Lew Ayres: Hollywood's Conscientious Objector

By Lesley L. Coffin and Marya E. Gates

Lew Ayres (1908-1996) became known to the public when he portrayed the leading character in the epic war film All Quiet on the Western Front. The role made him a household name, introduced him to his closest friends, brought him to the attention of his first two wives, and would overshadow the rest of his career. To be a movie star was his first and only ambition as a child, but once he found success, he was never fully satisfied in his choice of profession. Although lacking a formal education, Ayres spent the rest of his life pursuing dozens of intellectual studies, interests, and hobbies. He even considered ended his acting career after just a few years to pursue a more “respectable and fulfilling” path as a director.

Ayres was given not one but two comeback opportunities in his acting career, in 1938 and 1945. He was cast in the film series Dr. Kildare where he showed his abilities in comedy and his unique strength at bringing a level of sincerity to even the most outlandish or idealist character. But he was willing to give up his star status to follow his moral compass, first as a conscientious objector and ultimately as a noncombat medic during World War II. To everyone’s surprise, he was welcomed back to Hollywood with open arms and new opportunities despite his objector status.

Biographer Lesley L. Coffin presents the story of a man of quiet dignity, constantly searching for the right way to live his life and torn between the public world of Hollywood and secluded life of spiritual introspection.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
• Release date: Oct 18, 2012
• ISBN: 9781628469431

Lesley L. Coffin

Lesley L. Coffin is an independent scholar and M.A. candidate in biographical studies at New York University.

Book preview

LEW AYRES

HOLLYWOOD LEGENDS SERIES

CARL ROLLYSON, GENERAL EDITOR

Lew AYRES

HOLLYWOOD’S CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR

Lesley L. Coffin

Foreword by Marya E. Gates

www.upress.state.ms.us

The University Press of Mississippi is a member of the Association of American University Presses.

Copyright © 2012 by University Press of Mississippi

All rights reserved

Manufactured in the United States of America

First printing 2012

∞

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Coffin, Lesley L.

Lew Ayres : Hollywood’s conscientious objector / Lesley L. Coffin ;

foreword by Marya E. Gates.

p. cm. — (Hollywood legends series)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-61703-637-8 (cloth : alk. paper) —

ISBN 978-1-61703-638-5 (ebook)

1. Ayres, Lew, 1908–1996. 2. Actors—United States—Biography. 3. World War, 1939–1945—Conscientious objectors—United States—Biography. I.

Title.

PN2287.A95C64 2012

791.43’028’0924—dc23

[B]

2012011625

British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available

To Cecelia Purcell, my grandmother

I find that I understand people far better from reading what great men, who have spent their lives

studying the human race, have found out about them and from reading my own reactions to things.

LEW AYRES, 1938

CONTENTS

Prologue

Foreword

Preface and Acknowledgments

CHAPTER 1.   Grandma’s Boy

CHAPTER 2.   Young Musician in Search of a Movie

CHAPTER 3.   The Kind of Role that Casts a Shadow

CHAPTER 4.   A New Kind of Star

CHAPTER 5.   Romantic Comedy

CHAPTER 6.   At the Helm

CHAPTER 7.   A Short Stay on Poverty Row

CHAPTER 8.   The Comeback King of 1938

CHAPTER 9.   Introducing Dr. Kildare

CHAPTER 10. A Doctor, A Comic

CHAPTER 11. Echoes of War

CHAPTER 12. Lew Ayres, Conscientious Objector

CHAPTER 13. A Camp in Oregon

CHAPTER 14. Like a Bomb Was Dropped

CHAPTER 15. Public Debate

CHAPTER 16. Basic Training

CHAPTER 17. In Search of Something

CHAPTER 18. A Hero Returns to Hollywood

CHAPTER 19. The Comeback of 1946

CHAPTER 20. Awards and Affairs

CHAPTER 21. The Return of Dr. Kildare

CHAPTER 22. Magnificent Obsession

CHAPTER 23. A Man of Honor and Faith

CHAPTER 24. The Older Gentleman

CHAPTER 25. Altars of the World

CHAPTER 26. As Time Goes By

CHAPTER 27. Reaching for the Butterfly

Appendix

Notes

Filmography

Selected Bibliography

Index

PROLOGUE

On April 3, 1942, Americans awoke to learn that in the midst of World War II, a Hollywood star had declared himself a conscientious objector and had been ordered to a conscientious objector camp in Oregon. Actor Lew Ayres was best known for his performances as the titular character in the MGM film series Dr. Kildare. The press even referred to him by his alter ego’s name. It was an irony lost on no one that he had first been famous for the antiwar film All Quiet on the Western Front.

