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[distant siren wailing]
[fly buzzing]
There is a fly in here, so I just want to get it, sorry,
because it keeps coming and I'm, like, trying to ignore it, but…
[Joan Collins] That's very strange you would say that.
[fly continues buzzing]
There's a very interesting thing that happened shortly after Jackie died.
There was this little, tiny fruit fly that was always in front of me.
It would be here, I would go to the Polo Lounge
in the Beverly Hills Hotel, it would be there.
I'd go to the south of France and be sitting there and it would be there.
And I said, "Well, this is Jackie coming to say that she's still there."
[Jennifer] Yes, we've all heard the story.
[fly buzzing]
-I guess Jackie came back as a fly. -[buzzing stops]
[sighs]
-Joan. -[soft music playing]
[projector whirring]
[Tracy Lerman] I sort of knew it was a different upbringing.
[Tiffany Lerman] Parenting wasn't really a verb…
[chuckling] …back in the '70s and '80s.
[Tracy] I didn't really understand what it was she was doing.
All I knew was that mommy was on TV a lot.
[Rory Green] There were definitely two sides. There was Mom…
-We're going to the Walden show. -[man] The Walden show.
-Bye-bye. -[Rory] …and there was Jackie Collins.
-Jackie Collins. -[audience cheering, applauding]
[Morton Janklow] There are people who are wonderful writers.
By that I mean people who use the language beautifully and elegantly.
Which was almost the direct opposite of Jackie.
Is it exhausting…
-What? -…doing research for your books?
-No. [laughs] -[crowd laughing]
[Morton] It was one of the reasons she was so successful…
because she could go out there and promote those books and not be embarrassed.
[soft music playing]
[woman] Obviously she writes a lot about sex.
[woman] She's putting female sexuality at the center of the world
and people lost their minds.
[Terry Wogan] Some of the sexual gymnastics, quite frankly…
[crowd laughing]
…give middle aged men like me a terrific inferiority complex.
[woman] She changed the way women got to have sex.
Women got to be selfish in bed thanks to Jackie Collins.
My final guest, the world's most prolific writer of romantic fiction.
-Barbara Cartland. -[audience applauding]
[Barbara] We've got to go back to the family to save the world,
I mean, look at the mess it's in.
-It's evil really. -[Jackie] What?
[stutters] The books that you write, quite frankly.
-[audience laughing] -[gasps]
[audience applauding]
[stutters] I think there's a place for everybody,
I think there's a place for Barbara's books
and there’s a place for my books.
And I would never criticize Barbara and say they all have to be like yours,
because wouldn't life be dull
-if we all had to do the same thing? -No, no. I didn't say that either.
-[all laughing] -My guests, thank you.
[audience applauding]
[Morton] It's always the same essential story dressed up differently.
It is about a woman facing disaster at the beginning.
And no matter how downbeat and downtrodden
she outsmarts all the tough guys and wins.
Girls when they leave school,
should be taught that in life they can do anything.
I really have this strong belief that women can do anything.
"Girls can do anything," that was her motto.
-Girls can do anything. -Girls can do anything.
-Women can do anything.
As much as she was saying that to everybody else,
she was consistently saying it to herself.
[dramatic music playing]
[Tita Cahn] That is what is so extraordinary about this tale.
What she wrote and who she was are two different things.
[man] She's one of the most successful authors in publishing history…
[woman] The excess, the glitz. The unashamed embrace of power.
[newsreader] Jackie Collins has sold over 500 million books worldwide.
She's got 29…
[woman] Jackie's novels really helped to create the ethos of the 80s.
[presenter] Without any doubt, one of the best-selling authors in the world.
[Tracy] That kind of became who she was.
[presenter] The most highly paid author in the United Kingdom.
[dramatic music playing]
[woman] Girl, woman, she, it's another word for a chick.
-Lady… -[woman 2] Second word.
-The… -Count five.
[woman 2] Tray. Boss.
[clapperboard clacks]
Well, hi, I'm so glad to meet you and I…
I think it's very exciting that you came in from London,
and that you're doing really a record of Jackie Collins.
[waves lapping]
[mellow music playing]
[Jackie] "The raft lay ahead, empty and inviting."
"What must it be like to be shipwrecked, cut off, alone in the world?"
"She often felt alone in the world."
"She swam rapidly toward the raft…
without another thought, he stripped off his shirt
and plunged into the sea after her."
"Don't talk."
"'Don't spoil it,' she willed Lennie."
"Salty flesh crushed against salty flesh."
"He pressed his hands into the small of her back
and let her feel his hardness."
"She didn't draw away, but moved her hips slowly suggestively."
"He entered her smoothly and she wrapped her long legs tightly
around his waist and moved with him
as if they had been together many times before."
"And then, she was lost in sensation, floating in paradise."
"Taken over by a throbbing release which sent her into spasms of delight."
"He stared into her eyes, so deep and full of secrets."
"Who was she?"
[music intensifies]
[Tracy] She was very private.
That's a huge persona that she'd go on interviews,
she would present in the same way. She was very warm, very affectionate.
But she gave very, very little away about herself.
I think people devolved a very natural interest in who is she and what--
How she'd come to be this person.
And that story was never told by her.
[Rory] It turned out that she really was her own archiver.
I mean, she had hung on to sort of every element of her entire life and career.
Almost every single letter that she'd ever received.
[Tiffany] Correspondence, letters with her and Joan, diaries.
She kept it obviously for a reason, I mean, it's incredible,
but there's a reason why she kept it all, it's her whole life.
[Tracy] Had she lived longer, she may well had written
that whole story that she had inside her…
you know, waiting to tell.
[interviewer] It seems to me that Jackie had different personas.
She did.
[interviewer] Can you tell me a bit about that?
Well, I think Jackie suffered for a while
of the baby sister syndrome.
-[dramatic music playing] -You must give the order, your majesty.
The order is given.
[Tita] Joan was extremely beautiful.
[newsreader] Joan Collins arrives at London airport from America.
This young star has been described by a Hollywood chief
as the greatest screen asset America has imported from Britain.
[Tita] And I mean a natural beauty with flawless skin and high cheek bones.
She was very beautiful.
And then, there was the baby sister…
who was very beautiful on the inside.
-[interviewer] Yeah. -If you know what I mean.
Okay. Uh…
And who are you? [chuckles]
-[man] I'm the AC guy. -Oh, hi.
-[man] Hi. -Hi.
-Part of the video. -Okay.
[Joan] When I starred in movies,
she cut out every single thing that was in the papers,
pasted them in scrapbooks and wrote underneath it,
"Wolverhampton Echo, January, da, da, da."
She was the younger sister.
It's like a marriage, you know.
It doesn't all go along just perfectly wonderfully all the time.
She was always scribbling away.
I never really asked what she was writing, but she was certainly writing.
[narrator] "1953, 14th of May."
"Went to a party with Joan."
"It was fun, but I get an awful inferiority complex when I'm with Joan."
"I feel all big and clumsy and dull."
"And Joan says everyone says I copy her."
[Joan] I knew that she was thinking about becoming an actress
and I gave her some advice, I said she should try and get into R.A.D.A.
And she said, "Don't worry about me, I'm going to be fine."
[narrator] "Please God, let me get into R.A.D.A."
"Rehearsed most of the day until five when the show began."
"Joan told me I was very good…
and not at all awkward as she had expected."
[Joan] She was very shy at first, but she realized at an early age
that she had a fantastic figure and the boys liked her.
And I think it was a great-- They were great toys.
-[upbeat music playing] -We lived in the basement,
very handy so you could just open the window and climb out.
Um, I don't think she ever made it to school. [chuckles]
[narrator] "Fourth of August, got train to meet Bob."
"We drove around, necked a bit."
"We took it in turns to lick a lollipop."
"Thirteenth of October. Henry and me necked on the bed."
"We went to Hyde Park, it was raining. He kissed me and said he loved me."
"First of March. Noel kissed me madly on both cheeks."
"Joan says Noel just wants to get banged."
"Eleventh of May. Henry, then up to some flat."
"We started to neck and strip madly."
"Twenty-eighth of October. That French film actor Maurice, he is 30."
