March 7, 1932

From Luella O. Parsons:

Joan Crawford is the latest actress under consideration to play the role in Rain that Jeanne Eagels created on the stage. I think I might say that it’s more than consideration since there have been several conferences between Nicholas Schenck for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Joseph Schenck for United Artists. Furthermore, Miss Crawford has expressed a willingness to play the colorful role in the South Sea Island drama.
I have an idea it will be a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer-United-Artists picture, if you know what I mean. The Schencks are brothers and there will probably be some sort of a partnership arrangement.
I won’t be much surprised if Raoul Walsh directs Rain. He is now definitely through with Fox and at the moment is listening to several interesting offers. Remember, he directed Gloria Swanson in the silent version of Rain.



Maurice Chevalier is going to keep on a-singing and a-singing for Paramount. Dick Rogers and Larry Hart have declined an offer in New York to write the words and music for a coming Broadway musical comedy for Chevalier. Paramount put them under a new contract and their first assignment is an original for the popular Frenchman. He makes two this coming year. There is a report that Jeanette MacDonald will sign with Paramount to play opposite Chevalier in the big musical numbers.


HAYS PLANS POLL ON MOVIE CHOICES

HEAD OF INDUSTRY SAYS IT SEEKS TO ADVANCE FILMS IN THE POPULAR ESTEEM

Change In Taste Apparent

Questionnaires to Be Distributed Among People In All Walks of Life Throughout Country

Hollywood, Cal., March 6 (UP)
Will Hays and the men who make motions pictures want to know the public’s preference in screen entertainment, and who in the family dictates the choice of programs.
Mr. Hays, president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America, Inc., announced today that editors, clergymen, educators, businessmen, and housewives, as well as a wide commonality of motion picture fans, would be polled throughout the country in an effort to determine the likes and dislikes of movie audiences, all to the end that pictures may be advanced in popular esteem.
The questionnaire will ask whether the husband or wife chooses the film entertainment for the family. It is hoped to establish a type of pictures preferred by parents for children.

Among other queries are:
What difference, if any, exists between the kind of entertainment that “goes big” on Broadway, and that which attracts the main street audiences?
Is realism or romance preferred on the screen?
May classical drama expect to receive popular support?
Is there a difference in the entertainment requirements of the debutante and the shop girl?
“A definite change in taste in motion picture requirements is already manifesting itself,” the announcement said.
“Pictures of a dramatic and intellectual calibre that would not have been successful as popular entertainment a few years ago are not only being received enthusiastically by motion picture fans, but are bringing into the theater new patrons.




GLORIA SWANSON STARS AT PALACE

“Tonight or Never” Is Sophisticated Comedy

Gloria Swanson is seen on the Palace screen currently in the romantic comedy hit, “Tonight or Never.”
Miss Swanson demonstrates great tact and subtlety in the handing of comedy sequences, especially when she sets out to find herself a gigolo. Her gowns display a great variety of Spring styles. Her leading man is Melvyn Douglas. The story is very sophisticated.
Metrotone News, an Our Gang comedy and Vernon Geyer at the organ complete the program.
The Palace announces that starting today and continuing throughout the week, photos of babies will be presented free.

March 6, 1932

LUNT, FONTANNE WILL NOT MAKE FILM THIS YEAR

New York, March 5 (AP)
Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne have about decided not to go to Hollywood this summer and make another picture. Instead they plan to make their second invasion of London to appear with Noel Coward in a comedy he is writing. The Lunts are still playing to standing room here with “Reunion at Vienna.”

LINDBERGH KIDNAPPING PICTURES AT AZTEC

An airplane edition of the Paramount Sound News devoted to the kidnapping of Charles Lindbergh, Jr., made its appearance on the screen at the Aztec Theater yesterday, the scenes having been printed and developed while en route from New Jersey to Kansas City. These scenes will be retained as part of the new program starting today.
Included in the scenes are views of Col. Lindbergh and his wife, the estate with its police guards, an airplane view of the home and surrounding country, the window out of which the child was carried down a crude ladder, as well as scenes of Miss Betty Gow, the baby’s nurse, taking the child for a buggy ride around the Lindbergh estate two months ago.

STAR’S FATHER DIES

Hollywood, Cal. March 5 (UP)
A heart attack caused the death today of Charles Sherman Ruggles, 73, father of Charlie Ruggles, film comedian, and Wesley Ruggles, screen director.

