mitch_waldow's Blog

Before Britney, Lindsay, Paris, Amy and Andy -- in fact decades before these talented celebs were born -- there was another group of wayward stars, whose alcohol-fueled antics make those of our current band of bad boys (and girls) seem tame.  I refer to a group that was known as "The Bundy Drive Boys," whose exploits are detailed in a new book, my first bit of summer reading.  The book is called Hollywood's Hellfire Club -- The Misadventures of John Barrymore, W.C. Fields, Errol Flynn and the Bundy Drive Boys.  It's written by Gregory William Mank and published by Feral House.

Barrymore, arguably the greatest American male stage actor of the early 20th century, had a long film and radio career, and his family carries on in the business today.  Fields, a big star in Vaudeville, became an even bigger name in the movies.  And Flynn, Anthony Quinn, John Carradine and some of the other "boys" also had big film careers.  In the early 1940s these guys hung out in a little cottage on Bundy Drive, north of Sunset Boulevard in the Brentwood area of L.A.  It was the rented home of Hollywood artist and professional old masters forger John Decker.  The rent was paid by journalist, author and screenwriter Gene Fowler, who served as the group's unofficial scribe.

The amount of alcohol that these men consumed, combined with their flamboyant public images, led to wild and sometimes violent scenes involving spouses, strangers and underage women.  Nudity and public urination, nightclub brawls -- just like the good stuff we see today -- were hallmarks of this boys club, whose coat of arms and motto was painted on the door of the Bundy Drive home: "Useless.  Insignificant.  Poetic."

For many years I was friends with Fowler's youngest son, Will, whose journalistic claim to fame was that he was the first reporter to discover the scene of L.A.'s most infamous murder -- that of Elizabeth Short, also known as the Black Dahlia.   At one time, Will was the news director of KTTV, which today is located on Bundy Drive.  How's that for useless coincidence?  When Will was a young man, he spent many an hour with the Bundy Drive boys.  In fact, he lived with Barrymore for several months, taking care of the ailing actor and driving him to the studio for his weekly radio gig.

One weekend some years ago, a friend and I talked Will into taking us on a guided tour of the Bundy Boys' old haunts.  We drove up to what was left of Barrymore's old estate in Beverly Hills.  It had been subdivided many years earlier, but the main entrance and courtyard were intact.  On Will's urging, we drove inside.  Will got out of the car and rang the bell.   There was no response, so Will called up, "Hey, is anyone home?  I used to live here with Barrymore in 1940!" 

Fortunately, there really was no one at home, else they might have called the cops.

We drove on, soon arriving at the Bundy Drive house.  The coat of arms and motto were still on the front door, more than 50 years after the Bundy Boys were gone.  The home's current residents told us they were proud of the history of the place, and planned to keep that door just the way it was.

Alas, a couple of years ago the little cottage was sold, torn down and replaced with a new, much larger house.  But before the place was razed, the old owner had the illustrious door removed and took it with her.  So the legend lives on, unhinged perhaps, but more or less intact.