Dina Merrill Hated Donald Trump

Love her!

From Film Director Rich Martini: Actress-Philanthropist Dina Merrill had a curious connection to Donald Trump - She and her family once owned Mar-a-Lago and sold it to Trump. I had spent months filming “Point of Betrayal” in Palm Beach, heard all kinds of nasty stories about Trump, and then he calls me on the phone and says “I hear you’re having your film premiere at Mar al Lago.” (I was, it was the only one ever. He didn’t attend, but Marla gave me the grand tour of all his photographs in all of the bathrooms. Funny.). He said “If you can get me a photograph of Dina Merrill at the premiere, in Mar Al Lago, that would be huge. I’ll give you a check for 50 grand for the photo, made out to “your favorite charity.”Kinda creepy, but UNICEF was the sponsor of our film premiere in 1996. So I called the star of the film, Dina, my pal, and said “Why did I just get a call from The Donald offering me 50 grand for your photograph at the Premiere?” She had me come over to her office to explain. She said “My family donated Mar Al Lago to the American people. We gave it to the Park service. And then when he was refused membership to the private Palm Beach country club (she was a member of the board), he talked someone into selling it to him for a million dollars which he never paid. I loathe him. I told him then I would never ever step foot in my home again while he was living in it.” I apologized for arranging the film premiere at Mar Al Lago - I knew she loathed him as he forced the film to shut down one day while filming at Palm Beach airport - and the guards came out and covered our 35mm camera. “No pictures.” Dina wanted me to sue him then for shutting down a film so he could land his private plane. But this was something else - the star of my film (along with Rod Taylor of “The Birds” fame) telling me why she couldn’t even attend the premiere. But she did something so classy, I can never forget it. She pulled out her checkbook and wrote a check on the spot for 50 grand to UNICEF (real money, not fake “charity money”) and said “Here, I’ve just made a donation so I won’t have to attend my own film premiere.” True story. So yeah - aside from all the other creepy things I’ve heard about the guy, from assaults on dates to other malfeasance and bribes, this one in particular turned into a good thing. His offer to give me salacious money backfired but turned into a nifty donation for UNICEF

I love Dina Merrill! She was class itself in all her films--love hr in Desk Set and a dozen others. Thanks for sharing this story, OP. And what a natural beauty, something the Dumpfs can never be.

I remember as a kid, Showtime would show "The Brass Ring" and "Anna to the Infinite Power" all the time and my lil' sassy gay self fell in love with her!

So even with his acuisition of Maro Lago he stiffed they seller and never paid for it? My God, he's always reconfirming my opinion of him as a horrible human being.

One can see Dina's warmth in this 1960 appearance on WML. She's the mystery guest.

R4 What a smile on her! The earrings are pretty great, too.

I remember many years ago watching a 60 Minutes episode with Donald showing them around Mar-a-Lago. Even back then he looked like an accountant who had embezzled so much of his employers money that he was able to take over.

How was he able to occupy Mar-a-Lago if he never paid for it?

There must be a way to prove that one way or the other, right? That would be a truly massive scandal.

I always wished it had been opened as a museum, as the architect is a favorite of mine and one with very few buildings that were left intact.

How did he convince the US Parks Dept to sell him something owned by the government? And then not sue his ass when he didn't pay for it? There are so many questions to that story. Who was the head of the Parks Dept at the time? I would think Dina Merrill's family would have been all over this travesty.

The government didn't want Mar-a-Lago - it was too big and was seen as too lavish. They were quite happy to off-load it. The Parks Department clashed with Palm Beach, the latter citing traffic concerns. Instead they got President Orange Cunt and his club of Deplorables. I dare say tbey rued the day.

Old money usually hates new money.