From Hubbard Keavy’s “Screen Life In Hollywood”:



Like most European stage people, Nora Gregor, who came here for German-version pictures and is staying for English talkies, is superstitious.
Before she signed her contract, she visited a numerologist to see if her name would do.
“Black cats scare me, I always pick up pins, and whistling back stage,” she says, “I can’t tolerate.”
“So I just had to see if I had the right name.”
The numerologist decided “Nora” wouldn’t do at all. So long as she stays in this country, Nora is using her given name, Eleanora.
Miss Gregor, a protégé of Berlin’s famous Max Reinhardt, is an Austrian, born in Italy. When she came to America about two years ago she knew not half a dozen words of English.
While making “His Glorious Night,” and “The Trial of Mary Dugan” in German, Miss Gregor realized Hollywood would be a rather nice place to live.
Eight months later she was prepared to compete with the best of Hollywood’s actresses, and is. She was cast the other day as the “Mistress” in Robert Montgomery’s “Mister and Mistress."



“MONSTER” JOINS CLUB

Boris Karloff, Universal’s new dramatic star, has joined Hollywood’s famous Cricket club, along with Clive Brook, Ronald Colman, Conway Tearle, C. Aubrey Smith, and others of the English colony in Hollywood. Cricket bowlers say “the monster” is a wicked batter at the wicket.




YOUNG BEERY SIGNED

Noah Beery, Jr., has been signed by Universal to play in its serial, “Heroes of the West.”

UNWITTING BANDIT

Robert Montgomery says “an actor we all know” gave a fellow a lift as he was returning home late one night. After a few minutes, he felt in his pocket for his watch. It wasn’t there.
Taking a gun from his overcoat, he pointed it at the stranger and said “Gimme that watch.”
The fellow handed him a watch and then was ordered out of the car.
When the actor got home he found his watch on the dresser where he’d left it.

JUST SOUP

Joel McCrea worked on the beach at Waikiki with a 310 pound turtle in a scene for “The Bird of Paradise.” The turtle comes back to Hollywood with the troupe for tank shots in the RKO studios. Then, alas, soup.

WASN’T BEER

Maybe he wouldn’t. Anyway, it was hot on the set where John Barrymore was playing a scene for his new picture “State’s Attorney,” and a lot of mouths watered as the star poured foaming amber liquid into a tall glass.
“Gosh,” remarked one electrician, “do you suppose that was real beer?”
“Naw,” snapped another, “didn’t you see him empty his glass into the sink when the director said “cut.”



(Home of Norma Talmadge and Joseph Schenck)

Norma Talmadge and Joseph Schenck will divide millions, ‘tis said, before they part.




NEW SERIAL QUEEN

The title “serial queen” has been in abeyance for some time. It used to be held by Pearl White, Grace Cunard and Ruth Roland. It now seems more likely to be about to descend upon Lucille Brown. This beautiful and adventurous actress has just completed “The Air Mail Mystery” with James Flavin, Universal’s West Point leading man, and Al Wilson, world famous stunt flier. It is her third Universal serial.




“THE DARK HORSE”

In this presidential election year of 1932, William Powell’s next starring picture for Warner Bros., and a most timely one, will be “The Dark Horse,” in which Powell will play the role of “a fighting, dynamic politician,” according to a wire from the West Coast. The picture will go into production at an early date under the direction of Mervyn LeRoy. The original story was written by an anonymous author who is said to be intimately acquainted with the details of political life as it is lived in modern America. Further details will be announced shortly.



HAS LITTLE REST

Rest is only a word in the dictionary to Helen Twelvetrees, blonde charmer of RKO Pictures. Finishing her new production, “Young Bride,” one day, she started to work opposite John Barrymore in “State’s Attorney,” the next.

PLANES USEFUL

“Locations” used to be picked out by studio experts from automobiles. Now they are picked out by airplane. Al Rogell spent a day over New Mexico and Arizona mountains, mines, deserts and valleys for the proper scenic locations for Tom Mix’s picture “Desert Loot,” which goes into production at Universal City this week.




“NIGHT WORLD” CAST

Hobart Henley has completed his picture “Night World” at Universal City. “Night World’ has the heaviest cast of any Universal pictures since “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.” It included Lew Ayres, Mae Clarke, Boris Karloff, Dorothy Revier, Hedda Hopper, Dorothy Peterson, Russell Hopton, Huntley Gordon, Arletta Duncan, Florence Lake, Bert Roach and Clarence Muse, celebrated colored actor who was added for the final week of production.



