Paul Bern: The Life and Famous Death of the MGM Director and Husband of Harlow

by E.J. Fleming

Paul Bern, known throughout the movie business as "Hollywood's Father Confessor," earned a reputation for being a loyal and supportive friend and for becoming one of MGM's most respected and creative directors. After his death, though, he was said to have grown so depressed and despondent over his own apparent sexual inadequacies that he committed suicide, and he would be denounced for attempting to rape his new bride Jean Harlow.

In this biography, the author uncovers startling new facts and argues that MGM knew the real story of Bern's death--that an estranged, mentally ill common-law wife murdered him. MGM understood that the earlier spouse rendered Bern's marriage to Harlow, its fastest-rising star, ambiguous if not bigamous, so the studio staged a suicide and embarked on a very public tarnishing of his memory. Included are 93 rare photos, many lost for decades, along with three appendices examining the handwriting on an alleged suicide note and Bern's will and estate.

Genres: Biography

396 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 31, 2008

About the author

E.J. Fleming has been researching Hollywood for decades and has penned biographies of Carole Landis and Wallace Reid, among other books. He lives in the country in Connecticut.

Reviews

[Nancy Loe · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the second book by E.J. Fleming that I've disliked, so I think I'm done with this author. Sloppy research abounds and Fleming shoehorns in every single fact s/he encountered. Would you like to know how many boilers were on the steamship that carried Paul Bern to America as a child? Four large boilers powering twin 35-foot propellers. Top speed? 14 knots. Date of launch: Sep 10, 1896. Beam? 62 feet. "Passengers were fed at 9 a.m., 1 p.m. and 5 p.m." I think you get the idea and this was only one page of padding.

Fleming also dances through every Hollywood murder or scandal, no matter how tangential to Paul Bern or how many other books have already been produced on William Desmond Taylor, Roscoe Arbuckle, Clara Bow, and the like. Fleming has a clunky prose style. And in the end, the author concludes Bern's death was murder at the hands of Dorothy Millette.

There's nothing new here (except for the photographs from the collection of Darrell Rooney - those were great) and you have to wade through a lot of tedious detail to arrive at a standard conclusion.

If you want to read about Paul Bern, I think David Stenn's Harlow biography did a great job. But save your money and skip this one. I have no idea why McFarland keeps giving this person book contracts. The book on Howard Strickling was just as bad.

[Anne Cupero · Rating 2 out of 5]

I did not enjoy this book at all. As so many other reviewers mentioned, it was an endless parade of casts and plots of every silent movie that Bern came in contact with, but it brought no life to the man. He was obviously extremely kind, but also gay...Ramon Novarro? Irving Thalberg? Please. What this book did was make me scream to have someone truly write about him and the life of that time period. Many gay men during that time married, pretended to be heterosexual, but subverted their true selves. I am sure he was no different. This book, though, did not really attempt to move through the hype, other than with his death. Also, Don Gallery, who was mentioned multiple times as being his son, was confirmed not to be later in his life. A DNA test, I suppose. Bern was indeed very interesting, as so many were during that time in Hollywood, yet when they are written about, and Jean Harlow was no different, it is as though the writers are starstruck themselves. They only read the lines, not through them. Fleming was only an investigator of facts and dates, and yes, those are important, but most of us who read about bygone Hollywood want to read the truth, we know the story that the studios spread, we want to know who the people really were. This book brings us no closer to Paul Bern.

[Marilyn D'Auria · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. I had read another book on the topic of Paul Bern's life that came to the same conclusion, but this one was a more satisfying read because it did a better job of bringing Paul Bern to life.

It didn't answer every question I had, in fact after reading it I had a few questions that the material didn't cover.

Like the Roscoe Arbuckle debacle, it is good that these men are being remembered again for the good they did and bringing to light to a new generation of readers how their reputations were maligned by others who had an agenda. The treachery of Old Hollywood.

For any fan of early Hollywood, this book is a must read that gives a good description of the cast of characters during that era.

[Sirena · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a very dry read. For some reason the author felt it necessary to include alot of unnecessary facts. Do we really need to know the details of every movie Paul Bern produced? Do we need to know the guest list of every party Paul Bern attended? There were also quite a few typos, missing words and misspelled words. The book did not get interesting until after Paul's death. The author talked about the MGM coverup and how those stories became "fact" over the years and have maligned Mr. Bern's name forever. Now those were interesting facts. A much better book on the subject is "Bombshell: The Life and Death of Jean Harlow."

[Barbara Haller · Rating 3 out of 5]

Came across this book while doing some random book surfing. It got really good reviews on Amazon. How I do not know! This was a very dry read. The first half or more of this book is just facts, dry, useless facts. facts about the ship that carried he family to America. facts about Hamburg (where they came from) etc, It isn't until Harlow and Bern's engagement that the book even has any life. A lot of this book is a series of plot synopsis from studio films that Bern was involved in. Not my idea of exciting reading!

[Dawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really liked this book. I have been a Harlow fan for years and was curious about Paul B but found the story most famously portrayed in the film Harlow as being absurd. I found this proposed story more believable.

[Heather G · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad

This wasn't a horrible biography but it was hard to stay with. The amount of filler used to make the book longer was ridiculous and pointless. Every social even Paul Bern went to was listed, whether pertinent or not plus a list of who all was there. So much unnecessary extras but the bones of the book was informative.