|
When Andrea King was born on February 1, 1919, a mystery began. To this day, the exact circumstances
of her birth remain cloudy and confusing at best, and while this is a simple detail of
life that most of us take for granted, Andrea learned to accept her unaccountable past
as part of a very unique background. Over the years, many colorful and admittedly
fabricated details have been written about her dubious beginnings, most of them artfully
spun by studio publicity departments "just doing their job." In order to help us understand
the pieces of the puzzle, we must begin with the facts... Andrea King, a screen name given to
her in 1944 by studio head Jack Warner, was born Georgette André Barry in Paris, France,
on the aforementioned date of February 1, 1919. Her mother, Lovina Belle Hart, or Belle,
for short, was the youngest daughter of Deborah and George Hart of Cleveland, Ohio. George
was the inventor of the grain elevator. And that, dear reader, is where fact ends and
speculation begins.
While in France, she began seeing an
old employer and friend of hers from the United States. His name was Alonso Robert Yates
-- a prominent, middle-aged, very distinguished, Washington diplomat, who was overseas
negotiating with other fellow diplomats to help end the war. Belle and Mr. Yates
began to see a lot of each
other, whenever their wartime duties permitted. At this point, the story takes
separate paths depending on who’s telling it... Belle’s version -- one that she
stuck with until her dying day -- was that during this time she met a French fighter pilot
named Georges André Barry. He was a member of the famed Lafayette Escadrille, a fearless
and heroic squadron of brave young men. A few months into a whirlwind romance
together, the two were
married, and tragically just one month before the Armistice, Georges’ plane was shot
down over Germany, and he died for the cause. The following February, Belle gave birth to
their only child -- baby Georgette (Andrea). Immediately after the birth, Belle fell ill with Childbirth
Fever and nearly died, and it wasn’t until her good friend Alonso Yates called for
help from Madame Marie-Louise Vallery-Radot (the renowned physician and daughter of Louis Pasteur) that
Belle was given the experimental saline solution that saved her life. This was the story that Andrea had been told many times as a child. An alternate set of circumstances
didn’t surface until many years later, but for now, we must get back to the facts... Belle and her newborn baby returned
to the States quite suddenly, only two months later, upon the sad and urgent news of
George Hart’s rapidly deteriorating health. And while Belle and her baby were
crossing the Atlantic to be with him, Belle's father George quietly passed away. A few years later, after settling in
New York, Belle consented to marry Douglas McKee, the Vice President of the Title Guarantee
& Trust Company, and the threesome moved into a large house in Forest Hills, Long
Island. Several years passed, and Belle gave birth to a second daughter, Anne Douglas
McKee, Andrea’s half-sister. But Belle didn’t fare well under the repressed
ideals of her banker-husband, and as a result the house was not a happy one. At the age of
11, Andrea attempted to run away from home, dreaming of a better life as an actress in Hollywood.
Fortunately, she didn’t get further than the Long Island freight yards and was
returned home safely without incident.
Andrea’s next theatrical endeavor under the guidance of C.P. Greneker was a much bigger success, and critics took notice of her performance. In "Fly Away Home," she was cast as the tough tomboy Buff Masters, with famed actor Thomas Mitchell both directing and starring in the Broadway comedy. A young teenager making his professional acting debut was cast alongside Andrea as her kid brother... His name was Montgomery Clift.
Nat was a handsome lawyer from the
picturesque Chicago suburb of Hinsdale, Illinois. He was a Yale man, and a direct descendant of
George Washington, which Andrea thought sounded too good to be true. They were married in
October of 1940, and against Nat’s better judgment, Andrea soon left the production
of "Life With Father," in order to give their fledgling marriage a chance to
survive. But the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, their lives changed forever. Nat went down to the recruiting office to enlist and ended up joining the Coast Guard, serving the Judge Advocate’s department as an attorney handling Merchant Marine court-martial cases. While he was away at training and later stationed in New York, Andrea was cast in the touring company of the Broadway hit thriller "Angel Street." She was playing Nancy, the cheeky Cockney maid (a role brought to the big screen years later by newcomer Angela Lansbury in the MGM film version, re-titled "Gaslight"). It was during this tour that Andrea first came face to face with her mysterious and highly questionable past.
Page 1
Biography | Next Page | Main Page
|
