"IS there a Howard Hughes?"
This was the cliché question in every news report during his last days, as they speculated on the whereabouts of the mystery tycoon whom nobody had seen for ten years, his mind gone, his kidneys shot away through decades of codeine addiction. It was a sad end for the truly brilliant innovator, brought down by his own sheer professionalism. Testing a new reconnaissance aircraft, he had lost a propeller and ought to have baled out. Instead he insisted on completing the landing in order to understand his plane better, and suffered a bad head injury, from which his apparent recovery turned out to be superficial.
Presently he began to show signs of growing eccentricity that led to that weird hermit life, with its obsessive rules of hygiene, observed by his full-time aides, two of whom are interviewed on this video. I had often wondered what kind of gremlin would volunteer for that kind of second-hand life, though these two seem normal enough. Yet the lifestyle must have tested their patience and, according to some reports, their ethics.
There is no doubting the envy that his earlier life aroused. In between breaking aviation records around the world, he is squiring (almost literally) every beauty in Hollywood, before becoming the biggest hotel-owner in Vegas. But Hollywood and Vegas, with their deceptive dazzle, may be the clue. Notice how none of those romantic conquests led to a close, lasting relationship. Why did he have to ask one of his co-directors to keep procuring these girls for him anyway? And why were all of them so expensively sworn to silence?
Although his contribution to the American war effort was prodigious, Tinseltown managed to spoil the story, when it turned out that he had treated President Roosevelt's son to a whole week of wine, women and song, as a sweetener for a big order of planes, apparently not as good as the rival product. This looked shabby at the height of a war when millions were being asked to make daily sacrifices.
From the dozen or so commentators among Hughes' close circle, we can detect that he moved in a decidedly cynical world, only Hollywood columnist Jim Bacon reflecting an air of decency and good cheer that enlivens the viewing experience.
