Elsa: The Obsession Continues. . .

​My Elsa Lanchester obsession began when I first read her autobiography in the 1980’s.  If you haven’t read it, you may want to stop right now to order it online or run to a bookstore to buy it. It’s called ELSA LANCHESTER, HERSELF, it was recently re-released, and it’s wonderful.  The photos alone are mesmerizing—she looks like three different people over time, all with crazy hair and a dimpled chin. Adorable.
 
I’ve always loved autobiographies. Being somewhat of a lifelong depressive, they’ve buoyed me during rough patches. Reading about others overcoming obstacles is, as Ruth Gordon would say, “encouragin’”.  (Read her memoirs, too. She and Elsa were pals, and kindred spirits.)  It’s encouragin’   that some people have humble beginnings, grab instant fame, lose it, fall in and out of love, win a war, lose face, choose another path, lose a parent, find a mentor, survive an illness or two, go to prison, win the lottery, have a facelift, write a tell-all, start all over again, and turn out just fine. My favorite autobiographies make me laugh out loud. The pluck of some people! The real Elsa had plenty of pluck and determination, the stuff I aspire to.
 
The film Elsa was a different story.  
 
Saturday mornings as a kid meant Universal horror films, hiding behind sofa cushions with my cousin. That’s where I first saw her in “The Bride of Frankenstein”, and--sorry, boy monsters—she’s the sexiest monster of them all, she steals the movie playing two roles in it, and she’s a GIRL. Girl Power! Thrilling!  
 
It was hard to put the beautiful monster with the white streaks in her hair together with the plump, older lady from the late show on TV, from Disney films in the 60’s, and from all the talk shows. The funny lady with the trilled Rs and big eyes, from “I Love Lucy” and “Here’s Lucy” and “The John Forsythe Show” and “Nanny and the Professor” wasn’t scary at all.
 
Why didn’t they give her more screen time as Katie Nana in “Mary Poppins”? I was embarrassed for her. She deserved more than one sputtering scene, having to listen to Glynis Johns sing a song that she’d have done better.  “That Darn Cat” almost made up for the slight, though. Elsa knew Hayley Mills?!  Wow, right?  Later on, when she was in that creepy rat movie, I started to wonder if she really was as batty as the characters she played.  Her autobiography sorted that out for me. She wasn’t.  
 
I had seen the brilliant Charles Laughton, and loved him, most notably in “Hunchback of Notre Dame” and “Les Miserables”. His revelatory performances in those films lead me to the books, which I read much too young and loved anyway, because I remembered his face and lumbering body, heard his distinctive voice, in the characters of Quasimodo and Javert. 
 
Later learning that Elsa and Charles were married made sense, somehow. Two such odd, super-talented old English ducks, opposites in some ways—he was a “serious” actor, and she was a clown—but they made an interesting couple. I never knew the secret of their relationship until I read Elsa’s vivid book. It made me love them both even more. Read it.