Secrets, Lies & PASSIONS

THE ACADEMY AWARD-WINNING ACTRESS LED A COMPLICATED LIFE THAT INVITED RUMORS

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When Claudette Colbert heard the gossip about her love life, she was aghast. “She screamed!” the actress’ friend, novelist Leonora Hornblow, recalled. “She said, ‘I thought everyone knew I liked men!’”

In the 1930s, Claudette’s knowing jet-black eyes, easy laugh and great legs made her a superstar of the Golden Age. At one point, the twice-married actress earned more money in a year than anyone in Hollywood except MGM honcho Louis B. Mayer. “When I think of Claudette Colbert, I think about champagne bubbles,” Bernard F. Dick, author of Claudette Colbert: She Walked in Beauty, tells Closer. “She had a natural effervescence.”

Despite her irresistible charm