R10 Interesting comment. There's a story about Dina being dissed by old money when she was younger. Her mother inherited the Post cereals empire. Dina was an only child. When Dina was attending a party full of 'old money', she heard them refer to her mother disparagingly as "that grocer's daughter." You're right, old money usually hates new money and at that point in her life, Dina's mother was 'new money.' I wouldn't doubt that shitty comment helped shape her kind personality and philanthropic nature. I like to think Dina didn't want to simply become a rich bitch but decided to follow her own path.

I dunno, R11. Dina was a clenched teeth heiress, but an easy going person and a trooper in her profession. I don't think she hated new money individuals so much as she disliked boorish new money trash.

See her in Robert Altman's A Wedding (1978) and you'll see Dina deal with that *other* half of the family, though those rednecks were no where as bad as entitled slob Trump.

I think "A Wedding" is underrated. It's very patchy, but there are brilliant moments - and what a cast!

The house in the film was designed by David Adler for one of Dina's cousins, IIRC.

Sorry, R11, I misunderstood your post (didn't read all of it).

In addition to what I said about Dina Merrill, it was in her character to be nice. I don't think people can be trained to be bitches if it's not already in them.

She was good friends with Lauren Bacall, who apparently invented being mean, so she must have had some edge to her. Although Bacall was politically on the side of the angels her whole life, so there was that much they had in common.

Like many bitches, Bacall knew when to be on her best behavior. Besides Dina, Betty was extremely friendly with Lena Horne and her NYC family and I doubt she was a diva around them.

Wow, Lauren Bacall and Lena Horne in the same room. That's a glamour reading for the ages.

Twenty years earlier, and add Vivien Leigh.

Be still my gay heart! God, Lena was lovely. Lauren looks like a challenge. And I hate to say it, but Vivian already looks as if she was losing her own matchless beauty.

Still, three immortal bitches. We shall not gaze upon their like again.

I can guarantee you that Lena didn't hit on Lauren.

R14 Thank you. I didn't understand your reaction. I don't think she cared if someone was 'new' money or 'old'...she just came off as a caring person.

You know, the more I hear of this Donald Trump fellow, the more of a bounder I suspect he may be.

R18, now THERE'S a Heathers reboot I'd pay good money to see.

Why in the world wouldn't everyone hate Trump? If you don't hate him, you are a Nazi.

If he never paid forMs raw Logo...the whole country should know.

Here's how Trump came to own Mar-a-Lago: After Mrs. Post died in 1973, her family followed her wish that it be donated to the people of the United States, to be used as the "Winter White House." The transfer happened in 1975. No president ever used it, however, and the U.S. donated it back to the Post Trust in 1981. That’s when Trump started circling, and making low-ball offers to buy it. The Posts resisted, whereupon Trump bought the small beach front property across the street and announced he would build a giant eyesore house there that would block Mar-a-Lago's ocean view. The Posts relented, and Trump ended up getting Mar-a-Lago for around $7 million. He planned to subdivide the estate and build large tacky houses on each lot, but Palm Beach put the kibosh on that.

I exult in the millions he's losing due to Covid and due to being President. No one is going to want anything with the Trump name on it anymore, and that's all they have to sell.

He's in his own kind of jail. A 74-yr. old prisoner.

Since the hospitality industry is already toast, and will be for at least the next two years, Donald J Trump will have to re-invent himself after office. The question is - AS WHAT?

[quote] Trump ended up getting Mar-a-Lago for around $7 million.

So Dina Merrill lied then?

Dina with husband Cliff in their fabulous kitchen.

I get Dina Merrill mixed up with Diana Rigg.

r30 - Oh no, Dina...no, no, no...

Dina Merrill was the daughter of Marjorie Merriweather Post and E.F. Hutton (as in "when E.F. Hutton talks, people listen". Well, apparently Dina didn't listen to her father since he didn't want her to go into acting. So she took the name Merrill as her stage name, the name of her father's financial chief rival, as in Merrill Lynch! I met someone who was caretaking for her in her final years, and he said she was a really very nice woman and always a class act.

How much was she worth when she died?