Newspapers across the country ran stories, saying that it was the experience of making this film that led him to oppose all forms of violence and particularly war. Others assumed that the role of Dr. Kildare had gone to his head and he was suffering from a case of mistaken identity, mistaking himself for the good-hearted doctor who lived by the Hippocratic Oath, First do no harm.

In truth, it was a decision Ayres made with very little connection to his career as an actor and without any concern for his professional life. He was simply choosing to truly live by his moral views after years of quiet self-discovery.

Always inquisitive, Lew’s film career had afforded him the opportunity to pursue a multitude of interests, including science, music, art, religion, and philosophy. Through these studies, Lew developed an intellectual interest in religion that, though he did not identify with a single organized religion, evolved into a deeply personal view of God’s will. By 1940, only a small group of friends were aware of his spiritual beliefs. However, as war loomed, Lew came to terms with the fact that he could not participate in the impending violence. It was his decision and he was willing to live with the consequences.

FOREWORD

Lew Ayres has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for his work in motion pictures and one for his work in radio. Yet, I bet they are two of the most overlooked stars on those gilded sidewalks. Actually, I’ve seen them and one is in a state of utter disrepair—it’s in a heavily trafficked part of Hollywood Boulevard—and the other is in pristine condition near the Capitol Record building. The point is, if you asked a random selection of tourists about Lew Ayres, more than likely their response would be, Who? Even those in the know when it comes to classic films are often at a loss to put a face to the name, if the name rings a bell at all, and it is such a shame. It’s hard for me to fathom that an actor with his talent, and who at one time was quite popular, could be so forgotten today. It doesn’t help that most of his films are not on DVD and you can only really watch them if you’re lucky enough to catch one on Turner Classic Movies.

I recently found myself with a lot of free time on my hands and at this time, drawn to classic films. The more of these films I watched, the more I had to watch; the more stars I would discover and fall in love with, the more filmographies I needed to complete. It was during this period that I discovered the work of Lew Ayres and was instantly struck by how different he was from so many of his contemporaries. He makes the most out of any role he’s given. He always gives 100 percent of himself and brings a quiet intensity and an honesty not often seen in actors at the time.

As it happens, I first fell for Lew Ayres when I was in the middle of watching a self-imposed Cary Grant marathon. Grant had always been a favorite of mine, but I realized I hadn’t actually seen much of his filmography. I decided to watch George Cukor’s 1938 film Holiday, a now slightly forgotten Cary Grant/Katharine Hepburn screwball comedy. The film was a box office bomb and helped solidify Hepburn in the late-1930s as box office poison (how silly that seems in retrospect!)

I loved this Holiday for many reasons, but the main reason was for the actor who played Hepburn’s brother Ned: none other than Mr. Lew Ayres himself. He steals every scene of that film, in which he’s featured. Which says a lot when you consider the stature of his costars. Ned is an unhappy person, like his sister Linda (Hepburn), whose only escape is alcoholism. It’s not uncommon to see excessive consumption of alcohol by rich characters in 1930s films, but with Ned it’s not out of a happy-go-lucky lust for life, but rather a kind of self-defense mechanism. The self-knowledge of the character itself is a bit ahead of its time, which in turn lends itself perfectly to an actor like Ayres. There’s just something in his eyes at all times. Ayres gives Ned the feeling of real life and incredible depth, displaying his inner turmoil and agony, without saying a thing. It is nothing short of an extraordinary performance. Holiday came out a few months before the release of Young Dr. Kildare, in which Ayres played what is arguably his most famous role, that of Dr. Kildare, a role he would play in eight films. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if Holiday had been more of a success and he had gotten to play roles like Ned more often.

Also released in 1938, just prior to his first take on Dr. Kildare, was Reinhold Schünzel’s Rich Man, Poor Girl. Schünzel’s film starred Robert Young and Ruth Hussey, and again features Lew Ayres as the female protagonist’s brother. However, this time I didn’t find myself loving the film. I did, however, love Ayres in it. The film is full of the kind of quirky characters that are so fun to watch while escaping from reality, but aren’t exactly like real people; that’s how the actors play them. Because of the way the film is written, the role of Henry Thayer is much more clichéd than that of Ned in Holiday.

