Saturday, June 27, 2009

March 31, 1932



PRINCIPALS IN TRIANGLE SUIT SILENT

Claire Windsor, Screen Star, And Mrs. Read Decline To Talk;

Broker Hides

Oakland, Cal., Mar. 31
All three principals in the alleged “triangle” which resulted in a $100,000 alienation suit against Claire Windsor, stage and screen star, being filed by Mrs. Marian Y. Read, young Oakland society woman, maintained silence today.

That is Miss Windsor and Mrs. Read did – and Alfred C. Read, Jr., young broker and alleged “cause of it all,” could not be found.

Mrs. Read remained in seclusion at the home of her mother, Mrs. James Young, 211 Athol avenue, and declined comment on either her alienation suit against Miss Windsor or the divorce action against her husband, which preceded it by a few days. She said she had been advised by her attorney to say nothing – yet.

NOTHING TO ADD

Miss Windsor, appearing with Al Jolson in a stage production in Los Angeles, also said nothing. Yesterday she declared herself “flabbergasted” by Mrs. Read’s action.

Efforts were being made to serve her with a summons in the suit and attorneys for Mrs. Read said that if they were unsuccessful in Los Angeles, an attempt would be made to serve the actress when she arrives in San Francisco Sunday for an engagement of the Jolson production.

CAN’T BE FOUND

Read, whose offices are in San Francisco, could not be located there and was reported to be in Los Angeles. But he could not be found at any of the principal hotels there, either.

Mrs. Read’s complaint, filed in the superior court here late Monday, charges that her husband met Miss Windsor last September and “began running around with her” immediately. It further alleges that the actress “enticed” the young broker from his home.




GRETA NISSEN AND HEYBURN MARRIED

Hollywood, Cal., Mar. 31 (AP)
Weldon Heyburn and Greta Nissen, both of the screen, were back in Hollywood today following their marriage yesterday afternoon in Tia Juana, Mexico.




ACTRESS WILL PAY $468 FOR CLOTHES

Los Angeles, Mar. 31 (UP)
Out of her salary, now held under attachment, Laura Hope Crews, stage and screen actress, will pay a bill of $468 for clothes, her attorney said in stipulating for a judgment against her which was on record today.




FILM DIRECTOR FACES CHARGES

Los Angeles, Cal., Mar. 31 (AP)
Edwin Carewe, one of the most famous of the film directors, has been indicted on four accounts for evasion of his income tax, federal officials disclosed today.




From Luella O. Parsons:

Los Angeles, Mar. 31
Oh, dear, I get all tangled up over Paramount’s “Crooner” and Warner Brothers’ Rian James picture “Crooners.” Both stories deal with a popular crooner on the radio and each company is trying to get a Bing Crosby or a Rudy Vallee to play – or shall I say, croon – the part.

Paramount expects to sign Bing Crosby, radio favorite, to-day or Friday. You know what Bing’s popularity is throughout the country. If you don’t then you don’t know your radio.

As for Rudy Vallee for Warners’ picture, “Crooners,” well, that is still up for discussion.




Six months ago our most energetic Hollywood producers were looking for Swedish actresses on Greta Garbo’s type and German frauleins with Marlene Dietrich’s beauty. The style has suddenly switched to English actresses. Without any apparent reason the vogue seems to be for these English gals with cultivated diction.

Carl Laemmle, Jr. returns with a glint in his eye. He has signed Margaret Lindsey, young English actress who appeared in “Death Takes a Holiday.” If she is half as good as Junior believes we will be hearing of her next year. Unfortunately, only a few newcomers do become headliners.

William Daly, young stage actor, also has been signed and that isn’t the half of it. Junior returns with the screen rights to “Harlem,” a negro stage play, “Counselor at Law” and “The Prison Doctor.”




A new face on the United Artists lot, Al Rogell, well known director, has been signed to direct Eddie Cantor in “The Kid From Spain.”

Eddie starts work immediately, but work or no work he has promised to appear April 9 at a benefit for the Los Angeles Sanitarium to be held at Universal City. Mrs. Sadie Harper, sister of Jack Warner, is chairman of the entertainment committee and she sets great store by the fact that the popular Eddie will be master of ceremonies. It’s a good cause, too.




Clara Bow mentioned in passing the other day that now that friend-husband is working she isn’t in any hurry to get back into harness. Rex Bell, said friend-husband, has been signed by Trem Carr to make eight Western features for Monogram release. Strange as it may seem, Clara has married a man who is perfectly willing to let her sit home by the fire while he works, a nice lad, this Rex Bell, a real person and one who can do much for Clara if she will let him.

Snapshots of Hollywood:



Betty Blythe, back from the ranch where she has been hibernating for a year or more, was looking stunning in black at the Brown Derby.

Raquel Torres was dancing with Charlie Feldman and seeming to enjoy it at the Frolics. Carole Lombard and William Powell also at the Frolics. Carole seems to care for Bill and it looks as if he is going to continue to keep steady company with her.




From Wood Soanes:

In these competitive days vaudeville and a large group of Hollywood’s screen players are finding each other mutually profitable.

Salaries are generously reported for publicity’s sake, but Jack Cooper, youthful screen star who goes on tour April 9, undoubted will top the list with an announced $7000 a week. Barbara Stanwyck and Frank Fay are said to have received $10,000 for a short run in the east, and large salaries are reported in other directions.

