Gladys Rosson was Cecil B. DeMille’s secretary for thirty-nine years, starting the summer she graduated high school in 1914 until her death in 1953 (DeMille and Hayne 1959, 95). She was also his mistress, part of his “harem,” or, as DeMille’s niece Agnes, calls it, his “seraglio”—the members of which vary according to sources (Agnes deMille 1990, 183). Regardless, she was intimately involved in DeMille’s work, ranging from the production of his films to the investment of his finances to the management of his image. If ever there was a woman behind the man, Gladys was she

Oleson, Zack

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by Zack OlesonGladys Rosson was Cecil B. DeMille’s secretary for thirty-nine years, starting the summer shegraduated high school in 1914 until her death in 1953 (DeMille and Hayne 1959, 95). She was alsohis mistress, part of his “harem,” or, as DeMille’s niece Agnes, calls it, his “seraglio”—themembers of which vary according to sources (Agnes deMille 1990, 183). Regardless, she wasintimately involved in DeMille’s work, ranging from the production of his films to the investmentof his finances to the management of his image. If ever there was a woman behind the man,Gladys was she.Gladys was with DeMille throughout the course of his career. According to her Los Angeles Timesobituary, she started out as the first secretary employed by the Jesse L. Lasky Feature PlayCompany, then she and Florence Cole were the only secretaries kept by DeMille during his shiftfrom Paramount in the early thirties (A9; Higham 1973, 215). At the time of her death, her titlewas secretary-treasurer of Cecil B. DeMille Productions (A9).Dividing her time between the studio bungalow, the company offices in Laughlin Park, theDeMille mansion, the yacht, and Paradise Ranch, where Cecil spent most weekends, GladysRosson accompanied DeMille everywhere, wherever he needed her. According to a 1920Photoplay interview, he “in eighteen years… has never passed a Saturday night at home,” neversaying “what I was doing, nor whom I was with” (St. Johns 30). On set she acted as a stand-in forGeraldine Farrar in Joan the Woman (1916) since the flames at the stake were too hot for the starand Gladys had a similar complexion and hair color as Farrar (DeMille and Hayne 1985, 174). Atthe studio she responded to letters, speaking on behalf of DeMille, and copied longhand the scriptfor Old Wives for New (1918) after a successful screening of the completed film in Los Angeles,Also Known As:Gladys RossenLived:Februrary 6, 1891 - June 14, 1953Worked as:accountant, executive secretary, secretary, secretary-treasurer, typistWorked In:United StatesGladys Rossonjust so she could send it to her sister in New York to see what Adolph Zukor’s pet scenariodepartment would say (DeMille and Hayne 1985, 214). New York disdained DeMille productions,which seldom enjoyed favorable East Coast critical reception, and Zukor’s department sent backthe transcribed script as unsuitable for pictures. As a typist, she was also indispensable to creativepersonnel. On the Seaward, DeMille’s yacht, Gladys accompanied writers in order to type up theirwork, but not always with a paperweight—she lost The King of Kings (1927) to the wind. Butclearly Rosson operated on multiple levels—maid, typist, researcher, executive producer,accountant. According to Phil Koury’s biography of DeMille, his secretary not only went onlocation scouts with DeMille, but also appointed the members of the staff who would accompanythem (36). Preparing for The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), she took 135 pages of notesdocumenting circus life as she traveled around with DeMille and the Ringling Bros. & Barnumand Bailey Circus (DeMille and Hayne 1985, 404). Koury writes that on trips Gladys even pickedout DeMille’s outfit the night before—the director known for his puttees, boots, and breeches (36).Unaccompanied, too, she traveled; a document from the DeMille archive details her itinerary for atrip from Los Angeles to New York to many locations around the Caribbean and South America,presumably scouting for locations (BYU, box 307, fldr. 10).The correspondence between DeMille and Gladys Rosson reveals a strategically tactful voice. Afterwatching a print of Four Frightened People (1937), for instance, Gladys slides in a point-by-pointcritique of the film’s continuity, color matching, and decency. Some actors are “too exposed,” shenotes, but all comments are passed off as “just a few things… in case they mean something” (BYU,1933 note, box 829, fldr 9). Sources confirm that DeMille solicited opinions from any member ofhis staff, though Charles Higham thinks they were seldom heeded (1973, 146).Most significantly, DeMille also trusted Rosson to invest the money made through DeMilleProductions (Koury 1959, 37). As a notary public, she handled both DeMille’s business and privateloans and investments and helped advise him during court cases, notably preparing for his courtappearance when he and his wife went on vacation to Europe in the early thirties (Higham 1973,136). Notoriously, Gladys lost DeMille around a million dollars during the stock market crash.After William Randolph Hearst indirectly tipped Julia Faye to sell all stocks, DeMille instructedGladys to do so, though she offered the stock at a half-point above market, as she always did(DeMille and Hayne 1985, 