Regardless, Ayres brings the same realism and honesty to the character that he always does. You can really find yourself caring for him because, unlike the rest of the film’s characters, you feel that he is real, his strife is real, and you aren’t sure everything is going to work out for him. As we all know, life isn’t always like the movies. This ability to appear so real is the basis of Ayres’s charm and why I’m so shocked he was never a bigger star, despite his successful run as Dr. Kildare.

You can see this same quiet intensity in his earlier performances as well. Think of his first film The Kiss—a silent film with Greta Garbo— in which Ayres holds his own amongst one of the silver screen’s most alluring and famous actresses and nearly manages to outshine her. Or his first starring role, in Lewis Milestone’s groundbreaking antiwar film, All Quiet on the Western Front. The film itself feels ahead of its time, allowing Ayres to give one of his most complex performances—and he was only twenty-two!

This early role in All Quiet on the Western Front proved to be very pivotal in Ayres’s life a decade later when the United States entered World War II. Ayres was a pacifist and when he was unable to secure a placement in the Medical Corps, he declared himself a conscientious objector, though eventually he was able to serve in the Medical Corps in the Pacific theater and in New Guinea. I always found this to be so inspiring, that Ayres would take such a brave stance for his beliefs when every other big Hollywood star was off fighting the war, being real life heroes. However, most of them on return said they were just doing their duty like everyone else.

After the war, Ayres did only a few films and was never quite as popular as he had been prior to the war. He did, however, receive his only Academy Award nomination for 1948’s Johnny Belinda. Again playing a doctor, Ayres has his trademark intensity and honesty, though he gives a much more subtle performance than most of his prewar films.

After Johnny Belinda, Ayres did a handful of films, as well as a lot of work in radio and television—including such widely popular shows as the original Hawaii Five-O and Battlestar Galactica. In fact, he worked steadily until his death in 1996, though by that point his legacy as a star from the Old Hollywood era had already become largely forgotten. In the fifteen years since his death, there has been hardly any mention of his name, inside or outside Old Hollywood fan circles. Even if you catch a film in which Ayres is featured on TCM, the odds are that you will hear some facts about the film or one of its other stars, but not a word about Ayres himself.

Film is an important part of our culture, and the preservation of early films is essential. This goes for the preservation of old Hollywood’s stars as well. So few stars of yore are truly remembered and revered as much now as they were at the height of their stardom. Lew Ayres worked in Hollywood for six decades and it is shocking to see how easily he and stars like him are forgotten today. Here we have an unbelievable opportunity to rediscover one of Hollywood’s seeming hidden gems. For all that I know and love about Lew Ayres’s film performances, I am ecstatic that this book has created a clearer picture of who he was as a man. Knowing who Ayres really was will enhance my understanding and appreciation of his artistry all the better, as well as the impact and influence he had on many stars later on.

I think an argument could be made that Ayres paved the way for someone like John Garfield, who is often cited as an influence on icons like Montgomery Clift, James Dean, and Marlon Brando. Even the legacy of Garfield pales in comparison to that of those three. Yet, even further back, you’ve got Lew Ayres, bringing the same kind of intensity and honesty. With any luck this book will reintroduce the world to the life and work of Ayres and perhaps then his stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame will be visited as often as Clift or Dean or Brando. Heaven knows he deserves it.

Marya E. Gates

Online Critic and Film Scholar

PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I distinctly recall sitting in my high school freshman history class and being told we would be watching a movie as an introduction to the study of World War I. A break from a lecture was always nice, and at age fourteen, I had almost no knowledge of The Great War, as World War I was known before World War II.

I sat in that dark classroom, in one of those uncomfortably hard school desks with the attached metal chair, and watched as slightly faded black and white titles appeared on the television screen. The music played and a written message appeared: This story is neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure, for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it. It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped its shells, were destroyed by the war.

This was not a promising beginning, and yet I was enthralled by the film. All Quiet on the Western Front held the entire class’s attention from the very beginning to the heartbreaking end. And when it was all over, many of us were still visibly moved. I had seen a group of characters close to our age that had not only died, but first had their spirit shattered. It was the best possible introduction to the tragedy of The Great War.

The film’s most memorable character was Paul, played by Lew Ayres. He was an actor whose name was unknown to the entire class, including myself, and yet his performance was brilliant and touching, because it seemed so natural. At the time, it seemed impossible that he could have just been an actor in a movie, but that’s likely further proof that the role was perfectly suited to him. But I was fourteen. I appreciated the film at the time, but promptly forgot. I forgot the actor. I saw no more of his movies.

