May 9, 1932

FILM STAR, WIFE OF DIRECTOR, INJURED

Sally Eilers and Mrs. Edward Cline in Hollywood Auto Crash

Hollywood, May 9
Sally Eilers, film actress wife of Hoot Gibson, and Mrs. Edward Cline, wife of the director, received slight injuries early today when Cline, swerving to avoid another machine, crashed his car into a telegraph post. He was not injured.

Miss Eilers was treated at a hospital for cuts about the face and head, and Mrs. Cline for bruises.




VON STERNBERG AND MARLENE GIVE IN

Hollywood, Cal., May 9 (UP)
Announcement that Josef von Sternberg, director, and Marlene Dietrich, actress, would return to the Paramount lot at once and continue filming the motion picture over which differences had arisen, was made to-day.

A satisfactory conference was declared to have been held by Von Sternberg and B. P. Schulberg, studio executive, in which the rights of the studio executive to determine the nature of the script of a play were agreed upon.




IAN KEITH TO WED BARONESS FERN ANDRA

Ex-Mate of Ethel Clayton Announces Troth to German-American Actress

San Francisco, May 9
Three days divorced from Ethel Clayton, screen actress, Ian Keith, actor, to-day made public announcement of his engagement to Baroness Fern Andra, German-American actress whose personal adventures would fill a good sized novel.

But the romance of Keith and Baroness Andra must endure a year-long wait before marriage, because the decree granted Keith in Los Angeles last Friday from Miss Clayton is only interlocutory.

“That will give us a better chance to find out all about each other,” said the baroness as she and Keith told their news.

Both Proposed

Keith said he proposed to Miss Andra the moment the telegram announcing the granting of the divorce arrived in his dressing room at a local theater last Friday night. And his fiancée interrupted, declaring it was she who proposed first, and he should really grant her the honor, because this is leap year.

“Anyhow,” they compromised, “we proposed to each other and are engaged.”

In theatrical circles the news did not come as a great surprise, principally because of the incident of a telegram received by Miss Andra last September. The missive was addressed to “Mrs. Ian Keith” and she took it, although at the time the Keith-Clayton divorce action was still a mater of doubt in the Los Angeles courts.

Questioned about the telegram at the time, Miss Andra only said: “Ask Ian.”



Condemned As Spy

Miss Andra, American-born but of German rearing, won fame on the European stage, had hectic experiences during the war, including airplane crashes and being condemned to death as a spy, and became generally regarded abroad as a woman gifted in the art of daring and successful adventure. Since the financial collapse of European stage ventures she has been in this country.

She is a baroness through her marriage to Baron von Weichs, a nephew of the former Empress Zita of Austria. The baron, her first husband, was killed in the war. She was divorced from her second husband, Kurt Prenzel, former German middleweight boxing champion.

Keith also has been married twice. His first wife was Blanche Yurka, actress whom he divorced.




ESTELLE TO DISPOSE OF DEMPSEY HOME

The house that Jack built is going under the auctioneer’s hammer. Estelle Taylor, film actress, said today her home constructed six years ago by Jack Dempsey, former heavy weight boxing champion, when he was her husband is to be sold at auction this month.

The lot and house on Los Feliz Boulevard represent an original investment of approximately $135,000 she said. The furnishings will also be auctioned. The building is surrounded by spacious grounds with a large swimming pool.

The home was a point in dispute when a property settlement was being arranged prior to their Reno divorce.

The house is much too large for me to live in alone so I am going to sell it, she stated. It will be difficult for me to leave it but what must be will be.




LILLIAN ROTH SEEKS MEXICAN DIVORCE

Hollywood, Calif., May 9 (AP)
It may be that Lillian Roth, stage and screen singer, is divorcing her husband for “mental incompatibility,” but here is what the husband, William C. Scott, aviator and member of a prominent Pittsburg family said today on his arrival in Hollywood:

“She lives her life at night and I live mine in the daytime. I love airplanes and she hates them, even to the wings. She loves the stage and its life, and – well, she’s a wonderful girl but we just couldn’t make the grade.”

Scott and Miss Roth were married in Atlanta, Ga., last April. Miss Roth will obtain a Mexican divorce.




ACTRESS ACCUSED OF EXCESSIVE DRINKING AT DIVORCE HEARING

Los Angeles, May 9 (AP)
Twelve expensively bound, limited edition volumes of “snappy literature” that he objected to having in the house were introduced as evidence against Helene Costello to-day by Lowell Sherman, actor, in his suit for divorce.

The actress laughed audibly as he described them.

