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you guys have got some merve .” Instead, I politely thanked them and said that I couldn’t change the spelling because it would greatly upset my father, whose namesake I was. (It didn’t much matter what I wanted. I spent the next ten years telling reporters “I don’t care what it says. There’s no second ‘e,’ damnit!” Dan Quayle would later have the same problem with “potatoe.”)
    My salary of $250 climbed to a whopping $300 a week after I starred in So This Is Love , with Kathryn Grayson. The public didn’t realize it, but as a contract player you could be the star of a major motion picture and when it was over you were still poor.
    Today they pay actors these astronomical sums, sometimes as much as $20 million a picture. Even so, I believe it’s smarter to do what Jack Nicholson did on films like Batman and As Good as It Gets: take a low salary in return for a percentage of the profits on the back end. If the film is a hit, you’ll make far more than you would have as a salaried actor, no matter how much you’re paid up front.
    My bookkeeper, Gloria Redlich, who’s been with me over forty years, always tells people about a remark I made to her when we first met: “You’ll never get rich on a W-2.” I still think that’s true.
    It turned out that So This Is Love was the only serious film role that I would ever have. The press screening was held at the Pantages Theater in Hollywood. Louella Parsons and Hedda Hopper were both there, confirming the importance of the event.
    It was in that theater that I saw myself, for the first time, on the big screen. I had never watched the rushes (the partial film clips shown at the end of each day’s shooting), so I had no idea what I looked like on film. As the picture unspooled, I found myself sliding further and further down in my chair. By the time it ended, I was under the seat, on the floor. Before the credits even finished rolling, I snuck out into the lobby, hoping to make a quick exit. But Hedda and Louella were there, blocking my path. “Oh, you darling boy,” they cooed at me in unison, “you’re going to be the biggest star in the world.” They kissed me and hugged me and I thought, What’s going on here? Could they be telling the truth? Nah.
    That night, I just lay there in bed, unable to fall asleep. Finally, I decided that Hedda and Louella were right. I was the biggest star in the world. I drifted off and dreamt that I was thanking the Academy for the great honor it had bestowed upon me.
    Unfortunately for my Oscar, I woke up.
    To be fair, it wasn’t only my performance that sank So This Is Love . The day before our picture opened, Twentieth Century–Fox released The Robe , the first motion picture ever shot in CinemaScope (“ The modern miracle you see without glasses! ”). For months afterward, all anyone could talk about was “widescreen.”
    From then on, I was given small parts and voice-over work in a dozen other movies, none of which meant a thing. Of course you remember that dramatic radio bulletin in The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms: “Well, folks, here’s another one of those silly reports about sea serpents again.” That was me.
    Finally I called my manager and said, “How do I get out of here?” It got so bad that one day the casting director called my house and I answered the phone as if I barely spoke English.
    “Can I speak to Mr. Griffin, please?”
    “He no home! He no home! You call back!”
    Shortly after that, I bought out the remainder of my contract. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do next, but I knew that I wouldn’t be giving that Academy Award speech anytime soon.
    Short-lived as my film career proved to be, it did earn me a small footnote in cinema history. Judged by today’s standards, my achievement seems almost comical. Believe it or not, when I kissed Kathryn Grayson in So This Is Love , it was the first time an open-mouthed kiss had ever been shown in theaters. At the time, it was a big deal.