Deadly Illusions: Jean Harlow and the Murder of Paul Bern

Deadly Illusions: Jean Harlow and the Murder of Paul Bern by Samuel Marx and Joyce Vanderveen.

The author of this book, Samuel Marx, once worked as story editor for MGM studios in the early 1930s, and it was during this period when he met and became friends with Paul Bern, then one of the studio's most popular and successful producers. During his days as an office boy for Universal Pictures, Marx had also met and befriended the soon-to-be famous producer Irving Thalberg, and it was Thalberg who hired Marx as story editor for MGM studio when he arrived there in 1930. Thalberg would eventually become one of the most famous film producers of his time before his untimely death in 1936.

The year is 1932, the morning after the Labor Day weekend when Marx received a telephone call informing him that his producer-friend Paul Bern, who was married to Jean Harlow at the time, was found dead in his home, an apparent suicide from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. When Marx arrived at the scene he found several of his colleagues were already there, including Thalberg, Louis B. Mayer and MGM's publicist Howard Strickling. Marx became suspicious when he learned that these men were at the house hours before the police were even notified.

Upon further reading we discover that Paul Bern was once married to a woman he knew and met long ago (during his theater days as an actor), and that this woman was mentally ill. Her name was Dorothy Millette, a stage actress who somehow became very sick and had to be institutionalized. Bern kept this secret from almost everyone he knew except for a select few; probably those he was very close to and trusted. We discover that Dorothy has now been released and is spending most of her time at a hotel in Sacramento. She begins to taunt Bern, who at this time is seen courting a young Jean Harlow, and expresses a desire to come back into his life and continue her aspiration to become an actress. In Dorothy's mind only a night has past, but in reality she has been in a coma for almost a decade. Marx claims that Bern was worried about how to handle the situation but seemed fine the last time he saw him.

The public knew nothing about this Dorothy Millette and it didn't reach newspapers until days after Bern's death. When it finally did reach the newspapers a nationwide search was conducted to locate the whereabouts of this mystery woman, and all that witnesses seem to know was that she was last seen on the Delta King, a steamboat that traveled between Sacramento and San Francisco. Dorothy Millette's belongings were left behind and never picked up, and she never got off the boat when it docked in Sacramento. Nobody knew what happened to her. All evidence pointed to suicide and people believed she jumped. A short time later her body was found in the Sacramento River.

Samuel Marx never believed the motive that became almost synonymous whenever someone mentioned the name Paul Bern; the man who killed himself because he couldn't make it with Jean Harlow, the man who was impotent. Marx claimed that Dorothy Millette -- her side, her story -- was more important than most people at the time were willing to let on. The triangle that made up the mystery, Marx claims, consisted of Paul, Dorothy and Harlow. Two of whom died the same year with Jean Harlow having only five more years left to live before dying of uremic poisoning in 1937. Marx also suspected a cover-up by the hands of certain figures at the MGM studio, a cover-up to withdraw any evidence that would create a scandal or tarnish the reputation of their young blonde bombshell, then on the rise of becoming one of the studio's biggest stars.

It is nice to read a book about something based on real events and knowing that the author himself was there and knew the people involved. But if you're truly immersed in the book you'll notice that there are some things which are almost entirely speculated upon and impossible to prove for the simple reason that both parties who were involved are dead. Nevertheless, Marx presents a credible argument to something that very well may have been a Hollywood myth all these years. I don't want to give anything away. It is such an engrossing book so read it. The final chapter is a jaw-dropping and utterly convincing finale to a good mystery. *** out of ****