Like Kane, Harold McCormick was divorced by his aristocratic first wife, Edith Rockefeller, and lavishly promoted the opera career of his only modestly talented second wife, Ganna Walska. In 1920 McCormick arranged for her to play the lead in a production of Zaza at the Chicago Opera. She fled the country after her Italian vocal instructor told her that she was unprepared to perform the night before the sold-out premiere.
