HOLLYWOOD HEYDAY

JOAN CRAWFORD ARDENT ADMIRER OF BING CROSBY

2012-01-29T17:59:00.018-05:00

Star Plays His Records on the Set All Day Long

A one-minute vignette of Joan Crawford who has the title role in “Letty Lynton”:

Born in San Antonio, Tex., golden brown hair… Blue eyes large and round…

Worked in department store… Then danced in chorus…

Has figure of a goddess… walks pigeon-toed… is strong in her likes and dislikes…

Always goes up to strange babies and talks to them… Goes to beach daily for sun tan…

Is critical of own work but sensitive to criticism… Has long mahogany colored nails… Favorite color all shades of blue…

Gets that way too sometimes…

Favorite singer Bing Crosby… Has all his records and plays them on the set all day…

Always adored Barbara La Marr but never knew her…

Never sits idle and makes hook rugs incessantly… Loves tennis and backgammon but hates bridge…

Has every dress made tighter… dislikes cheap jewelry and affected people… Loves dramatic roles best… Is petrified at own previews… Loves her home and changes furniture annually… Has pajamas by the hundreds…

Hates to be waited on by servants… has five… Is petrified at making personal appearances… Gets fan mail by the thousands… Loves to sit for photographs… Usually destroys most all…

Loves ice tea, tomato soup and corn flakes… Practices singing daily… Always loses her gloves…

People always try to sell her things… Pronounces been, “bean”… says thank you eternally… Drives a sharp bargain in business… Has enthusiasm of child… Hates to make plans;

Fears disappointments… Afraid of the dark.

FEATURED PLAYER FEELS POISE WILL WIN OFFICE POST

By Dan Thomas
Hollywood, May 7

A girl who isn't afraid of losing her place in the movies!

That, ladies and gentlemen, is quite a statement – one that can be said of few in pictures, regardless of sex.

Consider for a moment what happens to a girl when she enters pictures. To begin with, if she is at all successful, she earns far more money than she ever could as a stenographer, bookkeeper or whatnot. She leads an exciting life. Result – after a taste of such a life she just can't go back to an ordinary dull existence and the thought is not a pleasant one.

After Year's Success

Cecilia Parker is one who is different. After a year of success – she has a contract and plays featured roles – Cecilia says:

“If anything should happen to make me drop out of pictures right now, I feel as though I would be much ahead of the game for the experience I've had,” the young actress told me. “Of course I hope to be able to carry on for some years yet. But there is no telling when one's picture life will come to an end. And when mine comes I won't cry – I will be glad to have had a taste of it.

Would Seek Office Job

“The first thing I would do if I were forced out of pictures would be to look for a job in an office. I believe that the poise and experience I have acquired in pictures would be of help to me in getting such a job, too. Poise is just as important in an office as anywhere else, although most girls don't seem to consider it so.

“Or I might get married. I expect to do that anyway when the right man comes along.”

Let's hope that Miss Parker's views on her screen career won't change. Our observation has been that actors and actresses die very hard and are miserable once their popularity starts to wane. To take Cecilia's attitude means pleasant years ahead.

ACTRESS PLAYS MOTHER ROLE FOR FIRST TIME

Loretta Young, who will be seen next Tuesday in “Play Girl,” a Warner Brothers and Vitaphone production, has for four years worked steadily going from one play to another, and portraying a variety of characters which ranged from the pampered daughter of the rich to gangster's moll and Chinese flapper.

But in “Play Girl,” she portrays the mother of a baby for the first time.

It might not have seemed strange if Loretta had rebelled at the part, but she loves it. “I have always been unusually fond of babies,” she says. “When I was a child playing with dolls, they were always baby dolls. When I cut paper dolls, those too were small children, and they were usually from the colored advertisments of some popular magazine. Cute babies. Fat healthy babies. I loved them all, and pasted their pictures into a large, loose-leaf scrap book. I still cherish it and even today, when I see some extraordinarily appealing baby picture in a magazine, I cut it out and add it to my collection.”

The baby in “Play Girl” for which Loretta Young and Norman Foster act as parents is a tiny one, but gives every evidence of becoming a bouncing child.

Loretta, so the baby's mother said, handled it expertly.

Others in the cast of “Play Girl” are Winnie Lightner, Guy Kibbee, Noel Madison, Dorothy Burgess, Mae Madison, Nadine Dore, Aileen Carlisle and James Ellison. The director is Ray Enright.

GRAND HOTEL PREMIER FINDS STARS ON HAND

Mrs. Clark Gable Almost Trampled On By Girls

By Dan Thomas
Hollywood (NEA)

Goings on about town: The premier of “Grand Hotel”... and why not with so many stars in the picture... Garbo, Joan Crawford, the Barrymore brothers, Wally Beery, Lewis Stone, Jean Hersholt...

Garbo and John Barrymore the only ones of the cast not present... Garbo never shows in public... and John had to go fishing... at least that's what Will Rogers said.

Rogers acted as master of ceremonies... thereby insuring success for that portion of the evening... he had one good crack... “Louis B. Mayer is a very close friend of President Hoover's – in fact, a few months ago he was about the only friend Hoover had.”

Plenty Of Big Lights

Just before the show went on it was announced that Garbo would appear in person to take a bow after the picture... and then Wally Beery came on garbed in a burlesque dress... it was very bad... the entire audience started to walk out on the stunt.

Never since the opening of “Hell's Angels” have I seen so many of those big lights in front of a theater... dozens of them... and what a list of who's who in the audience... Everyone in town who could scrape up a dress suit and the price of admission attended... of course young Doug was there with Joan Crawford... and making no attempt to conceal his pride in her...

Edmund Goulding and his wife also present... what a job of directing he did on the picture... he'll be writing his own ticket for a long time as a result of it.

Stars, More Stars

Norma Shearer and Irving Thalberg, coming in late...

dozens of girls almost trampling on Mrs. Clark Gable in their frantic efforts to get Clark's autograph...

Jack Oakie doing his best to protect his mother from the crowd...

Karen Morley, all dressed in white, with Billy Bakewell... and pretty Gene Stratton looking almost like a painting in her black gown,

Constance and Joan Bennett, with their husbands, together as usual...

Jean Harlow, with the famous platinum tresses now red, causing everyone to look twice before recognizing her...

Bob Montgomery doing a stag act with Reginald Denny and Elliott Nugent and their wives... Mrs. Bob is in New York...

Dick and Jobyna Arlen wondering if football tactics might be of some use... Larry Olivier and Jill Esmond following right behind them.

Marlene With Hubby

Seldom have I seen so many men with their own wives... Marlene Dietrich with her husband... Al Scott wishing Colleen Moore was with him... but she's just a poor little working girl in the theater across the street these days...

everyone trying to get across the street to the Roosevelt at the same time after the show... and finding the exits too small... but arriving eventually... to stay as long as Harry Halstead and his gang can be persuaded to keep the music going.

IRVING THALBERG CREATIVE GENIUS OF GRAND HOTEL

At the opening in Los Angeles Friday night, April twenty-ninth, of the amazing picture “Grand Hotel,” Mr. Will Rogers, with his accustomed cleverness and verbal gracefulness, mentioned the actors in the play, one after another, and mentioned the director and the many whose names were on the program and some who were not.

All of these good people so complimented arose and bowed and basked in the spotlight and received the kindly plaudits of the audience.

One young man with a fine sensitive face and the fire of genius in his eyes, sat quietly unnoticed and unheralded throughout the entire evening.

And he was the one person who was mainly responsible for the marvelous success which everybody was enjoying on this wonderful occasion.

The actors were notable. No one denies them the credit which is their due, but if this or that actor had not played his part, some other actor would have been found to play it equally well.

Moreover, remarkably able as the director was and the scenario writer, too, still if these competent people had been absent, some other competent people could have been discovered to take their places.

But who can find another Irving Thalberg, the brilliant creative mind back of this great picture and so many other of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s splendid productions?

Perhaps only those who work with him fully appreciate what the genius of Irving Thalberg meant to “Grand Hotel” and what it means to the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer institution and to the whole moving picture industry.

Mr. Thalberg has the admirable modesty of genuine merit, but next time we hope that this modesty will not prevent SOME mention and SOME spotlight and SOME proper recognition of the man who is the most interesting and the most significant figure on all such occasions.

ORPHEUM TO FEATURE “BEN-HUR” IN SOUND AND PARTS IN COLOR

Screen spectacle which passed out with the coming of the talkies may be seen in all its glory with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's return showing of “Ben-Hur,” conceded to be the most spectacular film in the world.

The picture, in which Ramon Novarro plays his greatest role, is now augmented with sound effects and will be shown at the Orpheum theater for two days, starting Tuesday.

“Ben-Hur” was directed by Fred Niblo, and the history of its three years in the making both in Italy and California, at a cost of four million dollars, is a real life odyssey of enterprise and adventuring, culminating with the completion of the gigantic Antioch circus and race course and the filming of the great chariot race between the Jew, Ben-Hur, and the Roman, Messala.

Increases Realism

The addition of sound makes the spectacular nature of these gigantic scenes even more vivid and impressive for in the chariot scenes the audience is now able to hear the thrilling cheers of the spectators. The effect of sound is again made apparent in the terrific sea battle in which the shouts of the wounded make for an alarming realism.

General Lew Wallace wrote “Ben-Hur” half a century ago and its success as a novel was followed in 1899 by its dramatization. The stage spectacle has since become known as the most widely produced offering in the world and the fact that no year goes by without a production of the spectacular Wallace drama in some country or other has given it the title of the world's most immortal story.

Among scenes which current talkies cannot duplicate are those of the Wise Men and the Star of Bethlehem, Jerusalem under Roman occupation, the amazing sea battle between Greeks and Romans, the brilliant chariot race, the hero's assembling of his Galillean legions, the finding of his mother and sister in the valley of the lepers and the miraculous healing wrought by the Divine Power. Many of the scenes are done in color.

MOVIE GO ROUND

2012-01-24T21:48:00.032-05:00

By Louella O. Parsons
Hollywood, May 8

Colleen Moore is opening her gorgeous home in Bel Air. It’s one of the show places in California and she hasn’t lived in it for over a year. During the time she has spent in New York, Palm Beach and other points East and South, the Martin Flavins rented it. Now that Colleen is married, she yearns to play hostess again.

