Episode 263

The Golden age, silver-screen legend who lived to tell a tale that could have only unfolded in Hollywood , Mamie Van Doren joins Media Path for a candid conversation about a life shaped by resilience, reinvention, and remarkable twists of fate!

The woman who helped define an extraordinary era of entertainment and cultural change has chronicled both her escapades and her conquered adversities in a page-turning new memoir called 'You Thought I Was Dead: My Life of Celebrities, Sex and Champagne.’

Mamie traces her grit back to a hard scrabble, Depression era, South Dakota childhood where poverty and hunger were a daily reality. Determined to escape that world, she set her sights on Hollywood, with a little help from lore, intentionally placing herself at a pharmacy soda counter in the in hopes of being “discovered,” just as Lana Turner had been. She was stunning and it worked. She was also 14!

What followed was a series of cinematic turning points. Including a TV role, broadcast from The famed Florentine Gardens and a close friendship with cocktail server Elizabeth Short, who horrifically became known as The Black Dahlia. Her brutal loss has affected Mamie profoundly and permanently.

Mamie recounts her rapid rise through the studio system after being spotted by a Universal executive, leading to a seven-year contract and her breakout role opposite Tony Curtis (and some handsome USC football stars) in 'All American'. 

She shares the origin of her now-iconic name, coined by an AP reporter and inspired by First Lady, Mamie Eisenhower. Its coining helped a farm girl named Joanie Olander fully embody her new Hollywood persona.

After marrying bandleader Ray Anthony and starting a family, Universal dropped her contract, only to see her quickly courted by other studios. 

She reflects on love, longevity, and her current 50+ year marriage to Thomas Dixon, as well as the complicated realities of navigating Hollywood at a time when powerful men often operated without accountability. 

In a deeply personal revelation, Mamie speaks about a terrifyingly dark encounter with Jack Webb that she kept silent for years. He was selling “law and order” when he drugged, tied up and violated Mamie. She reflects now about how much (and how little) has changed.

Stories where Hollywood and history intersect are a common thread in Mamie's adventures, such as a romantic interlude with Che Guevara while filming in Buenos Aires, and a dangerous, self-funded three-month tour to the furthest outposts of the Vietnam War to entertain troops. The gravest danger she faced was an on-stage attack at an officers’ club in Saigon. But her time with the troops remains an experience that shaped her perspective on freedom and sacrifice.

And IMDB Roulette this week is raucous, racy and romantic, with a trip to the cutting edge of rock ’n roll! Is Mamie the girl who invented it!?

In current recommendations --

Lisa: Documentary (directed by our very own Weezy!) Family Band: The Cowsills Story, streaming on Prime

Weezy: TV Land original series Younger, streaming on Netflix