March 12, 1932

FILM ACTRESS PLANS TO WED

Los Angeles, Mar. 12 (AP)
Joan Bennett, screen actress and member of the Bennett family of theatrical fame, and Gene Markey, screen writer, will be married here next Wednesday, they have announced. The couple obtained a marriage license yesterday. They have been engaged several months.
Miss Bennett is the daughter of Richard Bennett and Adrienne Morrison, both well known on the stage, and a sister of Constance and Barbara Bennett. The marriage will be her second, a divorce in July, 1928, having ended her union with John M. Fox of Seattle.
Markey, a native of Jackson, Mich., is the author of several well known screen plays, his latest being “As You Desire Me,” written for Greta Garbo.

MARY NOLAN FILES APPEAL

Los Angeles, Mar. 12 (AP)
Sentenced to thirty days each in jail on wage claim charges, Mary Nolan, screen actress, and her husband, Wallace T. Macrery, were at liberty today under appeal bonds of $250 each.
The couple was convicted Wednesday on eight counts of failure to pay wages to employees of a gown shop Miss Nolan operated. Jail sentence was imposed only on one charge, Miss Nolan and her husband being given suspended sentences totaling 630 days each on the seven other charges.
Miss Nolan was known on the musical comedy stage as Imogene Wilson.




IN LONDON’S HIGH SOCIETY

By Dan Thomas
Hollywood, March 12
Influential Walter! Gossip reaching Hollywood says Corinne Griffith, who in private life is Mrs. Walter Morosco, is quite a social leader in dear old London. Corinne went to England to make pictures, but they haven’t interfered with her social activities.
A short time ago, so the story goes, the actress had the honor of having the Prince of Wales among her guests. As the evening wore on someone suggested that the entire party move to one of the swanky night clubs.
“It’s rather late,” remarked the Prince, “don’t you think it will be very crowded?”
‘Oh,” replied Corinne, “It’s all right – Walter will be able to get us a table.”




HARPO MARX’S HARP HIS START

Almost every day some new secret is brought to light around Hollywood. Today’s reveals how Harpo Marx, one of that famous Marx quartet, started playing the harp and why he never says anything either on the stage or screen.
It seems that some years ago while Harpo was working as a bell hop in a New York hotel, the Marx family started out on a vaudeville tour. Just before they were to leave, Ma Marx decided that she couldn’t leave Harpo in the big city all alone.
So he was taken along. But there was no time for anyone to write any lines into the act for him, so he just walked around on the stage, saying nothing.
That went on for several weeks until Ma decided that he would have to do something. So she asked him what musical instrument he would like to play. “A harp,” replied Harpo, knowing that they were expensive and thinking that his mother would not be able to buy him one, thereby enabling him to continue loafing.
However, Ma finally dug up an old second-hand one for $40. But it was so old parts of it used to fall off right on the stage. Then they got in a railroad wreck. Seeing the insurance collector settling with a passenger who had been injured, Harpo dashed back to see if his harp hadn’t been smashed.
But only the case was damaged. That didn’t stop him, though. Taking a piece of glass, he freshened all the cracks in it and then demanded a settlement from the insurance agent. He got $250. Later, when he returned to New York he sold the harp to a music store for $300.
About a week afterwards he was telling a friend about how he had bought the harp for $40, had collected $250 insurance on it and then sold it for $300.
“Yes,” replied the friend, “and that store just sold it for $750 as an antique.”




DEFUNCT PLANT FOUND HANDY

Hollywood, Mar. 12

An abandoned manufacturing plant of a defunct aircraft corporation fits in well with Hollywood’s economy ideas.
The script of “Sky Brides” calls for a set portraying such a factory. To build it would have cost plenty, but the one already standing contains all the props necessary, including planes in course of construction. To top it all, the factory is at the airport where they’re makine aerial scenes.
Looking backward with the prosperous Spencer Tracy, now doing well by himself, recalls his term with a Brooklyn stock company a few years ago when he made $75 per week and had to buy his own wardrobe. There was no show Sunday nights, so Tracy and his wife cruised the neighborhoods in search of the more reasonably priced movies where Tom Mix and the heroes of melodrama ruled.




SHE DIVULGES MAKE-UP IDEAS

Hollywood, Mar. 12

American husbands who fume on party nights because they’ve “been dressed and ready for hours” while their wives linger before boudoir mirrors won’t thank Lily Damita for her makep-up philosophy.
Lily, who speaks her mind, doesn’t like to see the familiar public application of lipstick and rouge.
French women – and Lily is one of them – get those things done before they leave the privacy of their rooms, she says. No matter how late they are, everything has to be just so before they’ll sortie from that privacy.
Once satisfied with the effect, they forget all about their appearance and don’t bother with “adjustments.”



CAGNEY IN TRAINING

Hollywood still continues on its pugilistic course. What with the newspaper writers catching black eyes and actors going into intensive training, one never knows what will happen.
Jimmy Cagney now is down at Palm Springs, with a trainer and two sparring partners, getting in shape for his next film, “Winner Take All,” a fight picture.
Jimmy is going through the whole routine, too – even to arising at five o’clock (in the morning) to do road work.

WISE EUGENE PALLETTE

A few days ago Eugene Pallette also went into training.
When questioned as to why, he said,”I have a fight with Paul Lukas in my next picture and that guy used to wresle for Hungary in the Olympic games. Boy, I need to train.”


From Luella O. Parsons:



Clara Bow hasn’t stayed away from the screen for want of jobs. Samuel Goldwyn tried his best to get her for “The Greeks Had a Word for Them,” Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer has talked to her about “The Red Headed Woman,” and Universal saw in Clara the perfect lead for “Impatient Virgin.” She turned them all down. Seems she was waiting for something else.
The truth is out. Clara wants to pick and choose her own story. She even has an idea in the back of her mind that she might like to make a picture herself, provided she has the right release.
This past week she bought “Souls in Pawn,” an original by Charles Furthman. He wrote the scenario for “It,” her greatest success. Clara is now within a few pounds of her normal weight. She knows she can take off the superfluous weight in a few weeks once she makes up her mind to make a picture.



Norma Talmadge has been suffering with a badly infected tooth in New York. She has had a trained nurse in attendance. There is a chance that Norma, whose legal residence is Los Angeles, may come here to file her divorce suit against Joseph Schenck. Several of the Reno divorces have been questioned, and it seems both parties must take up residence in Paris to make a divorce there legal.




CLARK GABLE STARS IN FILM AT STRAND

“Polly of the Circus” heads the program at the Strand theater starting Sunday with Marion Davies creating the role of a trapeze artist and Clark Gable that of a modern minister. This drama is based on Margaret Mayo’s stage play of some years ago. Highlights of the drama include the fall of the trapeze star, a scandal which ensues as the result of her convalescence in the minister’s home, the refusal of the board of clergymen to give the minister a church when he marries the circus girl, and the subsequent drastic attempt of the girl to repair the damage.



SHANGHAIED LOVE AT LYRIC SUNDAY

“Shanghaied Love,” a Columbia picture which will come to the Lyric theater Sunday, is a story of love and adventure aboard a picturesque old sailing vessel, with Richard Cromwell, Noah Beery and Sally Blane in the leading roles.