When she returned to California she was indifferent to motion pictures. She was determined to continue her stage career. She felt she had had too many heartaches during the early days of the talkies, when her experience as one of the screen’s most successful stars seemed to count for naught.

But it’s all different now.

Three film companies came after her and, after all, California is home and Colleen has many friends here and she loves the movies.

No Jokes For Garbo

You cannot make light of Greta Garbo to the film colony and get an approving smile. You cannot imitate her threat to “go home," and find any of the film stars who think you are funny. Greta Garbo is one star whose work as an actress is respected.

Will Rogers discovered that when he urged Wallace Beery to dress as Garbo after promising the audience at the opening of “Grand Hotel” that Garbo had consented to appear.

Rogers was big enough to admit his mistake and to come right out in the open and take the blame, and it takes a pretty big person to do that. He was astounded by the storm of criticism that followed the hoax.

Jack Can Come Back

Jack Gilbert’s little announcement that he intends to become a director started something. Telephone calls, telegrams and eager friends all tried to tell him that he is making a mistake. I wonder.

Jack, in his heyday, was the most important male star we have ever had, with the possible exception of Rudolph Valentino. He is still a great actor.

If he wants to step out of character for a brief time and direct a picture he is perfectly justified. It needn’t mean that he is through with acting forever. He can come back and his little directorial experience won’t do him any harm.

On Camping Trip

Oh the great outdoors! Robert Montgomery and Reginald Denny are planning a three-day camping party at Denny’s luxurious cabin in the San Bernardino mountains. Bob is to play the lead in Marion Davies’ picture and he is trying to figure out how he can get three days and still be on the job.

Irving Pichel has bought three acres in Flintridge and will build a farmhouse home.

Gary Cooper is all set for a beach house. Some of his friends suggested that he ought to have a party for the chimpanzee that he brought back with him. Gary waxes enthusiastic over the chimp, which he says has a very sweet disposition. Being used to Lupe Velez’s temperamental outbursts, maybe the chimp seems mild.

Hollywood’s Club

New York has its Dutch Treat club, but leave it to Hollywood to have its West Side Asthma and Riding club. You should have read the list of members, headliners all of them. The only phony thing about it is the title. The members are Groucho Marx, Don Marquis, Don Ogden Stewart, Homer Croy, Buddy Desylva, Allen Rivkin, Harry Brand, Ted Cook, Jimmy Gleason, Harrison Carroll, Chic Sale and a number of other literary lights.

Someone suggested the title ought to be changed, but, as Groucho Marx said, “It wouldn’t be fair to the people who have resigned. They might want to join again and find it’s the same old West Side Asthma and Riding club.”

The Film Babies

Where are all these gay parties at the beaches? I spent Sunday at Santa Monica and I was never so surrounded by babies and baby conversation since Parsons Jr. was in the nursery.

Barbara Bebe Lyon held open house. Marlene Dietrich brought over her little daughter Maria Sieber, all dressed in silk pajamas.

“I washed my hands in chloroform,” Maria confided, “so I could hold the baby.”

Marlene explained that she meant a disinfectant.

Irving Thalberg Jr., his blond curls in ringlets, had his picture taken with Barbara, but he didn’t think much of her or the camera, either. He kept telling his mother that he wanted to see Sammy Goldwyn and even though she is Norma Shearer to fans, she is only mother to him.

BETTE DAVIS GETS PART IN BARTHELMESS FILM

By Louella O. Parsons
Los Angeles, May 7

Little Bette Davis, blond, young and with ability, has been elected to take the place of Marian Marsh at Warner Bros. Fox is dickering at this very moment with the Marsh girl. Marian, according to report, will go to Fox on a contract now being negotiated.

Bette has a great chance if she will put herself in the hands of a capable makeup man. She gave a great performance in “Seed” and one was not distracted by over-beaded eyelashes and over-rouged mouth.

She plays opposite Barthelmess in “Cabin In the Cotton” and she won that role after innumerable tests were shown Barthelmess. Hardie Albright has one of the chief roles. Michael Curtiz directs.

Jack Oakie, sweater and all, will soon have a trip to New York. He has been signed by Charles R. Rogers or will be signed for one of the leads in “Madison Square Garden,” the picture in which Jimmie Gleason will do his comedy stuff.

Well over 3000 feet of film were shot of the Garden when Charlie was in New York, by special permission of and in association with W. F. Carey of Madison Square fame.

Despite all this fight atmosphere, “Madison Square Garden” will not deal solely with the pugilistic game. There will be hockey, bicycle races and many other forms of sport.

The latest up to to-day on the Nancy Carroll-Paramount scrap is a compromise. Nancy, it appears, was getting bonuses in addition to salary, which gave her a fat weekly pay check. In the general cutting down order it was decided to remove the bonus and hand Miss Carroll a flat salary.

At first she refused, but according to a friend of hers, she and Paramount have reached an agreement whereby she receives $1000 a week. The one thing Nancy asks for is better stories, and that she is promised. She feels her roles haven't been good the past year. And there is something in what she says.

GOSSIP

Hollywood - Watch out for this one! Pola Negri is going to write a book entitled “My Confessions.” And Pola says she is going to tell everything, leaving nothing untold. What a sensation it should create.

Also, Ann Harding has resumed her piano lessons. Well, it must be getting rather quiet around the house these days at that.

John Boles has swapped his horse for a bicycle for the time being. He claims that he really gets more exercise on the bike. He wouldn't if he rode the horse in our fashion.

Clara Bow dropped in at the Paramount studio the other day to visit with some of her old pals. And didn't say a word about resuming her career – even when she was asked.

Now that they have gone nautical, Bill Seiter and Laura La Plante are wondering what to call their new yacht. Bill sort of favors “The Panic.”

And we hear reports of a romance budding between Barbara Weeks, pretty Wampas Baby Star, and Alex Tiers, wealthy man-about-town.

Helene Near Altar?

More love rumors – these concerning Helene Costello, just back from Europe, and Harold Haas.

And right on top of that comes the report that Nancy Carroll's latest marriage is beginning to wilt.

Jack Gilbert is getting to be his old self again. Don't know what causes it but I hope he holds out long enough to put that old personality on the screen.

Suggestions for song numbers in the forthcoming Wheeler and Woolsey opus, “Hold 'Em, Jail” - “Sing, Sing You Sinners,” “Just a Gigalo” “My Time Is Your Time” and “Wrong Number.” What d'ya mean, not so good?

“One Eye” Connelly, that gentleman who used to crash the papers so much because of his gate-crashing activities, now is the unofficial greeter outside the Brown Derby each day at lunch time. That's one gate he doesn't seem to be able to crash, however.

Chico – Bridge Expert

They can keep him in a hostpital if they want, but they can't keep Chico Marx from playing bridge. It's a laugh to watch him, too. Someone has to hold and play the cards for him. Chico simply doing the bidding and giving instructions on which cards to play. He's lucky, too.

But the studio isn't so fortunate. While he's winning at bridge, the studio is losing thousands through holding up production on the new Marx film.

How's this for speed? Glenn Tryon came home from the harbor where he had been puttering around with his boat, at five o'clock the other day. Scattered all over the house, to make sure he would see one of them, were notes from his wife saying, “You don't know it but you're acting as master of ceremonies in San Diego tonight.”

At six o'clock Glenn boarded a plane. At seven he was in San Diego. And at seven-thirty he was on the job. And did he wow 'em!

NAGEL TELLS NEEDS OF MOVIES

By Louella O. Parsons, Motion Picture Editor, Universal Services
Los Angeles, May 7

With many of the most virulent symptoms diagnosed and remedies skillfully suggested for the current ills of the motion picture theaters, Conrad Nagel returns to Hollywood.

He returns after five months touring the country. He has seen small houses filled to overflowing, while huge, expensive theaters remain empty. He has talked with theater owners who have not felt the bitterness of unoccupied seats and he has heard lamentations from theater owners who have suffered the pangs of poverty.

What’s the remedy? “Give the people good pictures and not too much vaudeville,” says Mr. Nagel, “and you will see a return of the old days.

“If I owned a theater I should separate vaudeville and motion pictures. They obviously do not belong together. Certainly, vaudeville, that failed as an entertainment, is not a crutch on which the movies should lean.”

A little thinner, much wiser and with much valuable information, Conrad returns, after having made over 700 addresses. He played five shows a day, he talked to women’s clubs, Parent-Teachers’ associations, and he debated with censor boards throughout the country. He went to stay five weeks and remained almost half a year.

Why? Because he was doing such intelligent work both Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and the Hays office urged him to continue.

Censor boards are not as black as many of our film writers have painted them, according to Conrad. “I found them a definite asset in Ohio,” he said. “They seek to do their duty and often they have been criticized for passing scenes that are considered harmful by women’s clubs.

“In most cases they only try to fulfill their duties. In a few states they take advantage of their position and openly fight motion pictures. I was asked to debate on Hollywood and censorship with a woman censor who had been widely publicized as fighting motion pictures. She had been noticeably unfair and she had misinterpreted everything about films and film folk.

“Our debate was staged in a hall occupied by the local women’s clubs and by the parent teacher association. I warmed up to my speech and I prepared a defense against some of her accusations that seemed irrefutable. Apparently they were irrefutable, for after I received applause for my efforts she disappeared and although we were supposed to debate, she refused to answer me.

“Most of the old ballyhoo methods of advertising in the front of theaters has disappeared. However, once in a while it confronts you,” said Conrad. “While I was in the East Eddie Cantor and George Jessel were doing a phenomenal business wherever they appeared. They would clear as much as $45,000 a week.

“I visited a small town in New York state and saw on a small theater the words ‘Eddie Cantor and George Jessel tonight’ and then in much smaller type, so small that you had to get very close to the sign board to read, ‘but not at this theater.’

“The inhabitants were so incensed at the hoax the theater owner had to close and leave town. I saw very little evidence of this type of advertising. A few isolated theater owners called attention to a coming attraction with sign boards suggesting sex angles where none existed, but this belongs more to main street and the five cent houses than to respectable neighborhoods.

May 8, 1932

2012-01-21T21:06:00.038-05:00

JOAN CRAWFORD EXTORTION PLOT PROVES TO BE SCARE

Hollywood, Calif., May 7
Joan Crawford, celebrated screen star, was greatly relieved to-day to learn that she had not been a victim of an extortion plot.

