"Penny Marshall & Cindy Williams" book, Chapter Two

This chapter focuses on Carole Penny Marshall (first name from Carole Lombard) from birth in 1942 to her arrival in California in '67.  And the family name was originally Marciano.

"Although the Marshalls and the clan of comedy writer and producer Carl Reiner were neighbors who lived opposite each other on the same block for seven years, they hardly knew each other.  Penny has only vague memories of the Reiner family, mostly because, she confesses with her typical deadpan wit, 'We weren't allowed to cross the street.' "  (That's probably my favorite quote in the book.)

Nonetheless, Penny did get Carl R.'s autograph, which she still had as of the time of this book.

I haven't read Penny's biography, but from the title, My Mother Was Nuts, I'm guessing that this book glosses over things a bit.  It does mention that Penny hated dancing but preferred it to chores, the deal her mother offered.

She was also insecure about her "ethnic looks," and notes, "To relive this [her '50s youth] before millions of Americans is a trauma."  She thought she wasn't pretty enough to be a star, so instead she dreamed of "being married with seventeen kids and living on a ranch"!  At the same time, her mother sent her to kosher summer camps because her mother "said Jewish boys make the best husbands."  She did date Jewish boy James Caan.

And she felt lonely because of the age gap between her and her siblings. 

She claims her mother thought New Mexico was closer than Ohio, although this might be a joke.  When Penny went to college in NM, she was "surrounded by all these blond six-footers.  I was in heaven...."  Just in case you were wondering if Penny had a type.

And she married one of them, Michael Henry.  The book is fuzzy on the chronology of her pregnancy, but I remember reading online that she got pregnant out of wedlock and considered abortion.  Instead, she got married and dropped out of college.

The marriage lasted two years and, at the time of this book, Penny apparently knew only vaguely that Mike lived in Arizona.  The Internet tells me he died in Phoenix in 2009 at age 65.

She continued to live in Albuquerque after the divorce, although she felt like she wore a "Scarlet Letter" as a divorcee.  She had various jobs but eventually got into acting.

And brother Garry was "an up-and-coming writer and producer" in L.A.  Re California, Penny says, "As soon as I moved out here, in 1967, I knew I had made the right decision.  The women in Hollywood were all neurotic.  They had all been married for a minute somewhere.  I didn't feel like an outcast."

After contacting Garry, she made arrangements to move there, with daughter Tracy.  "The last thing she would have expected was that less than ten years later, she would emerge as one of the hottest TV stars around," a good cliffhanger to end the chapter on.