5. A Major Star’s Unhealthy Relationship
Year after year, Hollywood studios tried to get Lana Turner to maintain a wholesome image in order to protect their investment in her. Year after year, she resisted. By the late 1950s, with her best acting years behind her, Turner no longer cared about whom she associated with or was seen next to. In 1958, she hooked up with a new boyfriend, Johnny Stompanato, a mobster with close ties to LA’s foremost organized crime figure, Mickey Cohen. On the one hand, Stompanato, a WWII Marine veteran, was a handsome hunk. On the other hand, he was a violent psychopath who often beat the daylights out of Turner, starting with the first time she tried to break up with him.
It was an unhealthy and scandalous relationship. It finally ended with a major scandal that shocked even a jaded Hollywood that was seemingly impervious to scandals. Within the span of a single year, Turner and Stompanato carried on a stormy affair filled with violent arguments, physical abuse, frequent breakups, and just-as-frequent reconciliations. On at least one occasion, Turner claimed that her mobster boyfriend drugged and photographed her in the nude when she was passed out, in order to blackmail her if he ever wanted to. The affair came to an abrupt end when Stompanato was stabbed to death in Turner’s home – not by her, but by her fourteen-year-old daughter.