"At three, we went to his flat with some other people, it was crazy."
"The parents found out all about Bob, both absolutely furious."
"Daddy shrieked and shouted that I looked like a tart."
"It makes me sick."
"To make matters worse, Joan is going to Hollywood on Thursday."
[Bill] My father was a show business agent.
He was very proud of Joan…
who then became the importance in his life.
[Tracy] Mom would have looked at her sister and thought,
"Wow, look at the attention that she can get from just being
as beautiful as she is, and Joan would win these
sort of most beautiful young actress in Great Britain.
Meanwhile, Mom was told all sorts of things by her father.
That she wasn't beautiful enough, not slim enough,
that girls should know their place.
I don't think that ever left her.
[soft music playing]
[interviewer] And what was your father like in those days?
[Joan] Remote, strict…
and being an agent.
Charming, everybody loved Joe Collins. I mean, he could turn on the charm.
And so could my mother, my mother was adorable.
Sweet, loving, the definitive 1950s housewife.
[Bill] "My mom, Elsa, was a quiet and gentle blonde beauty."
"Men lusted after her, while women lusted after Joe."
"So I guess they were even, except Elsa never did anything about it,
although I am certain Joe did."
"A philanderer for sure."
[dramatic music plays]
[narrator] "My father was a screamer."
"If it could be said he would yell it."
"Once I watched him throw a plate of food at my mother."
"'This is my house, you will obey my rules,
you're old enough and ugly enough.'"
"I am king!"
That's the truth, okay.
[narrator] "Nothingville."
"What an awful day, felt awfully alone."
"Had a row with Daddy."
"I've come to the conclusion that I like Mom better than Dad."
"Fourth of October."
"Sixteen at last."
"I got an express letter from Joan saying she wants me to go to Hollywood
as soon as possible."
[jet engine roars]
[car horn honks]
[Joan] Mid '50s Hollywood was extremely glamorous.
Marlon Brando and James Dean and a whole bunch of other people.
And so Jackie joined the set and she was the little-- The kid.
[jazz music playing]
[narrator] "First of July."
"Went to a cocktail party at Diana Dors, got very loaded."
"Went to a party where I danced up a storm to 'Voodoo Suite' by myself."
[Joan] We went to a lot of nightclubs and danced like,
you know, Mocambo and Ciro's, and yes, I would take Jackie, uh,
because there was always an extra man hanging around and, um, she loved it.
[narrator] "Fifteenth of January."
"Went to a cocktail party at Judy Garland's."
"Fourth of March."
"Went with Joan to the Gene Kelly's, we played ping-pong with Sid Chaplin"
"Met Bridgette Bardot, a French film star, God, she's cute."
"Marilyn Monroe, her walk could make a revolving door look stationary."
"Twelfth of January."
"Saw the casting people at 20th Century Fox with Joan."
[indistinct chatter]
"Joan is trying to get me in the picture."
"Twenty-eighth of January."
"Met Marlon Brando, I spoke to him quite a lot."
"He's only my height and kind of fat."
[Joan] Well, it's sort of folklore now.
I was sitting at a dinner-- A party, one of those casual…
It was always barbecues and jeans and t-shirts and I was sitting
with, um, Stewart Stern, who was the writer of Rebel Without a Cause
and, um, Paul Newman and, uh, Arthur Lowe.
[narrator] "Around 12, Marlon Brando arrived,
talked to him a while, then went up to Arthur's room."
"He called me sincere, sweet and luscious."
He took her by the hand and he took her upstairs.
And I was saying, "Where are you going?"
She said, "I'll be fine."
Like… [scoffs] …"Get out of it."
[jazz music playing]
[narrator] "Sixth of August."
"Got a letter from Mommy telling me to come home."
"I cried and cried and cried."
[Joan] That's when I found out that she was writing down a lot of things.
And I remember she was writing and she said,
"One day I'm going to write a book about all of this."
And I said, "Well, I think that's a great idea
because you know what Hollywood is really like."
[presenter] Her ninth book is currently a major best-selling title
on all the best seller charts.
Hollywood Wives and truthfully her phone
hasn't stopped ringing with people wanting to know
who is really supposed to be who in the book.
So would you welcome, please,
the lady that's rocked Beverly Hills, Jackie Collins! Yeah!
[audience applauding]
I'm Morton Janklow, I'm a literary agent.
And I was a literary agent for Jackie Collins for about 22 years.
It was a very simple formula.
She would observe things in life, and then translate them into books.
I could sometimes pick out the characters in her books
who were based on real life people.
I think to be successful, you have to write about what you know.
And whether I'm lucky or unlucky enough to know a lot about Hollywood,
I think it's what I like to write about.
And Hollywood Wives is fiction,
but of course it is based very much on facts.
-Where were you? -[man] Talk to my wife.
What time do you call this?
[laughing]
[Jackie] Well, people loved that, they'd go,
"Oh, I know who that character is."
"It's-- It's Clint Eastwood!" And I'd go, "No."
"Well, then it's Burt Reynolds!"
And I'd go, "No, you have to play the guessing game,
that's the whole fun of a Jackie Collins book."
[man] Bye-bye.
You know, they know that I'm not some little old lady in, uh, Des Moines,
writing about the Hollywood that I think exists,
-I'm actually out there… -[host] Right. Right.
…in Hollywood doing a lot of research, um,
forcing myself to go to parties and watch the movie stars at play.
[Morton] The success of Hollywood Wives was so unexpectedly enormous.
We were hoping for good sales, but the sales were tremendous.
She made a lot of money and that really set her up.
[Barbara] My husband, Marvin Davis, was a very successful oil man.
In 1981 or 82, Marvin bought 20th Century Fox.
It is really fun to have a studio. It really is.
Here is Prince Edward…
someone who was the head of ABC at the time
and the queen.
Jackie Collins.
Actually, we entertained your queen
on sound stage 9, Queen Elizabeth.
[newsreader] A dinner for 500 guests at the studios of 20th Century Fox
is the hottest ticket in Tinsel Town for years.
[camera shutters clicking]
I used to bring a baked potato with me wherever I went,
so that I had something plain on the side.
I took out my little gold bag and I put my baked potato on the plate.
And she said…
[imitating the Queen] …"Oh, how wonderful, what a good idea."
From the minute I met Jackie that night, we were bonded, we were close.
And she didn't do it in a way that you would notice.
Her notes were right up here.
[soft music playing]
[Tita] 90210 was a very close knit
and small community.
[indistinct chatter]
We were in each other's lives is all I can say.
None of us can be invited to everything all the time.
Cary Grant, Kirk Douglas, Gene Kelly, Gregory Peck, Louise Jourdan.
-[Jackie] And here we have Mr. Caine. -What sort of a camera is that?
[Tita] The Caines, the Moores and the Connerys too.
[Jackie] In the flesh.
Jackie had an absolute gift of taking notes
and photographing us without being intrusive.
[Oprah] Caller, your chance to talk to Jackie, hi.
[caller] All right, my question is,
is her life as exciting as the books that she writes?
[Oprah] Is your life as exciting, that's good.
Jackie, is your life as exciting?
Yeah, I've got a pretty exciting life, I think so.
She knew that I was gay, and so of course her eyes lit up
when she found out that I was a lesbian and that I…
She always wanted to know about my personal life.
-Was I in a relationship, was I dating? -[Jackie] "For Susan preferred women."
"For the last three years she'd been having a very satisfying affair
with the producer's wife, sexy copper-haired Paige Wheeler."
[Gina] I was in one relationship where I had a girlfriend in Palm Springs,
and I would come back and she would want explicit details about what I had done.
[Jackie] "They were naked and playing games."
Who I had seen, what did they look like.
[Jackie] "You show me yours, I'll show you mine."
Um…
She wanted sort of the outer layer,
so that she could create the inner details,
was sort of the sense I got.
Here we have the great Mr. Jack Provano.
[Melody Korenbrot] When we first met Jackie,
we got a phone call from a New York publicist
who asked if we'd be interested in this author named Jackie Collins.
We had no clue who she was, we were movie publicists.
[man] Where are you going, Melody? Where are you?