Dina Merrill was a class act. Of course she wouldn't want anything to do with a piece of shit like Trump.

I doubt trump got the estate without paying for it. Here's another version of the story. The Posts did hope the property would be used by presidents when they donated it to the government but it was never used that way and the parks service gave it back to the Post Foundation. From the linked article:

"Considering the original amount Trump offered to pay, he got a pretty good deal. Donald Trump reportedly paid $10 million for his Mar-a-Lago property. This is significantly less than his original offer of $25 million. The sale included 17 acres of land and all the original home furnishings. He also later purchased the beachfront property in front of the estate. . . . . .

. . . . . Although Mar-a-Lago was beautiful, President Nixon preferred to stay at his friend Bebe Rebozo’s home in Key Biscayne, reports Vanity Fair. President Jimmy Carter’s administration was leery of the high taxes. They faced annual estate taxes and maintenance costs of $1 million. Consequently, the administration returned the estate to the Post Foundation in 1981. The foundation didn’t want the burden of handling the finances, so the property was placed on the market for $20 million."

so it’s Jimmy Carter’s fault

No. It’s BeBe Rebozo’s fault.

"... sale included 17 acres of land and all the original home furnishings."

Trump probably hauled it all to the dump. He reportedly hates antiques.

R36 Who would the Federal government be paying estate taxes to?

[quote] So even with his acuisition of Maro Lago he stiffed they seller and never paid for it? My God, he's always reconfirming my opinion of him as a horrible human being.

And such threads are always reconfirming my opinion of datalounge credulity. It took only moments of googling to confirm the holes in this story. The mere thought he could have secured this property without paying the owner and the owner would just let it slide was idiotic on its face.

Forty years later she seems bitter she was outmaneuvered. If she didn't want Trump to own the property she had the option of pulling out her checkbook again and writing another but larger check to the Post Foundation.

Tricky Dick and Bebe...a romance for the ages.

Dina may have been super nice and not superficial, but she cared about manners. Newer money inbreed yahoos were not her cup of tea.

[quote] Although Mar-a-Lago was beautiful, President Nixon preferred to stay at his friend Bebe Rebozo’s home in Key Biscayne, reports Vanity Fair

I doubt Nixon ever had the option of staying at Mar-a-Lago, since he resigned in August 1974, before the house was given to the US.

Everyone who was anyone in new york looked down on Trump as vulgar and wanted nothing to do with him or his family. They were dirt.

^ We tried to tell the voting masses that in 2016, but they were under his asshole spell and wouldn't listen

^They watch too much trash tv. I don't know anyone in NYC who watched his show or that kind of television.

Trump will always be looked down on, as he should. And his days of being invited to those big glittering liberal Hollywood celebrity packed events are over.

No more Met Gala's or Vanity Fair Oscar parties for him or Melania. It's a wrap, those days are over. His presidency was the last straw. Not being invited to those types of events with Movie Stars and Socialites will hurt Trump more than anything else will.

That's how shallow he is. He never deserved all of the fame wealth and opportunities he's had in his life. He squandered every good thing that ever came his way and he never did anything else to help others that wouldn't benefit him in some way.

Trump is a lost cause, rotten to the core.

He never went to the Met gala. He hated art because it was something else he couldn't do. Someone once asked him why he didn't collect the way other billionaires did. He said "You know what a Van Gogh is? It's some paper with some mud smeared on it." The real reason "I am actually not a billionaire" was, of course, not forthcoming.

R49 Trump did go to the Met gala. You need to do some Googling.

So it was Carter? It was handed over in 1981, under Reagan, so not so sure about that. But if it was Carter - he probably didn't think it was a good 'look' to have this huge mansion for Presidents while the economy was not in good shape.

Funny that the main reason he bought the place was because he was rejected from the Palm Beach Country Club. I hope that is true.