BEA LILLIE AT STATE FRIDAY

Beatrice Lillie, featured in the Fox Movietone musical farce “Are You There?” showing at the State theater Friday, has quite an international background, being London’s and New York’s favorite comedienne. Miss Lillie was born in Canada and is the wife of Sir Robert Peel.



COMEDY GANG FILM COMING

El Brendel and Fifi Dorsay are starred in their funniest Fox comedy, “Mr. Lemon of Orange,” which will be the featured attraction at the Grand theater. Brendel has a dual role, one as an inoffensive boy salesman, and the other as a hard-boiled racketeer who is mistaken for the salesman and vice versa. Fifi has the role of a night club singer who is determined to put Brendel “on the spot.” John G. Blystone directed.



PANAMA FLO NOW ON SCREEN

Helen Twelvetrees, star of “Millie” and “Her Man,” is featured at the State theater in “Panama Flo.”
Staged against a background of Panama and South America, it is the tale of a New York showgirl stranded by a perfidious sweetheart, who is tricked into accompanying an unscrupulous oil “wildcatter” into the jungle as his housekeeper.
When the sweetheart attempts to rob the oil man, however, she shoots her lover. The outcome of this strange triangle provides the climax.
Playing the other principal roles will be found Robert Armstrong and Charles Bickford.

March 5, 1932

BETTY BRONSON PLANS TO WED

Asheville, N.C., Mar. 5 (AP)
Friends here today confirmed a report from Hollywood that Betty Bronson, film star, had become engaged to Ludwig Lauerhaus of Asheville, who went to Hollywood recently to become connected with the motion picture industry.
W. J. Cocke, Jr., attorney for the large Lauerhaus interests here, said the report was correct, adding that the Asheville man had met Miss Bronson three years ago on a transatlantic liner.
Lauerhaus, who is about twenty-eight years old, went to Hollywood last summer.

LOUIS JOHN BARTELS FOUND DEAD ON COAST

Star of “The Show Off” Had Been Appearing in Movies at Hollywood Studios

Los Angeles, March 4 (Special to the New York Times)
Louis John Bartels, 36 years old, popular stage and screen actor, was found dead in his Hollywood home late today.
He came to Hollywood about a year ago from New York to assume a role in “The Canary Murder Case.” He later appeared in “The Florodora Girl” and several other pictures. He was also featured in a series of comedy shorts.
Before coming West he had appeared in several Broadway successes in New York, among the most important being “The Show-off.” He had been on the stage for about ten years. He lived here with his father, Charles Bartels.
The exact cause of the death of Mr. Bartels will remain undetermined until after an autopsy, but police surgeons said they had treated him several times recently for acute alcoholism.
Rosalie Stewart, who produced “The Show-off,” said last night that Mr. Bartels was born in Chicago. His last New York stage engagement was in “The Five o’Clock Girl,” a musical comedy.



VALLEE TO BUY HOME IN WEST

Los Angeles, Mar. 5 (AP)
Rudy Vallee, radio crooner, who left his bride in tears when he departed for New York Thursday night to resume fulfilling his radio contract, is planning a Los Angeles home, it was reported today when negotiations were opened for purchase of an acre and a half estate on Beverly Boulevard. Vallee will occupy the home when he returns with a New York show which is to fulfill an engagement at a local theater.
Mrs. Vallee, the former Fay Webb, daughter of Chief of Police C. E. Webb of Santa Monica, probably will remain on the coast until her husband returns. Vallee recently paid her a ten-day visit.



WOULDN’T QUIT SO LUKAS WINS

After reviewing Paul Lukas’ recent success on the silver screen, it seems more or less in order to look back a few years to the time that Lukas had all but bought his ticket back to Hungary – a “flop” as far as pictures were concerned.
It sort of helps one’s morale in these depressive days to hear about others who have had an uphill battle – and come out on top.
Lukas came over from Hungary during the silent picture days. Having never had an occasion to speak English before, he spoke it very poorly. Then the talkies descended on Hollywood, spelling the doom of a great many players. Some just dropped out of sight. Others, Emil Jannings and Pola Negri among them, went back to Europe.
But Lukas didn’t want to return to his native land. That, however, didn’t make any difference to the studio executives. They told him he was through and tried to buy his contract. However, they wanted to pay only a certain price. The actor wanted more. Finally he was told, “Come back tomorrow.”
The following day he was told that the studio would meet his price.
“I am sorry, gentlemen, but I have decided I do not desire to stop,” he replied. “I can learn to talk English very well. Why not give me the chance? You must pay me anyway – let me try what I can do.”
That argument went on for hours. Lukas had made up his mind that he wouldn’t be licked. His arguments won out and today he is doing better than he ever did before.