-I'm carrying-- Down here. -[both laughing]
-[man] Where are you going? -Gonna carry her bags, as usual.
[Melody] In the '80s, she was one of the few, there's a handful that wrote.
[Morton] I had Judy Clarence and Barbara Taylor Bradford
and Danielle Steel.
But Jackie was the only one I knew
who really notices that it was dependent on her hard work.
When she'd written a book, she would attend marketing meetings.
Most authors don't do that. They hand in the book and then disappear.
She was out front, she was there.
[Oprah] You can ask a question, yes.
Miss Collins, you're a very beautiful lady,
but you have an inner beauty about you.
-Doesn't she? -Oh, yes, and…
[Barbara] Her women were strong in her books.
And they came from a strong person.
And I think Jackie was a strong person.
[all laughing]
And women who would not ever read books before loved her.
[interviewer] Why did you get onto the line?
Because we like reading her books.
[interviewer] How many of the other books have you read?
-All of them. [chuckles] -[women chuckling]
[woman] I'm an addict.
[Jackie] Here we have Hazel in Paris. Bonjour, Hazel.
Bonjour!
[Hazel] I went to all Jackie's book signings.
[speaking French]
One after the other of women would just go up
to her and say, "I'd like you to sign my book."
"But please can I tell you, thank you so much."
"From reading your books, I now have so much more courage."
And, "Thank you, I was in a really bad relationship."
One after the other.
[Melody] There would be lines around the block.
Every person got a moment with her. She didn't treat anyone badly.
You got to talk to her, she talked to you.
Her fans made her
and she wasn't going to treat them poorly, ever.
[interviewer] Are you going to read the book after?
We're going to read the book when we get on this line.
By the time we get to her, this book will be finished. [chuckles]
There is nobody, you know, that built the empire as far as the brand
like she did.
I-- I don't know of another authoress that has done that.
[indistinct chatter]
I can tell you it's substantial, I can tell you it's millions,
but, you know, I certainly can't tell you what,
you know, her empire was worth.
[interviewer] But in Hollywood terms it was significant?
Substantial.
[interviewer] Yeah.
[Rory] To be an author and to also have that level of celebrity,
that was unheard of.
[Tiffany] She was a larger than life character.
She was there for all her friends,
everybody thought that they were the best friend.
My name is Laura Lizer and I was Jackie's business manager,
but also, I was her best friend.
I'm Jan Gold and I'm Jackie Collins' best friend.
My relationship to Jackie Collins is a best friend.
[sighs]
Well, anyway.
-[caller] Good morning, Jackie. -Good morning, how are you?
[caller] I'm doing great, can you tell me--
-…in just a couple of minutes. -Okay.
[static]
[Tita] She lived in Jackie land.
But she was far more fragile than she would have you know.
Very few people saw past the facade.
[hums]
-[projector whirring] -[birds singing]
[soft music playing]
[narrator] "Twenty-third of Feb. I went around several model agencies."
"Went for an interview and I had to put on my bikini."
"In makeup I was told my nose was too long."
"Went to see Bill Watts, he said my eyebrows were too thick."
"I look awful, Joan told me so."
"I wish I could get some work."
[Joan] She did a picture with Alec Guinness,
I remember she was very excited about that.
And then she played opposite Roger Moore in The Saint.
And then Daddy sent her off on the variety circuit
and she was billed as Joan Collins' younger sister,
which I think infuriated her.
She didn't want to be associated with me,
because people would always ask her about me, you know.
[narrator] "Twenty-first of September."
"Went to Harley Street to have a nose operation."
"I can't swallow or breathe and look like a monster."
[Tita] I hate to say these things,
but Jackie had a lot of fixing to do and she struggled with weight.
And the teeth are done and the nose was done.
I mean, I'm just being frank, but she made herself just beautiful.
[narrator] "Twenty-eighth of October."
"I love my new nose."
["My Dearest One" playing]
♪ There is one… ♪
[narrator] "May 17th."
"Had dinner at Wallace's with him, a nice quiet evening."
"Lately things are great with us."
♪ I want you near to me… ♪
[Jennifer] She had had some flood damage in one of her rooms,
and, um, we had to go through a number of items
and there was a suitcase on a shelf that, um, I opened and she said,
"Oh, that was my-- My first wedding dress."
[indistinct chatter]
♪ Truly I do… ♪
[Tiffany] I don't know how they met actually.
But Wallace sort of appeared in her life.
-[Bill] They met at a dinner party. -[laughs]
He was very charismatic, he was lovely, he was a very nice person.
♪ But please… ♪
[Joan] He was from a nice family and my parents liked him a lot.
He was solid, he had a business.
[Tracy] She'd been struggling in her career,
she hadn't really become an actress.
And she was really swept off her feet.
You know, they went to Gstaad and they went skiing
and they went here and they went there and he took her to Italy.
It was an incredibly sort of whirlwind romance.
[Rory] Wallace was very desirable in the kind of social scene.
Had a lot of ladies.
And I think, you know, that she liked a challenge.
[indistinct chatter]
[Tracy] He was what they would consider in those days a playboy.
But he had money and it would mean
that she was be able to move away from her father.
[narrator] "We drove to Sanremo for the day, went to Monte Carlo Casino,
-later ate at the harbor in Cannes." -[laughs]
♪ I do ♪
[Rory] When Hollywood didn't happen, I'm guessing she just thought,
"Maybe I'll just get married."
[narrator] "April 21st. Daddy started talking about me and W."
"We discussed getting engaged."
[Joan] It was a very, very big, fancy-schmancy wedding at Roman House.
Jackie had a 21 inch waist, she looked absolutely ravishing.
Wallace was in a top hat.
-Oh, God! And I came with Warren. -[indistinct chatter]
We took pictures, we made speeches.
It was a lovely wedding.
Later she had showed me a photograph of her in that--
In that dress and we talked about Wallace, we talked about, um,
just that he was not emotionally well.
[narrator] "Spent the day with Wallace, he's still ill."
"I'm so happy with him most times."
Very quickly on, she saw something that was really concerning
and really difficult and didn't understand it.
[narrator] "Wallace stayed in bed all day."
"Atmosphere strained."
He had gotten involved in a doctor who started to heavily medicate him.
And consequently that led to him becoming an addict.
[narrator] "Ever since our marriage, my husband has been a drug addict."
"My husband always objected to my having friends into our home,
and would be in a drugged condition when my friends arrived."
"To such an extent that my…"
[Tracy] She was a young woman, married, pregnant with me,
with a husband who was, you know, severely, um, mentally ill.
[narrator] "At twelve o'clock midnight, he leaped out of bed
and I discovered he had taken some methedrine."
[Tracy] "He rushed to the balcony saying he was going to throw himself off."
"After some 15 minutes, Wallace did not reappear from the balcony."
"And growing very worried about his threat,
I went to look for him and found the balcony empty."
[somber music playing]
He used to threaten her, I think is the right word,
that if she left him, that he would commit suicide.
[narrator] "July 12th."
"Wallace kept me up all night, was violent and abusive."
[Joan] I came back from Hollywood, Tracy was born.
[Bill] I would say it was difficult.
She had Tracy, Tracy was very young, and we were looking after her
and going to visit Wallace at the various hospitals he was in.
[narrator] "Dear Mrs. Austin, I'm writing to let you know
that your husband has agreed to undergo some electrical treatment,
which we hope will ease his tension."
"He received his first treatment this morning,
but I am very glad to say that…"
[Tracy] Electroshock therapy was very brutal, it was very primitive.
So not knowing the kind of husband that she would get back
after something like that, the fear must have been, you know, enormous.
-[dog barking] -[ominous music playing]
My mom absolutely worshipped her mom.
Elsa was kind of like this angel,
very warm, very nurturing, very, very loving.
[Joan] Daddy said, "We are not to mention that she has got cancer,
we don't use that word." She's got a virus, she has a bad flu.
It was as though, you know, she had some horrible communic--
I mean, it was really terrifying how strongly he felt about it
and we would talk about it, we would cry a lot, we would visit her.
And Jackie had Tracy and she would bring Tracy,
little baby Tracy to see Mommy.
[somber music playing]
She had a dying mother,
a father who was so bereft, but covering it all up,
and this husband who I think was now doping.
