The Song and Dance House—Cyd Charisse

The shrill, sustained jangle peculiar to long-distance calls sounded in the kitchen.

“Pittsburgh calling Mrs. Tony Martin,” the operator monotoned.

“This is she,” Cyd Charisse acknowledged. It was Tony, of course. In their five years of martriage, he never has missed phoning at least once a day while he’s out of town.

“How’re the boys?” he asked.

“Great,” Cyd said. “Little Tony had his first trip to the dentist today . . . Well, we got him into the chair, anyway . . . You’re sending what?” The beautiful, leggy dancer walked the phone into the library. With one toe, she deftly shut the kitchen door behind her. The conversation with Tony, mostly love-talk, lasted half an hour.

When it was over, Cyd was still smiling, inside and out. In the front hall, she met Casey, their amicable butler. “If a crate arrives with some lamps,” she offered lightly, “they’re from Mr. Martin.”

“Lamps?” Casey repeated. “Did you say lamps, m’am?”

“That’s right.”

“Did the mister say how many we can expect?”

Casey asked, with a pained expression.

“Three.”

“Where the blazes can we put three more lamps?” the outspoken butler muttered. “We already got more lights than we got electric outlets. We got more pictures than we got wall space. More records than—”

Cyd and friend Dusty Negulesco combed City for perfect center table for livingroom: it has slide-out trays that are removed for buffet dinners.

“Now, Casey,” Cyd placated. “You know Mr. Martin likes new things around the house. Don’t let it worry you. I’ll find a place for them.”

By now, Cyd Charisse knows what to expect of her tall, handsome, singing husband.. She knows that he’s a shopping addict, that given fifteen minutes between. planes, he may buy a dozen ash trays, a Mercedes-Benz, an oil painting, two platinum rings, or a whole dining room set.

She knows, too, what an incredible amount of bric-a brac he receives from his thousands of fans. A couple of little old ladies in Michigan, for example, knit him one laprobe every two years. When he played the Palladium-in 1948 he mentioned that he loved sports, especially cricket. At the next performance he was gifted with two dozen cricket bats, one of which he brought home to hang over his bar. He has framed personal letters from Eisenhower and Nixon thanking him for entertaining at the Inaugural festivities in Washington. When he sang at the American Shoe Manufacturers Convention he received a token gift of one of his own shoes—in bronze.

The Martins’ ten-room Colonial house stands on a busy Sunset Boulevard corner. (Tony likes to be in the middle of things!) Once grim and old-fashioned, it has been modernized by Cyd.

Tony is also one of Leo Durocher’s best friends, which means he gets his share of Giant trophies. Cyd must find room in their library for autographed baseballs, autographed photos of all the leading players, and a bat used in the 1950 World Series.

The lamps, too, were a present from a grateful fan. One night, during a recent singing engagement at the Chez Paree in Chicago, Tony was asked to sing, “Happy Birthday” to a youngster. He obliged and the father of the teen-ager who was having the party turned out to be a lamp manufacturer. He showed his gratitude by sending Tony three of his newest products.

It’s a credit to Cyd’s good disposition and adroit management that she ean still work Tony’s acquisitions into their tenroom house. A lesser woman would have given up long ago. But Cyd hardly lifts an eyebrow any more. She simply crowds the old pictures closer together to make room for the new ones. She shifts the furniture around to allow for a few more tables and on them she sets the extra lamps or whatever Tony sends home.

Foyer and stairs were originally red tile; Cyd covered them with carpet to match the rose-beige livingroom rug inherited from previous owners, lined one wall with antique mirror and indoor plants.

Cyd, of course, wasn’t always this relaxed and trusting about Tony’s spending and his acquisitional idiosyncrasies. Her first doubts were over the purchase of their two-story, California Colonial-style house.

They had been married only a few months in 1948 when she discovered that they were paying an astronomical rent for a modest Bel Air honeymoon home. She was horrified. Her Texas blood began to boil and she decided it was foolhardy to rent a house. She began working on Tony at once, pressing him to buy a house—just any little place with a garden and a pool: Tony was agreeable provided the place wasn’t too far from town. He likes to be in the middle of things.

