Film historians give Lizabeth Scott a bad rap. The actress doesn’t even get a chapter in David Shipman’s Great Movie Stars series of books. Leslie Halliwell in his Filmgoer’s Companion writes of her blonde hair, defiant expression, and immobile upper lip. Eddie Muller claims that she was a polarizing figure in the movie business, under the control of Hal Wallis, despite she was on contract by Wallis only ten years. Muller calls her accent Hollywood via Scranton by way of Broadway. But he admits that Lizabeth Scott has gained a devoted cult following which grew over the years. Dan Callahan in Barbara Stanwyck: The Miracle Woman says Scott is a curious ersatz figure. She has hissing, sibilant line readings and curdled, tough girl smiles and tears. Scott can look down or into the distance for reflective moments of bruised intensity. She also fiddles with her hands and props. Her walk is that of a model since the actress was one professionally, this also means she wears clothes well. Scott cried with real tears and could be very funny tossing off barbs. She played a drunk in Easy Living, Stolen Face, and Bad For Each Other. Scott does an English accent in You Came Along, a cockney one in Stolen Face, and a southern accent in Loving You.
She was born Emma Matzo on Sept. 29, 1922, in Scranton, Pa., one of six children of Ukrainian immigrants. She attended Marywood College, but quit to move to New York City. She enrolled at the Alvienne School of Drama, got work in summer stock and modeling and started calling herself Elizabeth Scott. She had the goods: the luminous eyes and moist lips that belied a heart of stone, the slinky figure, the sculptured cheekbones, the cascading hair and husky voice suitable for torch songs or seductive close-ups. Irving Hoffman, a columnist for The Hollywood Reporter, had befriended Scott and tried to introduce her to helpful people. On September 29, 1943, Hoffman held a birthday party at the Stork Club—Scott had turned 21. By happenstance, Hal Wallis was also at the club that night. Hoffman introduced Scott to Hal Wallis, who arranged for an interview the following day. When Scott returned home, she found a telegram offering her the lead for the Boston run of The Skin of Our Teeth. Miriam Hopkins was ill. Scott recalled "On the train up to Boston, to replace Miss Hopkins, I decided I needed to make the name more of an attention-grabber. And that's when I decided to drop the 'E' from Elizabeth."
She has the same androgynous beauty of Bacall, though her physique is more emaciated. There is more than one parallel with Bacall. The actress had the husky voice and sultry but tough demeanor. She was said to be presented as the new Bacall, as Bacall was created by director Howard Hawks as his ideal woman. Scott was The Threat as Bacall was The Look. But the actress was just as much a threat to Veronica Lake, with the same side-parted hairstyle. Lake was the top star at Paramount Pictures at the time, where Wallis had his production company. But while Scott outlasted Lake, she did not have the same career longevity as Bacall. For Hal Wallis Productions the actress made You Came Along, The Strange Love of Martha Ivers, Desert Fury, I Walk Alone, Paid In Full, Dark City, Red Mountain, Scared Stiff, and Loving You. As she was signed to Wallis and not Paramount, Scott was contracted to appear in his films.
With rare exceptions, Lizabeth was stereotyped on the screen as the temptress who had no desire or will to change and was doomed to find a worthwhile good guy to love her only when she had already passed the point of redemption. In the 1973 essay The Treatment of Women in the Movies, Molly Haskell identifies Lizabeth Scott as “a kind of blonde Joan Crawford in the noir arena of female characters,” who wasn’t necessarily evil herself, but whose very presence seemed to invite evil. “Every time she appeared, the atmosphere became heavy, and we knew that trouble, big trouble, was ahead,” wrote Haskell. She was generally a compliant player, accepting whatever was assigned to her. This seemed to contrast with her own nature, since Scott was known to be a remarkable individualist. But even if she disliked the material, the actress would work to find something redemptive about it. Scott was no mere sexy siren, pin-up or filly with more curves than brains. She was a hard-working, well-trained career girl. Along with her talent and brains, the actress had a face and figure that dreams were made of and a personality like a ball of fire. The face was about picture perfect, chiselled nicely and had the clean cameo features that cameramen craved. The skin was like honey and the thick taffy hair matched. It tumbled in a long curving do that just fit the gal. the eyes are big and blue and the lashes and eyebrows inky black. The wide mouth was just made for a smile, and she knew how to laugh with her eyes.
The part she most loathed was Jane Palmer, the venal femme fatale in Too Late for Tears. Ironically it is considered one of her best performances. It was only once that Scott declined something - the Wallis film of The Rose Tattoo. Her withdrawal from making The Big Steal was said to be a decision made by Wallis. It would be an article in Confidential in 1955 that really impacted the actress’ career as the magazine claimed that she was a lesbian. Scott sued but the case was dismissed on a technicality. Later she would be exonerated when Confidential reporters in another court case admitted their facts had not been confirmed. The actress always denied being a lesbian. She said a vengeful wife had paid for the article to be fabricated and published, but the damage was done. The actress was independently wealthy, thanks to Wallis’ help in acquiring interest in income producing properties.
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From the late 1950s, Scott did not need to work. She was not a recluse, still having a social life. But the actress had always been happy with her own company, locking herself into the house and not even answering the phone. She did not write a memoir, however Scott gave an extensive interview to Ronald L. Davis in 1985, and Carole Langer in 1996. Books that were helpful were James Robert Parish’s The Paramount Pretties, Karen Burroughs Hannsberry’s Femme Noir: Bad Girls of Film, David Ragan’s Movie Stars of the ‘40s: A Complete Reference Guide for the Film Historian or Trivia Buff, Bert Prelutsky’s Sixty Seven Conservatives You Should Meet Before You Die, Todd Hughes’ Lunch with Lizabeth, and Bernard F. Dick’s Hal Wallis: Producers to the Stars. Also useful were profiles in Film Fan Monthly and Films Of The Golden Age.
