Joan Crawford's 4 Spouses: All About the Actress’ Husbands, Including a Pepsi-Cola Executive

Nicole BrieseThu, March 5, 2026 at 9:49 PM UTC

0

Joan Crawford and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. ; Joan Crawford; Joan Crawford and Alfred SteeleCredit: Getty (2)

Joan Crawford, née Lucille Fay LaSueur, was married four times, and according to the legendary film star, each of her husbands left her with more wisdom than the one before.

Crawford first wed actor Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in 1929. “We were both teenagers,” she wrote of her first spouse in her 1971 autobiography, My Way of Life.

The pair divorced in 1933, and Crawford went on to marry three more times with actors Franchot Tone (1935 to 1939) and Philip Terry (1942 to 1946) and Pepsi-Cola president and board chairman Alfred Steele, to whom she was wed from 1955 until his death in 1959.

The Berserk! actress opened up about the institution of matrimony in My Way of Life. “I’ve been married four times. Some people might say that anyone who’s been married that often isn’t meant for the state,” she said. “Three failures — if they can be called that — are the most terrible, heartbreaking, anguishing experiences anyone can have. And they get worse each time.”

Still, each one of Crawford’s legal unions held a lesson despite the pain their demise brought. “Marriage, like everything else, is a learning experience, and I try to learn something from everything that happens, even if it hurts like hell,” she added.

The author also learned from her significant others, writing, “I have been fortunate enough to marry men who were well-educated, cultivated, with a love of good literature, good music, all the fine arts.”

Here’s a look back at Joan Crawford’s four spouses.

Douglas Fairbanks Jr.

Joan Crawford and Douglas Fairbanks Jr.Credit: Getty

Crawford’s first march down the aisle was to wed fellow actor Fairbanks Jr. on June 3, 1929, at St. Malachy’s Roman Catholic Church.

According to Fairfield Jr., who spoke to The New York Times about their nuptials, their love affair was “romantic” and “sweet.”

The actor later claimed to the same outlet that his wedding to the Metro-Goldwyn Mayer (MGM) superstar was “psychologically hastened” by his parents’ opposition to their union.

Crawford had a different outlook. “Fun was the word for that one. We had a marvelous time,” she wrote in My Way of Life.

The duo got a chance to work together on 1929’s Our Modern Maidens, in which she played Billie Brown and Fairbanks Jr. portrayed Gil Jordan.

Joan Crawford and Douglas Fairbanks Jr.Credit: Edward Steichen/Conde Nast via Getty

Crawford hinted at trouble when she wrote of the differences in their career approaches. “Doug taught me a lot of intangible things. To be more tolerant, to respect myself ... I tried to give him confidence in his own talent ... but he wasn’t as ambitious as I was,” the actress said.

Fairbanks Jr. shared a similar sentiment in a July 1930 issue of Vanity Fair. “[She] is one of the few people in the film colony who does not change her manner at the close of the working day,” he wrote. “She is consumed with an overwhelming ambition.”

According to the Our Blushing Brides star, Fairbanks Jr. was more extroverted than she. “I think he needed more outside stimulation than I did,” Crawford noted in her book.

By 1933, the two had called it quits, as The New York Times reported.

"That marriage wasn’t a failure. It ended because I took my work with deadly seriousness,” Crawford penned. "I wanted Douglas, but I wanted work too … We parted with deep sadness and mutual respect.”

Franchot Tone

Joan Crawford and Franchot ToneCredit: Getty

Crawford’s relationship with her second husband Tone, to whom she was wed from 1935 to 1939, developed naturally, since they saw each other “almost constantly” on set.

The actors costarred in Today We Live, Dancing Lady, Sadie McKee, No More Ladies and more. “Our friendship deepened until we had a very good thing going for us,” Crawford wrote in My Way of Life.

While Crawford had misgivings about marrying a second time, Tone won her over with what she called his “quiet self-assurance” and “sophistication.” “I loved him … I cherished every minute we spent together,” she wrote.

Mayor Herbert W. Jenkins presided over the couple’s Englewood Cliffs, N.J., wedding on Oct. 11, 1935, per The New York Times.

Advertisement

Crawford and Tone intentionally spent time as a couple away from the cameras. “We both worked hard at building a life together that was completely apart from our acting, and to a large extent we succeeded,” she wrote in her book. “We were so much less social than most of Hollywood.”