It must have been very, very hard for her.
[narrator] "Wallace phoned me and said, 'The Lord will have your soul.'"
"He spoke of taking Tracy into court."
[Tracy] Suddenly she was completely trapped…
[baby babbles]
…and probably with no notion of,
"How do I get out of this and what do I do?"
[dramatic music playing]
[car engine starts]
[Melody] She didn't have any money,
but she got up enough courage to leave
in the middle of the night and never looked back.
And shortly after, she found out that he had killed himself.
["Misty Moon" playing]
I think the circumstances of his death were pretty horrible.
You know, going off into the black forest
and I think he was taking pills, I'm not quite sure how it happened.
♪ Since my lover had gone… ♪
[host] As a teenage girl, you married a businessman who was older than you,
who you've described honestly as dynamic, exciting, but a manic depressive
who was dependent upon drugs.
You divorced him after four years of marriage
and shortly afterwards he was found dead.
And you have a daughter from this marriage.
I mean, I knew he would do it, I knew two years before he would do it.
And you can't live your life with somebody saying to you,
"I'm going to kill myself if you leave me,"
or, "I'm going to kill myself if you do this or that."
Eventually you have to go off and live your life
and you can't feel guilty about it.
I've never felt guilty about it because I knew he was going to do it
and there was nothing that would have stopped him.
I wouldn't have stopped him, nobody could have stopped him.
[Tracy] This was the defining point I'm guessing in her life
to moving her on, I think, to-- To protecting herself.
And how did she do that?
She… She created a world for herself,
of wonderful characters who wouldn't let her down.
Hi, I'm Jackie Collins.
I write novels, big long powerful stories, the kind I like to read.
And thanks to you I've been lucky, they've all been bestsellers.
And now I'd like you to get…
[Tracy] If she could become successful in her own right,
nobody else could take that away from her.
[upbeat music playing]
The double standard, I grew up with it, didn't you?
Men, as far as far as I could tell, had it all their own way,
and women were very good about it.
They accepted it, as if it was their light in life to wait
quietly in the kitchen or the bedroom.
[crowd chanting]
[Jackie] Why, I ask myself, why do we accept it?
Why do we tolerate a society which nods approvingly
if a married man plays around, but if a married woman does it,
"Oh, dear me. She's a slut, a tramp, a bad woman."
[Morton] She writes about a woman being sexually harassed on the job.
[crowd chanting]
-A horrific marriage. -[crowd chanting]
A man who destroys her temperamentally.
-[crowd chanting] -The authors who do the best
are the ones who personally feel those problems.
[indistinct chatter]
[host] What does feminism mean to you then if you are a feminist?
It means, um… It means freedom, it means sexual freedom,
I don't like the double standard.
I think that, you know, women and men should be able
-to be as free as each other. -["Vitamin C" playing]
♪ Hey, you ♪
♪ You're losing… ♪
[Joan] She would go for the hunks, the bodybuilders, the six packers.
I mean, she was still very young, she was 21 or 22 years old.
♪ You're losing, you're losing You're losing, you're losing… ♪
[Tracy] She certainly got back into having a few relationships.
What her own turmoil was after my father, I don't know.
But she felt that, you know, she deserved more.
♪ Hey, you ♪
♪ You're losing, you're losing ♪
♪ You're losing You're losing your vitamin C ♪
♪ Hey, you ♪
-[interviewer] So, Johnny, can you just… -[Johnny Gold] Yes.
[interviewer] …tell me a little bit about yourself?
My name is Johnny Gold. I was a partner of Oscar Lerman.
[indistinct chatter]
I first met him, I think it was '62.
[seagulls crying]
He said to me, "How would you like to be in the club business?"
I said, "Well, I don't know anything about it."
He said, "You'll learn."
So I said, "Well, fine." And we opened Tramp.
[disco music playing]
[Tita] Oh, I met everybody at Tramp.
I met Muhammad Ali, I met the Caines, I met…
Oh, whoever was in town all stopped at Tramp.
♪ I'll do anything you ask me to… ♪
Jackie and myself, and even Joan as well, we would go to this club,
because it was the most in club in London.
♪ I'll do anything you ask me to… ♪
She used to sweep in looking amazing in this skin tight low cut black dress.
She had the dynamite figure and it always had zhuzh around
and all the guys would be panting.
[Johnny] Oscar and I are sitting there and Oscar says, "Oh, my God."
And I looked and it's Jackie.
And I said, "Oh, my God, Johnny. I'm going to marry that girl." [chuckles]
[Tracy] I know she had two men that both asked her to marry them
and she took me away on holiday with both of them
to decide who was better with me.
[chuckling] So that would have been, you know, very confusing for me,
but nonetheless, she came back and decided
that Oscar was the man for her.
-[soft music playing] -[indistinct chatter]
[Joan] Everybody loved Oscar, they really did.
I never heard a bad word about him.
And he worshipped the ground she walked on.
[Johnny] And the first apartment they lived in was the one
that Jackie was already living in.
And one day he found this manuscript.
And Oscar said, "What is this, Jackie?"
And she said, "Well, I started to try write a book."
So Oscar took it and read it and he said it was good,
he said, "I was really shocked."
And he said, "I made her finish it."
I said, "Jackie you've got to finish this book."
[Jackie] I'd been writing all my life.
I'd written a lot of half books that I hadn't finished,
and he was the first person that said to me,
"It's absolutely terrific and you can do it."
And so I did it, I mean, he said, "You've got to finish it."
I'd never finished anything up until that time.
I think that had been in her sort of psyche for a long time.
Because she had a lot of trauma, you know, prior to that.
But she found that very, very painful to talk about.
Certainly, you know, to be able to sit down and write.
That was her sort of lifeline.
[Jackie] It took me forever, but I finished it.
And then I looked along my bookcase
and saw a publisher that I had a lot of their books and I thought,
"Well, if I like what they publish, maybe they'll like what I write."
[Tracy] In those days you actually had to send a big thick manuscript off.
And I think it got picked up by the first publisher that it got sent to.
Four hundred pounds.
Four hundred pounds she got for that first book.
How did I remember that? Anyway, um…
[interviewer] And what was that book called?
I think-- Was it The World Is Full of Married Men?
["Devil Woman" playing]
"Chapter one. Claudia was in bed,
she was a very beautiful girl and she knew it."
"And David knew it, so everyone was happy."
"She caressed his back, and he felt desire rise up in him again."
"She'd only to touch him and he wanted her."
"There's only one little problem, I don't want to marry you."
"Not even if you were free and we could rush off and do it now."
"I want to do what I want to do, whenever I want."
"No ties, no strings, I don't want marriage,
it means nothing to me."
♪ She's just a devil woman… ♪
[Jan] She firmly believed that it would do well, she was that positive.
But I think she was surprised at how amazingly well it did do.
And of course the one thing we all loved was that end killer line,
"Justice for all females."
[Tracy] They published, you know, 2,000 books,
and within eight weeks, suddenly, you know,
oh, my God, we're going into a 100,000.
♪ Let me see the lines on your hand… ♪
[Jeffrey Lane] I'd worked with Joan as a publicist since the late 60s.
Joan took me to a party in London at Tramp
at the book launch for The World Is Full of Married Men.
Jackie was the first author to write about women who were…
Who behaved like men, who did what men did
and didn't apologize or excuse themselves.
[Tracy] So it very quickly made her very controversial at a very young age.
[Bill] They had two children, Tiffany and Rory.
Oscar was earning money with the club…
and it enabled her to just write.
He wasn't at all threatened by her talent or her creativity, you know,
he really just wanted to, you know, he wanted to help her develop that.
[indistinct chatter]
When they'd come back from Tramp, they'd stay up, you know,
drinking and playing charades.
There was always a sense that she was researching.
[Johnny] You know, the names were slightly changed,
but you could recognize them if you were on that scene
and we knew who she was writing about. Um…
[interviewer] How about you?
Well, a lot of people thought The Stud was me, but it wasn't.
-[interviewer] Jackie said it was you. -[Johnny] Did she?
Well, she called me a sexual athlete, I mean, that's not bad.
