How Veronica Lake ‘Had to Get Out of Hollywood’ and Became a Worn out Waitress?

Welcome, Age of Vintage Society. The one-woman play, Drowning in Veronica Lake, uncovers the secrets of the forgotten 1940s screen siren. Hype, scandal, booze and more bad boys than you could poke a stick at, it's a darkly funny, sadly familiar tale of the toll stardom can take. In 1942, Lake was the hottest of Hollywood hot. She was in demand, both professionally and personally. Her platinum blonde hair, which always covered her right eye, was the style of the day. How Veronica Lake had to get out of Hollywood and became a worn-out waitress. Make sure to watch the video until the end and leave your thoughts in the comments. If you are new here, join our wonderful community by subscribing to the Age of Vintage channel. The sad tale of Veronica Lake, from actress to cocktail waitress. When someone says old Hollywood blonde, who do you think of? Marilyn Monroe, Grace Kelly, maybe Jane Mansfield. Veronica Lake may be a blonde which only die-hard old Hollywood fans may remember. But in her time, Veronica Lake won both popular and critical acclaim. Veronica is remembered for movies such as Sullivan's Travels and I Married a Witch. She inspired so many with her trademark hair and her beauty, while she was a star in her own right. That light soon burned out as quickly as she rose to stardom. One of the most beautiful visions of 1940s films was that of Veronica Lake. With her peek-a-boo bang, she was an iconic image of film noirs. Some of her popular films of the time included This Gun for Hire, The Hour Before Dawn, Hold That Blonde and Out of This World, among others. Veronica was a big screen name in the 1940s and her success in acting seemed unstoppable. In the watchful coolness of this siren's gaze, you'd be right to sense that although so gleamingly young, this was somebody who'd already encountered choppy waters. By the early 1950s, however, Lake's career had hit the skids. Still suffering from schizophrenia and in a state of paranoia, she turned to drinking heavily to relieve herself from the burden. Apparently, she began to show the classic signs of schizophrenia. Quirky speech patterns, muddled thinking processes, auditory hallucinations, paranoid tendencies, along with clear signs of disturbed social life. This only added to her deteriorating mental state and, with the stress of three broken marriages, a domineering stage mother, a manic depressive personality and a self-destruction addiction to liquor, she pushed herself over the edge. After 1952, she would make only two more films, both grade B horror flicks. The beautiful superstar with the peek-a-boo hairdo, who entertained and inspired so many, never received the professional help which would have saved her from the mental suffering and she would endure it alone. She eventually frequented cheap hotels in New York City and worked as a bartender, where she obtained a steady supply of booze. She never revealed her true identity and even her co-workers were in the dark about her glamorous past. Born November 14th, 1922, Constance Frances Mary Ockelman was born in Brooklyn, New York. Mainly Irish blood, her mother was of Irish descent and her father was of both Irish and German descent. She had a very aggressive stage mother who pushed her towards show business against her will. Contrary to what you might have expected about Lake, her dream was never to be a movie star or even an actress. Her real ambition in life was to become a surgeon. Sadly, the closest she ever got to that job was acting as a doctor in one of her films. Her father worked aboard a ship for an oil company. He wasn't around much due to the fact he worked aboard a ship but, when Lake was only 10, he died in an industrial explosion in Philadelphia. Lake was sent to Villa Maria, an all-girls Catholic boarding school in Montreal, Canada and from which she was expelled. The keen family later moved to Miami, Florida. Lake attended high school in Miami, where she was known for her beauty. She had a troubled childhood and was, according to her mother, diagnosed as schizophrenic. In 1938, Lake moved with her mother and stepfather to Beverly Hills, where her mother enrolled her in the Bliss Hayden School of Acting. By 1939, using her stepfather's last name, she was playing small parts as Constance Keene in such films as All Women Have Secrets and Sorority House. She also appeared opposite veteran tipsy comedian Leon Errol in a 1939 RKO comedy short titled The Wrong Room. A bedroom farce set in a resort hotel, it casts her as a newlywed who keeps fainting in Errol's vicinity, causing him to have to hide her unconscious body from his wife and other interested parties. In her largest part thus far, the young actress spent most of her screen time pretending to be out cold. According to Lake, it was as Constance Keene that she introduced the hairstyle of the century. In her first major film, I Wanted Wings, Veronica Lake launched a national craze by wearing her long blonde hair seductively cascading over one eye, in what came to be known as the peek-a-boo style. The look suited her character, who was supposed to be drunk during the scene, but the look became very closely associated with Lake for much of her career afterward. She knew she had lost the chance to play the part and left the studio sobbing, but then came the phone call from the picture's director. He wanted her for the part. Her acting may not have been perfect, but she had a magnetism on film and, the biggest surprise of all, her hair had been a smash. He liked the eye-hiding gimmick of it. The picture was going to be a hit, he said, and that would make her Connie a star. A star, however, needed both a gimmick and a good name. He hated the name Constance Keene, so he rechristened her Veronica Lake, borrowing the Veronica bit from his secretary and adding the last name Lake, because her eyes