129). No one took their offer and DeMille never said a word to rebukeher. He explains in his autobiography, “she was, after all, the same Gladys who, one evening whenshe was dining with me and I fell asleep exhausted at the dinner table, calmly sat all night withher hand under my chin, so that I might sleep undisturbed by a duckling in the soup plate” (295).A woman who lets her employer sleep on her hand all night is clearly more personally devotedthan any ordinary secretary. Gladys never married; neither did Jeanie Macpherson or AnneBauchens, two other women of the “harem,” although most of DeMille’s secretaries also nevermarried (Koury 1959, 31). That term “harem” appears in many accounts of DeMille’s life.According to Gloria Swanson in her autobiography, gossip columnists were already using it before1918—roughly around the time DeMille’s The Arab (1915) was released, which, although it did notstar Swanson, might account for the gossip columnists’ terminology. But Swanson also thoughtthat being invited over to dinner by Constance, Cecil’s wife, in order to quash the story of theiraffair might have had something to do with the term (Swanson 1980, 112). Gladys, however, isseldom mentioned as part of the harem in contemporaneous sources; most biographies andprofiles seem to add her name after the fact. Whether or not the story of her affair broke duringher lifetime is difficult to say.Anne Edwards interviewed Cecil’s granddaughter Cecilia about Gladys Rosson for her book, TheDeMilles: An American Family. On Cecilia’s authority, Edwards claims that the affair betweenGladys and Cecil started in the early thirties, almost twenty years after she started working forhim. “To compensate Gladys for abject and unfulfilled early devotion,” she then argues, “Cecilbecame ‘godfather’ to the entire Rosson family,” helping all of Gladys’s siblings with their careersin the motion picture business (87).Behind every great woman, there is a string of other women, and Gladys no doubt had arelationship with each one of them. It is revealing that Gladys was sent presumably as a delegatefor the DeMilles (including brother William) to visit Lorna Moon, the writer, scenarist, andmother of William’s biological and Cecil’s adopted son, Richard, when she was on her deathbeddying of tuberculosis (de Mille 1998, 249 ). All of the memos Lorna received regarding loans fromCecil were signed by Gladys, as were the memos to MacPherson’s assistant, Cora, once she wasdying of tuberculosis as well (Richard deMille, 190). Gladys visited Jeanie when she was dying,too (Higham 1973, 282). When you have an affair with your accountant, such as Cecil carried onwith Gladys, she knows who’s getting how much. The DeMille archive contains muchcorrespondence in which Gladys follows up on loans to Julia Faye and Macpherson, as well asrelatively unknown actresses such as Genevieve Bell (BYU, Oct. 1945 letter 23, box 393, fldr. 4).Katherine Albert, a Screenland features writer, once blamed DeMille’s staff, who “thrill at hisevery word” for the lack of soul in his pictures (16). Whether or not we give credence to thisanalysis, we can say that through her undisputed devotion, DeMille’s secretary helped create notonly an auteur but a mogul. But in retrospect we have to wonder what portion of his achievementwas made possible by such a capable coworker. It is a shame Gladys Rosson is credited with solittle.See also: Jeanie MacphersonBibliographyAlbert, Katherine. “Well, Mr. DeMille, We’re Waiting!”  Screenland vol. 2, no. 1 (Nov. 1923): 15-16.Edwards, Anne. The DeMilles: An American Family.  New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1988.Koury, Phil A. Yes, Mr. DeMille.  New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1959.Louvish, Simon. Cecil B. DeMille: A Life in Art.  New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2007.“Miss Rosson, C.B. De Mille Secretary, Dies.” Los Angeles Times (15 June 1953): A9.Rosson, Gladys. Correspondence. 1933 [Box 829, fldr. 9]. Brigham Young University.------. Letter 23 October 1945. [Box 393, fldr. 8]. Brigham Young University.St. Johns, Adela Rogers.  “What Does Marriage Mean?  As Told by Cecil B. DeMille to AdelaRogers St. Johns.”Photoplay 19.1 (December 1920): 29-30.Archival Paper Collections:Cecil B. DeMille Archives. Brigham Young University, Harold B. Lee Library.FilmographyA. Archival Filmography: Extant Film Titles:1. Gladys Rosson as Possible TypistThe King of Kings. Dir.: Cecil B. DeMille, sc: Jeanie MacPherson (DeMille Pictures Corp. US1927) cas.: H.B. Warner, Dorothy Cumming, William Boyd, Cecil B. DeMille, si, b&w, 16 &35mm. Archives: Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique [BEB], Cineteca del Friuli [ITG], George EastmanMuseum [USR], Library of Congress [USW], Cineteca Nazionale [ITN], Cinemateca Romana[ROB], UCLA Film and Television Archive [USL], BFI National Archive [GBB], JugoslovenskaKinoteka [YUB], Academy Film Archive [USF], Lobster Films [FRL].Credit ReportNeither FIAF nor AFI credits Gladys Rosson for any films; only IMDb credits her as “typist” forThe King of Kings.CitationOleson, Zack. "Gladys Rosson." In Jane Gaines, Radha Vatsal, and Monica Dall’Asta, eds.Women Film Pioneers Project. New York, NY: Columbia University Libraries, 2013.<https://wfpp-test.cul.columbia.edu/pioneer/ccp-gladys-rosson/>

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