After questioning a mysterious eastern youth who had sought an appointment with the screen star, police announced he had been released when they had determined there had been no attempt on his part to extort money from Miss Crawford.

Advised of this fact, Miss Crawford determined to drop the case.

POLA NEGRI SAYS SHE WILL WED IN SUMMER

Cleveland, O., May 7 (UP)
Pola Negri, film star, confirmed reports upon arrival in Cleveland today for a vaudeville engagement, that she will be married either in July or August.

She declined to reveal her prospective husband's name although she declared he was an American and had been married before.

NANCY CARROLL AND STUDIO SETTLE ROW

Hollywood, Calif., May 7 (INS)
Although unconfirmed by the Paramount studio today, friends of Nancy Carroll, film actress, said she had patched up her differences with Paramount and would receive a salary of $1000 a week without bonuses hitherto given her.

The studio also was said to have promised her better stories.

ANN HARDING LEAVES RENO

Reno, Nev., May 7 (INS)
Within 24 hours after she had arrived in Reno by airplane, Ann Harding, blonde screen star, was zooming back to Hollywood today with Reno’s “friendliest” divorce decree.

Two hours after her “love” divorce decree had been granted from Harry Bannister, her actor husband, Miss Harding, after bidding her erstwhile husband an affectionate farewell, sped away in her trim green speed monoplane in which she had made the journey here from Hollywood.

For several minutes before her plane left, Miss Harding and Bannister walked about the airport holding hands and seemingly loath to part. Finally, after an affectionate embrace, she started her journey back to filmland where her meteoric rise in pictures wrecked their “ideal marriage.”

ETHEL CLAYTON PLEA FAILS

Los Angeles Judge Rules She Must Accept Divorce Decree

Los Angeles, May 7 (AP)
Ethel Clayton, film actress, must accept the divorce decree awarded her from Ian Keith, actor, even if she does not want it.

Miss Clayton, to whom the decree was granted some time ago, later decided she did not want it. She said she wanted separate maintenance only until she received $4500 under a property settlement and petitioned to set aside the decree.

Superior Judge Dudley Valentine yesterday ordered the divorce decree regularly docketed in the County Clerk's office. Attorneys for Mr. Keith had requested the action.

MARY ASTOR SAILS FOR SOUTH SEAS

Los Angeles, May 7 (AP)
Bearing Mary Astor, film actress and her husband, Dr. Franklyn Thorpe, Hollywood physician, the 35-foot yacht Henrietta sailed today for a cruise of the South Seas.

Prior to its return in August, the yacht will be put in a Honolulu Harbor for the birth of an infant to the couple.

SENNETT DROPS DIRECTION OF CHARLES MACK FEATURE

Hollywood, May 7
Mack Sennett has withdrawn from direction of the Charles Mack feature, which was a Moran and Mack picture until Moran dropped out of the cast. He will engage a director and be content with supervision.

NILS ASTHER GETS PASSPORT, RETURNS

Tijuana, Mexico, May 7 (INS)
Nils Asther, Swedish motion picture actor, has returned to Hollywood today after being detained in Mexico for 10 days because of failure to bring his American passport with him, officials announced. The passport was sent him from Hollywood and Asther left at once. He passed the time fishing in Ensenada.

DOLORES DEL RIO RETURNS TUES.

After an absence of two years, owing to illness, Dolores Del Rio returns triumphantly to the screen in a glamorous role. The star makes her belated celluloid appearance in RKO-Radio Pictures' “Girl of the Rio.”

Featured with her is Leo Carillo, rapidly becoming an outstanding screen star.

Miss Del Rio's appearance is a fortuitous one in that she selected a story which affords in plot structure, atmosphere and treatment a fit setting for her talents as an actress.

She plays the role of “The Dove,” who is forced by circumstances to dance and sing in a riotous cafe just across the border from the United States.

DOROTHY JORDAN DEVELOPS INTO CAPABLE ACTRESS

Evolves from “Just a Sweet Little Southern Girl”

The evolution of Dorothy Jordan from “Just a Sweet Little Southern Girl” into a young lady beginning to show talent as an actress has required about three years of hard and steady work.

She went to Hollywood originally under contract to Fox, which then was signing all the promising stage people it found as well as many who showed little promise. After a brief trial, Dorothy was judged to be of the latter group and was released.

Her uncertainty and humiliation were relieved by a self-sought role in “The Taming of the Shrew,” and after her first picture with Ramon Novarro at M-G-M she was placed under contract – still a sweet little Southern girl.

Since then, Fox, the studio that turned her down, has been borrowing her, notably for “Young Sinners” and more for “Down to Earth” with Will Rogers.

In the interim Dorothy, as sweet as ever but less naïve, has begun to develop as an actress. She considers one of her best roles that of "The Roadhouse Murder.”

STEAKS HOLD GERMAN MOVIE STAR IN U. S.

New York, May 7 (AP)
Dita Parlo, German movie star, likes to watch Americans eat steaks. And she likes the steaks, too, especially the New York night club thick kind.

She mimicked the method today, with vigorous motions of teeth and hands.

She likes them so well, she confided, she deliberately missed three Bremen-bound liners and began giving this city as her permanent address.

JOAN BENNETT WANTS MILLIONS

No greater tribute can be paid to the romantic theme of “She Wanted a Millionaire,” the Fox photoplay which marks the first screen appearance of 1932 of Joan Bennett, than the fact that five members of its cast were caught in the web of cupid during the making of the picture.

In the picture, Miss Bennett marries James Kirkwood and as the film ends she is shown preparing to marry her co-star Spencer Tracy. At the same time that she was portraying these screen romances Miss Bennett was enacting a real life romance and before completion of the picture she announced her engagement to Gene Markey, the writer.

James Kirkwood, too, had an affair of the heart and returned to the studio one day with a new bride, Miss Beatrice Powers, the young woman you will see in the beauty contest sequence of the picture as Miss Germany.

IT TOOK FILMS TO MAKE HERBERT A TRAMP

“The movies made a tramp of me!”

Hugh Herbert is not the only actor singing that song – only he means it differently.

Since Hugh deserted his typewriter for the grease paint at RKO Radio Pictures' studio he has played a tramp in five different productions – beginning with the railroad hobo in “Danger Lights.”

In “The Lost Squadron,” he shares hobo honors with Richard Dix and Joel McCrea. They play three returned aviators who “ride the rods” to Hollywood and become stunt flyers.

HIS ENNUI MADE COOK AN ACTOR

Sheer ennui made an actor of Donald Cook, former stock favorite, now seen in “The Trial of Vivienne Ware.”

He might have been a banker. In Portland, Ore., his home town, he started out as a clerk in his uncle's bank, doing the jobs most young bank clerks do. It bored him, irritated him besides because he felt that no matter what he accomplished, it would be attributed to his relationship to the head of the bank.

One day he left, bound for New York. It took him three years to get there. En route he worked at whatever he could find. He got jobs in stockyards, in lumber camps, in a business college, sold vacuum cleaners and mincemeat and other commodities, and all the time got nearer his goal.

In Kansas City, working by day, he played parts in community theater at night. A year later he was on Broadway, and his troubles were over. He has been “at liberty” rarely since.

About two years ago he came to Hollywood, partly to visit relatives on the coast, principally at the call of romance. His marriage to Frances Beranger, step-daughter of William DeMille lasted briefly. “We didn't hit it off” is his only comment.

GEORGE BARBIER IS AGAIN CAST WITH MAURICE CHEVALIER

George Barbier, jolly king of “The Smiling Lieutenant,” is a member of the cast of a Maurice Chevalier starring picture for the third time in his brief film career. He was one of the first actors to be assigned a featured part in “One Hour With You,” when casting staff made their selections.

It was in Chevalier's “The Big Pond” that Barbier made his film debut while working on the Broadway stage.

Since signing a picture contract following his appearance in “The Smiling Lieutenant,” Barbier has appeared in five Hollywood productions: “Twenty Four Hours,” “Girl About Town,” “Touchdown,” “No One Man,” and “Intimate,” all within four months.

His rapidly increasing list of films gives promise of a screen record comparable to that he held on the stage in playing more than 750 roles.

“One Hour With You” also has Jeanette MacDonald, Genevieve Tobin, Charlie Ruggles and Roland Young predominantly cast.

ZITA JOHANN, HUNGARIAN BEAUTY, MAKES FILL DEBUT IN “STRUGGLE”

Actress Was Theater Guild Leading Lady When Only 19

Zita Johann, who makes her cinema debut in D. W. Griffith's “The Struggle” was born in Hungary, but came to the United States as a child of nine. Her father was an officer in the Hungarian Hussars, and in her childhood was stationed at the sizeable city of Temesvar, in the should of Hungary.

At 19, she became one of several leading women to Basil Sidney in the first road tour repertory company the Theater Guild sent out. Only a brief experience in stock had preceded this. George Bernard Shaw's “The Devil's Disciple,” Leonid Andreyev's “He Who Gets Slapped” and Ibsen's “Peer Gynt” were included in the repertoire.

Followed a succession of stock engagements, interspersed with metropolitan and road engagements. Nineteen twenty-seven brought a long road tour in “The Cradle Song,” the play from the Spanish, which Eva Le Gallienne had produced with her Civic Repertory Company in New York.

In the fall of 1928 she appeared in a play of Tennessee rural life called “Rope.” Then came her selection by Arthur Hopkins to create the heroine in Sophie Treadwell's “Machinal.”

This play had its New York premier early in September, 1928. The critics proclaimed her a new-found genius of tragedy. Then the films beckoned. The young actress went to Hollywood – there to remain for six months without playing a part or making even one scene. She returned to New York and was playing in “Tomorrow and Tomorrow” when signed by Griffith.

PARAMOUNT HAS 'MIRACLE MAN'S' TALKIE VERSION

Only Half of Principals in Silent Film Are Remembered

Only half of the six leading players in the silent production of “The Miracle Man” 13 years ago are remembered by the general public today.

It is easily remembered that Betty Compson, Thomas Meighan and Lon Chaney worked in the original film, for they soon rose to stardom as the result of their marvelous portrayals.

Today, in the Paramount's talking version those parts go to Sylvia Sidney, as the girl crook, Chester Morris as the leader of the group and John Wray as the Frog, a fake cripple.

