"Act of God"

The story had made the rounds in Rome, where newspapers first printed it in August. Hedda Hopper gingerly slipped it into her gossip column last month as a rumor, and Hollywood had buzzed with it ever since. But last week, when Columnist Louella Parsons spread it as fact all over the front pages of the Hearst papers, a nation of moviegoers gawked. Screamed Hearst's Los Angeles Examiner across eight columns: INGRID BERGMAN BABY DUE IN 3 MONTHS IN ROME.

That was about all Louella's story had to say. The news, she said, came "straight from Rome," the latest scene of Ingrid's celebrated romantic entanglement with 43-year-old Italian Director Roberto (Open City) Rossellini, for whom she had renounced her husband and her career.

"Isn't That Enough?" Two days before Louella broke the news (and then burst into tears because stern journalistic duty had driven her to it), the Italian newspaper Il Tempo had noted that Ingrid was "knitting little things" and "rose with a certain difficulty from her seat." And it was no secret in Rome that a tall Sicilian physician had examined Ingrid and then blabbed.

Newsmen seeking confirmation and comment searched in vain for Ingrid's husband, Dr. Peter Lindstrom, who has not seen her, except for a grim two-day visit, since she went to Italy in March to make a "different" movie. "Lolly" Parsons' story was two days old before anyone penetrated the Roman seclusion of Ingrid and Director Rossellini. Then the New York Times's studious Vatican correspondent, Camille M. Cianfarra, interviewed them in Ingrid's apartment. While the Swedish actress poured strong black coffee, Reporter Cianfarra managed to ask whether she was to become a mother early next year.

Snapped Rossellini: "Whether she is or is not is nobody's affair. I think that report deserves neither denial nor confirmation, because it is an attempt to pry into the private life of a woman who, to assert her right to her own life, has given up her career . . . Isn't that enough?"

"Ashamed by All This." Ingrid and Rossellini made it plain that they would be married as soon as she gets a divorce from her husband. "Unfortunately," explained Ingrid, "there have been some difficulties; otherwise I would already be Roberto's wife." Added the director: "Ingrid explained things quite clearly to Mr. Lindstrom last May when she saw him in Messina during a 48-hour visit. Our situation was fully discussed. And I want to make clear that at that time the relationship between Ingrid and myself was absolutely correct. It is not our fault, is it, if we cannot get married because Ingrid has been unable so far to obtain a divorce?"

Cianfarra's dispatch discreetly ducked the obvious question: Did Ingrid look as if she were an expectant mother in her sixth month? For a colleague, the Timesman had an answer: not at all. That at least threw some doubt on Louella's arithmetic.

Next day, for the Associated Press, talkative Director Rossellini talked some more: "Ingrid has been taking sedatives to quiet her nerves. She is, how do you say, ashamed by all this." Rossellini's voice trembled. "We are overcoming the difficulties which have thus far delayed Ingrid's divorce." He hinted that they had found a legal way out: "It might be called an act of God."

While Hollywood chattered and speculated over the fate of the 34-year-old beauty who had been one of its top box-office attractions, RKO was whipping up a thunderous promotion campaign for her latest picture, Stromboli, directed by Rossellini during a tempestuous spring and summer on the volcanic isle north of the Sicilian coast. The star and the director would get equal billing (type of the same size), and the ads would trumpet: "THIS IS IT!"

Not all the hubbub over Ingrid's reported expectancy could drown out international rumblings of another major obstetric event: the birth of Rita Hayworth's baby was "very imminent" in Lausanne, Switzerland. For weeks, newsmen had camped for a birth watch in the Lausanne-Palace Hotel. Cracked one late arrival, recognizing many a hardened press veteran of Rita's wedding to Aly Khan near Cannes seven months ago: "I think it only fitting that we should be together again at this moment." By week's end, correspondents by the dozen were tripping over one another every time Rita and Aly tried to sneak out of their suite.

Rita's fans learned from the papers that the delivery might involve surgery; her five-year-old daughter, Rebecca Welles (by her marriage to Orson Welles), had been born by Caesarian section. But they were assured that Rita was cheerful--and eager to get back to Hollywood.

Meanwhile, no preparation was being spared. Rita's suite was ready in Lausanne's chichi Mont-Choisi Clinic. The clinic staff was fully alerted. Police guarded the building. Throughout the world, faithful moviegoers waited in suspense for suave, skilled Obstetrician Dr. Rodolphe Rochat to go to work.

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