ennifer's Just "Mom" To Her Boys
by Ed Wallace
(Unidentified magazine, November 27, 1954
Jennifer Jones hasn't forgotten her Oklahoma upbringing. She says please when she wants something, thank you when she gets it, and her maybe you'd rather is somewhat rare among stars.
She still likes a hamburger with everything on it but the fry cook's foot and she gets a dreamy expression when she thinks of pig stands.
"I remember when I was a young girl," she said, pressing her lips upward into a grade school smile, "eating strawberry ice cream and waiting for the evening paper to read 'Boots and her Buddies'. And when I was older, I loved those pig stands." (For those unfortunate enough to have missed out on pig stands, they serve mankind by serving barbecue sandwiches.)
Jennifer's life began in Tulsa with an inborn hunger to be an actress and she can vaguely remember stomping up and down the aisles of her father's movie theater, knees bent and arms bowed in imitation of an ape man.
"Mother was my first audience," she said. "I remember getting her to watch me while I floated around the house in costumes."
Jennifer's business in New York is the lead in "Portrait of a Lady," which will open at the ANTA THeater on Dec. 21. And while she has made out all right in Hollywood, winning the Motion Picture Academy Award with her first part in a movie, she is taking nothing for granted in New York.
"If anything good happens to me in this play, I'll be so happy I may die of sheer joy," she said. "I want so very much to be good."
Jennifer is taller than her movie fans may imagine - 5 feet 7 - but she gives a logical explanation of this deception. "That's because I've had so many parts I played barefoot. And the fact that I had tall leading men."
Jennifer went to Hollywood in 1941, got the part of St. Bernadette in "The Song of Bernadette" in 1942 ad the Oscar as the best movie actress in 1943. Her first marriage was to Robert Walker, a highly talented and ill-fated actor who died in 1951. Their two sons are Robert, 14, and Michael, 13. Jennifer married David O. Selznick in 1949 and they have a young daughter whose naming brought together the best brains in Hollywood.
They were so determined to give her a nice name - one that she would grow up to like - that they kept putting it off until some of their relatives were downright worried and friends were more than a little annoyed. Like most people with a baby to name, they gave it an inordinate amount of time and consideration. They bought a book with1,000 names and they searched through the Bible.
Mr. Selznick would read a hundred names, try each one for size and sound, then declared that he liked the name Mary.
Jennifer, either in a French phrase, or carried away with something she had recently read, thought names like Babette, Nicole, Jaime and Renee were nice, and here she ran into immediate rebuff by her two boys who reasoned they should have a vote in the naming of their sister. "All right," she told them, "give us a list of names." Armed with pencils, Bob and Michael set down their nominations: Betty Sue, Sally Ann, Nancy Lee, Peggy Jo.
These names found no support from the parents or friends and the boys retired from the contest. The game had rocked along for a month when Jennifer suggested that she liked the name Gaye for a girl. "Droopy," said the boys. "How do you know she is going to be gay? And even if she turns out to be light-hearted, what right have you to advertise her personality?" "Those are my boys," Jennifer said.
As the thing dragged along, daily telephone calls came from relatives with their weary question: "Have you named the baby yet?" Then the tone changed to "Haven't you named the baby yet?"
Then one evening Joe and Lenore Cotten came over to the house," Jennifer said. They were in a baby-naming mood and they showed it. When they walked out that door, the Selznick kid was going to have a name.
They tried a few, ranging all the way from the old-fashioned Southern belle tandem handles, came up through the Normandy peasant school, touched the West End of London, brushed briefly with the Hemingway type of feminine names and finally said it should be Mary Jennifer. This, of course, was not as daring as it might sound. Mr. Selznick was itching for some support for Mary, and Jennifer certainly must like Jennifer because she chose it for herself when she took leave of her real name, which was Phylis Isley.
The Cottens heard no protest and Joe added "Can't you just hear some boy saying "Mary Jennifer...I...love...you?"
That did it. Mary Jennifer was fully engraved and monogrammed.
When asked what advice she would give, if any, parents in the care and feeding of young boys, Jennifer had a ready answer. "If I were ever asked for advice on children, I'd keep my mouth shut," she said. "But I hope I'll be smart to handle Mary Jennifer the right way. I was awfully young when the boys were born. I feel a little more confident with the little girl."
Since boys are naturally full of noise and faults and confusion, Jennifer was asked what she would like to change about her two sons.
"I wish they would call me mother," she said, almost wistfully. "Instead of - mom."