In the original film, Frankie Lee appeared as the crippled boy; Joseph Dowling as the patriarch and Monte Dumont as the pickpocket, parts which are now played respectively by Robert Coogan, Hobart Bosworth and Ned Sparks.

Of the original sextet, Miss Compson and Meighan are still film favorites, Chaney and Dowling are dead, Dumont plays character roles under the name John Dumont and Frankie Lee, grown up, no longer acts.

George Loane Tucker, director of the silent film, is dead.

Others who worked under Tucker's guidance in 1919 included W. Lawson Butt, Elinor Fair, F. A. Turner and Lucille Hutton. Their places in the new version are filled by Lloyd Hughes, Virginia Bruce, Frank Darien and Florine McKinney.

Boris Karloff also has a role in the Paramount's film, but who first created the part for the screen is unknown today.

GRAND HOTEL BOASTS FIVE STARS

“Grand Hotel,” Metro-Goldwyn’s most ostentatious production, is playing at the State theater this week, in the first road show engagement since the inception of talking pictures. Two shows daily are being presented, with all seats reserved.

“Grand Hotel” boasts probably the most imposing cast that has yet appeared in any single photoplay.

The five most prominent roles in the new film are played by Greta Garbo, John Barrymore, Wallace Beery, Joan Crawford and Lionel Barrymore.

Miss Garbo, now working in “As You Desire Me” at Culver City, plays Grusinskaya, the dancer. John Barrymore is the baron with whom she falls in love, and Wallace Beery has the role of Preysing, a German financial speculator. Miss Crawford plays Flaemmchen, a stenographer, and Lionel Barrymore has the much-discussed role of Kringelein.

Other roles are filled by Lewis Stone, Jean Hersholt, Purnell Pratt, Rafaelo Ottiano, Tully Marshall, Frank Conroy, Edwin Maxwell, Ruth Selwyn, and Kathryn Crawford.

In cinematic form, “Grand Hotel” was made under the direction of Edmund Goulding.

GANG PICTURE COMING FRIDAY

Howard Hughes has a bodyguard, an ex-Texas ranger, since the threat of gangland was directed at him during the filming of “Scarface.”

The fact is now revealed for the first time. One of his friends in Houston let the “beans out of the bag” last week in that city to a newspaper reporter there. It will be recalled that newspapers over the country several months ago carried stories about the message of one of Al Capone’s emissaries to the young producer, saying that the “big boy” wanted to see the picture before it was released.
“He can just put his money down on the line at the box office,” Hughes officially answered the man.

Throughout the filming of the gangland story, which makes no secret about being based on the life of Al Capone, two gangsters were seen around the studio. It was this which caused the bodyguard for young Hughes to be rushed to the coast. He insisted upon a Texas man, as a precaution against any possible connection with the underworld gang whose threat hung over his head.

Hughes is now reported to be somewhere between Bermuda and Texas, his Texas ranger bodyguard with him.

For awhile, he has left the litigation involving the release of “Scarface” behind him, and is preparing to return to Hollywood, defying the wishes of the censor board of the state of New York to change the final scenes in the picture before it can be released in that state. Hughes is going to release it, and fight the censor boards through injunctions in every town in New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio, in which it plays.

Scarface will be played at the Empire theater starting Friday, in the original version as produced by Hughes. It has just finished an engagement in New Orleans, in the original version, where reports say it has broken the records established by “Hell’s Angels.”

Hughes himself describes the picture as “a gang picture to end gang pictures.”

RADIO TRICKS SHOWN IN FILM

Mysteries of radio sound effects and the modus operandi of storms, bridge crashes, racing horses and other incidentals to broadcasted drama prove excellent comedy material for “Are You Listening?” an unusual picture laid in the atmosphere of a national broadcasting station. The film is based on the widely-read J. P. McEvoy radio story.

The “applause machine” with which handclaps are manufactured to create applause in the right spots in the broadcasts of musical numbers, the “thunder chute” in which cannonballs are rolled down a wooden frame to reproduce the roar of a storm, the “wind whistle” with which artificial gales are created – are all worked by actual radio broadcast experts in order to make the scenes as authentic as possible.

Some of their secrets are peculiar, as, for instance, the crashing of timbers, which is reproduced by breaking matches two inches from the microphone.

TWO PICTURES, VAUDEVILLE AT STRAND

Janet Gaynor, whose latest production, “Delicious,” comes to the Strand theater Sunday for three days, proves again that she is the exception to the “luxury and wealth” rule of the movies. In this picture, in which she is co-starred with Charles Farrell, she is again most appealing as the pathetic little figure surrounded by poverty and squalor through which her innate goodness and charm shine brightest.

The story of “Delicious” is consistent with this characteristic of Miss Gaynor except that her occupation is a little more than ordinarily unusual. She is, of all professions, a marmalade girl. Or was, before embarking in the steerage of a giant liner to sail for America to find a home with an uncle in Idaho.

Buck Jones, popular screen star, is the hero of the outdoor drama, “Ridin’ for Justice,” which is the second feature attraction on this program.

“Ridin’ for Justice” was directed by D. Ross Lederman.

Five acts of vaudeville headed by Bob (“Speed”) Myers as master of ceremonies, completes the bill.

CHIC SALE FILM RETURNS THURSDAY TO PALACE THEATER

“The Expert,” which comes to the Palace theater Thursday, presents in the leading roles two actors who were hits in “The Star Witness” – Charles (“Chic”) Sale and diminutive Dickie Moore.

Edna Ferber, author of the story, expressed great satisfaction with the choice of the team of Sale and Moore as the inseparable pals of the heartwarming drama. The lovable, if opinionated, old man who finds himself out of place in the city home of his married son and the waif who finds himself out of place everywhere constitute the roles played by Chic and Dickie respectively.

Lois Wilson, Earle Foxe, Noel Francis and Elizabeth Patterson are seen in the large cast.

THE BIG TIMER AT EMPIRE WEDNESDAY

A very human story of youth, its ambitions and disillusionments, its set-backs and come-backs is told in “The Big Timer,” the picture coming to the Empire theater Wednesday for a three-day engagement. It reaches greatness through its simplicity, sincerity and understanding.

Ben Lyon portrays the character of Cooky Bradford with a vitality and sympathy that make you like him even when he is being his dumbest, for, though Cooky is a wise guy, hi isn’t as smart as the girl who stands back of him.

Eddie Buzzell, directing his first feature, has made a very real picture. Thelma Todd is alluring as the Park avenue siren and various other colorful characters are cleverly interpolated.

LEW AYRES COMING TO MAJESTIC SOON

Lew Ayres will soon be welcomed back to the RKO-Majestic theater as co-star with Mae Clarke in “Night World,” hailed as an intimate expose of the “café racket” and the little-known but exciting activities of the people who live by it.

Supporting roles are enacted by Boris Karloff, Dorothy Revier, Dorothy Peterson, Hedda Hopper and Clarence Muse.

HARRY CAREY IN PLAZA PICTURE

Harry Carey will be back in the saddle at the Plaza theater again Sunday for a two-day stay in town in the role of a U. S. Cavalry officer in “Cavalier of the West,” the first feature production he has made since his return from Africa, where he went to play the starring part in “Trader Horn.”

“Cavalier of the West” is the first of a series of eight romantic melodramas that Carey will make for Weiss Brothers Artclass Pictures corporation. “Roped” is the second.

Lew Cody, veteran star of the screen, heads the cast of Tiffany Productions’ newspaper drama, “X Marks the Spot,” scheduled to show at the Plaza theater Sunday and Monday.

The producers have assembled a strong supporting cast with a comparative screen newcomer, Wallace Ford, in the principle supporting role.

Sally Blane has the leading feminine role, while the dependable Fred Kohler, for years under contract to Paramount, is the heavy spot.

MURDER MYSTERY COMING TO MAJESTIC NEXT SATURDAY

A murder that shocked the nation, “The Famous Ferguson Case,” is the new First National feature picture coming to the Majestic theater Saturday for a four-day engagement. It will get a peep into the real world behind the scenes of newspaper making, such as has never before been granted to the army of newspaper readers.

Joan Blondell plays the central role in “The Famous Ferguson Case,” She is assigned to write “sob stuff” for her sheet about the dreadful affair at Cornwall when the wealthy banker, Mr. Ferguson of New York, was found murdered under circumstances which point the finger of suspicion directly at Mrs. Ferguson and her close friend, Judd Brooks.

YOUNG, LILY IN RKO COMEDY

The comedy romance of a “just pretend” bride and her bachelor groom on a “make believe” honeymoon, “This Is the Night,” is featured this week at the RKO-Majestic theater.

Featured in the role of the synthetic bride is Lily Damita. She is ably supported by a cast that includes Charlie Ruggles, Roland Young, Thelma Todd and Cary Grant, a new and handsome screen hero.

In “The Is the Night,” Lily Damita is a beautiful but “broke” French actress who is engaged by Charlie Ruggles to pose as the wife of Roland Young, who has been caught in a gay mood with Thelma Todd, the wife of Cary Grant. Ruggles reasons that Grant’s suspicions will be allayed when he sees Young is very attentive to his own wife.

Complications arise when Young and Lily Damita are forced to join Grant and his wife on a vacation trip to Venice. Hilarious comedy situations arise as the synthetic bride and groom share the same sleeping compartments and later when they share the same hotel suite.

Thelma Todd becomes almost uncontrollably jealous when she observes that not only her bachelor friend, Roland Young, is falling in love with Lily Damita, but her husband and Charlie Ruggles, too. These complications resolve in a cyclone of farcial predicaments that end merrily.

The “Sultan of Swat,” Babe Ruth, heads the program of short film features in the first of his series of sport reel titles, “Slide, Babe, Slide.”

Other short subjects are the Frank McHugh newspaper comedy, “Extra- Extra,” and the RKO-Pathe News.

SIRENS OF SCREEN ARE NOT LURING BACHELORS IN LEAP YEAR

2011-06-16T21:57:00.019-04:00

SIRENS OF SCREEN ARE NOT LURING BACHELORS IN LEAP YEAR

By Dan Thomas
Hollywood, May 7

And how about these very eligible screen bachelors?

With leap year already swiftly passing into history – one-third has already gone by the boards – quite a number of Hollywood’s bachelors are holding fort against the onslaughts of Dan Cupid in a manner that is a little short of amazing.