When the talkies began to arrive they hurt the big circuits. They would take a vaudeville star and show him doing his song and dance in a hundred or more theaters in one night. Now vaudeville is providing handsome recompense to many players who are no longer in demand in motion pictures. Others are slipping but still have a “personal appearance” audience.

Harry Weber, a well-known agent, discussed the matter in Hollywood the other day and said that there are twenty-two weeks work available in the major cities with about sixty additional weeks in smaller towns, and at smaller salaries. Many stars are taking five and six weeks’ work between pictures.

William Powell and Richard Barthelmess are toying with the idea. Victor McLaglen is rehearsing an act and so is Hobart Bosworth.

Already in vaudeville are Sue Carol and Nick Stuart; James Hall; Esther Ralston; Fifi Dorsay; Irene Rich; Louise Fazenda and Jean Harlow.

Others on tour include Belle Bennett, Daphne Pollard, Tom Moore, Alice Joyce, Rosetta Duncan, Leon Janney, Harry Langdon, Lita Grey Chaplin, Conrad Nagel, George Stone and Blanche Sweet.




Mack Sennett has selected the title “Hypnotized” as the title of his fifteen reel road show feature… And there is a rumor in Hollywood that a group of stars who happen to be “between contracts,” so to speak, are banding together for a cooperative venture in the films.




Karen Morely, who has been improving each shining hour in the talkies since she started work, is to have another chance opposite Warner Baxter in “Man About Town.”




Will Rogers is preparing to start work on “Down to Earth” at the Fox studios also.




Columbia studios have re-opened after being closed for eight weeks. They start with Edmund Lowe in “Criminal Court” and Walter Huston in “Faith” and plan twenty-four more pictures this year.


“State’s Attorney” is being made again at Radio. It was postponed to await John Barrymore’s recovery from injuries sustained in an automobile accident. Helen Twelvetrees has the feminine lead and George Archainbaud is directing.


Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack who were responsible for many fine nature pictures are to be reunited as a team at Radio when they go to work on “The Most Dangerous Game,” a film version of the Richard Connell story. The yarn is ranked as one of the world’s best short stories. Cooper and Schoedsack will be remembered for “Chang,” “Grass,” and “Four Feathers.”




Kay Francis and William Powell will be team mates in “The Jewel Robbery,” which was done on the stage by Mary Ellis and Basil Sydney.




Lionel Barrymore has been signed to a new contract by M-G-M following his work as Kringelein in “Grand Hotel.” The picture is ready for release as soon as some of the Garbo scenes are re-taken.




Adrienne Allen, latest English actress to try her luck in American movies, arrived here today and will assume a leading role with Fredric March and Sylvia Sidney in “Merrily We Go to Hell.”

Miss Allen, a slender blonde, has been successful in London and Broadway stage productions, and has been signed to a contract by Paramount.




‘ARROWSMITH’ WITH COLMAN

Helen Hayes, Richard Bennett in Cast of Drama Based on Sinclair Lewis’ Story

“Arrowsmith,” by Sinclair Lewis, the only American novelist to win a Nobel prize, comes as a motion picture to the State theater tomorrow, with Ronald Colman playing the title role of the crusading young doctor.

Helen Hayes, the stage star who recently triumphed in her first screen appearance in “The Sin of Madelon Claudet,” plays opposite Colman in the role of the devoted wife who risks her life for her husband’s career.

Richard Bennett, the stormy petrel of the stage and the father of Constance, Joan and Barbara Bennett, has a major role as Sondelius, the plague-fighting Swede, and A. E. Anson, an eminent stage figure making his motion picture debut, has another rich character role. Myrna Loy, Charles King, Alec B. Francis, and David Landau take important parts.

“Arrowsmith” is the story of one man’s devotion and ambition in the battle of humanity against the death-dealing plagues which have always been the scourge of mankind. It sweeps from mid-western countryside to a tropical island in the West Indies, where young Dr. Arrowsmith and his colleagues go to battle against the black death. His relations with the little nurse he marries as a struggling country doctor, continuing throughout the picture, weave a broad current of romance through its stirring scenes.




AMERICAN TRAGEDY ON NATIONAL SCREEN

“An American Tragedy,” which opens at the National Theater today, is the story of a boy, lonesome and confused, who seizes his first chance at love, only to feel it become a lodestone which keeps him from real love and his opportunity to satisfy his youthful ambitions.

In desperation he tries to free himself of the first girl, and involves himself in a series of events from which he is powerless to escape.

Phillips Holmes has the leading role, with Sylvia Sidney and Frances Dee carrying the two important feminine roles.

Saturday will bring Tom Tyler in “The Man From Death Valley,” and chapter two of the serieal “The Vanishing Legion.” Starting Saturday, two children, if they are not over 12 years old, will be admitted on one ten-cent ticket between 12:45 and 1:45 P. M. every Saturday.


2 comments:

A said...

All seems well in Hollywood as of March 31, 1932. Fabulous castings and signings are pending, and Claire Windsor has her drama settled. Fabulous post as usual.

GAH1965 said...

Thanks - Although I think Laura Hope Crews probably wasn't too happy about having her wages attached over her $468 shopping spree.