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Hedy Lamarr on a vintage postcard

NOBODY WANTS ME NOW — 1965

Written by Torunn Grønbekk

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On this day in showbiz history (27 January 1966), Hedy Lamarr was arrested for shoplifting. Absent from the screen since 1958, the 53-year-old Austrian glamour girl had pretty much slipped from public consciousness when a security guard apprehended her in the parking lot of swanky department store May & Co in Wilshire with $86.00 worth of stolen items secreted in her handbag. Lamarr’s explanations (“some of the other stores let me do it” and “it must have been a misunderstanding”) didn’t cut it and the ensuing six-day trial in April 1966 drew sensational headlines. Even though the jury acquitted her of petty theft, Lamarr’s comeback role in the 1966 film Picture Mommy Dead was withdrawn (she was replaced by Zsa Zsa Gabor! Apparently, Gene Tierney was also under consideration). An enterprising Andy Warhol promptly capitalized on the scandal by cranking-out the underground movie Hedy starring drag queen superstar Mario Montez as Lamarr.