It wasn’t Lew’s role in All Quiet on the Western Front that sparked my intellectual interest, but his performance as Ned in Holiday, the classic screwball comedy. That is where I was reintroduced to Lew the actor.

Flipping channels in my college dorm room, I had happened across a movie starring Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn that seemed right for the evening. I’d missed the opening credits, but it looked good so I stuck with it. And, suddenly, there he was, making such a memorable entrance as the younger brother who went to Christmas mass with a hangover.

Every time Lew Ayres appeared on screen, I was struck by how deceptively brilliant his performance was. On the surface it seems comedic and light, but underneath lays a heartbreakingly tragic character. A man drowning himself in bottle after bottle, unable to accept the most basic pressures of life and cursed with a family that exhibits little concern. When Katharine Hepburn’s character leaves the family’s oppressive home, she begs Lew’s character to come with her. Unable to find the courage, he refuses, and though his sister promises to return and take him away, the audience knows Ned will not get his happy ending.

It wasn’t until the end of the movie that I realized Lew Ayres, the actor I vaguely remembered from that high school screening of All Quiet on the Western Front, was the actor playing Ned. And I was even more surprised to learn from Turner Classic Movies that soon after this film, he declared himself a conscientious objector, which nearly ruined his career. That statement stayed with me. It made me want to know more, to better understand this footnote in Hollywood history. I looked for a biography on Lew and was shocked to find that one did not exist.

It seems unreal that this could be the first published biography of a Hollywood star whose story has been so steeped in Hollywood myth. Perhaps this is the first biography because it was as difficult for others as I ultimately found it to be.

It was difficult not due to a lack of available information, but because of the challenge of separating fiction from fact and sorting through the countless documents, some of which contained inaccurate information planted by the Hollywood studio’s publicity departments. I found countless articles wherein the basic facts were incorrectly reported, sometimes by multiple publications and a host of Hollywood reporters, all to cultivate the most marketable image of Lew Ayres. Sorting through these documents proved arduous, as was determining why such stories had been spun and planted.

In the writing of this biography, even so-called legitimate news outlets could not be trusted. From the moment Lew’s status as a conscientious objector was made public, the newspapers almost universally assumed that the actor’s role in All Quiet on the Western Front was the motivating factor in his refusal to take up arms. Likewise, popular culture has come to the conclusion that Lew’s career was all but destroyed by his having taken such a stand, a claim that has proved simplistic and misleading upon further examination. This work is not intended to simply retell that story or enhance the legend, but to tell the entire story of Lew Ayres—a man who lived a long and complicated life in Hollywood. Lew was more than simply a symbol, but also an accomplished actor who holds a place in Hollywood history.

I am so grateful to those whom have helped me in the research process. As a resident of New York City, I am eternally grateful to the New York Public Library system, in particular the Main Library and the New York Library for the Performing Arts in Lincoln Center, both of which had massive collections of periodicals, press releases, and clipping files, as well as remarkably helpful reference librarians, who had a knowledge not only of their own holdings but also national holdings. I am also grateful to the many university and public libraries that made their holdings available.

I would like to express my thanks to a number of archives. The staff at the University of Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research provided me with several of the rare films in their collection as well as many rare fan articles from the 1930s and ’40s, which would have otherwise been almost impossible to locate. Charles Silver and his support staff at the Museum of Modern Art provided me with access to their remarkable collection of historical articles and clippings on Lew Ayres, and also access to a number of Lew’s early and rare films, otherwise unavailable to the public.

I am also extremely grateful to a number of film and television archives for the access they provided to dozens of rare films and television programs, many of which had to be specially requested. Thank you to the entire New York staff at the Paley Center for Media for helping me to view a number of Lew Ayres’s television projects. Thank you to Mark Quigley, manager of the UCLA Film and Television Archive, for arranging duplications and screeners of many films and television programs that are only available at the UCLA Film and Television Archive. The same is very true of Josie L. Waters-Johnston and Rob Stone of the Library of Congress Motion Picture Collection, which has done a remarkable job preserving so many early films and television programs.

Although I have no personal connection to them, I would like to express my gratitude to the many film companies that are continuing to preserve their classic films and making them available to the public, including DVD companies that continue to release films from the golden age and retail companies like Netflix that make this kind of research affordable. Thank you to the emerging digital platform sites (including Archive.org, Hulu, Amazon, and iTunes) which have made hard-to-find programs readily accessible, many for the first time since their television airing or theatrical release. And finally, I am forever indebted to TCM, which has continued to air rare films, and without which this project might never have begun.

