She soon transformed herself into a national swimming champion, and when the oily finger of show business came beckoning, she was ready: first a stint with Billy Rose's Aquacade, then a plum contract at "MGM University." Barely into her twenties, she had become one of the world's top 10 box-office attractions.Īlong the way, she was pawed by some of the world's most determined lechers and eventually did some pawing back of her own: affairs with Victor Mature and Jeff Chandler plus the requisite parade of dysfunctional spouses.
When she was only 8, her older brother a promising child actor died suddenly from a burst colon, leaving her the family mainstay. Diving tiara-first from a six-story-high platform, she snapped three vertebrae in her neck and spent half a year in a body cast.īut Williams was nothing if not resilient. To produce this brand of Technicolor spectacle, Williams had to be slathered from head to toe in thick cream makeup her hair was smeared with warm baby oil and Vaseline until she was "as waterproof as a mallard." She was also her own stuntwoman and, in various movies, narrowly escaped being drowned, shredded by a coral reef and chewed by a boat propeller. like Venus on the half shell, or a Chevy on the way to a celestial lube job." well, let Esther and co-writer Digby Diehl tell it: "With flames shooting up all over the pool, fountains blasting like a hundred fire hoses, the swimmers treading in unison, there I am, rising up out of the water. Take that climactic folly from "Bathing Beauty" (1943), with its. And, of course, she was the centerpiece of some of the most spectacularly kitschy numbers ever committed to film. But if memory dissolves Williams into an aqueous Doris Day, repeat viewings confirm that she had a natural, affable presence all her own. Only in a younger America, perhaps, could a killer backstroke, statuesque frame and unbendable smile translate so instantly to stardom. which, as her darkly entertaining memoir reminds us, made all the difference. And his would-be pupil knew when to get wet. Technically, he was a little off the mark Williams actually lip-synched to her pre-recorded vocals but he knew when to leave well enough alone. "Anybody can do Portia," he said, "but I don't know anyone except you who can sing and swim at the same time." Reviewed by Louis Bayard, author of the novel "Fool's Errand."Įarly in her MGM career, Esther Williams pleaded with a Russian acting coach to teach her Portia's speech from "The Merchant of Venice." His response was as wise as it was generous. Excerpt from " The Million Dollar Mermaid".
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