Then there are others, once conquered by this same “General” Cupid, who appear to have launched very successful counter-attacks.

All in all, it begins to look as though 1932 is one leap year which will pass down into history without having accomplished a great deal at least insofar as Hollywood is concerned.

Yet, strangely enough, these hard-to-get bachelors are constantly seen in the company of charming girls.

They do, however, go in for a variety – which perhaps is the secret of their singleness.

Take Ramon Novarro for instance. Considering the number of wives some men have been able to acquire, one might reasonably suppose that Ramon has had a few opportunities to place a wedding ring upon a girl’s finger.

Just what Novarro’s defense is – and such a highly eligible young man must have a defense because few men are a match for any woman when it comes to this business of romancing – remains somewhat of a mystery.

Perhaps it is the announcement he made a couple of years ago about wanting to go into a monastery. No matter how romantically a girl may want to feel, it must be difficult when she considers that her man’s chief ambition is to be a monk.

William Haines gets his protection from two sides – his mother and his artistic sense. Bill’s “best pal is his mother.” She is by his side at a good many of the social events he attends. Oh, of course, he goes out with other girls too. But “mom” comes first. The girls know this.

Then there is that artistic sense. In addition to owning an antique shop, Bill goes in for interior decorating in a big way. And how can a girl be expected to excite a gentleman, no matter how eligible, with talk about boudoirs and kitchen decorations when he already knows more about them than she does?

As far as George O’Brien is concerned, there isn’t any way of explaining just how he has managed to live a life of ease as a bachelor. And George himself declines to explain it.

He has been high on the list ever since his arrival in Hollywood too. The son of Dan O’Brien, for years San Francisco’s chief of police. That sounded pretty good to Hollywood’s fair young creatures. One could pick a much worse father-in-law than a chief of police.

That wasn't all that was in George’s favor though. He just naturally is the kind of a man girls rave about. And if you don’t believe that, listen in on a Hollywood “hen” party sometime. In fact, I have spent entirely too much time hearing of George’s virtues when the girls shouldn’t have been thinking of him at all.

He goes out quite a lot, too. And, to be quite frank, he seems the most apt to make me out a dishonest writer. He has been seeing entirely too much of a certain young lady lately.

Joel McCrea also is on the list of “immune” eligibles. But then Joel has been running loose around Hollywood for only three or four years now. Perhaps given time, he may pass out of circulation.

There’s no doubt about Joel’s popularity. Even wives rave about him. And several single girls have baited their hooks for him. But so far he has continued to roam around perfectly contented with his present status.

Edward Everett Horton is another. He has adopted an uncle complex. Brother Wyn has children who are exceptionally fond of Uncle Eddie. And Eddie reciprocates that feeling.

Also, he finds that being an uncle is quite a safe pastime. Then, too, Eddie owns a very comfortable home which seems to function very smoothly without the assistance of a wife.

There are a number of others too – equally single. And all have had one or more chances to tie that matrimonial knot. But each, through his own peculiar method, has steered clear of such entangling alliances.

Walter Byron, Charles Butterworth, Chic Sale and George Brent all have done well in resisting those feminine charmers.

Quite a number of the younger boys have done pretty well, too. But they haven’t been in the racket long enough to deserve much credit. Besides, most of them are simply waiting for certain girls to murmur “yes.”

INTIMATE GLIMPSES TAKEN OF MOVIE FOLK AS THEY ARE SEEN IN HOLLYWOOD’S HALLS

By Dan Thomas
Hollywood, May 7

Strolling around: Gary Cooper, Sally Eilers, Mary Brian and Ken Murray all returning home on the same train.

Parties and still more parties for Lilyan Tashman.

Chico Marx home from the hospital, but still unable to walk.

And Mrs. Adolphe Menjou confined to her bed as a result of two cracked ribs sustained when she slipped on the bathroom floor.

Howard Hughes and a pretty unknown dining but not dancing at the Cotton Club.

In court to get her divorce, ZaSu Pitts stated that her husband left her five years ago. And here everyone thought all was quiet and peaceful until a few months ago. Guess one can keep a secret in Hollywood after all.

Claudette Colbert looking at new cars and trying to decide which one to buy.

Jack Dempsey and Estelle Taylor at the Frolics together, and enjoying themselves immensely. Maybe you think that won’t start rumors of a reconciliation. But don’t get excited. Reiterating our statement, there will be no remarriage.

Tallulah Bankhead dancing with an unknown at the same place.

Mr. Marlene Dietrich in town to visit his famous wife.

While playing a “truth game” at a party, Sylvia Sidney was asked if she really loves B. P. Schulberg, and she declined to answer.

Kay Francis leaving for Yosemite for a short rest before starting her next picture. Then she and Kenneth McKenna will be off to Europe for a real vacation.

Al Jolson trying to get hopped up over his forthcoming picture, his first in two years. He claims that he has to train just like a fighter before that necessary enthusiasm finally bursts into flame, then nothing else matters.

Richard Wallace and Tallulah Bankhead replacing the Von Sternberg-Dietrich combine in “The Blonde Venus,” the story which has caused such an uproar on the Paramount lot. When it’s finished somebody is going to have a big laugh. Will it be the executives or the two who refused to do it in the present shape?

Now somebody must be found to replace Bankhead in Gary Cooper’s next, “The Devil and the Deep.”

Ralph Graves feeling quite enthused over his new writing-directing-acting contract. Well, why not?

At last the movies have decided it might be a good plan to show the world they can poke a little fun at themselves… witness the current crop of pictures… there’s “Merton of the Talkies,” and “The Truth About Hollywood”… not to mention “Movie Crazy,” which is to be Harold Lloyd’s next release.

REIGN OF SERIAL QUEEN AT END

By Robert Grandon

Chatting with Junior Laemmle the other day, the question of old serial queens came up.

Grace Cunard, Helen Holmes, Ruth Roland, Pearl White, Kathlyn Williams, Marguerite Snow… where, oh where are they now?

“Serials are coming back, Bob.” Junior reassured me. “Universal makes them, and not for neighborhood audience and kid patronage alone, although, of course, youngsters revel in them. When you go to New York again, visit Roxy’s. You’ll find our serials on tap there.”

Which led me to make some queries regarding the modern serials.

I’m not talking now of those which run week after week in neighborhood houses, most of which are quickies produced by independents along Poverty Row. But of the serials which have succeeded, the leading ones of yesterday do I sing.

Grace Cunard is around Hollywood now attempting a comeback.

You catch an occasional glimpse of Kathlyn Williams in the films.

Marguerite Snow, she was Mrs. Jimmy Cruze in the Thanhouser days, is in private life.

Ruth Roland left for real estate and Pearl White is in Egypt.

Their successor today is Lucile Brown, a wisp of a 23-year-old girl, who is Universal’s serial star. Daughter of a minster, beauty prize winner, artist’s model, actress, musician, she became a serial heroine with “Battling with Buffalo Bill,” “Danger Island” and “The Great Air Mail Robbery.”

But serial stories have changed.

Helen Holmes made railroad serials and did her own stunts, leaping from trains, being tied to tracks, running engines, and all that.

Pearl White took her own chances too.

But the modern serial queen is saved by doubles when real danger hovers over, and the worst she need expect is a ducking in a cold lake or a fall from a galloping horse.

Indians have gone out of style… automobiles have replaced many a galloping horse… and airplanes bring modern serials right up-to-the-minute.

May 7, 1932: Joan Crawford Target In Extortion Plot

2011-06-05T10:47:00.021-04:00

JOAN CRAWFORD TARGET IN EXTORTION PLOT; MAN HELD

Authorities Listen In on Film Star’s Talk With Suspect

Los Angeles, May 7 (AP)
An apparent extortion plot aimed at Joan Crawford, film actress, was being investigated today by the district attorney’s office with the announcement one man was in technical custody for investigation.

Investigators said the actress’ apparent fear was based on a note which was slipped under the door of her home, asking for an appointment.

District Attorney Buron Fitts, who took an active part in trapping the suspect, refused to divulge details. He admitted, however, the man in the asserted plot was from Washington D. C.

Miss Crawford appealed to Fitts yesterday, it was learned, saying she had an appointment at her studio with the man. Two investigators were placed in an adjoining room but, Fitts said, the sound recording device they had failed to register the conversation between the actress and the suspect.

“From the report of the investigation it is difficult to tell just what the man wanted,” Fitts said.

The man was taken to the district attorney’s office, and, after being properly identified, was ordered to reappear there today for further questioning. No charge has been placed against him, although he was told not to endeavor to leave the city.

ANN HARDING WINS DIVORCE

Film Star Leaves Courtoom With Tear-Stained Face After Private Hearing

Reno, Nev., (AP)
Ann Harding, film star, was granted a divorce here this morning from Harry Bannister at a private hearing.

The ordeal of divorcing a husband she professed she still loves appears to have been a trying one for Miss Harding, who came from the court room with a quite evidently tear-stained face. She was helped into an automobile by her husband’s attorney, Morley Griswold.

The courtroom was closed to a throng of curious, including newspapermen, who stood about the door as Miss Harding arrived dressed in black except for a silver fox fur. Bannister, who arrived at the courthouse first, gave her an encouraging pat on the back as they walked into the courtroom together.

Miss Harding’s complaint, which was prepared after her arrival here from Hollywood,
charged “extreme cruelty.” Bannister’s course of conduct, the complaint said, disturbed her peace of mind and made continued association with him a risk to her health.

Miss Harding is to have sole custody of their four-year-old daughter Jane, with Bannister being granted the right of visitation. Contents of the property agreement were not disclosed.

Bannister did not remain in the courtroom to hear his wife’s testimony but left immediately after he had established his proof of residency here. Tomorrow he expects to fly to Hollywood and from there to New York where he will consider, he said, offers to appear in motion pictures.

Miss Harding also intends to leave Reno for Hollywood tomorrow, but whether they will go together could not be learned.

Bannister greeted her affectionately when she arrived here yesterday noon and last night they dined together at the home of William Woodburn, Miss Harding’s attorney.

Thus ended what Hollywood called “an ideal marriage.”

TALMADGE FINDS DIVORCE DELAY

Mrs. George Jessel has made a condition that may block any chance of a marriage between her husband and Norma Talmadge.