Sherman, twisting his small mustache, then testified that his wife embarrassed him by excessive drinking, threw cocktail glasses at him when he remonstrated, and struck his mother, knocking her across the room and over a table.

He told of an argument when they were in a swimming pool, during which, he said, she struck him with a whip she had been using to train dogs.

Arguments that went on all through the night, preventing him from sleeping, were described by the actor.




MEXICO CITY BANS ‘GIRL OF RIO’ PICTURE

Mexico City, May 9 (AP)
The motion picture “Girl of the Rio,” called in Spanish “La Paloma,” and featuring Dolores Del Rio and Leo Carillo was barred from further presentation here today by order of the Federal district government.

It was charged that the picture, now showing at one of the leading theaters, slurs Mexico and the Mexican people. It was barred recently from Panama and it is reported similar action against the picture has been taken by other Latin American countries.




PARTED BUT HAPPY

Two Talkie Stars Enjoy Perfect Bliss

Separate Homes of Colbert And Foster Make for Happiness, Both Aver

Hollywood, May 9
The marital “five-year plan” of Claudette Colbert, screen actress, and Norman Foster promises to become a lifetime arrangement, the couple said today.

Since their marriage five years ago they have been “separated.” Miss Colbert has maintained her own home here, and Foster has done likewise.

“It’s a blessed arrangement,” the actress enthused. “I come home and go out when I wish and with whom I desire. My husband is privileged to do the same. We have implicit trust in each other, and the years have proved we are right.”

“There’s nothing that I know that has done more to preserve our happiness,” Foster agreed. “We are still head over heels in love with each other. To my mind, married couples lose their enthusiasm and love that first led them to the altar, because they become bored by constant companionship. This leads to petty quarrels, then serious disagreements, and finally, in many cases, to the divorce courts.”

The couple “drop in” on each other regularly, go to the theater, on yachting trips, dances and enjoy other diversions “without the sometimes oppressive knowledge that we’ve got to be together,” as Foster pointed out.

They embraced for the newspaper cameraman just to prove that their affection is more real than reel.


ACTOR’S WIFE GIVEN DIVORCE

Los Angeles, May 9 (AP)
A divorce from David Dunbar, forty-five years old, stage and screen actor, whom she charged with cruelty, was granted today to Mrs. Margaret Dunbar, twenty-five years old, by Superior Judge C. L. Shinn.

Dunbar had filed an answer denying the charges, but failed to appear in court. An attorney represented him and agreed that two minor children should be given into custody of Mrs. Dunbar.

Mrs. Dunbar testified that on one occasion Dunbar threatened her with a razor and she “screamed and begged for mercy.” She also charged Dunbar failed to support her and that he was abusive when she was unable to provide him with funds from her earnings.




DIVORCED PAIR BACK AGAIN IN MOVIE COLONY

Hollywood, Cal., May 9 (AP)
Ann Harding and Harry Bannister, who profess they still love one another although they were divorced last Saturday, took separate paths today in order that Bannister might “regain his lost identity.”

Miss Harding and Bannister yesterday flew back from Reno, where the divorce hearing was held. The actress traveled in her private plane, and Bannister followed, piloting his own ship.

It was because he had become known as “Mr. Ann Harding,” Bannister said, that the couple decided to divorce. He said he wanted to pursue his screen career as an individual apart from Miss Harding.

Miss Harding returned to her Hollywood home in the hills, while Bannister took an apartment at a Beverly Hills Hotel.

“I do not intend to return to the stage, but will continue my work in motion pictures,” said Bannister. “Several offers have been made to me. As yet, I have not made a decision on any of them.”




CAREWE FACES U.S. COURT IN TAX QUIZ

Los Angeles, May 9 (AP)
Edwin Carewe, once noted as a motion picture director, was due in federal court today to enter plea in a charge of income tax evasion over a four-year period.

Carewe, now retired from films, allegedly failed to pay proper taxes in the years of 1926 to 1929, inclusive. The amount involved approximates $108,000.




RENALDO FACING TRAFFIC WARRANT

Los Angeles, May 9, (UP)
Duncan Renaldo, motion picture actor, was in difficultly today over a traffic charge in Merced County.

A bench warrant for Renaldo’s arrest was in the hands of county traffic officers, together with a letter from Justice of the Peace Osborn, of Atwater, Calif.

Osborne asserted Renaldo failed to appear in his court to answer a traffic charge, and agreed to plead guilty and pay a $30 fine. Renaldo sent $15 and Osborne claimed that $15 bail money posted by the actor does not apply to the remainder of the fine.