Back to Articles Index
by Ed Wallace
(Unidentified magazine, November 27, 1954
Jennifer Jones hasn't forgotten her Oklahoma upbringing. She says please when she wants something, thank you when she gets it, and her maybe you'd rather is somewhat rare among stars.
She still likes a hamburger with everything on it but the fry cook's foot and she gets a dreamy expression when she thinks of pig stands.
"I remember when I was a young girl," she said, pressing her lips upward into a grade school smile, "eating strawberry ice cream and waiting for the evening paper to read 'Boots and her Buddies'. And when I was older, I loved those pig stands." (For those unfortunate enough to have missed out on pig stands, they serve mankind by serving barbecue sandwiches.)
Jennifer's life began in Tulsa with an inborn hunger to be an actress and she can vaguely remember stomping up and down the aisles of her father's movie theater, knees bent and arms bowed in imitation of an ape man.
"Mother was my first audience," she said. "I remember getting her to watch me while I floated around the house in costumes."
Jennifer's business in New York is the lead in "Portrait of a Lady," which will open at the ANTA THeater on Dec. 21. And while she has made out all right in Hollywood, winning the Motion Picture Academy Award with her first part in a movie, she is taking nothing for granted in New York.
"If anything good happens to me in this play, I'll be so happy I may die of sheer joy," she said. "I want so very much to be good."
Jennifer is taller than her movie fans may imagine - 5 feet 7 - but she gives a logical explanation of this deception. "That's because I've had so many parts I played barefoot. And the fact that I had tall leading men."
Jennifer went to Hollywood in 1941, got the part of St. Bernadette in "The Song of Bernadette" in 1942 ad the Oscar as the best movie actress in 1943. Her first marriage was to Robert Walker, a highly talented and ill-fated actor who died in 1951. Their two sons are Robert, 14, and Michael, 13. Jennifer married David O. Selznick in 1949 and they have a young daughter whose naming brought together the best brains in Hollywood.
They were so determined to give her a nice name - one that she would grow up to like - that they kept putting it off until some of their relatives were downright worried and friends were more than a little annoyed. Like most people with a baby to name, they gave it an inordinate amount of time and consideration. They bought a book with1,000 names and they searched through the Bible.
Mr. Selznick would read a hundred names, try each one for size and sound, then declared that he liked the name Mary.
Jennifer, either in a French phrase, or carried away with something she had recently read, thought names like Babette, Nicole, Jaime and Renee were nice, and here she ran into immediate rebuff by her two boys who reasoned they should have a vote in the naming of their sister. "All right," she told them, "give us a list of names." Armed with pencils, Bob and Michael set down their nominations: Betty Sue, Sally Ann, Nancy Lee, Peggy Jo.
These names found no support from the parents or friends and the boys retired from the contest. The game had rocked along for a month when Jennifer suggested that she liked the name Gaye for a girl. "Droopy," said the boys. "How do you know she is going to be gay? And even if she turns out to be light-hearted, what right have you to advertise her personality?" "Those are my boys," Jennifer said.
As the thing dragged along, daily telephone calls came from relatives with their weary question: "Have you named the baby yet?" Then the tone changed to "Haven't you named the baby yet?"
Then one evening Joe and Lenore Cotten came over to the house," Jennifer said. They were in a baby-naming mood and they showed it. When they walked out that door, the Selznick kid was going to have a name.
They tried a few, ranging all the way from the old-fashioned Southern belle tandem handles, came up through the Normandy peasant school, touched the West End of London, brushed briefly with the Hemingway type of feminine names and finally said it should be Mary Jennifer. This, of course, was not as daring as it might sound. Mr. Selznick was itching for some support for Mary, and Jennifer certainly must like Jennifer because she chose it for herself when she took leave of her real name, which was Phylis Isley.
The Cottens heard no protest and Joe added "Can't you just hear some boy saying "Mary Jennifer...I...love...you?"
That did it. Mary Jennifer was fully engraved and monogrammed.
When asked what advice she would give, if any, parents in the care and feeding of young boys, Jennifer had a ready answer. "If I were ever asked for advice on children, I'd keep my mouth shut," she said. "But I hope I'll be smart to handle Mary Jennifer the right way. I was awfully young when the boys were born. I feel a little more confident with the little girl."
Since boys are naturally full of noise and faults and confusion, Jennifer was asked what she would like to change about her two sons.
"I wish they would call me mother," she said, almost wistfully. "Instead of - mom."
Back to Articles Index