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7. Post-Traumatic Inspiration
- The University Press of Kentucky
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Post-Traumatic Inspiration 143 Buzz and Gertrude posed for acquittal photos for the Associated Press. The accused wore suit, tie, and artfully folded handkerchief; Mother was decked out in hat, brooch, and spectacles, looking very much like a doting grandmother. The grueling hours between court and set weighed heavily on Buzz. Stage Struck was shooting on an inflexible schedule when the superfluous third trial was under way. A Dick Powell sequence wrapping at 2:00 a.m. was followed by a look-your-best appearance in front of judge and jury at 9:00 a.m. sharp. But Buzz looked at his oppressive schedule in a positive light: “I was lucky that I had so much work because it helped keep my mind off the accident. Even though I was found innocent, it was a shocking and terribly depressing thing to have been involved in the death of three people. I think it was the heavy work commitment that saved my sanity.” The legal expense, the pages of billing minutiae to the quarter hour, came due on the heels of Buzz’s $95,000 settlement. Giesler’s fees amounted to almost six figures—worth every penny to keep Buzz from losing his sanity and facing hard time for murder. No one snapped pictures or took statements of the victims and their relatives. The cash settlements may have come with restrictions against on-the-record comments. To learn their feelings about Berkeley’s final verdict would have been enlightening, if not profoundly saddening. Judge Burnell’s unusual ouster never attracted much attention, and he and the threatening voice that led to his reassignment disappeared from public consciousness. The identities of the caller and the one who hired him were never revealed. When it takes three highly charged murder trials to affirm innocence, human nature is loath to accept the final verdict. Those pronounced innocent can’t return to the state they inhabited one second before the alleged transgression. Just ask Fatty Arbuckle. Found innocent of scan7 144 Buzz dalous charges that left his career in tatters, he was guilty, not of the crime, but of being charged in the first place. So it was with Buzz. The trial had tainted his name; in the minds of some, his reputation as a boozer made a car accident inevitable regardless of the law’s last word. Fortunately, he wasn’t looked upon with suspicion by his coworkers. It was the public perception of the name Busby Berkeley that changed following three deaths to which he was permanently linked. A coincidence perhaps, but by the time of the third trial, the kind of musical Buzz had been making was facing extinction. To call it a transformation would be equally correct. A new naturalness where songs would spring from between lines of dialogue rather than being compartmentalized at a picture’s climax was the direction musical films were taking. At RKO, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers were its chief proponents, with dance numbers filmed in a style antithetical to Buzz’s. He rested in Redlands and was given no work from the studio while the dust from the final trial settled. The case of Merna Kennedy was also legally sealed. When all was said and done, the trial-weary Buzz agreed to pay annual alimony of $7,500. It seems Buzz wasn’t the only one in Hollywood who believed he deserved the recognition the Academy refused to bestow at the March awards. Less than two months after his acquittal, Buzz was made the guest of honor at the first annual dinner dance of dance directors at the Trocadero. More than 250 people attended, including top studio personnel and just about every Hollywood dance man. A framed certificate was awarded to Buzz by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences “in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the pioneering and development of musical productions in motion pictures.” In the award’s border were black-and-white images from Buzz’s numbers along with the signatures of all the leading dance directors in attendance. “I appreciate it as a very nice tribute,” said Buzz, “because they all thought I was the best of the bestest.” Feted one day, undercut the next. On January 6, 1937, Jack Warner sent a memo to studio counsel and contract negotiator Roy Obringer: “In the next four or five days get hold of Buzz Berkeley. Instead of him going up $500 I want him to stay...