From Luella O. Parsons:
Los Angeles, Mar. 5



I think Mata Hari did it. The glamorous Great Garbo created particularly by George Fitzmaurice has made him one of the most sought after directors for women stars in Hollywood. Constance Bennett has wanted Fitzmaurice as her director for a long time and when has there been a time when Connie hasn’t gotten just what she wanted? You really have to hand it to her for sticking to her convictions.
At any rate, when George Fitzmaurice finishes As You Desire Me, he will move over to Radio Pictures to direct Constance Bennett in her next picture, Free Lady, for them.
Greta’s next will undoubtedly be Sun of St. Moritz, based on a German novel by P.O. Rockett, and George Fitzmaurice will probably direct it, that is, if Garbo decides to remain in America. I am betting ten to one she will sign that waiting contract.



Eileen Percy, newspaper writer, becomes an actress again in State’s Attorney, John Barrymore’s current picture at Radio. She plays the second lead opposite Barrymore and Helen Twelvetrees. I have often wondered why Eileen has not had more good motion picture jobs offered her. She has beauty and she has talent. Yet the companies engage girls without her experience and who haven’t half her personality. While Eileen has been doing newspaper work and doing it very well, the screen is her real love.



LEWIS’ ‘ARROWSMITH’ DOING BIG BUSINESS

“Arrowsmith,” Sidney Howard’s adaptation of the Sinclair Lewis novel, with Ronald Colman and Helen Hayes in its leading roles, is currently in its eighth week at the Gaiety theater, New York.





TOO GOOD LOOKS COST HER PLACE

Hollywood, Mar. 5 (NEA)
Nothing is a more pleasant shock to a character actress than to be told that she is too good looking for a particular role.
Take the word of Minna Gombell for that . Minna hasn’t been put in the wheel chair class yet by any means. And she is very attractive in her own natural blond way. But character actresses aren’t given to dwelling a great deal upon whatever beauty they may or may not have. And Miss Gombell has been playing character roles since she signed her first film contract with Fox about a year ago.
Hence it was quite a shock to her when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer asked to borrow her for a role in Joan Crawford’s next film and then decided that she was too good looking.
“Imagine me too pretty,” Minna exclaimed as she told me of the incident. “I guess this old body isn’t ready for burial after all.”
When Miss Gombell first went to work on the Fox lot her contract read “actress and diction instructor.” For four months she actually taught diction to the younger players around the studio – at the same time proving her teachings by walking in and nearly stealing every film in which she appeared.
She is spending her full time acting now but that contract naming her as an instructor has been placed among her most treasured possessions.
Out of a make-up this actress is more fun than a tubful of apples on Hallowe’en night. She has a highly developed sense of humor and loves to play practical jokes of the variety which couldn’t possibly result disastrously.



Also she is a perfect hostess, unique in Hollywood in that she introduces all guests to all others whom they don’t already know. That custom became obsolete around the movie village years ago when parties began assuming gigantic proportions.
“I guess it is just my old-fashioned Eastern training,” she explains – Minna was born and educated in Baltimore.
Miss Gombell always has had a secret ambition to write, but never could quite muster up sufficient courage, being afraid that somebody might tell her that she had better stick to acting.



PAGAN LADY COMING TO LYRIC SUNDAY

“Pagan Lady,” a Columbia picture featuring Evelyn Brent, is to be the main attraction at the Lyric Theater Sunday and Monday.
Miss Brent “falls” for a missionary and is willing to marry him to save him from the avenging guns of her rum-running sweetheart, but is it fair of her to marry this young idealist?
That is the question settled in “Pagan Lady.”
Conrad Nagel plays the missionary and Charles Bickford the rum-running sweetheart. Others in the cast are Ronald Young, William Farnum and Lucille Gleason.