Joan Crawford and Franchot ToneCredit: General Photographic Agency/Getty

According to Crawford, though Tone was still receiving “good” parts in films, it didn’t trump her “stardom,” causing a rift between them.

“One writer said sensitive husbands don’t like second billing. Franchot was sensitive — very sensitive,” she wrote. “Perhaps I should’ve given up my career entirely. But I felt I was born to be an actress and I’d worked so hard to achieve what I had!”

The New York Times reported that the two separated on July 20, 1938 “on the most friendly terms.”

On Feb. 10, 1939, Crawford filed for divorce on the grounds of “mental cruelty,” claiming that Tone treated her in an “inhumane manner” and caused her “great mental suffering and distress” by insisting she go out with him socially after work.

Philip Terry

Joan Crawford and Philip TerryCredit: Getty

Crawford and Terry were introduced by a mutual friend early on in 1942, according to the (via The New York Times). Six months later, they said their “I dos” on July 21, about 10 minutes after midnight at the ranch estate of attorney Neil McCarthy.

While Crawford said that Terry, also an actor, brought her “peace of mind and companionship,” she didn’t count him among her great loves.

“I was … wanting a real marriage and being so much alone,” she wrote in her memoir. “That was my only excuse for marrying Philip Terry. ... I persuaded myself that it was love. It wasn’t. That was my fault from beginning to end.”

Despite the lack of passion on Crawford’s part, the couple started a family together. They welcomed their son Christopher via adoption in 1943. (Crawford was already a mom to daughter Christina, whom the actress adopted on her own in 1939. The actress later adopted fraternal twins Cathy and Cindy in 1947.)

Crawford also enjoyed professional success during her marriage: She won an Oscar for 1945’s Mildred Pierce, which she filmed while married to Terry. But the pair had called it quits by the time she received the award at the 18th Academy Awards, having separated on Dec. 16, 1945, per the (via The New York Times).

Crawford filed for divorce from Terry on March 12, 1946, alleging that her third husband treated her in a “cruel and inhumane manner.”

Alfred Steele

Alfred Steele and Joan Crawford, circa 1955Credit: Getty

Crawford and Pepsi-Cola president and board executive Steele exchanged their vows on May 10, 1955, per the Miami Herald.

According to Crawford’s 1971 memoir, the couple had been planning a big wedding in New Jersey with 600 guests set to attend when the businessman abruptly changed course.

“We were just sitting around feeling so happy and talking about how happy we were. Suddenly, Al said, ‘Let’s fly to Vegas tonight and get married,’ " Crawford later told the Miami Herald. “I said, ‘Alright. Let’s go.' It was as simple as that.”

The New York Times reported that Crawford and Steele hopped a private jet from Hollywood, Calif., to Las Vegas. At 2:10 a.m., they were wed in the penthouse suite of the Flamingo Hotel in an intimate ceremony presided over by Judge John Mendoza.

Crawford later told talk show host David Frost that she had overcome a fear of flying in order to walk down the aisle a fourth time. “I was scared to death … and I flew in order to marry him and I’ve been flying ever since,” she said during a 1970 show appearance.

Joan Crawford with Alfred Steele, circa 1957Credit: Bettmann/CORBIS/Bettmann Archive

Unlike her previous marriages, the Mommie Dearest subject said her interest in her husband’s work helped to bring them closer. “From the very beginning of our marriage, his company became our child,” she wrote. “We stimulated each other, out of mutual love and pride.”

The pair also traveled together, taking frequent trips to Beirut, the Belgian Congo, Uganda, Kenya, Zanzibar and Mexico, among other destinations. As Crawford revealed in her book, they even settled for “a time” in Switzerland.

No matter their location, Crawford said she worked to make their house a home. “During the most blissful years of my life, the dead center of my life was my husband,” she wrote in My Way of Life. “I worked with him, and I made sure that he was as comfortable and happy as a man could … be.”

The couple’s adventures were cut short on April 19, 1959, however, when Steele died of a heart attack. According to the Miami Herald, Crawford was with him at the time of his death. “We had one month less than four years of beautiful happy marriage. I’m luckier than most people,” she later told Frost.

Per The New York Times, Crawford was elected as the first female director of the Pepsi-Cola Company’s board two days after Steele’s death.

on People

Original Article on Source

Source: “AOL Entertainment”