Renowned ladies’ man Kirk Douglas wasn’t prepared to dish on his sexual exploits during his appearance on the Dick Cavett show in 1971 to hawk his latest movie, “A Gunfight.”
But Cavett, a sly night-show host, knew viewers weren’t interested in Douglas’ new Western. They wanted to know if the very married hunk was bedding all those gorgeous Hollywood actresses.
Was he fooling around with Faye Dunaway on the set of “The Arrangement”? What about Kim Novak?
Cavett told him that ABC had compiled a film of all “the incredible number of women that have passed through your hands” — and he directed the actor to watch a series of clips of himself romancing co-stars Lana Turner in “The Bad and the Beautiful,” Jean Simmons in “Spartacus,” Ava Gardner in “Seven Days in May” — and, of course, Dunaway.
“(Alfred) Hitchcock said in an interview once that it’s very hard for the romance on screen not to carry over into the private lives of the actors,” Cavett said coyly. “Have you found this true?”
Douglas thumped in anger, “An actor is supposed to immerse himself in the role!”
At the time, Douglas — who turns 100 years old on Friday — was the biggest star on the planet, with a range that blew away audiences, whether he was wielding a sword against the Romans as “Spartacus” or crying in anguish as Vincent van Gogh in “Lust for Life.”
He didn’t have to answer to Cavett — or anyone, for that matter.
It would be another two decades before the man who still commands a standing ovation when he enters a room would finally admit to his infidelities.
In a titillating autobiography written when he was 71, Douglas admitted that he’d not only cheated on his first wife, Diana Dill — with whom he had two sons, including mega-star Michael Douglas — but he also messed around on his current wife, Anne Bydens, who gave him another two sons.
Before the marriages, and in between, the man born Issur Danielovitch to a poor Jewish family in Amsterdam, NY, was unquenchable.
“I’m a sonofabitch, plain and simple,” he admitted in his 1988 autobiography, “The Ragman’s Son.”
Douglas opened his little black book and ticked off some of the greatest names to grace the silver screen.
The actor kissed and told on Crawford, Linda Darnell, Marlene Dietrich, Rita Hayworth, Evelyn Keyes, Marilyn Maxwell, Patricia Neal, Ann Sothern and Gene Tierney.
“As I look back, I realize that somehow I was attracted to women who were neurotic,” he said.
It began with his English teacher, a Mrs. Livingston, who seduced him when he was 14, he said.
A few years later as he struggled to become an actor, he enrolled at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and his eyes fell on a sultry blond woman named Betty Bacall.
Douglas said Bacall, who would later change her first name to Lauren, teased the impoverished student about the shabby, oversize overcoat he wore — so she got him a new one.
“I was always touched by that act,” wrote Douglas. “And how did I repay her? One warm spring evening on a rooftop in Greenwich Village I tried to seduce her. Unsuccessfully. As far as I’m concerned, Lauren Bacall can do no wrong.’’
The thrice-Oscar-nominated actor was no gentleman, however, when he tucked into a tale about the night he spent with “Mildred Pierce” actress Joan Crawford, who would also later be trashed by her adopted daughter, Christina Crawford, in her book, “Mommie Dearest.”
He went out with Crawford just once, he said — and never called her again.
Crawford played an innocent flirt throughout their dinner, he said. But the instant the front door of her Hollywood mansion closed behind them, she tore off her dress, flung it aside and grappled Douglas to the foyer floor.
Douglas said Crawford’s move was too aggressive to be exciting, and when they were doing the deed, he noticed her bad breath.
Afterward, Crawford, a famous dirt-a-phobe, took him on a tour of the multi-level home, where Douglas noticed how immaculate it was.
“She took me upstairs and proudly showed me the two children — how they were strapped so tightly to their beds, how she diapered them so efficiently. It was so professional, clinical, lacking in warmth, like the sex we had just had.”
Douglas added: “I got out fast.”
Another one of Douglas’ conquests was gorgeous redhead Rita Hayworth. Douglas said he found the star “beautiful, but very simple, unsophisticated.’’
She would tell him, “Men go to bed with ‘Gilda’ [her famous 1946 title role], but they wake up with me.’’ Douglas wrote, “I felt something deep within her that I couldn’t help — loneliness, sadness — something that would pull me down; I had to get away.’’
To him, Hayworth was a fantasy created by Hollywood, like Marilyn Monroe. On the screen, Douglas said, Monroe was “the sexiest woman in the world. In real life she was blah. And always late.’’
One of his favorite conquests was Gene Tierney, known for her icy, Oscar-nominated sociopath performance in “Leave Her to Heaven.”
Douglas dished about some of Tierney’s odd habits — including insisting that he visit her by climbing into the window of her Hollywood home and mount her when she wasn’t expecting it.
“Maybe it was an aphrodisiac,’’ Douglas wrote. “I didn’t question it. Mine was not to question why; mine was just to get through that window.’’
Then there was the affair with Patricia Neal.
In her own memoir, the Oscar-winning actress wrote of the love affair she had with married leading man Gary Cooper.
When it came to sex, Douglas admits he looked at it as if he were on a big game safari in Africa.
But Douglas rounded out the picture: Neal was having an affair with him at the same time.
Douglas said Neal was in love with Cooper and would “cry” during their trysts because she was being unfaithful to the “High Noon” actor.
Sexy brunette Ava Gardner’s beauty took his breath away.
Douglas remembered staying at a hotel one night when he was awakened by a knocking. He opened the door to find the distraught actress.
Although Douglas had dated her a few times and found her “a wonderful country girl who was cursed by being too beautiful,’’ now she scared him because she was dating the tumultuous Frank Sinatra.
“They must have had one of their usual explosions and she rushed out,’’ wrote Douglas. “It was about 2 o’clock in the morning.
“She didn’t know where to go and ended up at my door. . . . She was quite upset and we chatted for about 10 minutes. She calmed down. She sighed, and got up. I walked her to the door, kissed her on the cheek and she left. No mention was ever made of her nocturnal visit.’’
When it came to sex, Douglas admits he looked at it as if he were on a big game safari in Africa.
“I looked at something and BANG! I had total control. I enjoyed [killing]; the Masai gave me a shield and a spear and called me Killer Douglas.”
In fact, he said he once used sex to punish a woman he knew was an anti-Semite.
He said he took the woman to bed, keeping the fact he was Jewish a secret until the climatic moment, when he screamed:
“I am a Jew! You are being f— by a Jew!”