Although there were several useful sources that were, due to archival retention policies, deterioration, and destruction, sadly unavailable for inclusion in this book—specifically, the majority of Lew Ayres’s personal papers, which were destroyed in a house fire in the 1950s—it was only because of the remarkable access I was given to the archives that do exist that this book was even possible.

Therefore, I would also like to thank those who conducted and archived oral histories with Lew himself. This includes interviews conducted for the TCM Archive Project, made available by the University of Georgia-Athens. In 1971, as part of his Hollywood Film Industry Oral History Project, Charles Higham conducted an oral history that is now located and available at Columbia University in New York City. James D’Arc also conducted an oral history for the L. Tom Perry Special Collection at Brigham Young University. The National Archive’s Selective Service Records yielded a remarkable amount of information regarding Lew’s conscientious objector status, as well as the response of the government and ordinary Americans to that decision. Lew’s conscientious objector file was provided by the National Service Board for Religious Objectors, and rights to access and use of information from the files were granted by J. E. McNeil, to whom I am extremely grateful.

A friend of Lew Ayres’s while he served in the Pacific, Paul Yinger kept up a remarkable correspondence with Lew during and after the war, all of which was saved. This correspondence was generously made available to researchers when Yinger donated his papers to the Graduate Theological Union Archives. I am grateful to Yinger’s two children, Rev. Marilyn Corvin and Jay Yinger, who granted me permission to access the collection.

Finally, I would like to thank Mr. Ayres’s acquaintances who provided personal anecdotes, both in their own writings and through personal conversations with me, including Ken Pearson, Leland Stewart, and Steven Goodman. Most importantly, I would like to thank Lew’s son, Dr. Justin Ayres, for his conversation, insights, and personal photographs, and for providing me with information from his father’s unpublished autobiography.

I greatly appreciate the foreword provided by film scholar and fan of Lew Ayres, Marya E. Gates, who expresses eloquently Lew’s lasting impression and why cinema historians should know of him. Thank you especially the University Press of Mississippi, not only for accepting and publishing this work as part of their Hollywood Legends series, but for continuing to publish works on the history of Hollywood. I’m proud this work will be included in this book series, which gives special attention to subjects who have yet to receive significant biographical treatment and to those legends that deserve reconsideration. Their noble mission to enrich Hollywood history was exactly the special classification of publications I was seeking out when first beginning this project.

On a personal note, I would like to thank the continued support of family and friends, including Oline Eaton, who read the first draft of this book and provided insight and suggestions when I needed them most.

This book was written while I completed my master’s degree in biographical studies at New York University, at the Gallatin School for Individualized Studies. I would like to thank all those professors and students for their continued support and encouragement of their student’s intellectual pursuits, especially professors Karen Hornick, Selma Thompson, and Christopher Bram. I would also like to thank Biographer’s International Organization, which was in its infancy when I first became a member and yet provided a remarkably warm and supportive peer group. Special thanks to my mentor, and now fellow biographer, Wes Gehring. Thank you to friends who have given me the time to work on this book, especially fellow film scholars Joanna Chebus, Jen McCoy, and Mia Gomez, who have served as sounding boards throughout this whole process.

Finally, I need to express my eternal gratitude to my family, who have been the single greatest source of encouragement throughout this journey. Thank you especially to my parents Alice and Tom Coffin, sister Natalie Coffin, and Cecelia Purcell, to whom this book is dedicated.

LEW AYRES

Fig. 1.1. A childhood photograph of Lew Ayres. Princeton University Library.

Chapter One

GRANDMA’S BOY

When Lew Ayres burst onto the Hollywood scene, his image was that of a child

Reviews for Lew Ayres

[knahs_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I was disappointed in this book. Yes, we did learn more about Ayers than previously known. There were numerous quotes from Ayers , an appendix of letters sent to government officials during WWII when Ayers came out as a conscientious objector, a complete filmography, and extensive footnotes. However, I felt there could have been more interviews with those who knew and worked with him. I felt there could have been fewer errors – for example, on page 44 a photograph identified actor Henry Travers as Charles Butterworth and on page 70, actor Leslie Howard’s name was spelled as Lesley Howard. It is these kinds of errors that make me distrust the rest of the book. However, the most disappointing was at the end of the book that mentioned Ayers death. There was no closure to the book to indicate where Ayers was buried, was there a memorial service and who attended and who did the eulogy, what happened to his wife, what happened to his son, and does he have any grandchildren. All of these were questions were left unanswered and to me, a good biography needs to provide closure.