Trump THRIVES on being looked down on, he defines himself by it. That's why he thinks he gets the short end of the stick, that's why he fights everyone, that's why nothing is "fair," that's why he sees himself as an underdog. People identify with that shit, and with Trump, it isn't just political pandering - he believes it. And these people believe not only is Trump like them - they can be like Trump, a slob who worked (they think) his way to the top. To defeat Trump, you must understand this. His boorishness is an ASSET.

If the Carter administration is the one that returned it to the post trust, that makes a lot of sense. Jimmy Carter is a man of modest means. He's not into living decadently.

That makes a lot of sense.

[quote] because he was rejected from the Palm Beach Country Club. I hope that is true.

I'm certain it is at least as true as the non-payment story

R52 There's nothing "underdog" about Trump. He wanted to get his footing in Manhattan real estate and his father fred put up the financing to make Trump Tower on fifth Avenue a reality.

That's not "underdog" shit. That's I was born on third base and I get to put up a gaudy shrine to myself on fifth Avenue and you don't because my daddy has the money to make my dreams come true, and yours don't type if shit.

Trump was never the "underdog" he just like to play victim. He also loves to interject himself into things that have nothing to do with him either. Like the central park 5 incident and Obamas presidency. No one is ever thing of Trump, but he interjects himself into everything. That's how much he wants to be important.

Trump is a desperate sad individual.

DUH, R55. His underdog status is in his mind. Can you read?

Dina, Diana, Deanna, same thing. Meh.

R42 The thought of you even entertaining the idea of DL as an authoritative resource makes me laugh at you! You do realize this was an anecdote told by a Hollywood director and not a story from The New York Times, yes? You type grouchy and republican.

R52, I agree. The white underclass LIKES that Trump is hated by the elites. And it seems a lot of people underestimate how thuggish the American public has become. Or always was.

Mar-a-Lago was a bit of a white elephant.

Mar-a-Lago is actually a very playful and sophisticated design - pure bawdy camp, rather than kitsch. The architect was Joseph Urban, who was a set designer and later theater designer. He was capable of some severely elegant work - the New School theater in New York is one of his intact interiors and is a masterpiece - but this was pure fantasy even by the standards of Palm Beach.

I'm not sure what will become of it. I would like to see it opened to the public, but it is bound to become a weepy deplorable shrine.

But I agree that it would not be suitable as the Winter White House. It's just too over-the-top.

I watched the Dina Merrill episode of "The Nanny" yesterday. Even though her character of Elizabeth Sheffield was an absolute bitch, she was a funny bitch, and Dina looks like she's having a ball getting manhandled by both Fran & Sylvia, first by being locked in a flower cooler, then having Sylvia remove her lipstick from Dina's cheek by licking her fingers and wiping it off of her. Then she calls out flirtatiously to her unseen chauffeur, "Jean Luc".

As much as I love "The Nanny", the show dropped Trump's name all the time, and he even made a cameo on it (same episode where Rosie plays herself, but never together....), being a total asshole even with a script. In other episodes, Maxwell had a meeting with him, and Gracie had a play date with Ivanka. "Golden Girls" and "Designing Women" got it right with their bashing of him.

In other threads I have read about Dina, there have been comparisons with her and other actresses such as Lee Remick and Constance Towers, cool, smart beautiful sophisticaed blondes, both of whom played Phyllis in "Follies". Had Dina had a stronger singing voice, she could have played her or Joanne in "Company". I wondered if Dina and Constance knew each other, and did a search, but all I could find on them together was the fact that Constance and Mexican ambassador husband John Gavin attended a party for the L.A. premiered of "On Your Toes" which Dina appeared in (and did sing). Too bad there isn't a photo of them together. It would have been nice for them to have done a remake of the TV movie "The Letters" where Dina played the younger sister to Barbara Stanwyck where Dina plays that role and Constance plays Dina's old role.

