Gary Merrill on July 28, 1950. That same day, he married Bette Davis, his co-star from "All About Eve", and adopted her daughter Barbara from a previous marriage. He and Davis adopted two more children, Margo and Michael, but they had a bitter divorce in 1960. Often politically active, he campaigned in 1958 to elect the Democrat, Edmund Sixtus Muskie, as governor of Maine. Merrill also took part in the Selma to Montgomery marches in 1965 to promote Black voter registration. In response to U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson's Vietnam War policy, he unsuccessfully sought nomination to the Maine legislature as an
Bette Davis lukewarm reviews and failed at the box office, Hollywood columnists wrote that Davis' comeback had petered out, and an Academy Award nomination for "The Star" (1952) did not halt her decline. In 1952, Davis appeared in a Broadway revue, "Two's Company" directed by Jules Dassin. She was uncomfortable working outside of her area of expertise; she had never been a musical performer, and her limited theater experience had been more than 20 years earlier. She was also severely ill, and was operated on for osteomyelitis of the jaw. Margot was diagnosed as severely brain-damaged due to an injury sustained during