Sunday, February 27, 2011

Lillian Roth


Lillian Roth: Recently News about is Lillian Roth, I really appreciate the old movies that I order from Netflix. I lately watched the movie 1954 "I'll Cry Tomorrow. It stars Susan Hayward. She was one of my favorite back in my teens, impressionable but I missed it. This is the story of Lillian Roth, a movie star child of the 20s. It has been very successful, but his career was hampered by his addiction to alcohol and has spent the last years of the 1930s in the shadow and the spiral deeper into alcoholism. She lastly "hit bottom" in 1946 and sought out the AA,  Anyone who has read my blog knows that I actually enjoyed the last 19 years as a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous. He had a great influence in my life and I was intrigued to see how (or whether) he would work for Lillian. After all, it was 1946 and AA had only been in existence for eleven years. Indeed, after contemplating suicide, Lillian finally dragged itself to an AA meeting. It was very interesting to see how its members detoxed. Today is rarely the case, except in a hospital or rehab. I'm always fascinated by the very old AAs who remember using small doses of alcohol to reduce a person does not die of DT. Also of interest were the scenes of the real AA meetings. They were very similar to those we hold today. What was different was a man, Burt McGuire, became his godfather. I cannot speak for our region of the country, but here it is best considered for a woman to have sponsor women. Lillian ended up marrying Burt and he became her agent. This is where the movie ended, but the rest of his life is equally compelling. In 1953, after much research and soul against the advice of Burt's, she appeared in an episode of the television series "This Is Your Life" with Ralph Edwards. In response to his story about alcohol, it has received over forty thousand letters. It is always a difficult thing for us in AA. One might think that a story like hers would be a good way to advertise AA, but we recommend the attraction rather than promotion. Our Tradition states 11, in part, “We need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio and films." The problem is that often when a celebrity with sobriety AA claims, he or she relapses and the credibility of the program. Burt tried to explain this to her, but she chose to do the TV show anyway. After 18 years of sobriety Lillian relapse in 1964 and his days sober and his marriage was over. She has spent the last 15 years of his life with 3 dogs and a companion of the woman,Lillian Roth

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