BILL HART SAYS OLD PLAYS OWED SUCCESS TO PLAYERS, AND NEW ONES ARE NOT SO

The big difference between the show business of today and yesterday, as William S. Hart sees it, is mainly in the actor. And it's principally that success, as now measured, carries dollars and cents as the yardstick. The dollar has replaced the satisfaction and pride, now practically extinct, which arose from the knowledge of giving a good performance and which was the measure that was once used, says Hart.



And this fact, in turn, is due to another - the disappearance of the road and its companies, opines William S. "There is no stage in America today," he declares, "because the incubators that bred actors, the stock companies and the road shows, are things of the past." Hence, he says, the desire to have approval gauged by the reaction of audiences, to hear someone say, "That was the best performance you ever gave," has become nearly extinct. Hart maintains that he is prouder of the fact that Lew Wallace complimented him on his portrayal of "Messala" in "Ben Hur" thirty-one years ago than he is because he can write a good-sized check today.

Regardless of what the field may have been years ago, silent pictures or the stage, Hart feels that both actors and managers used to feel a greater pride in the artistic outcome of their plays and films than currently. The work was taken far more seriously then from the production angle.



It was in 1914, after 12 years of legit trouping that Hart made his first picture. He was one of the earlier stage players in Hollywood period. There's a big gap between the salaries of those days and contemporary wages, but in the first year of his picture work Hart explains this did not exist. It was in 1925 that the salary ascent started and kept going until the recent slashing points out the former film star.

A parallel of the old and new is that pictures have always provied a better money break for actors than any other phases of their work. In 1914, Hart states, he was getting the highest sum he ever received as a legit performer, $175, which in turn was just half his top vaudeville stipend. His film earnings of course made those amounts look silly.



Hart looks at things from only one aspect, that of the actor. And he does so with pride. The horseback riding he did when working, and which he still does on his Santa Clara Valley ranch, have made that physically possible. Hart emphasizes that soundless pictures depended considerably on a players acting ability. However, with mikes hanging over every studio actors head today, a great deal depends not so much on the trouper's voice but on the technicians, he maintains. A turn of a doohicky, Hart believes, can either make a voice cow or flea-like. In which sense this actor maintains sound was also partly a bad break for actors as well as a good one period.

March 4, 1932

CHILDREN OF FILM STARS ARE PLACED UNDER GUARD

Hollywood, Mar. 4 (INS)
A corps of quiet faced, inconspicuous men moved into the residential sections of Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and the beaches to-day to guard the children of half a dozen motion picture stars from possible kidnappers.
Several screen notables admitted the precautions had been taken and were prompted by the fate of the child of Colonel and Mrs. Lindbergh.
Ann Harding, the blonde stage and screen star, who had one scare from a threatened abduction, employed guards for her little daughter, Jane. For some time employees on the estate of Harold Lloyd, the comedian, have been equipped to handle a possible extortion raid, but a pair of private detectives was added to the guard to-day. The Lloyd children are Gloria, Marjorie, Elizabeth and Harold, Junior.
Marlene Dietrich, German film star, would not comment on a report she had private detectives guarding her young daughter.
It was said at the studio, however, that Barbara Bebe Lyon, 4-months old daughter of Ben Lyon and Bebe Daniels, had been placed under surveillance.
The police were not enlisted in the movie guard, because it was said the picture folk wish to avoid attention.

From Luella O. Parsons:


(Merian C. Cooper, Marguerite Harrison and Ernest B. Schoedsack)

Los Angeles, Mar. 4 –
Ernest Schoedsack and Merian Cooper, travelers, film experts and producers of the never-to-be-forgotten Chang, are together again. Their reunion takes place at Radio Studios where they combine to produce The Most Dangerous Game, famous short story.
Perhaps you’ve read The Most Dangerous Game, voted ninth best story in the entire world by one of the magazines, and included in every anthology of best short stories. Unlike Chang, Grass and the rest, it will be made right within the Radio studios, and it’s the first of a series to be produced by Schoesdack and Cooper.
In these days of hard time talk it’s worthwhile to note that Chang only cost $100,000, but that it grossed over $2,000,000. You see, it isn’t always the costly pictures that do good business.



If all actors had as easy a time after they started free-lancing as Edmund Lowe they wouldn’t have to worry. I know four companies that were trying to sign up the erstwhile Fox favorite. Columbia finally turned the trick. Eddie will be starred in Revolt based on the life of William Fallon and written by Jo Swerling. Irving Cummings will direct. This, we are told, in no way conflicts with The Great Mouthpiece written by Gene Fowler.