Mrs. Jessel has reputedly said that she will not consent to a divorce unless she can sue her husband and name a co-respondent. Jessel is supposed to have made an emphatic refusal after hearing the name his wife wished to mention.

Miss Talmadge has not as yet started the agreed upon divorce suit against Joseph M. Schenck. The Schencks were married about sixteen years ago. The unavoidable delay in Jessel’s effort to free himself has held back the Schenck divorce action from accounts.

The Jessels have been twice married with George Jessel, now thirty two. Mrs. Jessel is the former Florence Courtney of the Courtney Sisters, high-ranking sister team of their day.

The Jessels re-married following a divorce procured by Mrs. Jessel after a prolonged separation.Since their second marriage, Mrs. Jessel has become an ardent Christian Scientist.

UNWANTED DIVORCE MUST BE ACCEPTED BY ETHEL CLAYTON

Los Angeles, May 7 (UP)
Ethel Clayton, film actress, must accept the divorce decree awarded her from Ian Keith, actor, even though she may not want it.

Miss Clayton, who was awarded the decree some time ago, later decided she did not want it. She said she wanted separate maintenance only until she received $4500 under a property settlement, and petitioned to set aside the decree.

Superior Judge Dudley Valentine yesterday ordered the divorce decree regularly docketed in the county clerk’s office. Attorneys for Keith had requested the action.

MARY ASTOR, MATE, SAIL FOR SOUTH SEAS

Los Angeles, May 7 (UP)
Bearing Mary Astor, film actress, and her husband Dr. Franklyn Thorpe, Hollywood physician, the 80-foot yacht, Henrietta, slipped its anchor to-day for a cruise of the South Seas.

Prior to its return in August, the yacht will be put in a Honolulu Harbor for the birth of an infant to the couple.

MARY NOLAN FACES NEW COURT CHARGE

Los Angeles, May 7 (AP)
More court trouble faced Mary Nolan, actress, today. A complaint charging her with evading taxi fare has been issued by the city prosecutor’s office.

J. B. McDonnell, owner of a local motor livery, complained that the actress, formerly known as Imogene Wilson on the New York stage, owes him $43.50 for four days’ hire.

Miss Nolan is now under sentence of 30 days in jail for failure to pay wages in connection with the operation of a gown shop in Hollywood.

FAIRBANKS BACK IN HOLLYWOOD AFTER CRUISE

Hollywood, May 7
Back in Hollywood today after a trip to the south seas, Douglas Fairbanks expressed himself delighted with the care-free life of the natives.

“They’re the happiest people in all the world,” the actor declared after his arrival from San Francisco, where he disembarked.

“I’d like to have a little native hut away back in the country, get my food out of the sea and forests and come to town on boat days only. That’s the way to live.”

ACTOR’S MOTHER IS ROBBED OF JEWELRY

Los Angeles, May 7 (AP)
A search for the robber who entered the apartment of Mrs. Julia Sherman, mother of Lowell Sherman, film actor, and robbed her of furs and jewelry valued at $10,000 was started to-day by the police.

Mrs. Sherman discovered the robbery when she returned home yesterday afternoon. Included in the loot was a $5000 mink coat and nearly a dozen neck pieces.

ROGERS FINED $5 ON SPEEDING CHARGE

Beverly Hills, May 7 (UP)
Will Rogers, having failed to appear in court on a speeding charge, sent his attorney today to explain to the judge.

In effect, the attorney said the cowboy-humorist, not being familiar with speedometers because cow-ponies don’t have them, thought he was on the hurricane deck of a bronc while trying out a new automobile and neglected to look at the gadget.

And the judge, saying he didn’t believe Will intended to break the law anyway, suspended a $5 fine.

Rogers was charged with driving forty-four miles an hour in a twenty-mile zone.

ATWATER WARRANT FOR RENALDO ISSUED

Los Angeles, May 7 (AP)
The arrest of Duncan Renaldo, film actor and figure in a series of court actions involving his home and his status as a resident of this country, was issued at Atwater, Cal. growing out of a speeding case.

Justice of the Peace W. H. Osborne asked that the actor be arrested and sent to his court to answer a charge of speeding. Because Renaldo already had obtained ten continuances and “apparently is trying to use this court as a playhouse.”

The arrest occurred last November 29.

FILM DISPUTE IS CONTINUED

Hollywood, Cal. May 7 (AP)
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will not, at least for the time being, attempt to settle the differences that Marlene Dietrich, Josef von Sternberg and James Cagney are having with the film studios employing them.

A statement issued late last night by members of the conciliation committee of the academy, meeting in special session, said: “Due to an unfortunate error it had been reported that the meeting was called to take action concerning certain disputes which lately have become public. None of these cases was discussed by the committee.

An official of the academy, who asked that his name not be used, yesterday said the special meeting probably would consider the case of the three artists.

Miss Dietrich and Von Sternberg have been suspended by their studio for failure to produce a story which they deemed “unsuitable.” Cagney was suspended by his studio over a disagreement relating to salary.

No indication was given by the academy if it would take up the case of the actress, actor, and director in the future.

PARAMOUNT TO ADOPT PROFIT SHARING PLAN

Hollywood, May 7 (UP)
Paramount Studio employees joyfully greeted the announcement today that the corporation would readjust their losses on stock purchased through the corporation, and that a policy of profit-sharing for all employees would be institututed “just as soon as general business conditions would permit.”

PEPPING UP RENEE ADOREE

Renee Adoree, returning from Arizona in June, where she has been taking a cure for a lung ailment, has been notified by all studios that they will have parts for her as soon as she is available.

WANTS TO BE DANCER

Loretta Young wants to play in a picture in which she is a dancer. She started in pictures at the tender age of five as a dancer, and has never lost the urge.

DOUG, JR., IS WRESTLER

Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., has “gone athletic.” He works out with a trainer daily near the tennis courts at the studios. His favorite form of torture is wrestling.

WAS LIFE GUARD

Bette Davis was once a life guard, and a good one. She is one of the finest swimmers in Hollywood and complains because the swimming pool at her Toluca Lake home is too small.

WORKS IN FRENCH

Andre Luguet, French actor who played the king in “The Man Who Played God,” is at work at present in the William Powell role in a French-speaking version of “High Pressure.”

CAN’T COOL “BOARDING HOUSE”

Metro has abandoned attempts to get Helen Morgan’s “Boarding House” story cooled down to a temperature that would get by censors. It’s now in the camphor for good.

FORGETS OPTIONS

Arthur Pierson, Regis Toomey and Gene Pallette, actors, have been dropped by Paramount.

Eugene Pallette has started his 640th motion picture role as one of the leading members of Tallulah Bankhead’s supporting cast in “Thunder Below.”

The comedian made his screen debut twenty-one years ago as a juvenile leading man.

His lengthy record was established in spite of the fact that he dropped out of pictures for three years to enlist in the army during the World war, and for another three year period to try his luck in the oil fields.

Charles Bickford is more of a business man than a film actor. In addition to his motion picture work he finds time to handle eight enterprises, an island in the South Seas, and write an occasional play.

He owns a hog farm, chicken ranch, lingerie shop, garage, gas station, two whaling boats, half interest in a pearling schooner, and a small island near Java where cocoanuts are grown.

From Luella O. Parsons:

Little Bette Davis, blonde, young and with ability, has been elected to take the place of Marian Marsh at Warner Brothers. Fox is dickering at this very moment with the Marsh girl. Marsh, according to report, will go to Fox on a contract now being negotiated.

Bette has a great chance if she will put herself in the hands of a capable makeup man. She gave a great performance in “Seed” and one was not distracted by over-beaded eyelashes and over-rouged mouth.

She plays opposite Richard Barthelmess in “Cabin In the Cotton” and she won that role after innumerable tests were shown Barthelmess. Hardie Albright has one of the chief roles. Michael Curtiz directs the picture.

The latest on the Nancy Carroll – Paramount scrap is a compromise.

Nancy, it appears, was getting bonuses in addition to salary, which gave her a fat weekly pay check. In the general cut-down order it was decided to remove the bonus and hand Miss Carroll a flat salary.

At first she refused, but, according to a friend of hers, she and Paramount have reached an agreement whereby she receives $1000 a week.

The one thing Nancy asks for is better stories, and that she is promised. She feels her roles haven’t been good the past year. And there is something in what she says.

I am glad, very glad indeed, that Erich Von Stroheim is going to have a chance to see his picture, “Walking Down Broadway,” put on the screen. He was that thrilled when Winfield Sheehan bought the story and told him he could direct it for Fox.

After one piece of bad luck after another, here seemed a good break. Now, after months of weary waiting, Fox will really produce the picture. It will co-star Sally Eilers and Jimmy Dunn.

What a popular child is Sally. We are getting letters every day about her, asking that she and Jimmy Dunn make some more pictures together.

Jack Oakie, sweater and all, will soon have a trip to New York. He has been signed by Charles R. Rogers for one of the leads in “Madison Square Garden,” the picture in which Jimmie Gleason will do his comedy stuff.

Well over 3000 feet of film were shot of the Garden, when Charlie was in New York, by special permission of and in association with W. F. Carey of Madison Square fame.

Despite all this fight atmosphere, “Madison Square Garden” will not deal soley with the pugilistic game. There will be hockey, bicycle races and many other forms of sport.

No one knows better than Antonio Moreno what a struggle Mexico has had to establish its own motion picture industry. Tony has been in Mexico several months, directing and producing Mexican talkies. He has completed two pictures and he admits it’s tough sledding. His first is “Santa” and his second, “Eagle Facing the Sun.”

“We filmed scenes against Mexican backgrounds so strikingly beautiful they put Hollywood sets to shame. However, we get plenty of grief, for if it isn’t a bird warbling in the rafters of the sound stage it’s roosters crowing outside. The peons on their burros insist on riding into the camera lines of our country scenes – while in the cities it takes the police to hold back the Indians who are wide-eyed at such devilish contraptions as sound apparatus and cameras. But everywhere we meet with enthusiasm and eagerness from the Mexicans.”

The expensive premier of “Grand Hotel” could have been improved. Is everybody listening?

I mean if Jimmy Durante had been among those present, it might have been better for the fans, for Jimmy probably would have added a riotous comedy note.

