Back in 2003 when I was in the throes of creativity in regards to producing one of the best and most thorough newsletters in the history of the Sons of the Desert (that’s my opinion anyway, and I know it is held by many others), I was working on issue 27 of Dante’s Info, which was a full 32 pages bursting at the seams with fun research and info. Encompassing four of those pages was an article I did based on a phone interview I conducted with Joan Del Mar. Joan had had a speaking role in Laurel and Hardy’s 1944 M-G-M film Nothing but Trouble. I titled the article the exact same thing that I titled this posting.
Joan had been born Joanne Delmer in 1934 and had been taken through Central Casting and assigned an agent at the age of six. One of her earliest performances was with Anne Baxter, who suggested that Joanne shorten her name, hence the abbreviated version Joan. Joan had small parts in such giant films as Mrs. Miniver and The Devil and Daniel Webster, but to Laurel & Hardy fans, it was her scenes on the football field as the timekeeper keeping the boys and players apprised of the time… “two minutes to go!” Joan recalled that she had hoped for more lines, but was told by the script girl, “No, you’re done dear.” But that was a minor disappointment compared to the periodic sprayings of dust and dirt that she and the other kids had to endure to appear more like an urchin.
As Joan and I chatted a dozen years ago, she told me of an appearance she had on The Jack Benny Show on the radio. She had vivid memories of her line and knew that the show had been broadcast on April 1st, but had never heard the show. I promptly went to work and consulted my fellow tent member Charles Sexton, who was a huge old time radio collector and sure enough he was able to get me a copy, which I shared with Joan.
Joan enjoyed a lucrative career in radio, but by the mid-1950’s, she had had enough of acting and decided to take a break. At the time that I had chatted with her, she had just recently decided that it was time that the break had ended. In fact she had small roles in such films at Bad Santa, The Wedding Planner, Along Came Polly, Addams Family Values, Armageddon, Bulworth, and The Man Who Wasn’t There. I would even occasionally excitedly spot Joan (who changed her professional name to the more exotic-sounding Del Mar at this time) in TV shows playing at the time.
One day I got a phone call from Marc Copage, who had played Diahann Carol’s son Corey in the TV series Julia, whom had been pointed in my direction by Joan in order to get a copy of the article I was writing about her that he could use on the website of a group of child actors that they were both part of. That was pretty cool.
But unfortunately I lost touch with Joan, having never actually met her in person, after I published my article. She appeared once in a while at Way Out West Tent meetings in Los Angeles, but I just never happened to connect with her.
But fortunately that finally changed on July 2, 2014, when Joan was among the honored guests invited to the film showing at the Egyptian Theatre as part of the Laurel and Hardywood convention going on that week. I explained to her who I was and she had a vague recollection, which is to be expected since it had been more than ten years since we had spoken. She had also had some pretty cool experiences in the meantime, working in some pretty big and acclaimed films.
Two minutes to go!
Joan’s had a blessed life for sure and I’m glad I finally go the chance to meet her face to face.
Celebrities of the 2014 Laurel and Hardywood convention will continue…
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