Janet Gaynor is recovering from the lost of a nasty, nasty wisdom tooth.
Edith Wilkerson went air-riding with Wallace Beery, her hero. Both deny an elopement. Also, Billy Wilkerson and Mrs. Beery deny Wally’s intentions are matrimony.



Evelyn Brent has lost her sun tan. She spent hundreds, too, on sun arc lamps to keep it. Shows the real sun has no rivals.

Harold Lloyd is using artificial rain in his new picture. He should have made it a few weeks ago when it rained every day.

HER LIFE QUIET, SAYS ACTRESS

Dorothy Peterson says nothing exciting ever happened to her.
She, who has been in fifteen films, of one nearly every month she has been in Hollywood, prosaically tells about being born in an unnamed little Illinois town, of college in Chicago, of being “fired” after a mere week in vaudeville.
And also of earning her first spurs with a Chautauqua, of eventually playing in New York a part that brought her some fame and other and more important roles.



SAME FREDRIC

Fredric March’s second dual-role is in “Strangers In Love,” and while the picture is but a pleasantly entertaining thing and improbable, March continues to prove his right to fame as an actor. And while only lately have critical hosannas been turned in his direction, he’s the same Fredric March who made an inconspicuous debut opposite Clara Bow in her first talkie, “The Wild Party,” nearly three years ago.



FILM DIALOGUE SHOULD BE BRIEF

The telegram should serve as a guide for the writing of talking picture dialogue, according to Ernst Lubitsch, Paramount director.
“Whenever writers of dialogues develop the feeling that they are shaping a telegram and that every superfluous word costs them money, they will have attained perfection for such scenario work,” explains the director of “Broken Lullaby,” featuring Lionel Barrymore, Nancy Carroll and Phillips Holmes.
“We must use speech only to express moods and situations that cannot be effectively expressed in pantomime,” Lubitsch declares.

PARADOX CITY IS HOLLYWOOD

Hollywood, the “film city,” is not a city but a suburb.

A trailer is an advertising film shown in advance of a picture.

Sound pictures can only be made where there is silence.

Film stars can make all the noise they want to when still pictures are taken.

Most “long shots” last only a few moments on the screen.

The slower the camera is turned, the faster the action will be.

A “sound mixer” who really mixed sounds would lose his job.

Paramount studio electricians use “whistle boxes” to keep lights silent.



JOAN BENNETT CAN VOTE NOW

Hollywood, Mar. 4
Joan Bennett has, at twenty-one, a full life to look back upon. The other day, February 27 to be exact, she became old enough to vote.
Joan has been married and divorced and is now engaged again. Her marriage to writer, Gene Markey, will be taking place “any day soon.” That’s all she says – “any day soon.”
Miss Bennett has been on the stage in one of her father’s plays, and nearly three years ago she came to pictures.
She is only seventeen years older than her daughter, Adrienne Fox, who has been named “Ditty.”



OLYMPIC GAMES TO INFLUENCE FILM STYLES

With the eyes of the world focused on the tenth Olympiad, Dame Fashion will feature stadium styles this spring, it is declared by Travis Banton, designer of wardrobes for film stars.
There will be a great variety of spectator sports costumes displayed this season, according to Banton, who creates costumes for Marlene Dietrich, Miriam Hopkins, Carole Lombard, Sylvia Sidney, Lilyan Tashman and Tallulah Bankhead. The typically smart outfits for attendance at the games, he says, will include light-weight knit frocks for cool days and shirt-waist dresses of tub silk and striped linens for warm days.

Among other important style developments of spring and summer, Banton lists the following modish items:
Long sleeves will stage a revival for daytime frocks.
Sports jewelry will demand a place of high favor.
Scarfs, bows and handkerchiefs will decorate pajamas, suits and coats.
Short pajama trousers, just below the knee, will be very popular.
Ornamental Grecian motifs will adorn many costumes.
Evening gowns will tend to cover the shoulders and part of the arms.
High waistlines will be seen in all types of clothes.
Sashes and ornamented wide belts will be very important.
Millinery will display an upward tendency at the back.
Long fringe will be chic for evening gowns.
Navy blue and white will be most popular for sports clothes,
Tan still is good, but sunburn is taboo.