He has returned from New York and was everybody on the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer lot happy! Jimmy will play a part in “Speak Easily,” Buster Keaton’s next picture, and plans are now to bring along Jimmy’s side-kicks, Clayton and Jackson, to emote with him.

Seems to me I heard of a battle that either Clayton or Jackson waged when someone spoke of something as being superfluous as a fifth wheel in Jimmy’s screen career.

Snapshots of Hollywood collected at random:

Joan Bennett in cerise lounging pajamas becoming to her blonde hair at the W. K. Howard’s.

Janet Gaynor with her hair tied up in a white veil to keep it in shape for tests she is to make, at the Howard’s. Bill Howard directs her and Charlie Farrell in “The First Year.”

Dorothy Burgess is denying that she and Clarence Brown intend to add a marriage sequel to their romance.

Ann Harding is leaving town via plane for Reno as per schedule.

Eddie Cantor and the Missus and Tom Mix and the lady who bears his name, stepping out at the Frolics.

PROHIBITION IS THEME OF FILM

“The Struggle” Is a 1932 “Ten Nights in a Barroom”

By Chester B. Bahn
“The Struggle” is a queer cinematic throwback, sort of a 1932 “Ten Nights in a Barroom.”

But only in the sense that I have used the term does this D. W. Griffith production succeed today. Crude in story, cruder still in treatment, and perhaps the poorest Griffith product from the standpoint of direction and photography, “The Struggle” represents misspent effort by those concerned, including Anita Loos and John Emerson, the scenarists.

It is difficult to accept the statement that these two able writers concocted “The Struggle,” it is simon-pure hokum, with the usual Loos-Emerson sparkle never instanced. The dialog is trite frequently to the point of irritation.

This, naturally, presupposes that the burden placed upon the shoulders of the players was mountainous, as indeed it was. Only Hal Skelly seems to have been successful in coping with it to any degree, slaving like a dramatic Trojan, he manages to vitalize Jimmie Wilson, the Loos-Emerson counterpart of Joe Morgan.

Otherwise, from the standpoint of performance, there is not much the candid critic may say in the way of praise. Zita Johann, making her cinema debut (you will next see her under the Radio banner), suggests possibilities, but in “The Struggle" she is permitted merely to suffer… and suffer… and then suffer some more.

If an exposition of the curse of drink, post-prohibition variety, still interests you, “The Struggle” is your picture. Having said that, there remains nothing for the analytical reporter to add.

Last minute Rialto news –

Jack Oakie’s Olympic games comedy will be titled “The Million Dollar Legs.”

Sally Eilers and James Dunn will co-star in “Walking Down Broadway.”

Chances favor the appearance of Madge Evans opposite Al Jolson in his first United Artists film.

BEHIND THE SCENES IN HOLLYWOOD

By Harrison Carroll
Hollywood Cal., May 6
A whole island turned out to bid Douglas Fairbanks farewell as he and his company boarded the Monowai and sailed out of the harbor of Papeete, taking with them the glamour of Hollywood transplanted to the South Seas.

Doug turned these Elysian isles upside down filming “Robinson Crusoe of the South Seas” and they liked it.

Wireless dispatches tell of the reception that the native girls gave to Maria Alba, Doug’s leading woman, and of a send-off party that might have been a scene in a motion picture – Polynesian chiefs, all the French officials of this capital of Oceanin, Chinese, natives, the entire population.

Sailing away, Doug promised that one of the first prints of the picture would be sent to Papeete to be shown in the island’s one little motion picture house, a theater as yet un-equipped with sound apparatus.

Their work done, the Fairbanks company has returned in eight deluxe cabins on the largest boat that touches Papeete. In the hold of the vessel was Doug’s dog, “Rooney,” which plays a part in the picture, two parrots and a brace of monkeys. The rest of the part is en route on Joseph M. Schenck’s yacht, “The Invader.”

In one of the few letters he has found time to write, Doug speaks of his picture: “It is a joyful story of the South Seas, a romantic fantasy of today. We have tried to make it a dream come true for every small boy who, at some time or another, has projected himself on a desert island; and yet we hope it also tunes in on the gypsy in every grown-up.”

Will Rogers was in great form as master of ceremonies at the opening of “Grand Hotel.”

“I came here,” said Will, who was in street clothes as usual, “because Louis B. Mayer called me up. That was sort of a command. You know Louis is a close friend of Mr. Hoover. In fact, a short time ago, it looked like he was Hoover’s only friend.

“This premier,” he added, “is really an anti-hoarding affair – to bring cash out of hiding. It’s a great success too. The box office says they even took in some Confederate money.

“And speaking of dough, ‘Grand Hotel’ is probably the only hotel in the country that will make money this year.”

He tossed them off like this for a few minutes.

YOUR DAILY GOSSIP:

Hollywood is razzing Sid Grauman for the very flat joke of leading the audience to expect that Greta Garbo would appear, and then bringing out Wally Beery dressed up in women’s clothes.

Incidentally, Wally was a female impersonator at one time – played a Swedish washerwoman…

Jean Harlow, original platinum blonde, has a new hair-shade, dark molasses taffy. Or was that a wig? She was squired to the premier by Paul (“Big Brother”) Bern…

Marlene Dietrich came with her husband…

Met Hedda Hopper standing in a doorway while the crowd almost pushed her off her feet. “Isn’t this swell?” she says. “I’m getting all my hips knocked off.”

Even honest witnesses disagree – that champion autograph seeker swore that Greta Garbo ran into the theater, hatless and wearing a red cape. Yet the fellow who takes the pictures for the fan magazines insists that she was wearing a dark overcoat and a beret. Fact is, she wasn’t there at all…

Another tip to the stargazers: After the premiers, many of the stars go to the Blossom room at the Roosevelt hotel. Dropped in for a minute and Joe Mann miraculously produced me a good table…

Lewis Stone, who is seen but rarely in bright light places was there…

Helen Twelvetrees had another party. Dolores Costello, a sweet person, stayed for a few minutes.

Jack Oakie was dancing with his ma.

Bert Wheeler, with his chin over a girl’s shoulder, whistled while he danced.

Those two couples who I recognized as dress extras were having the best time… Some meanie sent the radio officers to quiet down the car-caller at the Chinese.

DID YOU KNOW?

That the schoolhouse on the Paramount lot once was Mary Pickford’s dressing room?

JOAN CRAWFORD AT HER BEST AT LOWE’S STATE

Chalk up another box office success for Joan Crawford, now playing at Lowe’s. “Letty Lynton” has everything for which fans cheer.

In the first place, there is Joan at her very best. And the several other reasons include an A-1 supporting cast, capable director, well-written script and splendid photography.

The title role gives the Crawford dramatic power an opportunity to assert itself.

Once again Joan is a bit of human flotsam – this time sailing back from South America and a sordid affair with a handsome foreigner. Aboard ship she meets one of her own countrymen and experiences the first real love of her life. When the boat lands they are engaged, but at the pier awaiting her is her ex-lover.

The coolness of her home and mother, and despair at ever escaping from her past leads Joan to contemplate suicide. At the apartment of her former paramour, where she goes to collect damaging love letters, she mixes poison with her cocktail. Fortunately, however, her unsuspecting host reaches for the drink first and obligingly passes out of the picture.

The law traces her to the winter home of her fiancée and brings her back to face murder charges. The evidence, however, is so slim, that the gallant lying of her betrothed and mother sets her free.

Robert Montgomery and Nils Asther have been very well cast in the male leads, and Louise Closser Hale, as Miranda the maid, provides just the necessary touch of humor.

Lowe’s stage revue feature “Whirligigs,” with everything going ‘round and ‘round, including the Chester Hale girls, who open the show with a hoop-rolling dance.

Taking as its theme this thing called love, the revue attempts to portray in dance love through the ages, from the age of the cave man down to modern times.

Supplementing the program are the Four Flash Devils, a colored tap quartet, a roller skating trip, and a juggling duet.

And in the pit, Bruce Brummit, with the assistance of Lucia Romano, soloist, presents an unusually effective Mother’s Day novelty overture.

MACHINE GUN TEMPO MARKS DRAMA

“Trial of Vivienne Ware” Is Court Room Story

Director William K. Howard made “The Trial of Vivienne Ware” in 17 days, a little more than half the usual feature production time. And the picture moves as rapidly as the production.

Last year Howard’s outstanding picture was “Transatlantic,” distinguished for its speedy action and excitement. His new one races so fast that you almost cling to your seat to keep from losing pace with it – which is the more remarkable because as far as the story goes, “The Trial of Vivienne Ware” is just a little-better-than-average court room melodrama.

It makes Howard champion of the “machine gun tempo” on the screen, where the action goes rat-tat-tat like bullets from a gangster’s rod.

A young lawyer (Donald Cook) steps from the train in a crowded station, makes his way quickly to a cab, gets in. There is no fadeout, a swift whirl of the camera traverses miles in the batting of an eye, and there we are watching Cook talk to Joan Bennett as Vivienne, in her apartment.

The scene changes similarly, when the trial gets under way, from court-room to flash-backs of relevant action, interspersed with quick flashes of testimony and melodramatic action – to the “big chase” finish.

ZaSu Pitts and Skeets Gallagher as radio announcers from the courtroom supply comedy that helps relieve the tension – but Gallagher as Graham McNally talks as rapidly as radio’s own Graham and is no slower than the picture itself.

PAUL LUKAS STAR IN BROADWAY FILM

“Strictly Dishonorable,” featuring Paul Lukas, Sidney Fox and Lewis Stone, is the feature attraction at the Broadway theater today.

This diverting picture tells the story of a fast-paced love affair which begins in a New York speakeasy, and finds its completion in a bachelor’s apartment on the floor above.

“THE BLACK CAMEL” CENTURY ATTRACTION

Warner Oland, Sally Eilers and Bela Lugosi, in Earl Derr Biggers’ mystery story “The Black Camel,” and Winnie Lightner in “Side Show,” are the attractions with will open a two-day engagement at the Century theater tomorrow.

Closing at the theater tonight are Sylvia Sidney in “Street Scene” and Ken Maynard in “Range Law.”

Warner Oland again portrays his favorite role of the Chinese detective of Honolulu, Charlie Chan, in “The Black Camel.” The mystery drama receives its title from one of Chan’s aphorisms that death is like a black camel.

