Valley of the Dolls
Valley
of the Dolls is the first novel by American
writer Jacqueline Susann.
Published in 1966, the book was the biggest selling novel of its year.[1] To date, it has sold more than 31 million copies,[2] making it one of the best-selling works in
publishing history.[3]
Plot summary
In
1945, beautiful ingenue
Anne Welles moves to New York to start a new life, seeking to escape the ennui
of her hometown of Lawrenceville, Massachusetts. She quickly finds employment
as a secretary at a talent agency, working under Henry Bellamy, and befriends
neighboring girl Neely O'Hara, an ebullient vaudevillian and aspiring stage
actress. When the nephew of Henry's partner, theatrical attorney Lyon Burke,
returns from the war to the agency, Anne quickly befriends and falls in love
with him despite already casually dating an apparent small-time salesman, Allen
Cooper. Anne is warned, especially by Henry, not to get involved with Lyon, a
known heartbreaker. After a short period of dating, Allen reveals to her that
he is secretly a millionaire testing her feelings for him, and that he is in
love with her, before proposing to her. Despite Anne's protests that she does
not want to marry him, Allen alerts the media, and the apparent love story
becomes a sensation. Anne befriends Helen
Lawson, a brilliant but ruthless Broadway
legend, who Anne is drawn to due to her apparent vulnerability and loneliness.
Neely and her familial troupe are hired onto Helen's latest production, but
Helen takes a dislike to Neely and minimizes her role. Anne uses her friendship
with Helen and Lyon to secure Neely a bigger role, and Neely becomes a breakout
star; however, Helen cruelly rejects Anne when she reveals that she was only
interested in Anne's friendship for the chance at a sexual relationship with
Allen's father. Anne also ends up befriending Jennifer North, a kind-hearted
actress famous for her attractive figure who is also involved in the
production. Jennifer is having her marriage annulled to an impoverished foreign
prince, and Anne assists in securing her annulment. On the night of the show's
opening, Anne and Lyon consummate their feelings, and Anne and Allen finally
break up. Anne moves in with Lyon and sells Allen's engagement ring, investing
the money with Henry's help on Jennifer's advice. The production is a massive
success, and Neely enjoys a meteoric rise to fame and moves to California with
her new husband to begin a film career. Anne's mother dies and she returns to
Lawrenceville with Lyon, who wants the two of them to live in the inherited
house so that he can start his career as a novelist. Though Anne loves Lyon and
wants to be with him, she refuses to live in Lawrenceville and leave New York;
Lyon, unwilling to be supported by her, breaks up with her and moves back to
England to write, leaving Anne heartbroken. Though Anne takes years to move on,
she eventually becomes the face of older, wealthy Kevin Gillmore's line of
beauty products, and starts a relationship with Kevin.
Meanwhile,
Jennifer begins a relationship with the childish, sex-obsessed Tony Polar, a
well-known singer, but their romantic progression is frequently intercepted by
his domineering manager and older sister, Miriam. Jennifer, desiring only to be
loved, pressures him into marrying her and quickly falls pregnant despite
knowing of his infidelity. After reuniting with an increasingly unsympathetic
Neely, who is in the midst of an affair, Jennifer becomes increasingly
dependent on "dolls," amphetamines and barbiturates to calm her frayed nerves. Finally, Miriam reveals the
reason for her opposition to the relationship: Tony, already barely mentally
competent, has Huntington's chorea,
which the baby will likely inherit; Tony himself will likely be committed to a
mental asylum within a few decades. Devastated, Jennifer aborts the child and
agrees to divorce. Jennifer then leaves for Europe, finding a career breakout
in European arthouse films, which due to her nudity are considered softcore
pornography in the United States.
Years
later, in 1950, Neely has become an established, celebrated actress enjoying a
lucrative film career and twin sons with her second husband, who she had been
having the affair with. However, long workdays and the stress over her
husband's infidelity (with both men and women) also keep her dependent on the
"dolls," and she is becoming increasingly unpopular with the studio
due to her primadonna
antics, tantrums and walkouts running her films over budget. Neely's second
husband leaves after she discovers his affair with a younger actress, and her
studio head threatens to end her career if she walks out of another take,
citing her new status as box office poison. A stressed Neely accidentally
overdoses on the "dolls," but makes a full recovery; however, the
head still manages to get her fired from the production by ordering the
director to put extra pressure on her, and Neely is replaced with the head's
young lover.