SEE HOLLYWOOD FIRST, IT HAS EVERYTHING

On Studio Lot Are to Be Found Manchuria, Jungles, New England, Switzerland

By Jesse Henderson, Special Correspondent
Hollywood, May 9

See America First is a pretty good slogan, but if you see Hollywood first, you don’t need to go anywhere else. Everything’s here at the present moment; on one studio lot there are Manchuria, the South Sea Islands, an American penitentiary, a tropical jungle, a New York newspaper office, a slice of New England, a chunk of Switzerland, and a cross-section of Hollywood itself.

Nothing takes the place of actual travel in this country or to countries afar, but just now a tour of Hollywood is a pretty good substitute for a world cruise. It gives you at least a blimp’s eye view of the globe plus the realization that while the telegraph, the radio and the airplane have made the world smaller, Hollywood reduces it practically to a capsule which you may swallow and digest in a day. Not that you can swallow everything in Hollywood, or digest it, either.

Geared To Progress

Just the same, the big motion picture studios are geared to the progress of the world which they entertain. They keep up with the times and delve back into ancient eras through their imposing lineup of artists internationally known, of their great industrial plants, their research departments, and their experts in every line of creative effort.

If you want a glimpse of King Tut playing Egyptian pinochle in something or other B.C., or at the young Chinese emperor Pu-yi trying to rule his new kingdom of Manchuko, a major studio can arrange this for you within a few days.

They could have been burned as wizards in the 1600s for the things they do in Hollywood now.

Modern organization and far flung resources spell versatility here. For example, a stroll through the RKO-Radio lot this morning is a journey from China to New England, with side trips to New York and Honolulu.

Hollywood Scenes

In one corner of the lot, Constance Bennett is making a picture about Hollywood. It shows not only the life of the film colony, but also the secrets involved in making pictures.

On another stage, the final scenes of a south sea island romance are in full swing with Dolores Del Rio and Joel McCrea as the central figures. For two months this company was in Hawaii where most of the scenes were photographed and now Hawaii has been brought to a section of stage for the indoor shots and one or two extra, outdoor sequences.

Less than a hundred feet away, Richard Dix, Edward Everett Horton and others are ensconced amid Oriental splendor in a picture about Manchuria.

Complete and accurate in each detail, a segment of Manchuria has been built for the story after weeks of research and the labor of hundreds of highly specialized workers. Among the players are two hundred Orientals. Native Manchurians are employed as advisers to Wesley Ruggles, the director.

Not far from the Manchurian town there rises an up-to-date American penitentiary, in which Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey will serve a term on celluloid. The construction of this pen is authentic – the builders had technical advise from an anonymous group who know their pens from the inside.

Living Jungle

A short walk from the penitentiary is a menacing jungle. It is made up of living ferns, interlaced branches and brush, and Fay Wray is going romantic in it while jungle animals prowl about.

Jungle animals of a different species are likewise prowling about the newspaper office a block or two distant, where Ricardo Cortez enacts the character of a wisecracking columnist. His daily routine takes him out into the various pits and palaces, skyscrapers and scrapes, which make a modern city what it is.

And it is only a step from the skyscraper to the Swiss chalet, the lovely New England countryside, the frisky continental cities whither Ann Harding travels in her latest scenario.




AL’S LITTLE JOKE

Al Jolson heard that Harold Lloyd was shooting some water scenes for his current picture a few days ago so he appeared on the set with a bucket full of fish.

“Just to make you feel more at home,” said the comedian to the comedian. Then he added, “Don’t be a sucker – take them home. I just caught them.”



Which, perhaps, is one of the reasons little Sidney Fox is doing so well. The other day Sidney was discovered in the studio hairdressing department. Her head was incased in a drying machine. She was eating lunch spread out on a little table in front of her. A book was propped against the teapot.

And ontop of all that, she was posing for pictures.




‘HIGHBROW’ MOVIES SHOWING REALISM GO BETTER WITH WOMEN

Hollywood, Cal., May 9 (AP)

So-called “highbrow” films, those depicting realism, find greater popularity among women than among men, a preliminary analysis of a national film poll by the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America indicates.

Kathleen Norris, the author, expressed what the film people said represented the typical feminine viewpoint when she wrote she “likes photoplays that depict real life that is lived and the real problems people have to face.”

George Ade, the author wrote: “I like nonsense on the screen if it is sheer nonsense and not nonsense trying to be a carbon copy of reality.”

Will Durant, also an author, replied: “I am as sentimental as Charlie Chaplin.”




