My tryst with Spencer Tracy

In this excerpt from a controversial new book, a Hollywood bartender recalls his nights of passion with the star

Published February 16, 2012 4:59AM (EST)

This article is excerpted from Scotty Bowers' controversial new memoir, "Full Service" (written with the help of Lionel Friedberg), about working as a sexual fixer in Hollywood. The book has come under fire for its explosive allegations about numerous Hollywood stars.

By the mid-fifties, Los Angeles was changing. Its population had reached two million, making it the fourth largest city in the nation after New York, Chicago, and Detroit. Mike Romanoff had opened his fancy new Romanoff ’s restaurant on Rodeo Drive. Rob­insons had launched its flagship department store at the corner of Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards. The gigantic new CBS Televi­sion City was under construction in Hollywood, intended primarily for the development and production of color television program­ming. After being temporarily closed down for financial reasons, the Hollywood Bowl reopened and celebrated its thirty-third season of music and entertainment under the stars.

My daughter Donna had grown into a beautiful little girl with sparkling blue eyes and long brown hair. She was a good student, attending a grammar school on the corner of Beachwood Drive and Tamarind Avenue in Hollywood, not too far from our small apart­ment. Even though I did not see much of her due to my vagabond lifestyle, I adored her.

As for my good friend George Cukor, he had made extensive alterations to his property on Cordell Drive in West Los Angeles. On the western side of his large home he had built two smaller houses. The interior of his own dwelling had been redecorated by Bill Haines, the art director and designer who had taken me up as his guest to San Simeon, William Randolph Hearst’s spectacular residence on the Pacific coast back when I was a kid on a weekend pass during my boot camp days in the Marines. The orange grove around George’s house had been replaced by landscaped gardens. One of the two new houses George built was rented out to Martin Pollard, a very suc­cessful and high-profile local Chevrolet dealer. The other one, where George’s property fronted onto St. Ives Drive, was rented out to famed Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer megastar Spencer Tracy. George and Tracy were the best of friends. They respected one another’s talents enormously. The two of them had first worked together at MGM in 1942 on the very successful romantic drama "Keeper of the Flame," in which Tracy costarred with ...

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By Scotty Bowers

Scott Bowers, now eighty-eight years old, still works as a bartender at private functions in Hollywood.

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