Paul Donnelly says Barrymore's inability to walk was caused by a drawing table falling on him in 1936, breaking Barrymore's hip. Barrymore tripped over a cable while filming "Saratoga" in 1937 and broke his hip again. (Film historian Robert Osborne says Barrymore also suffered a broken kneecap.) The injury was so painful that Donnelly, quoting Barrymore, says that Louis B. Mayer bought $400 worth of cocaine for Barrymore every day to help him cope with the pain and allow him to sleep. Author David Schwartz says the hip fracture never healed, which was why Barrymore could not walk, and MGM historian John Douglas Eames describes the injury as "crippling". Barrymore himself said in 1951, that it was breaking his hip twice that kept him in the wheelchair. He said he had no other problems, and that the hip healed well, but it made walking exceptionally difficult. Film historian Allen Eyles reached the same conclusion.