A sympathetic Anne reconnects with her; Kevin hatches a plot to resurrect
Neely's career by having her sing on a televised spectacular for his brand. Neely at first refuses, but following a
successful supper club performance and a belligerent run-in with a downturning
Helen, she agrees to it. However, she is unable to cope with the demands of the
rehearsals and overdoses to avoid performing; due to union rules that she has
breached, she is unable to work for another year. To Anne's distress, Neely
disappears to Europe.
Jennifer,
in Europe, is pressured to undergo surgery to hide her age; though she has
always lied about her true age, she is now ten years older than her claimed age
of 27. She agrees to the surgery, after losing weight in a drastic "sleep
cure" treatment. However, unhappy with her European career and boyfriend,
she returns to the United States to continue acting. Three years later, she
becomes engaged to an older senator who she believes loves her for more than
her body, and she is excited to get married and have a child; however, a
routine test reveals that she has breast cancer and will require a mastectomy, and though the treatment will likely save her, it will
render her infertile. After her unaware fiance assures her that he didn't want
children and makes a comment suggesting he's only interested in her body, a
despondent Jennifer becomes convinced that she'll never be loved for who she
is, and she will be nothing without her body. Escaping from the hospital,
Jennifer returns to her hotel room and commits suicide.
In
1961, Neely reappears in the midst of Jennifer's funeral after a drug-ridden
venture through Europe, but her career resurrection is halted when she loses
her voice, apparently from psychological issues. After bungling a self-harm
attempt, Neely becomes institutionalized, which a guilty Anne pays for. Though Neely
initially chafes under the hospital's oppressive rules, she begrudgingly
submits to them in order to be able to eventually leave. Meanwhile, Lyon
returns to New York and reconnects with Anne, much to the chagrin of Kevin, who
has been in a relationship with Anne for over a decade; weakened due to an
earlier heart attack, he fears losing Anne. Anne is unable to overcome her
passion for Lyon, and the two begin an affair. Though Kevin alternates between
lashing out at Anne in jealousy and pleading with her to return, he eventually
breaks up with her, and Anne and Lyon reunite. Some time later, Neely finds her
voice again, after an impromptu sanitarium performance with a now-incompetent
Tony Polar. Anne works with Henry, who is retiring from the agency, to get Lyon
to abandon his nonstarter career as a writer and become a partner at the
agency, with Henry loaning Lyon money secretly funded by Anne (who has become
wealthy due to her prior investments).
Lyon
is initially put off by Neely, who has become obese, but successfully plots her
career comeback after her release. Anne and Lyon get married and Anne quickly
becomes pregnant, but her happiness is short-lived when Neely demands that Lyon
escort her everywhere on her lucrative comeback tour; furthermore, Lyon learns
from Neely about Anne's deception, and is outraged by her help, feeling
emasculated and possessed by her. Lyon begins a brazen affair with the
rejuvenated, newly slim Neely despite his new baby with Anne; Anne is
increasingly left alone as he and the now-possessive and cruel Neely (who has
become self-centered and arrogant due to her newfound success and resentful of
Anne) spend every night together. Henry convinces Anne to wait out the
humiliating, public affair and pretend she knows nothing, assuring her that
Lyon will grow tired of Neely and return to her. The affair stretches out for
years, with Neely pressuring Lyon to end his marriage and Anne becoming
dependent on the "dolls" to relax, but Lyon reluctantly stays with
Anne. After repaying Anne's loan, he breaks off the affair (losing Neely as a
client in the process), but quickly begins a new one with a teenaged
up-and-coming singer. Anne overhears their affair while throwing a New Year's
party in 1965, and though she finally admits to herself that Lyon will never
stop having affairs, she assures herself that she will eventually fall out of
love and become numb to all of her pain before reaching for her
"dolls" again.