From Louella O. Parsons

Los Angeles, May 9
Three more Tarzan stories for Johnny Weissmuller, whose splendid physique was the subject of much discussion after he appeared in “Tarzan, The Ape Man,” has had three stories written especially for him by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

W. S. Van Dyke, who does nobly with these epics of South Africa and other remote regions, will again direct.

“What other thrills,” we ask “remain after the ones in the first Tarzan story? And now, will Weissmuller wear more clothes and will he speak lines? And if he does, will he be the coming screen sensation?”

Looks as if he will soon establish a Gable following, that will make his prowess as a swimmer come second – how that lad does the Australian crawl!




Wonder if Carmelita Geraghty’s new blonde hair had anything to do with getting her the job of heroine in “Jungle Mystery,” Universal’s next serial.

Carmelita’s dark tresses have always been very becoming but these movie girls will tell you that blonde hair photographs much better.

“Jungle Mystery” has been adapted from Talbot Mundy’s story The Ivory Train, and it has all the thrills of a Pearl White mystery yarn plus modern dialogue and sound.

Pat O’Brien and Slim Summerville are two other Universal recruits. They emote in the airmail story which is to go into production as soon as a leading man is available. Carl Laemmle, Jr. has decided that Lew Ayres is too young to play the seasoned flyer.




Talk around Hollywood is that Gary Cooper is about to do a little Marlene Dietrich-Josef von Sternberg on his own at Paramount.

He is not satisfied with the story of “The Devil and the Deep,” and he is refusing to play the lead in it opposite Tallulah Bankhead.

Gary came back from his journey to Africa much improved in health, and with a new slant on life. One idea being that he won’t play in any story that he feels is bad for him.

At the present he is devoting himself to the Countess Frasso, who seems to have followed Lupe Velez rather successfully in his affections.




Douglas Fairbanks may have to share the spotlight when he is telling fish stories with his son. Young Doug and Robert Montgomery have chartered C. B. DeMille’s yacht and yesterday they betook themselves to Mexico to do a little fishing.

Doug and Mary returned home to find the house filled with flowers sent by friends. What a lot of stories Doug has to relate on Tahiti. Some day, perhaps, he will write a book on his adventures in foreign countries, many of them encountered while he was making pictures.




Screenshots of Hollywood collected at random:

Donald Cook more seriously hurt in an automobile accident than anyone knew, now convalescing.

John Wray getting ready to leave for New York for personal appearances; Neil Hamilton arriving in state at the Brown Derby on a bicycle.

Hoot Gibson in a bright red tie presented to him by Eddie Hillman.

Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks celebrating their return home with a party at the Mayfair. Marlene Dietrich escorted by her husband, Rudolph Sieber, and Josef von Sternberg, creating a mild sensation when she walked into the Mayfair dance. Ernest Vajda entertaining the Adolphe Menjous.

George Archainbaud, Richard Barthelmess and Watterson Rothacker given a joint birthday party by the Archainbauds. Numerous and humorous gifts were given the boys.

Joan Crawford getting her Sadie Thompson clothes together for “Rain.”




LAST MINUTE RIALTO NEWS -

John Wayne will star in a series of Westerns for Warners.

Betty Davis replaces Marian Marsh on the Warners program; Marian is expected to ally with Fox.

Jack Oakie, completing that Olympic games comedy for Paramount, will be seen with Jimmy Gleason in “Madison Square Garden.”

Paramount will co-star Carole Lombard and George Raft in “Hot Saturday" and “Pick-Up.”

Virginia Bruce will be opposite Jack Gilbert in “Downstairs.”



Renee Adoree is now expected to have her old role in the talkie version of “The Big Parade.”

Cary Grant, who left Broadway musical comedy a few months ago for film work, today was selected to play the juvenile lead in Tallulah Bankhead’s next Paramount starring picture, “Devil and the Deep,” in which Gary Cooper and Charles Laughton, the English actor who recently joined the Paramount group of film players, appear.

Three interesting additions to the cast of “The Million Dollar Legs,” the Olympic games film farce being directed by Edward Cline, were announced today. They are Hugh Herbert, Lyda Roberti and Susan Fleming who join a cast headed by Jack Oakie and including W. C. Fields, Ben Turpin, Hank Mann, George Barbier, Ben Taggart and little Dickie Moore, the child actor.

Charlie Ruggles, Maurice Chevalier’s military pal in “The Smiling Lieutenant,” combines his comedy talents with those of the Continental star in “One Hour With You.”

Ruggles has the comedy lead in which the feminine parts are played by Jeanette MacDonald, Genevieve Tobin and Adrienne Ames.