[Joan] When I read The Stud, I said, this would make a great movie.
I'd now been an actress for over 20 years, 22 years.
[screaming]
I'd done this terrible movie called Empire of the Ants.
[screaming] Get me out of here!
And, um, you know, I was-- Parts weren't coming my way.
Joan was really famous…
before Jackie, right, really famous, huge in London.
And then Jackie started to become famous,
but Joan's acting at that point…
not much.
[Jan] I mean, Joan was nothing,
and I don't think Jackie ever thought that would happen.
And I certainly don't think she ever thought…
she would revive Joan's career.
So I asked Jackie if she would write the script
and that I could then start taking it to various producers,
to various people that I knew to get it financed.
[Johnny] "The Stud by Jackie Collins."
"Fontaine came in, I followed her to a small elevator
and we pressed closely together as it started up."
What's going on?
"'Are we there?' I asked foolishly."
"'No, but we soon can be,' she replied, pulling up my trousers."
-[moaning] -That's right.
[Johnny] "Screw me, you bastard! Keep it hard!"
[Oliver Tobias] When I first read the original script,
I thought it was just like a silly sort of soft porn opera,
it had nothing going for it.
And now we've made an interpretation out of it, it's a very different story.
Oliver Tobias thought he was the second coming of Rock Hudson.
-[suspense music playing] -[woman] You're my Christmas present.
[Oliver] Jackie Collins is a good writer,
but, I mean, movie making is a different medium.
You know, I mean, you're making movies, it's a director's medium
and he's the painter and the actor's the color.
I'm a color in a picture.
[splash]
[birds singing]
The-- The attitude towards women writing films and scripts is changing now.
I think before they were supposed to write films about ladies
that had nervous breakdowns in southern Wales or something.
I think all that has changed, I hope so anyway.
[Bill] There was great snobbery at that time.
[narrator] Where would we all be I wonder without the jet set?
They have turned boredom into an art form and big fat books
have also been based on their aimless comings and goings.
-Ladies and gentlemen, Jackie Collins. -[soft music playing]
[Bill] But, look, Jackie was laughing all the way to the bank.
[Tracy] She had found, you know, her niche
and she went on to write many successful books after that.
But the criticisms throughout the '70s felt I think to her quite, um…
Quite difficult.
You realized that you could write a book that had a lot of sex in it,
that was very upfront about these things and that people would buy it.
Now, that was no accident.
[Jackie] I have to stop you there
because I've never written for commercial reasons.
Because I'm a woman writing this kind of-- They call it racy, raunchy literature,
this shocks a lot of people.
God forbid a woman should be writing
about sex the way that men are writing about sex.
-[man] Have a little taste, Jackie. -Probably will.
-Of the wine? -[man] Sure.
-Yes, thank you. -Do you still have the herpes, McLeane?
[audience laughing]
I would think, people always ask me where I get all the characters from,
well, here they are, sitting all around me.
[Tiffany] These men didn't get called out on it.
So it was a real double standard that was really unfair.
[Jackie] I had to get up at 6:00, take the kids to school,
make their lunch and I would be writing
on my way to meet them after school at every stop light.
But to take a case like, say, Jackie Collins, for example,
now, there's no mastery of anything here.
So, really the thing is just something to decorate an airport bookstore.
Jackie Collins is never going to become classic no matter how long you wait.
That's what I find interesting with that.
It starts off as nothing and ends up as nothing.
Now as a woman in my fifties, I get so many women
who were teenagers at the same time
I was a teenager saying, "Oh, my God, your mom taught me everything about sex,"
and I was like, "Oh, really?"
Well, great, because she wrote great sex in great books.
[Jackie] And I'm not claiming to be a great literary genius,
I'm claiming to be a terrific storyteller.
And so I would say that the people who criticize me the most
are the ones who've never read me.
[Tiffany] It hurt her.
[Tracy] She was like, "I'm going to go out there and make sure I protect myself."
[audience applauding]
She had to find an image…
[man speaking indistinctly]
…almost like a shield.
[man] …successful novelist, Jackie Collins.
It was the hair pieces, it was the makeup.
-It was the big hair before big hair. -And you know the tie and the suit.
-And the shoulders. -And then fabulous jewels.
Big yay earrings.
[man] For those of you who haven't read this latest…
[Jeffrey] I mean, she became the representative
of the characters in her book.
With cleavage and jewels and looking gorgeous.
And it was always quite startling.
[Hazel] And she added the leopard print, leopard print wasn't vogue.
-[Laura] It was sort of a suit of armor. -[audience applauding]
She got joy out of the sparkle, but also felt somehow protected by it.
[Joan] She phoned me up, I was in America.
And I was extolling the virtues of Los Angeles life to her.
Her books had been really successful in England, but not in America.
And I said, "The only way to break into America was to go and live in America."
Oscar used to get a bit nervous at times, his hands would shake.
He said, "She wants us to uproot and go to LA,
because she thinks she can make it there with the books."
["Kids in America" playing]
♪ Looking out a dirty old window ♪
♪ Down below the cars In the city go rushing by… ♪
[Joan] So they picked up three children, two dogs and they moved to America.
♪ Friday night and everyone's moving I can feel the heat… ♪
[Tracy] She just had a sort of wanderlust.
♪ Heading down I search For the beat in this dirty town… ♪
[Tracy] She was going to do what she needed to do.
♪ Young ones are growing ♪
♪ We're the kids in America We're the kids in America… ♪
[Tracy] She was going to write that seminal book.
She has over 16 million books in print
and it took just two weeks for her latest novel, Lucky,
to become number one on the best seller list,
and she's joining us from Los Angeles this morning,
Good morning, nice to see you.
Good morning, Joan, nice to see you too.
[Rory] Mom always used to say, "Lucky is who every woman wants to be."
And I used to think, "Well, no actually, Lucky is exactly who you want to be."
But I think so many women actually did relate to her.
[Jackie] "Lucky Santangelo stood out as she strode bristly
through the crowd at the casino."
"She was a strikingly beautiful woman of 28 with an unruly mass of jet curls,
black gypsy eyes, a wide sensual mouth…"
You also have a mini-series that's going to air, what, next week on NBC?
Yes, three nights, six hours. I wrote it myself and I co-produced it.
"'I want to get laid,' she thought, 'I need to.'"
"It couldn't be just anybody,
there had to be a certain sexual chemistry."
I've created some very strong heroines over the years,
and the strongest of course is Lucky Santangelo.
You bastard.
[Jackie] When I'm writing Lucky, I become Lucky.
-How did you manage it? -When I say I can do something, I deliver.
[Rory] Lucky Santangelo was, you know, really strident and really bold
and really sexy and really empowered.
[man] Looking good.
Who, me?
-[man] You always look good, Lucky. -I do?
[man] Okay, here we go,
[speaking foreign language]
On TV One tonight, I'm Jackie Collins.
[announcer] Jackie Collins, best seller…
[speaking foreign language]
When you get to America, you now open the door.
Jackie was in, like, I can't remember the number of countries.
Her books were translated in, like, 30, 40 languages.
[speaking French]
-Jackie Collins. -[audience applauding]
[Morton] The amazing thing is, she writes what looks like an American story
and we find interest in Czechoslovakia.
In Israel, in African countries.
-Tell us, what are you doing in Hong Kong? -I'm doing some careful research here.
Um, I would very much like to set some scenes in Hong Kong.
[woman speaking French]
[Melody] People loved her.
Any country she showed up in, they wanted to get her to autograph them
or, "My mother likes your books."
Or, "My daughter loved your books," you know.
-[man] Do you believe it? They found her. -[indistinct chatter]
[speaking French]
…is doing very nicely in France…
[Melody] That's what Jackie created by coming to America.
An international name.
Here we are in Paris, the Plaza…
Oscar was like, "Yeah, let's do it."
"If that's what you want to do, let's do it."
Welcome to Paris, Jackie Collins. Hey!
[Laura] He was her rock,
and I think he was very instrumental in her success,
because of having somebody like Oscar behind her.
[woman] How was the necking scene this morning?
I don't need to even comment on that if you look at this spot here on my dress.
-Press the red. Press the red. -[woman] No.