Background
Susann
had apparently been thinking about the novel for some time. Some years earlier,
she had begun Underneath the Pancake, a show business novel, with her
actress friend Beatrice Cole (c. 1910–1999).[4] Later, she considered writing a novel about drug usage in
show business to be called The Pink Dolls.[5]
Valley
of the Dolls is considered a roman
à clef, with its characters based on
famous figures such as Judy
Garland, Carole
Landis, Dean
Martin, and Ethel
Merman.[6] In 1973, after publication of her third novel, Susann said,
"They can keep calling it that roman à clef. It'll only make my
books sell. I don't care."[7] Susann insisted that she began each book with a theme:
"Then I start asking, what kind of a personality? And because I have a
good ear, I unconsciously pick up certain people."[7]
Reception
The
book was published by Bernard
Geis Associates on February 10, 1966,
and "took off like a Cape Canaveral space shot." [9]
Although
Publishers Weekly, in an advance review, called the novel "big,
brilliant and sensational", if "poorly written",[10] the book received largely negative reviews. Feminist Gloria
Steinem panned the book in The New York Herald
Tribune [11] as did The New York Times.[12] Time magazine called it the "Dirty Book of the Month",
and said, "It might more accurately be described as a highly effective
sedative, a living doll."[13]
Despite
the poor reviews, the book was a runaway commercial success. On May 8, 1966, in
its ninth week on the list, the book reached #1 on the New York Times
Best Seller List, where it remained for 28 consecutive weeks.[14] With a total of 65 weeks on the list, the book became the
best selling novel of 1966.[1] By the time of Susann's death in 1974, it had entered the Guinness Book of World Records as the best selling novel in publishing history, with more
than 17 million copies sold.[15] By 2016, the book had sold more than 31 million copies.[2]
Adaptations
In
1967, the book was adapted into a film of the same name, directed by Mark Robson (Peyton Place),
and starring Barbara Parkins
as Anne, Patty Duke
as Neely, Paul Burke
(Lyon), Sharon Tate
(Jennifer), and Susan Hayward
(Helen). The screenplay was written by Helen
Deutsch (National Velvet) and Dorothy
Kingsley (Seven Brides for
Seven Brothers), and produced by Robson and David
Weisbart. Like the book, although the
reviews were scathing,[16] the film was an enormous box-office hit, becoming the sixth
most popular of the year with $44 million at the domestic box office.[17] Susann, who had a cameo as a news reporter, hated the film,
reportedly telling director Robson that it was "a piece of shit." [18]
The
novel was adapted for television in 1981 as Jacqueline Susann's
Valley of the Dolls, a
mini-series executive-produced by Susann's widower Irving
Mansfield and directed by Walter
Grauman. This version stars Catherine
Hicks, Lisa
Hartman, and Veronica
Hamel. In 1994 a late-night, syndicated
television soap opera,
Valley of the Dolls, ran for one season and 65 episodes. The premise was a
loose adaptation of the novel.[19] BBC Radio 4
broadcast a 15-episode dramatisation scripted by Yvonne
Antrobus over three weeks in August and
September 2005. It was part of the Woman's
Hour programme's ongoing fifteen-minute
daily drama slot,[20] and has been rebroadcast several times on BBC
Radio 4 Extra in three 70-minute omnibus
episodes.[21]
References
· The 20th-Century American
Bestsellers Database: 1960s.
University of Virginia, via Publishers Weekly, 2016. Retrieved January 10,
2017.
· · Symonds, Alexandria.
'Valley
of the Dolls', by the numbers.
T: The New York Times Style Magazine. February 9, 2016. Retrieved
January 10, 2017.
· · Seaman, Barbara. Lovely
Me: The Life of Jacqueline Susann. 2nd ed. (New York: Seven Stories Press,
1996), p. 197.
· · Seaman. Lovely Me,
p. 251-252.
· · Kasindorf, Martin. Jackie
Susann Picks Up the Marbles.
The New York Times, August 12, 1973. Retrieved January 5, 2017.
· · Susann, Jacqueline. Valley
of the Dolls. (New York: Bernard Geis Associates, 1966).
· · Daniels, Mary. Susann's
Best Love Story a Private Affair.
Chicago Tribune.
August 15, 1976. Retrieved January 10, 2017.
·
Mansfield, Irving and Jean Libman Block. Life with Jackie. (New
York: Bantam Books, 1983), p. 132.
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