Veronica Lake - Later Years

Later Years

After a single film for 20th Century Fox, Slattery's Hurricane (1949), her career collapsed. By the end of 1951 she had appeared in one last film (Stronghold, which she later described as "a dog"), filed for bankruptcy, and divorced de Toth. The IRS seized the remainder of her assets for unpaid taxes. Lake turned to television and stage work and in 1955 married songwriter Joseph A. McCarthy.

After breaking her ankle in 1959, Lake was unable to continue working as an actress. She and McCarthy divorced, after which she drifted between cheap hotels in Brooklyn and New York City and was arrested several times for public drunkenness and disorderly conduct. A New York Post reporter found her working as a barmaid at the all-women's Martha Washington Hotel in Manhattan. At first, Veronica claimed that she was a guest at the hotel and covering for a friend. Soon afterward, she admitted that she was employed at the bar. The reporter's widely distributed story led to some television and stage appearances, most notably in the off-Broadway revival of the musical Best Foot Forward. (Her contract overlapped with the departing Liza Minnelli and the two briefly co-starred together.) In 1966, she had a brief stint as a TV hostess in Baltimore, Maryland, along with a largely ignored film role in Footsteps in the Snow.

Her physical and mental health declined steadily. By the late 1960s Lake was in Hollywood, Florida, apparently immobilized by paranoia (which included claims she was being stalked by the FBI).

She spent a brief period in England, where she appeared in the plays Madame Chairman and A Streetcar Named Desire.

When Veronica: The Autobiography of Veronica Lake (Bantam, 1972) was published, she promoted the book with a memorable interview on The Dick Cavett Show, as well as an episode of To Tell the Truth, on which the panel had to guess which of three disguised women was the "real" Veronica Lake. Two of the panelists, Bill Cullen and Peggy Cass, quickly disqualified themselves because they knew her. With the proceeds, she co-produced and starred in her last film, Flesh Feast (1970), a very low-budget horror movie with a Nazi-myth storyline. She then moved to the UK, where she had a short-lived marriage with an "English sea captain", Robert Carleton-Munro, before returning to the U.S. in 1973, having filed for divorce.

Lake was immediately hospitalized. Although she had made a cheerful and positive impression on the nurses who cared for her, she apparently was estranged from her three surviving children, particularly her daughters. Elaine Detlie became known as Ani Sangge Lhamo after becoming a member of the Subud faith in New Zealand. Diana became a secretary for the U.S. Embassy in Rome in the 1970s. Michael De Toth stayed with his mother on and off through the 1960s and 1970s. He married Edwina Mae Niecke. When Lake died, he claimed her body.