{New Article} 1934: Clark Gable Replies

As a followup to this article posted this week, “An Open Letter to Clark Gable,” here’s Clark’s response to claims that he’s gone “high hat.”

Anyhow, thanks for the kick in the pants. Perhaps I needed it. I just finished rereading your open letter to me in the August issue of HOLLYWOOD and if talk like that is going around, you can tell the world I want to answer it.

You ask if I’m going high-hat. My answer is No!

You ask if I’m going social, if I’ve traded my turtleneck sweaters for a tuxedo. No again! I’d rather climb into a leather jacket and a pair of hiking boots and tear out to Arizona in my Ford after deer or cougar than to go to a Mayfair Ball any day. Stiff collars hurt my Adam’s apple and always did.

You’ve written a lot of stories about me, Gene, and they were good stories, too. Even I have enjoyed reading them and that’s something. I’m not responsible for the parts I play but you ought to know me too well to think that I’ve changed any off-screen. Success hasn’t softened me, not a bit. If anything, it has hardened me more. The fight to keep on top takes a lot more work than the one to get there and the fellow who lets it soften him doesn’t stay on top long.

But where do you get that boiled shirt stuff? I haven’t work a dress suit since Strange Interlude. What about Red Dust and Men in White and even It Happened One Night? Was I a softie or a stuffed shirt in any of those? And when it comes to trading mulligan stew for caviar, give me mulligan every time and no matter if I eat it out of a tin can or out of hand painted china and whether I eat it with the right fork or use a bent spoon, I’m still a mulligan eater at heart.

You say I’ve come a long way. I have and I admit it. I couldn’t be where I am today if I still had the mannerisms that I knew when I was a lumberjack or an oil field worker. A rolling stone might not gather much moss but it picks up a lot of polish. I have, and I’m proud of it. Polish may make a man more of a gentleman but it should not make him a sissy and a softie. Some of the he-est he-men in the world know how to balance a teacup and wear a tail coat.

You say that Ace Wilfong in A Free Soul was my best role. I don’t think so myself. I liked my part in It Happened One Night. That was comedy, of a kind, but I’ve always wanted to do that kind of comedy. Anyhow, the Ace Wilfongs went out with the gangster cycle.

He’s right about the Ace Wilfongs. The gangster films of the early 1930’s were fading and Clark spent the latter part of the decade playing more Peter-Warne-type roles.

Nobody knows better than I, that I am not a great actor. I wouldn’t even agree with you that I’m a great personality. I’m just a guy who got a lucky break, that’s all. If people like me on the screen and I manage to give a few million people a vicarious thrill, that’s fine. I want to give them the kind of roles they like, as far as I can but if I ever let it go to my head, I hope somebody will take a punch at it.

Success has changed me. It will change anyone. When I was struggling along, I wanted success, I wanted fame and I wanted money. Now that I’ve got them, I don’t think they are worth what it takes to get them. If I had a swagger and carried a chip on my shoulder it was because I had a goal to fight toward. If I’ve lost it, it is because I’ve found that the grass on top of the hill isn’t as green as it looked from below. I don’t mean to sound cynical. I’m merely trying to be honest with you and with the people who put me where I am today.

This attitude of “I’m not a great actor but the people like me” was consistent throughout Clark’s entire career. One of his last interviews he stated that he’d retire once the people stopped going to see him.

You can read more of Clark’s reply in The Article Archive.