Bogart was a colorful human being. He was a great star yet did not intimidate Scott during the shooting of Dead Reckoning. Bogart was a very charming man and kind with her. She never had any intellectual discourse with him but could see that he was extremely intelligent. Often Bogart would call her at home to ask how the actress was, but the age difference and their world views were vastly different. He was forty-six and she half his age at twenty-three. Scott was not interested in the world beyond her work. Bogart by contrast was conscious of all the things she did not care about. This included until politics and the Hollywood gears. One day he invited her to his dressing room for lunch. Bogart told the actress he would have liked anything but to be an actor. It was such a stupid thing to be and such a foolish life. Yet Bogart loved to frolic, loved partying, and loved staying out all night. Bogart had been warned Scott was temperamental, but she couldn’t have been nicer to work with. He also refuted the press’s comparisons of her to Bacall, instead stating the actress more resembled Mayo Methot.
Lizabeth found John Cromwell a good but very demanding director. Everything was too perfunctory and definitized. He had a very nice smile which made you think Cromwell was a dear sweet man but then he got officious. She had to hit her marks exactly, and not be one or two inches off, and this bothered her tremendously. The actress hadn’t thought about lighting before, only the lens. Being on her mark was less important to Scott than the emotion that had to come from within for the moment. Most people interested Scott and, when she met someone, the actress outdid a psychoanalyst in encouraging that person to talk about themselves. She was outspoken, explicit and direct and expected the same traits in everybody else. When Scott talked, she closed her eyes and used hands, sitting on the edge of a chair leaning forward, tense, as though getting ready to take off.
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In May 1969, the wedding of the actress to oil executive William Lafayette Dugger, Jr. of San Antonio, Texas, was announced after a two-year engagement. She was aged forty-eight and he around the same. Scott said Dugger was a wonderfully interesting man, and she loved him very much. Dugger had a medium build, and was good-looking, with dark hair, a warm personality, and a strong handshake. Dugger planned to make a movie in Rome with Scott called “The Legend of Angel”. From the way William Dugger talked about the actress, people could tell he really loved her. Dugger had bought every copy of Scott’s songs album he could get and wanted her all to himself. Dugger didn’t want his fiancée to tour singing but to stay home. He suddenly left the room then returned with a copy of the album in his hand. He gave it to Rex Mondo, saying there was more than just lyrics. She was a misunderstood soul searching for love.
Her outward appearance was just a shield. Dugger suddenly died on August 8, 1969, following complications from an abdominal surgery. There was mystery surrounding the death. On August 21, 1964, he had signed a typed will attested by two witnesses as required by Texas Probate Code. It had left all his property to his sister Sarah Dugger Schwartz. However, approximately one year before his death, Dugger made some pen and ink changes. After his sister’s name he wrote in “and Lizabeth Scott my fiancée in equal shares.” Dugger initialled the change and had one witness sign their name. The changes were referred to as a holographic codicil. Hal Wallis died on October 5, 1986. It was said that despite his two marriages, he retained a fascination with her. Charles Higham in his memoir, In And Out Of Hollywood, writes about this. He was present the night Wallis watched one of the films he had made with the actress, repeatedly.
Other sources claim Wallis would screen the films he had made with her every night over and over. He was said to have never gotten over Scott’s sheer physical beauty, voice and charm. This did not phase Wallis’ then wife Martha Hyer. She wanted her husband to write about her instead in his 1980 autobiography. But he refused. The book Starmaker, written with Charles Higham, does mention her. However, there is nothing about their personal relationship. Martha Hyer didn’t write anything about Scott in her memoir, Finding My Way, either. In 1996, Lizabeth got a laugh when Carole Langer comments she was not the typical Hollywood actress. She replies, “Is that a compliment?” Langer answers yes and the actress thanks her. She gets another laugh when Scott says Langer has a question mixed up.
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Scott claims to still be a severe introvert. Her friends of the past included Patricia Neal. She admitted to being a feminist but not a wild feminist. Scott was a feminist mostly because she had achieved what the actress always wanted to achieve. All her goals were not interfered with by any man. Scott knew she could triumph over any impediment there might be, and there was nothing that stood in her path. Until her last days, Scott got a tremendous amount of fan mail, including from young people and college students. She assumed this was because a lot of her film noirs were shown at colleges in academic cinema courses. Maybe those films depicted a contemporary look and feeling which made them so appealing.
The correspondence between Scott and Todd Hughes continued and then she invited him to lunch. This took place at the Musso & Frank Grill on February 14, 1997. When the actress suggested they order fish from the menu she grinned, and they both laughed. It seemed Scott was teasing the subject of her being a lesbian. She ordered a lamb sandwich instead. He felt they had committed to a friendship. Eddie Muller had organized a black and white portrait shoot for Los Angeles Magazine with many of the surviving noir queens. But the actress had no interest in it. The event was organized by Eddie Muller who contacted Todd Hughes, knowing he was a friend. Muller wanted Scott to be a special guest at the screening.
Lizabeth said she would do it if Muller was not in the building. Had Scott been influenced by Muller’s book Dark City: The Lost Word of Film Noir? In it he wrote how off-screen she preferred the pillow talk of other women. Muller graciously stepped aside. She arrived with her escort, casting director Marvin Paige. The theatre was packed and there was a standing ovation as Scott walked down the aisle. Fans came with memorabilia that could be signed in the lobby after the screening. Hughes volunteered to help set her up at a table and the line stretched down the lobby and around the entire periphery of the theatre. The actress was polite to the fans, but this would be her last public signing. –Lizabeth Scott: Noir Baritone Blonde (2026) by Peter Shelley