‘IMPATIENT MAIDEN’ AT ORPHEUM WITH AYRES

Lew Ayres is at the Orpheum theater this week as a handsome young medico in the film, “Impatient Maiden,” from the pen of Donald Henderson Clarke, dean of modern novelists of the more “daring type.”

Supporting Ayres are such featured players as Mae Clarke, John Halliday, Una Merkel and Andy Devine. James Whale, creator of “Frankenstein,” directed.

A short screen comedy and a Pathe News review of current topics complete the screen fare.




AMERICAN SHOWS ‘BEHIND THE MASK’

Jack Holt and Boris Karloff co-star in the current American theater attraction, “Behind the Mask.”

The story is one concerning the mysterious leader of a dope ring, who by force of will dominates his hirelings and directs the importation and sale of narcotics.

As the story goes, no one has ever seen him and no one dares to apprehend him. The secret service fathoms the depths of the mysterious “Mr. X” hoax, but manages to pin the crimes and sorceries which accompany his notorious career only at the risk of several ace operatives.

Constance Cummings plays an important part in this newest of shudder films.

Andy Clyde is seen in a Mack Sennett comedy, while Eddie Buzzell and a newsreel complete the program.




LEWIS STONE, HUSTON STAR IN ‘WET PARADE’

Neil Hamilton’s Study Of Blind Youth Best Of Imaginative Work

By Wood Soanes
The evils of alcoholism, both licensed and illegal, are presented with fervor on the screen this week in “The Wet Parade,” a melodrama that becomes distinguished more through its presentation and interpretation than its subject matter.

In "The Wet Parade” Upton Sinclair undertook to prove that conditions have gone from bad to worse in the liquor traffic since the constitution was amended to curb it, and voices the faint hope that some day they will get this thing figured out.

But in the fashion of the pamphleteer, Sinclair is forced to use short cuts for his arguments, and, as usual, these short cuts lead to illogical conclusions. As a debate for or against prohibition, “The Wet Parade” is merely good melodramatic entertainment.

In the first period we have the Old South with hospitality, bourbon and graceful Southern gentlemen taking their juleps in major portions. One of these, Lewis Stone, becomes so engrossed with the convivial business that he gambles his fortune away, gets the d. t.’s and finally slashes his genial but worthless throat in the hog sty.

In the second period, a disreputable Northern gentleman, who also has as much character as an alley cat, moves from the pre-prohibition days into the new era, seeks to console himself with bootleg liquor, which so affects his brain that he slays his faithful wife when she tries to curb him, and goes to the penitentiary for the balance of his life.

The younger generation is also affected. The Southern gentleman’s dashing son inherits his father’s taste for rum, samples a bad bottle or two, and becomes permanently blind; The Northern gentleman’s son, disgusted with drink, becomes a prohibition agent and finds that the way of the law enforcer is not strewn with freshly cut roses.

The two families are joined by this time and a new generation is uttering his infant cries of hope that some day everything will be lovely.

Victor Fleming, the director, was undoubtedly faced with a considerable chore in translating the Sinclair novel into terms of cinema, but he did a magnificent job. Unable to soften the hokum melodrama to any extent, he exercised intelligence in his selectiveness of the players and in his presentation of scenes. The results take two hours of screen time but they are eminently satisfactory.

First to come forward for honors is Lewis Stone, with white hair and goatee to match, who paints a delightful picture of the Southern gentleman with the unquenchable thirst; next is Walter Huston, whose characterization of the Northern toper is a masterpiece of caricature, proving anew that he is one of our major actors, and third on the list is Dorothy Jordan, playing the Southern girl with understanding and charm.

But these players have roles that play themselves without much guidance. For sheer invention, the palm must go to Neil Hamilton, whose study of the Southern boy who goes blind is one of the most carefully conceived and executed screen portraits to pass in review in a long while. Hamilton peered beneath the surface of his blind man and found drama of the most compelling sort.

There are certain characteristics that go invariably with the blind but are never captured in interpretation – the spirited attempt of the new afflicted to discount the loss of sight, false tone of enthusiasm that marks their speech, the guarded speed of movement. Hamilton not only perceived these items but he projected them naturally and credibly.

If prizes are distributed for inventive work of this sort, Hamilton deserves a hearing.

A smaller touch, but one that also deserves commendation, is Jimmy Durante’s picture of the wise-cracking prohibition agent, whose death scene is affecting.

“The Wet Parade” can otherwise take its place with the alcoholic dramas of other years, notably “The Drunkard” and “Ten Nights in a Bar Room.” In fact Sinclair borrowed too liberally from this honky-tonk school for complete comfort and were it not for the items listed above, this new addition to the shelf might have become richer in travesty than in drama.