In 1950's Hollywood all of the on-screen rebels were of the male-persuasion. However inarticulate and unfocused it may have been, male stars could at least stand up and be counted. Discontent would emerge in more distorted ways with their female counterparts. The women of this golden age were the centerpiece of many a scandal. There were exceptions, most notably Robert Mitchum's conviction for possession of marijuana, which at the time was considered a Class A drug. There were several scandals that involved couples as with the on-again and off-again romantic relationships of Frank Sinatra and Ava Gardner and Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor come the 1960s.
It was the women who attracted the most attention. Life would imitate art more than anyone had anticipated. One of the biggest scandals of the time was Ingrid Bergman's affair with Roberto Rossellini, by whom she had a child. No matter that they would eventually become husband and wife - Ingrid Bergman brought down the wrath of heavy-handed Hollywood upon herself and seemed to even enjoy defying the whole moral order in breaking her own previously 'virtuous' off-screen image. Bergman was welcomed back to Tinseltown with the plum role of Anastasia in Anatole Litvak's 1956 film about the alleged survivor of Russian royal family for which she earned an Academy Award. Her scandals only made her ultimately more a palatable object of interest and sympathy. A similar result attended Land Turner's ambiguous involvement in the homicide of underworld figure Johnny Stompanato, which was reflected in her 1960 film, Portrait in Black.