EUROPEAN STAR NEW INTEREST AT HOLLYWOOD

Sari Maritza, petite European film star, who has been the focal point of Hollywood’s interest since her arrival in the film colony a month ago, is going through a number of tests in preparation for her first American performance in “The Girl in the Headlines.”
Scenes from a number of plays are being filmed daily with Charles Starrett opposite Miss Maritza in order that Director George Cukor may become familiar with her style of acting before actual work begins on the picture.



LLOYD CHOOSES LEADING LADY

Constance Cummings is Harold Lloyd’s leading lady in his next comedy which started production on February 22. Miss Cummings has been borrowed from Columbia Pictures where she is under long-term contract. She just finished working opposite Ben Lyon in a picture as yet untitled.



“KIKI” ROBERTS WANTS TO SHINE

Hollywood, Mar. 4
Marion “Kiki” Roberts has her heart set on a movie career.
The former Follies girl, sweetheart of the late Jack “Legs” Diamond, now being featured in New York burlesque, tells reporters there she has had several screen tests and that she is just waiting for a chance at the movies.
The chance, according to Hollywood’s angle, is a slim one. Hollywood long ago ceased glorifying, if it ever did, the principals in sensational news stories by offering them contracts.
There are several former movie stars around Hollywood now whose careers were abruptly ended because of their connection with such stories, and it’s scarcely logical the studios would go forth in search of more problems of the kind.
Anyway, it’s a safe wager that no front-rank movie company is going to put Marion’s name on a contract, whatever her beauty and talents may be.
There was one girl in pictures until recently who made the grade by living down unfortunate past associations, and proving her worth as an actress. But she was an exceptional case.

Messrs. Laurel and Hardy are going to Europe on a combined business and pleasure trip.

Richard Arlen is trying to sell his yacht, but can’t get an offer.



WATERLOO BRIDGE AT NATIONAL THEATER

“Each year the Universal Producing Company turns out at least one really fine picture,” according to Mrs. Lew Newcomb, National Theater manager.
“A few were “Hunchback of Notre Dame,” “Merry Go Round,” “Show Boat,” “All Quiet On the Western Front,” “Seed,” and “Dracula.” Into this select class Carl Laemmle, Jr. places “Waterloo Bridge” which opens at the National Theater to-day.
The cast includes Mae Clarke and Ken Douglas. The engagement closes Friday night and will be followed, for Saturday only, by Billy Cody and Andy Shuford in a western, “Land of Wanted Men,” and also a chapter of “Battling With Buffalo Bill” and several short subjects.

March 3, 1932

ROGERS WEEPS DESCRIBING VISIT WITH BABY LINDBERGH



Man Who Keeps America Happy Sheds Tears As He Recalls Bouncing Kidnapped Child On His Knee Recently

Santa Monica, Cal. Mar. 3 (Universal Service)
There were tears to-day in the eyes of the man who keeps America happy.
Just two weeks ago Sunday, Will Rogers bounced Colonel Lindbergh’s baby boy on his knee.
With Mrs. Rogers, the cowboy philosopher had passed the day with the Lindberghs in their Hopewell, N. J. home. “He is the cutest little feller you ever saw. His hair is just like Lindy’s except more so because he’s got hundreds of golden ringlets all over his little head.”
Rogers walked back and forth on the lawn in front of his white ranch house perched high into the Santa Monica hills. His eyes were on the ground, his arms behind him.
“His face is just like his mother’s and he’s got her real blue eyes too. He was talking away all the time and saying the usual things that a baby that age does, “Mamma” and “Daddy” and that that sort of thing.”
“We were all down in a kind of big sunroom and Mrs. Morrow was there and the nurse brought the baby in all dressed up with blue knee pants and a blue blouse with a white tie. A kind of blue serge suit that sorta matched his eyes.”



BLOCK BUILDING

“Mrs. Lindbergh sat on the floor and built blocks for him for a long time, and he would knock them down and laugh and she would build them up again just like any other happy mother and her baby.
Lindy would toss a sofa pillow at the little feller and it was a game the child seemed to like a whole lot.“
Rogers removed his horn-rimmed glasses and nervously bumped them against the palm of his hand.
“I watched the baby trying to get up and down the steps that led into the sunroom and I looked at Mrs. Rogers and she was looking at me and we were both thinking away back when our big youngsters were toddling up and down steps and it made us both happy to be watching that baby because we’re so crazy about the little fellers.
I asked Lindy if he had taken the baby airplane riding and he said he hadn’t. You know Lindy don’t say a whole lot but he sure is wrapped up in that real boy of his.”



