"He Was a Beautiful Man"

When the service ended, an honor guard of Marine aviators carried the body of ex-Marine Tyrone Power, 45, from Hollywood's Chapel of the Psalms to a grave in Memorial Park Cemetery. Major Power deserved the attention; he had served his country well during World War II. As an actor, he had been better than many of Hollywood's handsome heroes. As a private citizen, he had certainly been no worse. But in paying its last respects to a man it genuinely liked--he had died in Spain on the set of his latest movie, Solomon and Sheba--Hollywood somehow had to turn the occasion into a supercolossal production. It brought to grisly life the mordant funeral fantasies of Evelyn Waugh or Nathanael West.

Dressed in solemn black, Ty's widow, Debbie, sat beside the open casket and held her husband's hand while the organ played Irving Berlin's I'll Be Loving You Always. Cinemactor Cesar Romero eulogized his pal: "He was a beautiful man. He was beautiful outside, and he was beautiful inside. Rest well, my friend." Actress Loretta Young caused a stir in the chapel by arriving in Oriental makeup from a stint before TV cameras. Outside, there were loud cheers for Yul Brynner, Ty's replacement as Solomon. "Look at him," one woman shouted. "He's growing a beard. And him with his bald head."

Babies bawled, while their parents attacked box lunches. A little boy fell into an artificial lake and sputtered up, screaming. A little girl got a hula-hoop lesson from her dad. Linda Christian, Ty's exwife, who had put on such a spectacular performance at the Italian burial of her good friend. Auto Racer Alfonso de Portago, made Hollywood headlines by staying away from the funeral at Debbie's request. If the crowd had any disappointment, it was that only one woman fainted.

In Spain, meanwhile, on the set of Solomon and Sheba, Tyrone Power's funeral marked a beginning, not an end, to trouble. Now that United Artists had decided not to cash in on a $2,500,000 insurance policy and pull out of the picture, problems piled up. Should they use a double to finish the scenes Ty had left undone? At least 50 applicants asked for the job. Even the final decision to hire Brynner and start again from scratch was plagued with difficulties. Stockier than Ty and almost 3 in. shorter, Yul would need all his costumes made over. He was already growing a beard so the last scenes would have to be shot first, then a shave and a run through the early days when the King of Israel was a beardless youth.

Big battle scenes already filmed on Saragossa's Los Monegros plains would have to be done over somewhere else. (Saragossa has already turned too cold.) Scouting parties spread out to the Canary Islands, and Malaga and Almeria on Spain's south coast. But it is not easy to find a sunny desert replete with enough Spanish soldiers (about 2,000) and enough horses (about 200). For a while, Ty's business partner, Ted Richmond, even considered Israel, finally gave up the idea because of a shortage of Israeli troops and possible international complications. ("What would Nasser say if we gave real arms to 2,000 Israeli soldiers?")

Back in Hollywood, most of the crowd had left before Linda Christian and Ty's two daughters, Romina, 7, and Taryn, 5, laid a 5-ft. cross of white gardenias on the grave--which was all right with Debbie. "Ty belongs to me now," said Debbie. "Whatever anybody else does is of no concern to me any more." Said Linda, "I am happy for her if she can find peace in that belief."

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