In 2003, I located the two surviving
children of Rudolph Valentino's close friend and trusted business
manager, S. George Ullman. They were both in their late 70's and both
eager to meet with me. Bunny and Bob Ullman wanted not only to have
their father's story told but to know their father's story. He told
his family next to nothing about his travails as Valentino's executor
and the prolonged legal issues with Valentino's brother Alberto.
Over a period of a couple of years I
worked with Bob and Bunny and visited them periodically while writing
Affairs Valentino. Bob was gravely ill at the time and I knew
time was of the essence. He was determined I find the court
records of Valentino's estate to know the truth about what happened
to his father. I did find those records... enough of them for him to
know his father was exonerated, praised by the court and also
persecuted by a cruel and woefully unjust collection process waged
against him for 30 years by Alberto Valentino.
In my first visit with Bunny she told
me her father was writing a book when he died in 1975. But the only
copy they had she loaned to a gentleman in southern California, a
local historian, paranormal investigator and ghost hunter who
conducts tours and can be booked to give lectures on a variety of
local historical subjects.
I do not recall exactly how he came to
have their only copy of the memoir but I believe Bunny told me she
spoke about her father and shared the memoir with a book club she
belonged to and this was how she came to loan her only copy of the
memoir. That was some two years prior and she had yet to convince the gentleman to return the manuscript.
At the time I lived in San Francisco
and I knew my ex-husband had a business trip planned in Los Angeles
and asked Bunny if she could write a letter granting him authority to
retrieve her father's memoir. She did just that.
When my ex-husband presented Bunny's letter, the gentleman handed over an open, worn US Priority mail
envelope containing about an inch of loose papers.
My ex-husband then delivered this precious parcel to Bunny. About a week later I visited
her and it was then she gave me the memoir. The memoir consisted of
faded photocopies, was not bound but she made an attempt to
organize it for me.
Now at the time I was also interviewing
collector Bill Self and as I was then ridiculously unaware and
naive...I told him, excitedly... about my find. He turned to me and
said he had read George's memoir because George “loaned” it to
him and he then asked me, “How many pages do you have?” I did not
actually know but I answered, “All of them??” That was the end of
that discussion. I am sure at that point Self quickly distracted me
with another Rudy relic to change the topic.
Bob and Bunny Ullman were not surprised
to hear Bill Self read the memoir. Neither of them held much respect
for Self and both felt he took advantage of their father and they
both felt he masterminded the theft of their father's Valentino
archive he kept in those wicker baskets in his garage. (More about
that in Affairs Valentino) For Bunny... Self never rose past
an exchange with him which took place in 1979 at her brother Dan's
funeral. She told me Self made a joke to her that day at the funeral
which she found inappropriate. She did not laugh and he said, “What's
the matter, Bunny? Don't you have a sense of humor?” She told him
it was her brother's funeral.
For Bob it was about those court
records. He was dying and he knew it and wanted to know. And as I
began to vet George's memoir, I began to piece the story together.
But it would not be until 2008, that I would realize Self made a copy
of George's manuscript. He most probably told George he would help
find him a publisher or some such thing and gave him back that stack
of copies. Why else would the family have a copy? Where was the
original. Knowing what I do now about Self and collectors... I am
sure he held on to George's original.
I learned about this when the L.A.
Times was conducting interviews for an article on Valentino in
2008-2009. I add this article was inspired by Micheal Morris as he
knew the reporter. The reporter called me at my work place one day to
tell me he just met with Valentino family spokeswoman, Jeanine
Villalobos and she told him the family had a copy of the 1975 memoir.
I knew immediately how that came about... Bill Self.
Bob and Bunny were upset obviously and
Bob never really believed they had a copy. Bunny was more worried
they had created some false document and it was on her suggestion I
made my statement on her behalf before my speech in Turin in 2009.
After my speech, Jeanine Villalobos
rose from the audience during a question and answer session to imply
George Ullman was “shopping” the manuscript. I have always
regretted I did not ask her why the family, who admitted to having
access to a copy never mentioned its existence nor shared all of
those great anecdotes publicly.
Bob and Bunny granted me
non-transferrable, exclusive rights to the memoir and authorized not
only Affairs Valentino but the publication of the memoir with
a biography of their father.
The last they heard from Bill Self was
when their mother asked him to intervene on her behalf when she
applied for residency in a retirement home in Beverly Hills.
According to Bunny, Self refused and her mother came to live the
remainder of her life with her. There was no love between the
Ullmans and Self.
In all the interviews I had with Self
during 2003, he knew I was also interviewing Bob and Bunny and never
once asked for me to give them his best regards, a tiny hello, and he
never asked where they were or how they were. There was no attempt to
contact them at all.
I made my copy of the memoir and
returned the stack of faded pages to Bunny and have told the story.
And today again I call out those who knew about this remarkable
document and said nothing all those years. How many more historically
important documents are they hiding, selling off into oblivion, tossing into the wind for some to cash? How
far they have gone to control their false narrative.