WIPES AWAY MIST

Rogers wiped from his glasses a mist – a mist that had not been caused by an atmospheric condition – and put them on again. A moment later he removed them again and nervously beat them against the palm of his hand.
“Generally speaking, I’m not in favor of lynchings and mob law and that sort of thing, but I’d gladly be a one-man lynching party in this case.
When Mrs. Rogers and me got ready to leave after one of the most pleasant days we ever had we went out to the car and there was little Lindy, Jr. climbing all over the back seat. We told him goodbye and started away and as we were driving along Mrs. Rogers and I both spoke what was on our minds and that was we need a little feller around the house with our two boys so grown now. “
With a gesture Rogers seemed to encircle his big ranch.



WANTS LITTLE COMPANION

“We got all this space and a lotta gentle ponies for little ones to ride and all we need are some little ones up here to make us mighty happy. Mrs. Rogers called me up from Claremore, Oklahoma early this morning about the Lindbergh baby and she was so choked up she couldn’t talk. It was like it was happening to our own.”
Rogers paused in his walking back and forth and there was a big gulp in his throat.
“Looking back on it all with little Lindy right in our car, God, why didn’t we drive away with him?”
The man who has made millions laugh turned his eyes to the sun to dry away the tears.


HOLDEN, STAGE AND SCREEN ACTOR, DIES

Hollywood, Cal. Mar. 3 (UP)
A long stage and screen career came to an end to-day when William Holden, 59, died at his home here after a year’s illness.
The immediate cause of his death was a paralytic stroke, the indirect result of an automobile accident a year ago.
Holden, after thirty years on the stage in New York and “the East,” came to Hollywood in 1928, appearing in such pictures as Three Week Ends, The First Kiss, Weary River, Holiday, The Trespasser, What a Widow, and The Man Who Came Back. His last film appearance was in Six Cylinder Love.




FILM ACTRESS SEEKS DIVORCE

Hollywood, Cal. Mar. 3 (AP)
If Aileen Pringle, former motion picture actress, has her way, she soon will have a Mexican “mail order” divorce from Charles Pringle, husband she has not seen since 1924.
Pringle, son of Sir John Pringle, chief privy counselor of Jamaica, is now on his plantation in Jamaica. The former actress said she would write him immediately to obtain his permission to the Mexican divorce.
The couple was married shortly before the start of the World war. Pringle entered military service and she began a career in motion pictures. His dislike for her profession resulted in the separation, the former actress said.

From Luella O. Parsons:



Los Angeles, Mar. 3
Only a few months ago Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. was classified as a chip off the old block. To-day he is not shining in the reflected glory of anyone. He has his own following and he is building up a clientele that any trouper would be proud to claim.
Union Depot did it by breaking box office records all over the country. The public, it seems, likes young Doug.
Yesterday Darryl Zanuck told me he has bought Revolt, a story by Mary McCall, as the next Fairbanks vehicle. Miss McCall also authored It’s Tough To Be Famous, Doug’s very latest picture. “And,” says Zanuck, “wait until you see the boy in that one.”
All of which means that Warner Brothers are going to do a little concentrating on Doug, Jr. He has proved to be worthy of their interest. William Dieterle, German director, will do the directional honors on Revolt.



The teacher, Laura Hope Crewes, is again becoming the actress. She has signed for one of the most important roles in John Van Druten’s play, After All. Miss Crewes, one of our most distinguished stage actresses, has devoted her entire time to voice culture since she came to Hollywood. To her has been given much credit for Gloria Swanson’s success in the talkies. She trained Gloria for The Trespesser, the first Swanson talkie. Charles Brabin will direct the Van Druten play, which has had such a run in New York. This, as we announced a week or so ago, will feature Margaret Perry in the same role she played on stage.



Constance Bennett is planning to do over her drawing room in white, rose, brown and green.

Bessie Love Hawks and Patricia are moving home either to-morrow or Friday from the hospital.

Greta Garbo, in white dress, white shoes, and white hat gave even the gateman at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer a surprise.

Vivienne Osborne lost ten pounds in a week.

Helen Twelvetrees, in another fetching spring outfit, was lunching with her husband at the Brown Derby.