[Jackie] "Suddenly a hand gripped her by the arm, it was Lenny Golden."
"'You're just the man I'm looking for,'" she said.
[indistinct chatter]
-[Jackie] What is today, Oscar? -Today is the happiest day of my life.
Twenty-one years ago, I got married.
[grunts]
[Morton] I used to call Oscar and I would say, "How are you, Oscar?"
And he would say, "Listen, Mort, it's 80 degrees, the sun is shining."
"I'm sitting by the pool in my bathing suit."
"How-- What could be better?"
[Jackie] Hi, Oscar.
[Rory] They were just such a perfect team together, they just worked really well.
Lots of laughing and love and confiding in each other.
[Jackie] Okay, I'm going out in New York.
And we're going to buy some art, come on, let's go.
[Oscar] Then we can have lunch.
Oh, I might have lunch at the Four Seasons.
[Rory] He was so proud of her.
He was so proud of who she had become and how she was managing that success.
[indistinct chatter]
[Joan] He was so important in her life.
He was the family man, he was her mentor, he was her lover.
[Laura] I would come to the house, meet them at the house and then go
with them with wherever we were going.
And every single time he would walk to the bottom of the stairs
and she would say, "Okay, I'm ready," and she would be at the top of the…
…stairs and he would just look at her and he'd be like,
"You are so beautiful. Look…"
"…how gorgeous your mother looks, absolutely gorgeous."
-Every… -…single time.
Whatever she wore, because he adored her.
-[Oscar talking indistinctly] -Bye, Oscar.
-[laughing] -[indistinct chatter]
[Oscar] Doesn't she look just beautiful, my God.
-[soft music playing] -[insects chirping]
You know, in any family, there's always going to be
you know, a little bit of nibbling and so on and…
[scoffs] …so what?
You know, sibling rivalry, it spurs you on.
I mean, it's very simple, you know, Joan was a big Hollywood star,
um, and Jackie was a writer.
You're finished, you've lost everything.
And I now own this house.
-This house, are you insane? -Oh, no. I'm perfectly sane.
So take this junk and your blonde tramp and get out of my home.
-[wind blowing] -[laughing]
She likes to call herself a female Harold Robbins
or the Harold Robbins for women.
Some people call her admiringly the queen of flash and trash
and she joins us this morning, and we're lucky to have you, Joan Collins, welcome.
-[Jackie] It's Jackie. -[host] Jackie…
-[laughs] Joan is… -[host] Joan was here last week.
Joan was here last week.
And then Jackie comes into Hollywood and becomes the queen of Hollywood.
Can't be easy for Joan either.
It is often stated that you and your sister, Joan Collins,
-the prominent actress from Dynasty… -Yeah. Right.
…don't get along and are feuding.
In fact, we've had it said here on this program--
Yeah, I want to talk to you about that. [laughs]
-But we're the best of friends. -I had a couple of relationships,
a marriage and a long-- And a boyfriend
that Jackie loathed both of them and they both loathed her.
So it was kind of difficult.
[indistinct chatter]
We saw each other, but it was slightly cool.
And then, when I got offered two million dollars to write two books,
you know, you don't turn that down.
[Larry] Prime Time, published by Simon and Schuster.
Why a novel? I thought your sister owns fiction.
Well, yes, she did, but I think there's possibly room for both of us.
I started writing this…
She would say, "Oh, my sister, my God, she's looking for something."
"She's writing a book now, for God's sake."
[Larry] How good a storyteller do you think she is?
I've no idea, Larry, I'm going to discover along with everybody else.
Are you excited about-- How do you feel about that?
Oh, fine.
She said, "How would Joan like it if I got a job in…
a television series.
So I think Jackie felt that writing was her territory,
it's where she became successful and made her name.
And, um, she worked tirelessly at being Jackie.
I don't think she ever said, "Well, not today, I'm too tired," you know.
They're so different, the two sisters.
And don't forget I came from the fashion world,
and so I'm accustomed to bitches.
There's always a certain amount of, um…
you know, "Maybe you are stepping on my territory,"
but it's certainly not intentional.
Joan got a lot of money from non-books.
There was a big issue as to whether she'd written and published her own book,
which I think Jackie was very secretly happy about.
So, you know, sisters are sisters, I mean, siblings are siblings.
She didn't like it, but I don't think--
She never used the word "betrayal" and I'm not sure that's the right word
and I can't think of the right word to use.
She dealt with it the way that she knew best, you know.
[Jackie] "Abigail and Primrose were as unalike as two sisters could be."
"They couldn't stand each other."
"Abigail was pushy and grasping, she loved entertaining and big parties."
"A true Hollywood princess."
"Primrose, the younger and prettier of the two
had opted for a different kind of life where she was able to raise her children
in what she considered a more real atmosphere."
"Who knew that they were destined to become
two of the most powerful women in Hollywood."
[Tracy] Whatever she felt in private she just kept to herself.
Everything that she stood for was magical and wonderful and sparkly.
But real life does go on.
[Jackie] And here we have…
[TV playing indistinctly]
[Tiffany] We'd been here about six or seven years
when our dad was diagnosed with prostate cancer.
I think it just came out of nowhere, I think everybody was sort of shocked
and, well, they didn't really tell anybody that he was sick and, um…
It was just-- It was very sad, they weren't expecting it.
It was in the late '80s, she was at the height of her fame
and I think it was hard for all of us.
[Laura] I think in many ways she didn't know how to cope with it.
She just thought if she carried on with her life, it just wasn't there.
And they decided to build a new home.
[Jackie] The new house.
[Tracy] The whole time that he was living with cancer,
he was working on this project.
-[indistinct chatter] -[laughing]
He was very focused on creating this house.
He was working with the architects, he was going to the site.
[Barbara] He was just so intent on getting that house finished for Jackie.
[somber music playing]
[Tiffany] The thing is, with my dad, he didn't want to go anywhere,
so it was really hard for him because… [sniffing]
…he didn't want to leave us and he didn't want to leave her
and he just didn't want to go anywhere, so it was just difficult.
[Oscar] Jackie, let me take a picture of you.
[Jackie] No, no, no.
-Come on, give me the camera. -[Jackie] No.
[Tiffany] So they planned out every element of this home.
It was quite beautiful, it was sort of almost museum-like.
That was her fantasy.
You know, it was like he had created it for her.
[indistinct chatter]
It was literally just ready.
But, you know, there came a point where he was actually too weak.
Dad died before they could move in.
[birds chirping]
The phone rang in the morning and it was Jackie and she said…
And she was sobbing, and she said, "Oscar is gone."
And I started sobbing too.
[Tracy] She really didn't deal with it very well.
She just retreated pretty much to staying in her study and writing.
[hums]
-[clears throat] -[Laura] Jackie, um…
sort of pulled up the drawbridge.
She was not going to shed any tears.
[somber music playing]
She couldn't do that, once the facade would crack,
you know, it unleashes the floodgates.
She only continued to be the Jackie she created.
Good morning, Nick. Good morning, Maryanne.
[somber music playing]
[Rory] She had learned how to survive, and for her…
what was always there for her, you know, was Jackie Collins.
[audience applauding]
How are you coping with Oscar's death?
Well, you know, I think that when somebody dies, you--
You have your grieving time,
and then you have to seize your life again.
[host] How long does the grieving time last?
Everybody is different, you know, some people will take much longer.
Is it difficult for you to carry on?
Well, you know, when somebody is sick for a long time,
you learn to accept the inevitable. You know it's going to happen.
[Melody] Times were changing and her books were selling,
not at the rate of Hollywood Wives, I can't deny that,
but they still are out there.
It's just that we changed as a world.
Because I knew I was coming on your program today…
-[Jackie] Yes. -…I bought a book yesterday
and I read the first paragraph
and I felt I am demeaning myself reading any further.
What book was it?
This is called, uh, Lovers and Gamblers.
Now, is that the only one of mine you've ever read?
Well, there is one left in my house once
and I'm afraid it was put out for the dust.
The thing that very much worries me about your books is the sex
that your strong women are enjoying,
which they're enjoying on a very kind of passive level.