Also, I just found a great TV movie called "The Brass Ring" where Dina plays a rare non-glamorous role as a mother suffering with depression. Sylvia Sidney played her mother in that. Dina was also very funny on a finale season of "Roseanne" where the Conners spend time with old money on a Cape Code estate (Episode: Hoi Polloi Meets Hoiti Toiti).

I propose that it be returned to the Park Service and reopened to the public with a huge sign that reads "NEVER AGAIN".

Dina Merrill, Ann Blyth (Veda!), Anne Jeffreys, Frances Bergen, Vicki Lawrence.

Fantastic insights on four great ladies.

I don't know why some of you act as though Trump in terms of his upbringing makes him "different" from pretty much every GOP nominee.

Low/Middle income white idiots have been voting for ELITE, silver-spooned, Republicans forever. They're full of shit with their "boot-straps" crap. They vote for white men who have no idea what it is to struggle to make a living, because they want to be treated as superior. They couldn't care less about the economic policies from the left that would actually HELP them. They simply want to be treated as infallible.

Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden - all from working class backgrounds

Bush, Bush, McCain, Romney, Trump - all from privilege.

"Low/Middle income white idiots have been voting for ELITE, silver-spooned, Republicans forever."

Good point, but that was the George HW Bush crowd, and they're dead. The new group favors the George W Bush/Trump type - the silver spoon elite that ACTS like a slob - just like them.

Dina Merrill also had a part on Rosanne in a later (the last?) season, where she played, what else, a rich fancy lady. When Moonlighting was on in the 1980s, there was a story line featuring DiPesto's mother. They hired Imogene Coca to play the role, which fit. I was hoping they's go completely wacko and hire someone like Dina Merrill just for laughs.

R68 That Roseanne episode was stolen at the very last second by veteran character actor Phil Leeds in drag as the wheelchair bound matriarch, remaining silent for much of the episode, but letting go when she's had enough.

I always felt like W Bush was putting on an act, given his privileged background. But then again the Bush family is not that rich. I've always thought of them as maybe upper middle class.

I don't see any mansion in which anyone grew up in. All of their homes always seemed to be pretty modest to me.

[quote] They vote for white men who have no idea what it is to struggle to make a living

R71, you think you've owned me by going back 60 years and the person you've chosen was someone who came from privilege and understood that fact? Way to go. You remind me of the people who say Bill Clinton was a draft dodger to counter the draft dodgers on the right or Bill's adultery when someone mentions a Republican adulterer or when we find out a Republican got an abortion for his mistress.

Why don't you people ever understand the difference? Did JFK try to destroy Social Security? Did he try to destroy every safety net meant to help working people? Do you understand the issue isn't being wealthy, it's not paying it forward when you were born into that wealth. When your instincts are to be greedy and selfish and take even more and do so on behalf of other wealthy people.

I don't mind if the President has a wealthy background. Generally that meant a good education; a sense of formality; and experience in speaking in public.

All of which is currently fucked out the window, of course.

The Mock Venetian stained glass window, no less.

Lauren Bacall wanted her buddy Dina Merrill to follow her on Broadway in Woman of the Year. The producers went another way and hired Raquel Welch, who got the best reviews of her career and better reviews than Bacall. So when Welch bowed out early with a pregnancy scare, the producers still refused to hire Dina and went with Debbie Reynolds, who was ill and couldn't keep the show from closing.

Bacall, who owned a piece of the show, was livid.

[quote]Dina Merrill Hated Donald Trump

Always ahead of her time.

Didn't Debbie pass out just once, r74? She was supposed to be great in the show, I just think she wasn't selling tickets.

I saw Bacall in Woman of the Year on Broadway. She was good, the show sucked. The only reason to have seen it was to see the star.

[quote] So when Welch bowed out early with a pregnancy scare

Why was it a "scare"?

Pregnancy at age 45, R78. Which was highly unlikely for Raquel.

Why didn't they cast Dina? Did they think she wouldn't be a draw? Or just to screw with Lauren?

R72 Republicans believe in self greed not public service.

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