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The FIR Vault

JAYNE MANSFIELD’S STARLET DAYS

By • Aug 1st, 2012 • Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6

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In January, ’57. FILMS IN REVIEW featured Courtland Phipps’ comments on the motion picture which marked Jayne Mansfield’s emergency from the starlet genre: “Why does it (THE GIRL CAN’T HELP IT) deserve FIR’s attention? Because it presents, in her first major screen role, Marilyn Monroe’s successor as the champion sexpot of the world.”

JM Visits with Baruch Lumet

The story goes that in ’54 she dropped a coin into a pay phone for a call to Paramount Studios. “Hello. My name is Jayne Mansfield ye come from Texas because I want to be a movie star.” The Paramount operator replied, “Thank you, but we already have a movie star.” The call was transferred to another line and the resulting appointment for a personal interview was all that mattered to Ms. Mansfield.

Jayne’s thespic background, of little consequence at Paramount, included: her performing debut before the public in The Austin Civic Theatre’s presentation of TEN NIGHTS IN A BAR ROOM, which opened September 21, ’51, at The Playhouse – in Austin, Texas. As Fanny Morgan, “the drunkard’s long-suffering wife,” Jayne Mansfield made her entrance in the play’s final act. An enthusiastic Jayne next appeared in a number of acting ventures on the stage at Camp Gordon, Georgia – among them a leading role in ANYTHING GOES, circa ’52. Additional information regarding Jayne’s pre-Hollywood experience was to be provided us by her acting teacher, Baruch Lumet, father of director Sidney Lumet.

Leggy Jayne Mansfield (with Frances Tinch) in '53 in Miller's DEATH F A SALESMAN

In ’52 Jayne had come to the senior Lumet seeking professional acting instruction. In an exclusive interview Lumet told us: “She was smeared with powder and paint to make an impression on me. I asked my wife to wash this girl’s face with soap and water. Then we had a long talk. She tells me she has a baby, a husband in the service in Korea, and she wants to be an actress.” Impressed with the young Jayne, Lumet gave her private lessons several times a week for a period lasting about six months, (It was during this time that Baruch Lumet opened the Dallas Institute of the Performing Arts.)

On October 22, ’53, the DIPA launched its first open-to-the-public theatrical production Arthur Miller’s DEATH OF A SALESMAN. Jayne Mansfield played Miss Forsythe, one of the floozies. On October 23, Dallas theater critic Bob Brock reviewed the production in the “Daily Times Herald”: “Janie Mansfield and Frances Tinch are perfect as two ladies of the evening…” Mansfield’s work with the DIPA’s Knox Street Players was to bring about an important advance in her career. Lumet elaborated: “My friend Milton Lewis, head of talent at Paramount Studios, came from Hollywood. He watched a performance. I pointed out Jaynie. Lewis said, ‘Baruch, call me when she’s ready to come to Hollywood.’”

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