grown and able to help her I have contacted her. I am helping her and want to continue to help her when she needs me.”
The public seemed to accept Marilyn’s explanation, which appeared in newspapers on May 3. Soon afterward, Marilyn, having saved herself yet again, began preparations for
Niagara.
Marilyn reported to the studio on May 21, 1952, for color and wardrobe tests. When she finished, instead of going directly to the location with Henry Hathaway, her co-star Joseph Cotten, and the rest of the cast and crew, Marilyn flew to New York to spend a few days with Joe DiMaggio. Much of that time was devoted to hanging out with Joe and his entourage at Toots Shor’s saloon on West 51st Street. It was Marilyn’s initiation into a world unlike any she had ever known.
The sportswriter Red Smith called Toots Shor’s “the mother lodge.” Others described it as “a boys’ club” or “a gymnasium with room service.” Jimmy Cannon called it “a joint where men come to brag when they’re proud and to fight the sorrow when it’s bad.” Shor himself, a fat, garrulous, pink-faced, crinkly-eyed former speakeasy doorman and bouncer, referred to his establishment as “the store.” He and DiMaggio were so close that one regular customer compared them to a pair of “lopsided Siamese twins.”
On entering Toots Shor’s, the first thing one noticed amid the stifling swirl of cigarette and cigar smoke was the immense circular barwhere patrons stood six deep. They were a hard-drinking, boisterous, argumentative, sports-obsessed group. The noise was often deafening. They debated and pontificated, they waved their hands about grandly, they mimicked sports plays, they knocked over a good many high-priced drinks. They engaged in bottle bouts, raucous contests to determine who could guzzle the most booze. In the distance, one caught a glimpse of the large, clamorous, brightly-lit dining room. Sports paintings adorned brick walls. Waiters ferried huge platters of food that almost everyone admitted was terrible. On one occasion, Jackie Gleason actually sent out for several pizzas.
“Had to do it,” said Gleason as a delivery boy brought the white boxes to his table. “Can’t stand the food here.”
You didn’t come to Toots Shor’s for the food. You came to soak in the atmosphere. You came to talk sports. You came to rub elbows with Ernest Hemingway at the bar. You came to be affectionately insulted by the proprietor: “Get outa my joint, you lousy, creepy, filthy bum!” For certain people in the sports and newspaper crowd, such abuse was a sign of recognition, a badge of honor. A young sportswriter knew he was on the way up when Shor growled that he was nothing but “a piece of raisin cake.”
You came to Toots Shor’s to watch DiMaggio and his entourage at Table One, the first to the left of the bar. You didn’t dare approach, however. If you did, Toots really would kick you out. An invisible wall protected Table One from the rest of the dining room. Everyone knew the rules: Look, listen in if you can, but don’t bother the Yankee Clipper. When DiMaggio’s first wife, Dorothy Arnold, divorced him in 1944, one of the problems she cited was that instead of coming home to his West Side penthouse, he spent too many evenings with his pals at Toots Shor’s.
DiMaggio did like to hang out with the boys. Yet even with close friends, he never said much. Jimmy Cannon, who always sat at Table One, noted that DiMaggio was “more a spectator than a participant in any group.” He was “concealed and withdrawn.” He watched, he listened, sometimes he cleared his throat. When Jackie Gleason, who called him Fungo, joined the group, perhaps he even laughed. Though DiMaggio tried not to show it, his shyness caused him considerable pain. Once, as the Yankees pitcher Lefty Gomez regaled the table with funny stories, DiMaggio sadly remarked to Toots, “I wish I could be like Lefty, but I can’t.”
DiMaggio may have been
The public seemed to accept Marilyn’s explanation, which appeared in newspapers on May 3. Soon afterward, Marilyn, having saved herself yet again, began preparations for
Niagara.
Marilyn reported to the studio on May 21, 1952, for color and wardrobe tests. When she finished, instead of going directly to the location with Henry Hathaway, her co-star Joseph Cotten, and the rest of the cast and crew, Marilyn flew to New York to spend a few days with Joe DiMaggio. Much of that time was devoted to hanging out with Joe and his entourage at Toots Shor’s saloon on West 51st Street. It was Marilyn’s initiation into a world unlike any she had ever known.
The sportswriter Red Smith called Toots Shor’s “the mother lodge.” Others described it as “a boys’ club” or “a gymnasium with room service.” Jimmy Cannon called it “a joint where men come to brag when they’re proud and to fight the sorrow when it’s bad.” Shor himself, a fat, garrulous, pink-faced, crinkly-eyed former speakeasy doorman and bouncer, referred to his establishment as “the store.” He and DiMaggio were so close that one regular customer compared them to a pair of “lopsided Siamese twins.”
On entering Toots Shor’s, the first thing one noticed amid the stifling swirl of cigarette and cigar smoke was the immense circular barwhere patrons stood six deep. They were a hard-drinking, boisterous, argumentative, sports-obsessed group. The noise was often deafening. They debated and pontificated, they waved their hands about grandly, they mimicked sports plays, they knocked over a good many high-priced drinks. They engaged in bottle bouts, raucous contests to determine who could guzzle the most booze. In the distance, one caught a glimpse of the large, clamorous, brightly-lit dining room. Sports paintings adorned brick walls. Waiters ferried huge platters of food that almost everyone admitted was terrible. On one occasion, Jackie Gleason actually sent out for several pizzas.
“Had to do it,” said Gleason as a delivery boy brought the white boxes to his table. “Can’t stand the food here.”
You didn’t come to Toots Shor’s for the food. You came to soak in the atmosphere. You came to talk sports. You came to rub elbows with Ernest Hemingway at the bar. You came to be affectionately insulted by the proprietor: “Get outa my joint, you lousy, creepy, filthy bum!” For certain people in the sports and newspaper crowd, such abuse was a sign of recognition, a badge of honor. A young sportswriter knew he was on the way up when Shor growled that he was nothing but “a piece of raisin cake.”
You came to Toots Shor’s to watch DiMaggio and his entourage at Table One, the first to the left of the bar. You didn’t dare approach, however. If you did, Toots really would kick you out. An invisible wall protected Table One from the rest of the dining room. Everyone knew the rules: Look, listen in if you can, but don’t bother the Yankee Clipper. When DiMaggio’s first wife, Dorothy Arnold, divorced him in 1944, one of the problems she cited was that instead of coming home to his West Side penthouse, he spent too many evenings with his pals at Toots Shor’s.
DiMaggio did like to hang out with the boys. Yet even with close friends, he never said much. Jimmy Cannon, who always sat at Table One, noted that DiMaggio was “more a spectator than a participant in any group.” He was “concealed and withdrawn.” He watched, he listened, sometimes he cleared his throat. When Jackie Gleason, who called him Fungo, joined the group, perhaps he even laughed. Though DiMaggio tried not to show it, his shyness caused him considerable pain. Once, as the Yankees pitcher Lefty Gomez regaled the table with funny stories, DiMaggio sadly remarked to Toots, “I wish I could be like Lefty, but I can’t.”
DiMaggio may have been
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