They're enjoying being brutalized and dominated,
-which is very unlike-- -That absolutely, absolutely ridiculous,
because as a matter of fact in my books the woman always comes out on top.
She did try to change with it, she knew.
-I have read Hollywood Husbands. -[Jackie] Yes.
And the beginning, the first chapter is disgusting.
I'm not-- Really disgusting, because it's all…
She was repeating herself a lot, as you can see even from her titles.
And I think the public had had as much of that information as they wanted.
The problem is that all of these women that you portray are tough cookies,
all right, and they do get somewhere.
My objection is that they're all also the most beautiful women in the world.
[woman] Jackie, you're writing to a formula, and, I mean,
there must be loads of people turning out this kind of formulaic stuff,
trying to get it published. But I do think that, sorry…
You know, I do think that perhaps your name,
your Hollywood connections etcetera must have helped you to get published.
I'm sorry, I think it's utter bilge.
I mean, this whole idea about having positive role models for women
-I think is total crap. -[Jackie] Yeah.
-[host] Are you a feminist? -Yeah, of course I am, yes.
-[host] She's a feminist? -Yes, of course I am.
I wouldn't say that you're a feminist in any way at all.
She's making millions of dollars…
-[woman] But sex sells. -…through abuse.
[Tracy] Her particular brand of, you know, feminism was a bit behind the times.
[Melody] The '90s were hard, and it was kind of mean.
You took her, you wanted her, now you don't want her.
So she sat down and she wrote.
But eventually she became completely confused and lost.
And it was like she was Lucky.
She was always Lucky Santangelo.
And she went on the rides
and the characters took her on these trips that were crazy.
They were just nuts, some of them.
But they took her and that's where she ended up.
[Jackie] "Lucky was deeply depressed."
"She took a long drive to the desert for hours, thinking about it."
"What was she going to do?"
[slow music playing]
And then she started, quite a lot later, I think,
going out with Frank.
-[Jackie] Darling, say something nice. -I love you, J.
[Rory] Frank was this kind of like single guy around town,
he'd never been married, always had lots of girlfriends.
He was one of those guys that was always smoking cigars and playing cards
with the boys and taking bets and he basically did what he liked.
I knew him through relationships with James Mason's daughter,
with Joanna Carson, many different, uh, "girlfriends".
He was not exactly a gigolo.
[Jackie] "With great care, he pushed her down onto the couch."
"'Get your clothes off, I mean now.'"
[interviewer] So what was it about Frank that Jackie was so attracted to?
Beats me.
[Jackie] Darling, would you wait on me hand and foot?
Absolutely not.
[Rory] It was a time when our lives were really moving on,
so we were distracted.
And, you known, he was like a character from one of her books.
He kind of, you know, came in and was like a character
-from one of her books. -From one of her books
Literally had sort of stepped out of…
[all] One of her books.
[overlapping chatter]
[Jackie] "There was no getting rid of him and he pursued her relentlessly."
"Sterling silver roses every day, cases of crystal champagne,
Jars of the best caviar."
-Good morning, Frank -Good morning, J.
[Jackie] How are you, darling?
-I'm feeling wonderful. -[Jackie] Good.
It's a beautiful day in Albany this morning.
And I just arrived and everyone is having breakfast.
And I love you, darling.
I wanted her to be with somebody else,
I didn't necessarily want her to be with Frank.
You know, he was nice, he was very charming,
but I didn't like him.
And he was the first man that I'd seen her be with or involved with who I felt…
you know, didn't feel wholly comfortable with her success.
[indistinct chatter]
[sighs] You want me to answer what was Frank like.
-Isn't that what you want? -[interviewer] Yes.
-[birds singing] -[wind blowing]
Well, he was a gambler, a drugger, an alcoholic, and an abuser.
That pretty much tells you.
[Jackie] All right, darlings.
Here we are at the wonderful, beautiful Colombe d'Or
-and we're having a wonderful time. -[Jackie] Okay, Frank, cut to the chase.
-[all laughing] -What else do you want me to say?
-Come on. Slowly, slowly. -[Jackie] Oh, slowly. I'm sorry.
If Frank felt slighted in any way, he would just…
go berserk.
[music playing over stereo]
This out of control rage.
And with it all, he could be quite charming.
That's always the trap, isn't it?
There was a tremendous amount of shouting and he did become,
um, extremely controlling.
Jackelina.
[Joan] He would lash out at her in a furious temper.
And she put up with it because, I think, maybe she felt guilty?
Why does one put up with anything, you know, women put up with a lot.
[Jackie] Okay.
[humming] Tell me if I walk into the sea.
Jackie, you're about ready to walk into the ocean.
[Jackie] Did we have a nice dinner?
That this woman who wrote about power and strength and strong women
could get involved with this man,
it's very difficult for people who love Jackie to watch this.
-[indistinct chatter] -[Frank] Okay, we're recording.
-[Tita] I mean, I just don't get it. -[Frank] Jackie, all right, say something.
This is Kir Royale, we're in the south of France, we are at the…
-We have made pests of ourselves already. -[Frank laughing]
-We've made pests of ourselves already. -Here, here!
[Tracy] You can be as strong as you like, you can have this amazing career,
you can have earned as much money as you could ever have wanted
and have a great family and everything going for you.
[Frank laughing] Roger, you’re terrific.
But, you know you can be 60 or 70, and still fall for somebody,
because somehow you think you're going to maybe replicate something
that happened in your early years and get a different outcome.
[somber music playing]
[Tiffany] It got bad when he got sick.
That's when the tides turned that he was mad at-- It was everybody.
And so I know that was a particularly tough time.
[narrator] "He was furious and despairing."
"He grabbed my arm and pulled me roughly out of the doctor’s office."
"'Frank, what's happened?'"
"'Lung cancer, inoperable.'"
[dramatic music playing]
[Tita] He was furious that she was writing books while he was ill.
She would write in her dressing room in the middle of the night.
She would get up when Frank was asleep
and she would write when he didn't know about it.
[distant siren wailing]
We asked Jackie, "Were there guns in the house?"
And Jackie said, "Yes, there had been, but they'd been moved."
Well, that's not comforting.
[interviewer] And why were you worried about guns?
[Tita] Well, obviously why.
I mean, why are you afraid of guns being around?
You're afraid someone might use them.
I mean, afraid he'd say, "Well, if I'm going, you're going with me."
She lives in her fantasy house in Beverly Hills
and has sold more than 200 million books worldwide.
But Jackie Collins told our Mark Steines,
that the success means nothing when compared to the love she lost.
[tense music playing]
[drum beating]
[Jackie] "The funeral was a grand affair."
[instrumental music playing]
"He was buried in a solid bronze casket that cost over 20,000 dollars."
"Lucky opened her eyes, it was no good dwelling on the past."
-[somber music playing] -"She felt remarkably calm."
"She smiled wanly and she winked. A true, ballsy, Lucky Santangelo wink."
[Jennifer] I worked with Jackie starting in 2008.
She had made it very clear to me
that she never wanted to get married again.
She didn't want to pick socks off of her bedroom floor anymore for anyone.
Or do laundry, or cook. She was done.
She was fine if someone who wanted to come over
and spend the night and then leave. And that's really where she was at.
-[indistinct chatter] -[camera shutters clicking]
[Jackie] "How does it feel to be back?"
"Pretty damn good."
"I have a story to tell you. I want you to sit down and hear me out."
She was the boss.
[Tiffany] She immersed herself in her work as ever.
But at that point, she'd been experiencing this foot pain
and was having a lot of trouble walking, like she could not walk.
And I kept on saying to her,
"We've got to get you to the doctor, can we please go to the doctor?"
She said, "Yes, I'll go next week, I'll go next week."
Tiff started saying, "I've got to try and," you know,
"we've got to do something about this."
"We've got to try and get her to a doctor."
And she eventually agreed.
And my mother is sitting next to me, and I will never forget this,
I mean, she looked like a teenager that had been caught.
She was like, "Tiffany, you're going to be so mad at me,"
and I looked at her and I said, "What? What?"
And she goes, "I've got a lump."
I said, "Where?" And she goes, "In my breast."
And I just remember, like, my whole world, like, crashing.
So she'd had a lump and we don't know.
