Doris Day, the quintessential 50s gal—more wholesome than brown bread, more American than apple pie. She didn’t have the sizzling sensuality of Marilyn Monroe or the acid tongue of Katherine Hepburn, but her sweetly-sexy screen persona endeared her to the hearts of millions.

Off screen, her life was at odds to the carefree romantic she portrayed on the silver screen. She had a trail of failed marriages and had braved circumstances more extraordinary than anything Warner Brothers could dream up. But just like the screen heroine she kept her chin up and emerged smiling.

On the eve of her 80th birthday, Natalie Hancock looks back at the ups and downs of one of the 20th century’s most enduring screen legends.

Doris Day made her last film, You Get Six With Eggroll, in 1968 and, with the death of her husband Marty Melcher in the same year, at just 44, she called a halt to one of cinema’s most memorable careers.

Since then she has slipped off the radar emerging only for a TV series in the 70s and to collect a Golden Globe Lifetime Achievement award in 1989. An honour that was long overdue.

She has secreted herself away in the picturesque California town of Carmel, where she can live away from the public eye. Her name no longer appears in colourful print on movie posters, in fact, the only thing she puts her name to these days is the Doris Day Animal Foundation. She believes that caring for animals has given her the secure loving relationship that she could never find with a man.

It seems extraordinary that the woman who has twice been voted the world’s favourite actress should find herself devoid of the type of relationship that typified her on-screen encounters.

The truth is that she was never short of offers, but she had a habit of picking the wrong ones. In fact, she once joked that anyone who had ever proposed, had been accepted. With four marriages behind her, she must have wished she had been as picky as she was in her dramatic rendezvous!

But her love life was not the only area which gave cause for concern.

Born on April 3, 1924 to two music teachers in Ohio, Doris Mary Ann Von Kappelhoff had no idea of the starry heights to which she would ascend.

Her first sojourn into the world of showbiz was winning 500 dollars in a dancing competition. But she was about to leave on a state tour when her car was hit by a train. Her leg was severely injured and doctors feared she would never walk again. She had to undergo 14 months of recuperation and, during that time, in order to keep her spirits up, she took singing lessons. It became quite obvious that she had a real talent.

When she was back on her feet, she auditioned for the Rapp Band. Barney Rapp, the bandleader, was knocked off his feet by her honeyed tones and he asked the young singer her name. When she answered Doris Mary Ann Von Kappelhoff he said, “that’s real pretty kid, but it won’t fit on the marquee outside.”

She then took her name from her favourite song, Day by Day, and so a star was born.

Unfortunately, her time with the band was not all happy.

It was during this period she met her first husband, trombonist Al Jordan. She married him when she was just 16. He was an extremely jealous and violent man who systematically abused her mentally and physically. When Day told him she was pregnant with his child, he brought her the name of an abortionist. When she refused, he later put a gun to her stomach and threatened to kill both her and the baby. He even badly beat her when she was eight months pregnant. She finally got rid of him by changing the locks to her apartment.

Two years later he put a gun to his head, this time he pulled the trigger.

Free from her oppressive relationship with Jordan, her career began to soar. She was touring all over the country and Hollywood studios were starting to show interest in her fresh-faced talent.

Unfortunately, come 1946, another failed marriage, this time to musician George Weidler, cast a shadow over Day’s personal life. But the following year would see her luck change again.

In 1947, Warner Brothers had plans to bring a lavish musical comedy called Romance on the High Seas to the screen. Arrangements had been made with MGM to borrow Judy Garland to star in the picture, unfortunately, Garland was unable to commit to the project for personal reasons.

Betty Hutton was then cast in the role, however, she discovered she was pregnant and was forced to bow out. In desperation, the movie’s songwriters, Jules Styne and Sammy Cahn, urged 23-year-old Doris Day to audition for the role after hearing her sing at a Hollywood party. Reluctantly, Doris auditioned and, to her astonishment, landed the coveted role.

By this time she was already a famous recording artist with her album Sentimental Journey being a million seller and earning her a gold disc. Her debut in Romance on the High Seas was widely acclaimed and one critic said, “Day throws herself into her movie debut like a woman aiming for a passing lifeboat from the deck of the Titanic.”

It wasn’t long before she was one of Hollywood’s hottest properties.

In 1953, while Monroe and Jane Russell were shimmying on a showboat and seducing in sequins, down the road at Warner Brothers, Doris Day was strapping on a gun belt and furs for her part as the rootinest tootinest woman in the wild west—Calamity Jane.

This was the film that would catapult her to new stratospheric heights. It also led to a string of roles in romantic comedies like Pillow Talk, That Touch of Mink and Move Over Darling.

Her fame also enabled her to spread her acting wings and undertake roles that weren’t in her typical sweet n’ sassy niche. She played opposite Jimmy Stewart in the Hitchcock thriller, The Man Who Knew Too Much and In Love Me or Leave Me she played Ruth Etting, a jazz singer trying to make it to the bright lights of Broadway. These subtle performances were often underrated and she was still favoured for her more frivolous roles.

At this time, it also looked like her love life was finally blossoming. She met and married her agent Marty Melcher. Outwardly they seemed very happy. Melcher adopted Terry, Day’s son by Al Jordan, and things seemed to be on the up.

However, behind the scenes, friends thought Melcher too controlling. He would have the final say as to whether Day would do a film or not. He also signed her up for projects she didn’t want to be involved with.

The full extent of his manoeuvrings was not discovered until his death in 1968. It transpired that Melcher had lost every penny of Day’s fortune through embezzlement and bad investments. He had also signed her up to star in a television series and other network specials.

As these commitments were made without her knowledge, Day could have hired a lawyer to free her from them, but taking a lesson from one of her characters she just whip cracked away, “a contract is a contract”, she said and she worked to fulfil her obligations.

By this time, as the feminist movement grew in strength, her role as the sweet ingenue become outmoded and, for the first time since the 40s, Doris had fallen out of favour with the film world.

She had been working since her early teens, and described this time as an opportunity to “play house.” She even had another go at marriage, but her 1976 union to businessman Barry Comden barely lasted three years. But still the irrepressible Day held on. “There were times when I wasn’t always up,” she admits. “Everything could be calm and peaceful, then the next day the bottom dropped out. What can you do? Moan and groan and feel sorry for yourself? No, you pull yourself up by your bootstraps and you get on with life.”

Instead she ploughed her energies into the Doris Day Animal Foundation, helping stray animals and giving them a quality of life that even the most spoiled pets could only dream of with daily meals of fresh meat, fruit and vegetables and brown rice.

Now, after years of exile, the post feminist, post politically correct posse, have finally realised there is nothing wrong with good clean fun. Doris Day has now found herself very much back in vogue, with films like Down With Love paying homage to the particular brand of romantic comedy that Day made her own.

Whatever your view, one thing seems clear. It seems fickle fashion has come full circle and Doris Day is back where she should be—on top.