The Martins looked at a great number of handsome new homes with pools to match. But always, either the price was out of reach or the location was too far out. Disappointment settled over the newlyweds like a bank of smog until Tony came home one afternoon with what he called “sensational” tidings. He had found a “buy” on the corner of Beverly Glen and Sunset Boulevard, about the busiest corner west of Hollywood and Vine.

Cyd did Tony’s study-music room in cocoa and light brown, had his theme song, “l’ll See You In My Dreams,” painted along top border. She papered the walls with sheet music from an antique shop.

He was wildly enthusiastic. “It’s just what we’ve been looking for! A little old, maybe, but what a location!”

Cyd’s ardor was restrained. She had to admit the address was ideal but when she saw the house—well—it had the charm of a mausoleum. The foyer and stairs were paved in red tile. The livingroom was dark and heavily beamed. The whole place looked gloomy and forbidding.

“What do we want with four bedrooms and plumbing from the 1890’s? I like the old trees, but honestly, this house gives me the creeps.”

Tony wasn’t at all subdued. “With some paint and a few kids we can liven it up in no time.”

Grudgingly, Cyd yielded to her husband’s enthusiasm. A mere four years later, the ten rooms are full and overflowing. With a family consisting of twelve-yearold Nicky, Cyd’s son by a former marriage, husky, three-year-old Tony and his nurse, Pauline, the upstairs rooms are completely occuvied. Then there are Frances and Casey Casparian to look after the house and Joan Arden, the secretary who comes by the day to work in Tony’s officein-the-home.

Cyd had Spanish arches of pink and grey master bedroom squared, planned room to blend her feminine pink chaise, wall-length mirrored dressing table with Tony’s tailored TV set, dark green conteur chair.

“Tone was right,” Cyd now admits. “We filled the rooms in short order, and the truth is we could use an even bigger place.”

Before the Martins actually moved into this spacious, old, brick house, Cyd corralled a couple of painters and a carpenter and put them to work modernizing the place. She had them paint the exterior brick a fresh white with dark green trim. She hung new brass coachman’s lamps beside the front door. Inside, she had the men slap light grey and white paint over all the somber dark beams. She instructed the carpenter to put more shelves in the library and to convert a lavatory into a formica and mirrored bar. The front hall closet became a powder room. To give it a bright finish, not reminiscent of any closet, she had the workmen paper the whole room including (home decorators, please note) the back of the door.

Cyd and Tony love sunning; patio has chaises of various widths, pool-side telephone, dining tables and serving counters from bar and kitchen.

Upstairs in the master bedroom, the carpenters squared off the old-fashioned Spanish arches and built a mirrored dressing table for Cyd. It runs the whole width of the huge bedroom. She put all new fixtures in their Mr. and Mrs. bath. And because Tony is considered one of the best-dressed men in show business, she had to turn an upstairs linen closet into extra wardrobe space. By the time they moved into the fifteen-year-old house, it had lost its dated look, and Cyd was excited and full of ideas about how she would furnish her first real home.

“Most girls grow up with dreams of how to decorate their houses,” she says. “They know the kind of bedroom they want on the type of fireplace they’ll have. I never gave the matter a thought. From the time I was fourteen I was so immersed in dancing that I sort of skipped over that stage. Then all of a sudden I had a home and if was up to me to make it attractive.

Cyd and Tony keep in shape by constant use of fenced-in pool, long walks on their acre of lawn and old trees, Four years ago house and grounds seemed too large for the newlyweds, now barely holds their growing family and staff.

“Not having any pent-up desires I simply started from what seemed to be a logical place. The rose beige rug in the living room came with the sale of the house. I wouldn’t consider scrapping such a bonus so I found out who had laid the carpet and ordered more of it to cover the stairs and the tile floor in the entrance hall.”

The same firm that filled the carpeting order also made custom draperies, so Cyd ordered tailored pull draperies with self valances for every window in the house.

The previous owners gave them a fire-man-red leather chair and ottoman. Cyd and Tony were delighted with the hand-me-downs. They were in excellent condition and made an ideal chair combination for the library. For that reason and that reason alone, Cyd started furnishing the library first.

