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If ever there was a natural-born star it was Joan McCracken. If ever a performer lived up to their early promise, first in ballet, then a spectacular debut on Broadway, it was Joan McCracken. And if ever a life played out in a way that would break the hardest of hearts it was Joan McCracken's.
Born in Philadelphia on New Year's Eve 1917, it was soon apparent that Joan had every gift, including magnetism and charisma, characteristics she inherited from her much-loved father, sportswriter Frank McCracken. Her childhood was made idyllic by the unreserved love and encouragement she received from her father and her four-years-younger brother, Frank Jr. (Buddy).
A talented gymnast as a child, by the age of eleven she had won a scholarship to attend a gymnastics school that trained students to Olympic level. But that same year her aunt took her to a ballet and Joan's future was set - it would be dance, not athletics.
Joan trained at The Catherine Littlefield Ballet school in Philadelphia and was a standout who was noticed from her first recitals. At the age of sixteen she quit high school to join their professional dance company full time. In 1937 Joan was given several principal roles when they became the first American ballet company to tour Europe and England, and her reviews were rapturous wherever they performed.
But 1937 was also the year when the fates seemed to turn against her. In February she was diagnosed with Type 1, insulin dependent, diabetes. Determined to carry on she did the European tour and relied on her fellow dancers to look out for her. They took to hiding sugar cubes in their costumes to help her in case it looked like she was about to faint.
An even worse calamity awaited her in August when her father died suddenly at the age of forty-two. Her most staunch supporter, the one who formed a solid anchor in her life, was gone.
In 1939 Joan married fellow Littlefield dancer Jack Dunphy and they toured the United States with the company until leaving that year to try their luck in New York. Joan started out dancing in the four-times-a-day ballet segment at Radio City Music Hall and also performed with the Eugene Loring Dance Players.
In late 1942 she and Jack both auditioned for a new Rodgers and Hammerstein musical to be choreographed by Agnes de Mille. In a testament to Joan's magnetism, when she walked across the theater de Mille noticed her and said to herself "I'm going to hire that girl." She hired them both for the dance corps.
While rehearsing a dance that involved only the women de Mille asked them to come up with something that would set them apart. Joan mentioned that she could fall and make it look real, so de Mille decided to make her the clumsy little sister who disrupts everything. When audiences saw the show Joan was a sensation, and she was soon listed in the program as Sylvie, The Girl Who Falls Down.
The show was Oklahoma! (March 31 1943-May 29 1948) and for all the revolutionary changes it was credited with it is also the only time an anonymous member of the dance corp became a star on opening night. So valuable was Joan to the box office that she became the highest paid ensemble dancer on Broadway and, even though there was a six-month wait for tickets, people would turn in their tickets if she was not appearing for some reason. Her public appeal was so strong that by the sixth month she had eight commercial endorsements, including becoming the most popular Chesterfield Cigarette Girl when the other seven campaigns were suspended and only her image appeared on billboards and advertisements around New York. When she gave her notice in the tenth month the producers offered her a sizable raise if she would stay, but she had signed with Warner Brothers so it was off to Hollywood.
And just as quickly Joan returned to Broadway. Dismayed by what she considered unprofessional-ism at Warner's during the one number she filmed for the movie Hollywood Canteen (1944), she convinced them to put her seven-year contract on hold so she could take a featured role in the next Broadway show choreographed by Agnes de Mille, Bloomer Girl (Oct 5 1944-Apr 27 1946). The show was a hit, and marked the first time she had to sing and act, as well as dance.
Early in the run fate dealt her another devastating blow. World War II was raging and just before curtain one night Joan received a telegram from the War Department informing her that Lt. Frank McCracken Jr., her beloved brother, had been killed in the South Pacific. The two men who would love her the most in life were gone by the time she was twenty-six.
She left the show after a year because a lead role, in just her third Broadway outing, awaited Joan in Billion Dollar Baby (Dec 21 1945-Jun 29 1946). She eventually bought her way out of the Warner's contract, but in 1947 she signed a one picture deal with MGM to co-star in the musical Good News (1947). It became the only full movie Joan ever made, but not for lack of interest in her. In fact a Paramount executive happened to see a preview and filled out his audience reaction card with "If you don't like Joan McCracken why don't you send her to Paramount. We can use her. Dick Webb."
Returning to New York exhausted by the Hollywood schedule of 12-16 hour days Joan knew she couldn't handle a musical right away, and surprised friends and fans by winning a part in a limited revival of Bertolt Brecht's Galileo (Dec 7 1947-Dec 14 1947), a straight dramatic role. Her critical acclaim led to an invitation to join a new acting school to be conducted only by the best talents in the theater. And so, in 1948 Joan McCracken became one of the founding members of The Actor's Studio. It wasn't her only artistic endeavor. An ardent student of the arts Joan visited every museum, art gallery and library in New York. Her social circle consisted of writers, artists and professors - anyone who could stimulate her intellect and thirst for knowledge.
Her first marriage had ended after the war, and in 1949 she appeared in a Broadway revue musical Dance Me A Song (Jan 20 1950-Feb 18 1950), which featured the married nightclub dancers Fosse & Niles. The Fosse was Bob Fosse, who was at best an untrained hoofer, but Joan thought he had potential in the theater. He recognized that Joan would be a valuable step up the ladder, so he pursued her. His disdain for his current wife, who was made to witness his blatant infidelity, should have given Joan pause. It didn't.
They were married in 1951 and Joan was tireless in using her Broadway contacts to promote Fosse. It proved to be an uphill battle because he couldn't even get a job dancing in a chorus through his own endeavors. Finally, producer George Abbott and choreographer Jerome Robbins, who loved her dearly and knew she was embarrassed by Fosse's failures, gave him a chance at choreographing their new show The Pajama Game (May 13 1954-Nov 24 1956). He copied every move innovated by the great choreographer Jack Cole, and Robbins ended up re-staging all the dances, but let Fosse keep the credit, so he was launched.
For her efforts and devotion Joan was treated to the endless humiliations of Fosse's womanizing. He seemed to take delight in torturing his wives with his infidelities after convincing them of his undying love. The only bitterness Joan ever expressed about his treatment of her was that he never said "Thank you" for the career she had handed him on a silver platter.
The relentless deterioration of her illness took its toll. By the mid-1950's diabetic neuropathy (nerve death) had robbed her legs of the athleticism and grace she was born with, to the extent that friends thought she was drinking heavily when they saw her staggering as she walked. That, and the anguish over her treatment at the hands of Fosse, drove Joan to her knees on a New York street with a major heart attack. A second attack at the hospital and her career as a dancer was over. It was 1955 and she was just thirty-seven.
She came home from the hospital to an empty apartment - Fosse had taken the opportunity to move out (they wouldn't divorce until 1959). In the next few years her strength was limited, but she did manage a short tour in a play, a few TV appearances, and a limited run off-Broadway.
On the evening of Oct. 31 1961 Joan attended a dinner party at a friends' apartment. They were all musing about future projects when Joan remarked "I just don't know what I'm going to do with the rest of my life." A few hours later, in the early morning of Nov. 1, Joan died in her sleep of heart failure. She was forty-three.
To this day people who see her for the first time in the two films she made are enchanted and wonder why there wasn't more. She also had what it took to be one of the greats in the theater. Instead of the storied career her talent and charisma seemed to guarantee, she is remembered today only with short descriptives:
The chorus dancer who stole the show on the opening night of Oklahoma!. The brilliant talent who mastered dance, comedy, and drama. The girl who fell down.