She says two years and I don't know if it was longer than that or not,
but she just hadn't, you know, she just…
She thought that she could defy it somehow or another,
and until it caught up with her.
So it was, you know, it was just…
[interviewer] Pretty shocking.
Yeah.
[somber music playing]
[Tiffany] She said she was very sorry that,
you know, that she hadn't said anything
-and she asked us not to tell anybody. -[indistinct chatter]
It felt like my father all over again.
They didn't really tell anybody that he was sick.
[Joan] Daddy said, "You're not to mention that she has got cancer."
"We don't use that word."
[Tracy] Because of her past experiences…
there was that bit of her that transcended
what she may have been concerned about.
You know, things had been so tough before this.
And I think her, sort of, traumatic experiences
kept coming back in to play.
I love you.
[Tracy] She sort of couldn't write it out, so she could just say,
"Right, I'm going to be fabulous, I'm going to live my life."
"I don't really want to know if there's anything wrong with me."
So, yes, she was vulnerable, um…
but very much like her spirit animal of being a cat…
she clawed her way out of that.
[upbeat music playing]
Please welcome the author Jackie Collins.
[audience applauding, cheering]
[gasping]
[Tita] She never stopped smiling, she never stopped working.
And I'm so pleased. Tripped my way onto the set.
Always like to make an entrance.
It's interesting the choice really when I look back,
because then she started writing Goddess of Vengeance…
-which is a Lucky Santangelo book. -[upbeat music playing]
[narrator] "Sitting at the table was Lucky Santangelo,
a dark-haired beauty and business woman supreme
who'd experienced her own share of controversial headlines
and scandals over the years."
"'Come on, Lucky,' Ina said, 'Look at everything you've accomplished.'
'Admit it, you're a goddamn superwoman.'"
"'No.'"
"'I'm a woman who took chances every step of the way.'"
"'I had to fight for my independence.'"
"'Believe me, it wasn't easy.'"
She said, "I can't just sit here and wait to die."
She said, "I need to go to London."
I said, "Okay, we're going."
She knew it would be her last trip,
and I think she wanted to see London one last time.
[narrator] "Lucky smiled a slow, dangerous smile."
"Let the show begin."
"This could turn out to be quite interesting."
[dramatic music playing]
[Tracy] She was told, you know, she had two or three weeks left.
She really needed to come home,
you know, she needed to come back to London
and she needed to say goodbye to everybody.
[Joan] We had a, uh, lunch at the hotel,
and she was there with Laura Lizer.
And then she said, "Now, I have to tell you something."
Um… "I have stage four breast cancer."
And I said, "That's not possible."
[Laura] You know, Joan was like,
"Okay, well, you're okay though, right, you're okay?"
And Jackie said, "Yes, I'm okay."
And when she went into the bathroom to get something, I said to Laura,
"Is she okay?"
And she said, "Yes, she's fine, she's fine."
I said, "She doesn't seem fine,
she seems a little fragile, a little shaky."
She said, "She's going to be fine."
She was hanging on,
hanging on to every little bit of strength that she could hang on to
to live that week in London.
[indistinct chatter]
For the first TV show,
we asked them ahead of time if they could start with her seated
and not walk on and sit down.
[man] And just off the plane from Hollywood…
-[woman] It's novelist, Jackie Collins! -[man] Yeah!
[audience applauding, cheering]
Yeah.
-[man] Lovely to see you again, Jackie. -[woman] Lovely to have you here.
Well, it's great to be back, I love this show, so much fun.
A few people said, "Jackie looks a bit weird or a bit thin or a bit odd,"
but, you know, like, not that well, but, I mean, she's still, you know…
whole outfit on, you know, takes an iron will to get up there
and do that when you feel as bad as that.
And Lucky is a really, you know, kick-ass woman.
I mean, she's strong, she's got everything she ever wanted
and she does it her way.
And I think we need more books with women who do it their way,
who are strong and sexy and can really control everything,
-you know, and she does. -[indistinct chatter]
[somber music playing]
In her mind, that was taking Jackie Collins out for the last time.
[laughing]
-[woman 1] That's why I love your books. -[woman 2] The thing is, I know.
[woman 3] Talking about the book, see, I know that you're very good
-in your research, very meticulous. -[Jackie] Yes.
So I need to know, did you check out all those sexual positions
-before you wrote the books? -Absolutely, every one,
-that's why I'm exhausted. -[women laughing]
[somber music playing]
You know, Jackie, she lived for her work and she was still working.
She was doing talk shows and she was doing what she loved doing.
So she did what she loved doing right up to
the last moment that she possibly could.
I wrote a book called Rockstar, and this rockstar told me the real story…
"This is how I want to be remembered."
She knew she was going to pass shortly after that.
Yeah. And I try to write erotic sex and humorous sex.
-[woman] Exactly. -And great sex.
I mean, Lucky in the new book, she has tantric sex.
[Laura] So all the last pictures of her…
[heartbeat]
…her working and promoting a book.
[romantic music playing]
Goodbye, stranger.
Maybe in another life.
[Tracy] "No goodbyes, no goodbyes, I'm seeing you all at Christmas."
[Bill] And off she went to America with Laura.
[Barbara] I never knew she was sick.
And you know what, I think that was strong…
and she showed strength in women and within her.
It's amazing how much her mind, that how she could control things
and how she was so strong mentally to deal with it the way
that, you know, she dealt with it, sorry. [crying]
It was pretty spectacular, because she just--
She got to do everything she wanted to do
and it was like she knew what was going to happen when she got home.
It was like she wrote her ending, that's what it felt like.
It was like she wrote her ending.
[somber music playing]
[Joan] I was in the south of France then…
and my cellphone beeped
and I turned it on.
And they said, "She's passed."
I cried everyday for three months.
I missed her, I have pictures of her still all over.
We were so on the same wavelength with, like,
things that happened, with seeing movies or with gossip.
My sister was amazing.
She had an incredible life.
And of course, you know, it was pretty shattering when she died,
because she was the rock that kept our family together.
[somber music continues]
[sniffs]
[Melody] I think being Jackie Collins, you know, that energetic,
brilliant persona that everybody saw is who she loved to be.
[Tiffany] That became entirely who she was,
it wasn't like she was lost in that or that she was hiding a part of herself,
but just that is who she was.
She was Jackie Collins, and then she was gone.
[insects chirping]
[Jackie] "Lucky knew it was time to leave."
"She brushed her long jet hair,
pinning it back on each side with ebony combs."
"She had power, she had control, she had everything she'd always wanted."
"She drove down the winding narrow road fast,
humming softly to herself."
"Tonight she would be like a queen."
["Le Fleurs" playing]
If you only did a documentary
showing her what she was showing to everybody, who cares?
Frankly, who cares?
The only upside of being old is that you don't give a damn.
-[woman laughing] -It happened, it's my life.
[Morton] The great storyteller is rarer than the great writer.
And Jackie was a great storyteller.
[Tracy] I think we're back full circle now with,
you know, women saying actually to be women we can be whatever we want.
We can be really openly sexual if we want.
She broke ground for all us women. She really did.
What would Lucky Santangelo do, what would Jackie Collins do?
Channel your Jackie Collins energy.
What I learned from her is that I can do anything.
And I can speak my mind. And I don't have to hide behind somebody.
She loved success in women. She was very iconic in that way.
[Barbara] Can I tell you something?
She happened to have been brilliant.
♪ Ring all the bells sing And tell the people everywhere ♪
♪ That the flower has come ♪
♪ Light up the sky with your prayers Of gladness and rejoice ♪
♪ For the darkness is gone ♪
♪ Throw off your fears Let your heart beat freely at the sign ♪
♪ That a new time is born ♪
♪ May mosaydee kaylie lowya roses ♪
♪ Say money ain't na, na, oh na ♪
♪ Looking for vayda tay breeze ♪
♪ May mosaydee kaylie lowya roses ♪
♪ For all of these simple things And much more, a flower was born ♪
♪ It blooms to spread love and joy Faith and hope to people forlorn ♪
♪ Inside every man lives The seed of a flower ♪
♪ If he looks within He finds beauty and power ♪
[vocalizing]