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Ava Gardner: Profane Goddess

© K Cruver

Honey, don't you know who I am? I'm a lousy movie star.
-Ava Gardner

Ava Lavinia Gardner was one of the most beautiful women to appear in movies, and that's saying a lot in Hollywood. She was born on Christmas Eve, 1922 in Grabtown, North Carolina, to a tobacco farmer and his wife. Though the family didn't have much money, they never went hungry either, contrary to many later accounts of her life.

Running around with the local boys, she acquired her lifelong love of rough language and bare feet. It was only when low market prices for tobacco forced the Gardners into the city that she realized her family was poor. Ava's one dress and thick southern accent made her the object of derision in school. While she struggled to adjust to the new surroundings, her father became ill and eventually died of bronchitis in 1935. Her mother ran a boarding house for laborers to pay the bills.

When she was eighteen, Ava had her portrait taken at her brother-in-law's New York photo shop. Pleased with the results, he displayed the picture in the front window of the shop. A supposed scout for MGM admired the portrait and promised that he could get Ava into the movies.

The man from MGM turned out to have less power than he claimed, but Ava eventually got a screen test anyway. Though she had a thick accent and no acting experience, Ava was summoned to Hollywood. She signed a seven-year contract with MGM and, chaperoned by her older sister Bappie, she moved to California. Her weekly salary was so low that Bappie had to work at I. Magnin to pay the rent.

During her first studio tour, Ava was introduced to Mickey Rooney (he happened to be wearing Carmen Miranda outfit for a comedy number). Rooney was immediately smitten. He tirelessly pursued Ava, first for a date and finally, for her hand in marriage. Rooney's womanizing and ruthless pursuit of the spotlight hurt Ava terribly. The marriage lasted a little over a year. During this time Ava also lost her mother to cancer.

Ava spent her days at MGM posing for cheesecake photos and playing bit parts. She appeared in seventeen movies between 1941 and 1946, and as she later noted herself, "no one noticed." It was not until Ava studied with a studio vocal coach that she finally had the accent and confidence for speaking roles.

Her first big break was on loan to Universal in 1946 for The Killers. Against her wishes, Ava's singing was dubbed throughout her career, but in this one film, she got to handle her own vocals. Ava was finally getting some attention and a shot at leading roles.