are calm and blue like a lake. The fad reached problematic proportions, however, when women working in war plants began getting their long hair caught in the machinery. Government officials petitioned Paramount to redo the star's golden tresses. Lake's film career, it seems, did not outlive her famous hairdo much longer, all but coming to a halt after her 1948 picture, Saigon. Over the years, there have been many iconic duos. These have included Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, Catherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, among others. Veronica would join that list when she was paired alongside Alan Ladd in the movie This Gun For Hire. The movie would make Ladd a star, the New York Times would write. One shudders to think of the career which Paramount must have in mind for Alan Ladd, a new actor, after witnessing the young gentleman's debut as a leading player in that studio's This Gun For Hire. Obviously, they have tagged him to be the toughest monkey loose on the screen. With Ladd being a bit short, he matched with Veronica perfectly. Veronica was very short herself at only 4 foot 11, with Alan being 5 foot 6. Even in the world of Hollywood, where movie stars are towering figures on screen while being shorter than your mother in real life, Lake was a rather extreme example. Veronica would accept a role in what is now one of her most famous movies, Sullivan's Travels. Sullivan's Travels was a drama romance film, where Veronica played a character simply known as The Girl. She would be the blonde companion to Joel McCree's character. The New York Times called the film, the most brilliant picture yet this year. When filming began of Sullivan's Travels, Veronica was six months pregnant. In 1941, she would give birth to a baby girl called Elaine Detley. But it was later in 1942 when Veronica would have a massive hit when she starred in I Married a Witch. The film was a fantasy romantic comedy film, starring Veronica as a witch whose plan for revenge goes comically awry. The film drew in $1.1 million at the box office. After this, Veronica would make a cameo as herself in Star Spangled Rhythm and received third billing for So Proudly We Hail. She received acclaim for her part as a suicidal nurse in So Proudly We Hail. At the peak of her popularity, she earned $4,500 a week. Veronica became pregnant again in 1943. Her son Anthony was born July 8th 1943. According to news from the time, Lake's son was born prematurely after she tripped on a lighting cable while filming a movie. Anthony died on July 15th 1943. Veronica and her husband separated in August 1943 and divorced in December 1943. Unfortunately, Miss Lake's rise to fame coincided with America going to war. Men left for the battlefield and women went to work in war industry factories. Some of these factory workers wore their hair down in the factories, peek-a-boo style. Their drooping locks began to present a safety issue. The US government intervened, asking the one-eyed beauty Veronica Lake not to wear her hair down for the duration of the war. She obliged, putting her hair up and was praised widely for her patriotism, giving up her peek-a-boo look for the war effort. From 1944 until 1946, Veronica made a string of mediocre films. Six films to be exact. Her film The Hour Before Dawn, where she plays a German sympathiser, received poor reviews due to her less-than-convincing German accent. Veronica's stardom seemed to be quickly burning out. Paramount only gave her films which simply wasted her talent. Hold That Blonde, Out of This World and Miss Susie Slagle. In 1943, Veronica Lake was as popular as ever with the movie going public. She was on a roll. She was one of Hollywood's most glamorous stars, but Veronica found the image severely limiting. She was naturally rebellious. She got tired of people expecting her to fit into a box. Veronica turned to alcohol, and her erratic behaviour led to rumours of mental illness. She was behaving the way a lot of men did, and they got a pass. Drinking, showing up hungover, that's part of Humphrey Bogart's legend. By the late 1960s, she had reached rock bottom, holing up in her apartment out of paranoid fears that the FBI was following her and tapping her phone. Those who knew her in the 60s said that the once-great beauty had turned into a worn-out mess, with rotting teeth, unwashed hair and the pasty complexion of a bloated alcoholic. In 1952, The Hell With You Hollywood, Veronica wrote, In Hollywood's wildest years, a precocious beauty from Brooklyn, with an unruly mop of hair over one eye, burst on the scene to become an overnight star. In a brief period of time, she made 26 pictures, became one of the country's top box office attractions, and then disappeared. After 20 years of rumours, the same girl made headlines when she was rediscovered as a waitress in a New York restaurant. She made perhaps the boldest headlines of all, for these are the uninhibited reminiscences of Constance Oakleman, who was made by Hollywood into Veronica Lake. Veronica Lake was one of the early stars of old Hollywood and she showed great versatility, appearing in dramas, comedies or musicals. However, her legacy in film can also be held up as a cautious reminder of both the fleeting nature of fame and the consequences of burning bridges. Lake's career may have burned bright, but it was a flame that did not last very long in the grand scheme of things. After Veronica Lake died of hepatitis at 50 in 1973, many believed the downturn of her film career years earlier had driven her to drink. If you liked this video, don't forget to give it a thumbs up, subscribe if you are new here, and if you want to support my work, please visit my Patreon page. Now it is your turn. What do you think about the life and legacy of Veronica Lake? It is unbelievable how a glamorous Hollywood star can turn into a worn out person due to the movie industry.