, with thousands of movie fans who, love to see his movies but can’t figure out what makes him tick in private life.

John Agar is actually a very bewildered man. So much has happened to him in Hollywood since his marriage to Shirley Temple that he has yet to regain his sense of balance.

He suffers from a deep almost unconquerable inferiority complex. Whether sub-consciously he is ashamed of being an actor, no one but a psychiatrist would know—although it’s apparent that he doesn’t find acting easy. Basically an introvert, exhibitionism is foreign to his makeup. When a director asks him to portray a particular emotion, beads of sweat break out on his forehead.

One of the reasons Shirley Temple co-starred with him in his first movie, Fort Apache, was to put him at ease. John Ford, one of the great directors of all time, outdid himself to get a natural performance from Agar.

Jack is much more at ease now, but he is still the most difficult man in Hollywood to interview. “I used to think Gary Cooper was pretty tight-lipped,” one veteran reporter recently pointed out, “but that Agar! You might as well be interviewing a museum collection. This guy’s as noisy as a mummy about his private life.”

There is little doubt that John Agar is a bitter and disillusioned young man these days. He has been, more or less, since Shirley divorced him—and certainly with good reason. He feels that in the public’s eyes he stands convicted for the unhappiness of their marital life. Once in Buffalo, for example, when he was on a personal appearance tour, he was pointed out by one bobby-soxer to another. “There,” said the little girl, “is the fellow who ruined Shirley’s life.”

This is, of course, untrue, but it’s the kind of slander that Jack’s been confronted with for the past year or so. On several occasions, he’s been advised to stand up and speak his piece and clear the air for once and all, but he simply can’t.

At the time of the divorce, he said, “As usual, there are two sides to the controversy. There is much I might have said and much I might say now. As I see it, however, no constructive purpose could be served by recriminations.

“This is the course I’ve followed since the divorce, and I still want to follow it despite possible wrongful implications. Right now Im interested in only two things, my daughter and my career. I like Hollywood, and I want to stay an actor so long as the public wants me. I’m pretty young in show business which is why I don’t have many opinions about parts and players and things like that. I just do what they tell me to.”

Agar realizes that many people regard him as a poor little rich boy who got all the breaks, first by being born into money, and second by marrying Shirley Temple.

He knows he can do absolutely nothing about such opinions except to let time, and pictures like The Magic Carpet prove that he has ability and talent of his own.

It is possible that he could be barred from further picture-making on the “moral turpitude” clause in his contract—every motion picture contract has a clause which says that bad behavior in public by an actor serves as an immediate grounds for dismissal—but this is hardly likely.

Hollywood and the public are both too tolerant to deprive a man of his livelihood merely because he’s been in two innocuous driving accidents.

If anything, they both hold out a welcome hand and an open heart when they feel an actor’s had a tough break. Bob Mitchum is a case in point. He is currently more popular than ever. Mitchum, however, has the appeal of a man who came from the wrong side of the tracks, who never had the advantages Agar has had. Everyone thought he was a little silly to endanger his $3,200 a week salary, his family life, and his future by getting in with some pretty shoddy characters, but everyone has forgiven him.

Will the public forgive John Agar?

A day after his second arrest for reckless driving, a girl who’s dated him occasionally, came up with this analysis: “Jack’s in the process of growing up. He’s 30, and he should’ve grown up long before this, but he’s been insulated from life. His father died when he was a kid, and his mother probably worried too much about him. When he married Shirley Temple, he found that from nothing he’d suddenly become a national figure. When Shirley dropped him, her fans regarded him as a national enemy. Nobody’s ever judged John on his own merits.”

N actor who starred with Jack in Iwo Jima, says, “The kid may be a little spoiled,. but he’s a nice kid. He wouldn’t do a mean or spiteful thing if it cost him his life. Other fellows out here break into the business, and the first thing you know, they’re trying io upstage you. They learn a few tricks, cut you out of the camera, even sit up nights figuring out ways to make you look bad. They want to use your body as a stepping stone. Agar’s not like that at all. He’s a gentleman, he’s well-bred, and he’s got a good heart. Maybe he can’t hold his liquor so well—but hell learn. These two traffic messes were all he needed.

“I don’t know—the kid’s arrested for reckless driving, and every paper in the world carries the story. I don’t blame him for suffering from a persecution complex. But eventually, hell snap out of it.

“When he does, you just mark my words. He’ll be one of the biggest stars this town has ever known.”

Whether the public feels as friendly about John Agar as do the colleagues who work with him—the next few months will tell.

Right now, he stands on trial before the court of public opinion.

THE END

—BY STEVE CRONIN

 

It is a quote. MODERN SCREEN MAGAZINE MAY 1951