Tony surprised Cyd with a Provincial dining room set. “The rest of the house is modern,” commented Mrs. Martin, “but—l like a change of pace!”

She did the room in grey and green employing the red as a foil for the quieter colors. She tried to keep the room under furnished, using only a couch, a leather topped game table with matching chairs and the new bar. She knew for sure that Tony’s tronhies and gifts would soon crowd the furniture. She was right. Since she first decorated the house, she has had to add a glass case for his collection of miniature liqueur bottles, half a dozen more record cabinets, a built-in radio, and a TV screen.

“The room just can’t take another improvement,” she says, “but that won’t stop Tone. Not one bit. He’ll keep buying anything that catches his eye.”

Before decorating her livingroom, Cyd sat down and analyzed her needs. She knew that Tony would be working at home with song writers and music arrangers. Experience had taught her that these fellows get carried away in a frenzy of artistic creation and forget evervthing but their work. They plop their feet on the furniture, drop cigarettes on the rugs, spill drinks, and make a general mess. Of one thing she was sure. She would need a practical livingroom that could withstand their abuse plus the wear and tear of children.

Fireman-red leather chair and ottoman accent quiet tones of the library. The tailored motif shows in the leather-topped card table and chairs.

With this end in view, she had four small couches covered in a dirt-proof, cocoa-colored fabric. She had her tables and piano done in an antique finish and then highly waxed to resist practically everything. And she chose only big, unbreakable lamps.

The task of decorating and filling a large house takes time and effort, as Cyd soon found out. She enlisted the help of her friend, Dusty Negulesco. She is a talented painter and the wife of the movie director, Jean Negulesco. Even so, the job progressed slowly. She and Dusty wanted to keep the rooms comfortable, but original. They spent weeks matching colors and choosing fabrics. They combed odd little shops for the round table that now sits in the center of the livingroom, It has removable, underneath trays that slide out and are used in buffet dinners. They also spent months finding one-of-a-kind pictures and novel accessories.

Midway in their labors Tony took an active interest in interior decorating and decided to make one of his large-scale gestures. This happened one afternoon when Cyd and Dusty had triumphantly finished papering his office and music recom. They had found a book of old songs in an antique store and with that as a start, they devised the scheme of using the pages of sheet music for wallpaper. The two girls had papered the yellowed pages on the walls themselves, after which, they had adjourned wearily to the pool. They were stretched out on chaises taking a well-deserved rest when Tony walked in.

“Go take a look at your new music studio,” Cyd suggested.

A few minutes later Tony returned. “Gosh, kids. It looks great! You did a terrific job.” Then, “I’ve got a little surprise, too.”

There was a pause.

“I bought the diningroom furniture, this afternoon.”

“You what?” exploded Dusty.

“I saw a nice table and some chairs and a couple of other pieces in a store right on Sunset,” Tony explained. “So I bought them. They’ll be delivered tomorrow. Boy. That’s another room finished,”

Dusty made a choking, clucking sound.

“Darling,” Cyd said quickly, “it sounds marvelous. I can hardly wait to see it.”

When the furniture arrived the next day it proved to be of fine quality. Nevertheless, it is Provincial and the rest of the house is comfortably contemporary. “But, you know,” Cyd says, “I kind of like the change of pace.”

For an entertainer who spends more time away from his home than he spends in it, Tony takes an inordinate amount of pride in his residence.

Only a few months ago when he was singing in New York, he was approached by an old nightclub buddy. “Hear you’ve married a movie star and got a big mansion in Hollywood,” the crony said. “How can a foot-loose guy like you take care of such a plushy set-up?”

Tony’s mind flashed back over the years when everything he owned was in his suitcase. “It’s simple,” he said, “I’m married to an angel, and all we need to take care of the house is a song from me every now and then, and a dance from her every now and then.”

His friend looked at Tony quizzically. “You been drinkin’?” he asked.

“Never been more sober in my life!”

Next day, he bought three oil paintings and air mailed them to Cyd. Right now she’s trying to find room for them.

(Cyd Charisse can be seen in MGM’s Brigadoon.)

THE END

—BY MARVA PETERSON

It is a quote. MODERN SCREEN MAGAZINE DECEMBER 1953