Modern Screen’s Hollywood Yearbook: Top Couples of 1962

The 1962 edition of Modern Screen’s Hollywood Yearbook featured a list of the ten most fascinating on- and off-screen couples of the previous year. Today, as a part of TMP’s “Historical Context” series of fan mag excerpts, I’ll be sharing the list with you!

Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty

“Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty are now playing their sizzling screen scenes in real life,” the mag proclaims, also stating that the pair have dinner dates “eight nights a week.” The two had filmed Splendor in the Grass about a year and a half earlier, and were – according to the mag – wrapped up in some sort of love quadrangle with Robert Wagner (Wood’s husband) and Joan Collins (Beatty’s fiance).

Rita Hayworth and Gary Merrill

Quite rudely, the mag refers to Rita Hayworth as a “five time loser” due to her previous divorces. She was reportedly moving on from those relationships by “raising very mild and merry Cain with Gary Merrill” — eating pizza, riding in a top-down sports car. The two were meant to star together in a Broadway show, but Rita dropped out after a few weeks of rehearsal. (The magazine also reports that Gary was supposed to co-star with Rita in the film The Happy Thieves.)

France Nuyen and Rod Taylor

Modern Screen reports that Nuyen had previously dated Marlon Brando, of whom another former girlfriend said, “Once you have loved and been loved by Marlon, no other man could ever mean anything to you again.” That lady was proven wrong, the mag says, by the fact that Nuyen found happiness with her Hong Kong co-star Rod Taylor. (She was not a series regular, but the two met on set when she guest-starred.)

Max Schell and Nancy Kwan

Modern Screen‘s mid-century colors show as the Kwan/Schell pairing is matched with Nuyen/Taylor in a feature called “East is East and West is West and Ever the Twain Shall Meet.” The two apparently met while filming Judgment at Nuremberg and Flower Drum Song (respectively) on the same lot. Kwan and Schell’s romance is described as “almost extinguished” due to the fact that Kwan wanted to speak openly about her affection for Max, while he wasn’t as outwardly gush-y about her.

Troy Donahue and Suzanne Pleshette

Ah, the familiar tale of love being found when it is least expected. The mag reports that neither Troy nor Suzanne was looking for love, but they fell for each other on the set of Lovers Must Learn. The longevity of the romance was questioned by the mag, since “it was Nan Morris, not Suzanne, whom [Troy] asked to join him in the festivities” when he visited New York for the Thanksgiving Day parade. Troy and Suzanne married, but only remained so for a brief time.

Richard Beymer and Dany Saval

Richard Beymer apparently pulled a fast one on Hollywood, with the gossip mags convinced he was in love with Tuesday Weld, while all the while he was courting Dany Saval! The two actually met on a blind date, when he was asked to escort her to the Beaux Arts Ball. The first night they met, “they danced until 5 am,” Modern Screen reports. Cute! Alas, it was not to be: the two never married.

Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio | Dorothy Provine and Frank Sinatra

Marilyn is a screen legend, and her romances remain well-known. It’s unsurprising that she and Joe DiMaggio are featured on this list of romances, though their story is the most complex in the bunch. Joe, Modern Screen says, “still care[d] for” Marilyn, while she had an eye for Frank Sinatra (another legend, whose romances also remain well-known) at the time. As for Sinatra, he was busy “showering jewelry on Dorothy Provine.”

Tuesday Weld and Gary Lockwood

Just as Richard Beymar wasn’t truly taken with Tuesday Weld, Ms. Weld also found romance outside of what was reported of her in the tabloids. Ironically, while the rumors of Weld and Beymar were accepted as fact, her relationship with Gary Lockwood was thought to be a hoax when the word broke! “As far as Gary’s concerned Tuesday’s the only girl he ever met that he wanted to see again after three dates,” Modern Screen reports.

Annie Fargé and her many suitors

Unlike the couples featured throughout the rest of the list, Annie Fargé gets a page dedicated to her many suitors. She married (to Dirk Sanders), divorced, and had her next husband (Geordie Hormel) picked out already, according to the mag. Like the ill-fated Dany and Richard, Annie and Geordie would never marry, but apparently had some lavish fun in the meantime: Modern Screen reported that Geordie was seen “driving a custom-built Lincoln with a trailer hitched behind. The better to haul his love around?”