Chan undertakes the task of unraveling the reason why a celebrated motion picture actress is murdered in her Hawaiian villa and gets into many unusual situations.

Coming to the theater on Tuesday are Barbara Stanwyck and Ricardo Cortez in “Ten Cents a Dance,” and Jack Mulhall in “Love Bound.”

The attractions on Thursday, Friday and Saturday will be Bert Wheeler and Dorothy Lee in “Too Many Cooks,” and George Bancroft and Kay Francis and “Scandal Sheet.”

May 6, 1932: Ann Harding Reaches Reno

2011-05-01T14:46:00.028-04:00

ANN HARDING REACHES RENO

Film Beauty Met at Airport By Husband Preparing To File Divorce Papers

Reno, May 6 (AP)
Greeted by his beautiful blonde wife with a loving embrace which included a kiss on the cheek just before noon today, only to be served with a summons in a divorce action four hours later, was the unusual experience here of Harry Bannister, actor, and husband of Ann Harding, one of the outstanding stars of motion pictures.

Bannister, whose six-weeks residency in Reno expired early this morning, was at the Boeing airport to receive the kiss when Miss Harding arrived from Hollywood and he was close at hand to accept the summons in the divorce complaint when the film star had affixed her signature to the various divorce papers that have been prepared for her in advance.

The couple, whose home life was termed as “ideal” by their friends, shocked the film colony six weeks and two days ago when they announced in a joint statement that they were contemplating a divorce. Bannister was Miss Harding’s leading man when she was a Broadway star, but when the blonde actress entered films she rose to stardom and Bannister was almost blotted out of the picture.

The joint statement said that their positions in Hollywood had become “untenable” and that the divorce was decided upon in order that Bannister could reestablish himself as an actor.

Miss Harding worked until three o’clock this morning on the film lot in Hollywood and at 7:30 o’clock departed from Burbank field in her own cabin plane headed for Reno. It was after 11:30 when the plane was brought down at the Boeing hangar and the actress stepped out of the cabin to be embraced heartily by her bronzed and athletic husband.

Bannister was at the airport an hour before the ship was due to arrive and paced nervously up and down the concrete runway. When the plane passed over the airport in readiness to land he waved both arms and was greeted from the air by the flutter of a handkerchief.

Newspaper photographers were requested by Bannister not to take close-up pictures of the actress “as she is tired and I want her to have an opportunity to rest before being photographed.”

There were only a few people at the airport and Bannister was not accompanied by any friends. He drove his wife immediately to the home of William Woodburn, her attorney, to complete the arrangements for the divorce.

The decree will be granted tomorrow or Monday. It is presumed that when either party to a divorce suit has lived here six weeks, that the action can be filed.

While in Reno Bannister has spent much of his time in boxing, flying his own airplane and in dude ranch activities.

He has offers from New York and London for motion picture and stage engagements, but expects to return to Hollywood for a brief stay before going east. Miss Harding will fly back to Hollywood with the divorce decree as a souvenir of her short visit to Reno.

The divorce complaint charges cruelty with no details given. The court is asked to approve the agreement in connection with the custody of their four-year-old daughter, now in Hollywood. They were married in New York City on October 21, 1926.

It is understood that all property rights have been settled by an agreement separate from the divorce decree.

DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS HOME FROM SOUTH SEA, MARY MEETS HIM

San Francisco, May 6 (AP)
Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford were together again today, en route for Los Angeles, following Fairbanks’ arrival here yesterday from the South Seas.

Miss Pickford was taken in a small boat to the liner on which her husband was returning from a film expedition. Fairbanks was waiting for her. They embraced and exchanged happy greetings.

Others connected with the Fairbanks company to return included Maria Alba, Spanish actress, who played leading lady in the South Seas film, William Farnum, actor, Tom Geraghty, writer, and Edward Sutherland, director.

ROMANCE OF STAGE STAR, FLIER NEARS DIVORCE COURTS

New York, May 6 (US)
Another Broadway romance is skidding into the Mexican divorce courts.

Friends of Lillian Roth, torch singer, learned today that she and her husband of just a year, William C. Scott, are “mentally incompatible” and that she is planning to put it before a Mexican court.

She met Scott, aviator and son of a Pittsburgh lumber millionaire, in Atlanta, where they were married.

ACCUSED DOCTOR SAYS DRUGS GIVEN STAR FOR MOTHER

Los Angeles, May 6 (AP)
The probable defense of Dr. I Jesse Citron, Hollywood physician, on trial for allegedly supplying illegal narcotics to the late Alma Rubens, film star, has been indicated by the testimony of A. Monroy, narcotics agent for the federal government.

Monroy testified that Dr. Citron has said following the physician’s arrest:

“I was called to the Rubens’ home several times. Miss Rubens met me at the door and stated her mother was ill. As I heard some groaning in the adjoining room, I felt obliged to write the prescription as requested.”

WILL ROGERS FAILS TO APPEAR FOR SPEEDING

Beverly Hills, Cal., May 6 (AP)
Will Rogers, who once was mayor of the community, did not respond when his name was called to answer a speeding charge in police court.

Judge H. E. Billings refused to issue a bench warrant for the screen humorist, who was accused of traveling 44 miles an hour in a 20-mile zone.

“I’ll call personally on my friend Will some evening soon, and he’ll need all his wit to explain this,” the judge said.

ARLISS ACCEDES TO SALARY REDUCTION

Hollywood, Cal., May 6 (AP)
Warner-First National film studios have announced that George Arliss, famous stage and screen actor, has agreed voluntarily to a “substantial” salary reduction. His contract has two years to run.

Arliss sailed yesterday for a return in the summer for his next picture.

CHAPLIN LEAVES SINGAPORE

Singapore, May 6 (UP)
Charles Chaplin, who was taken to a hospital suffering from dengue fever when he arrived here from Java on April 30, sailed today with his brother Sydney to continue a tour of the Far East. He appeared in good health.

COHAN TO APPEAR IN A TALKIE

Hollywood, May 5 (AP)
One of the best known figures on the American stage, George M. Cohan, will make his first appearance in a talking picture within a few months.

Announcing a Cohan contract, Paramount studio tonight said his first film will be “The Phantom President,” a burlesque on national politics.

STAR TALKS TO AUDIENCE ON PHONE

Hollywood, May 6 (AP)
The first international hook-up, so they say at the studios, to be made part of a motion picture feature, was effective last night.

Dolores Del Rio, Mexican film actress, talked to a Mexico City theater audience from her home in nearby Santa Monica at the premier of her latest picture.

RKO-RADIO REOPENS CULVER CITY STUDIO FOR FEATURE PICTURES

Hollywood, Calif., May 6 (AP)
Re-opening of the RKO Pathe studio in Culver City, which has been dark since that company’s merger with Radio Pictures several months ago, was announced today by B. B. Kahane, president of RKO-Radio.

Kahane said contracts have been signed with J. I. Schnitzern, Larry Darmour and J. C. Bachman, each of whom will make four feature pictures for the 1932/33 Radio program.

Work on the pictures, which will employ several hundred persons, is expected to start soon.

BUENOS AIRES BANS SHOWING OF FILM

Buenos Aires, May 6 (AP)
The foreign office today forbade the exhibition of the motion picture “My Sin” at the request of the minister from Panama, who charged that the film injured the dignity of a brother country. Tallulah Bankhead and Frederic March have the leading roles in the picture.

ALL-STAR TALKIE OPENS RUN ON MAY 13

By Chester B. Bahn

That’s service for you!

In this column yesterday a plea was made for the local presentation of “Grand Hotel” with its galaxy of cinematic names.

Now comes the announcement that the talkie will be given a two-day local release at the Eckel theater beginning one week from to-day. All seats will be reserved; screenings will be at 2:40 and 6:40 P. M.

I hear that---

Madge Bellamy may return to talkies via “Girl With Red Hair,” independent production

M-G-M will retitle “Footlights” as “Speak Easily”

Helen Hayes may star for United Artists in “Barrets of Wimpole Street”

Fox plans a new tale glorifying the newsreel cameramen

Jacqueline Logan, withdrawing from “Coast to Coast,’ legit play, will return to London to direct talkies

Tala Birell will be directed by Hobart Bosworth in “Broken Dreams of Hollywood”

Warners have signed Glenda Farrell, legit actress, for two talkies

And Sam Goldwyn has signed Dolores Carey and Vivian Mathews, also of the stage, for talkies

M-G-M has ruled that Clark Gable must not play polo – it’s too risky

Marlene Dietrich and Josef Von Sternberg are expected to return to German talkies, adjustment of their difficulties with Paramount failing

Leo Carillo will star in four independents which Radio will release

“Bird of Paradise,” finally completed, cost Radio $800,000

Casting assignments:

Nellie V. Nichols of vaude for “The Sporting Widows,” Charles Coleman as a newspaper columnist in “Merrily We Go To Hell,” Dickie Moore for Jack Oakie’s Olympic Games comedy.

This, that and the other ---

Universal has found its own “Union Depot” in “Michigan Boulevard” by Elinor Dolcart

Karen Morely will be opposite Lionel Barrymore in “The Claw”

Warners’ “New York Town” becomes “Big City Blues”

Willow Wray, sister of Fay, and Renee Denny, wife of Reginald, sing in Educational’s new 20 minute canned grand operas.

Oscar Apfel gets a “Sporting Widow” role

Genevieve Tobin has signed at Columbia for six pictures with time in between for stage work and personal appearances

James Crane will be in “The Challenger” with George Bancroft

Fatty Arbuckle and Addie McPhail will wed in June

“Letty Lynton” with Joan Crawford and Robert Montgomery in the principal roles opened at Lowes tod-day. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s sensational filmization of the Marie Belloc Knowles novel is an intriguing drama of modern morals with a vivid climax in which the heroine is faced with the choice of loss of reputation or prison.

Clarence Brown, who last directed Miss Crawford in “Possessed” screened this new romance of South America and New York. A notable supporting cast includes Nils Asther, Lewis Stone, May Robson, Louise Closser Hale, Emma Dunn, Walter Walker and William Pawley.

FLORINE MCKINNEY, STARDOM CANDIDATE

By Chester B. Bahn

Four years ago or thereabouts a little Fort Worth girl entered a personality contest conducted by the local Publix theater, emerged the winner and was booked for a week’s engagement.

The astute house manager appraised her as a possible cinema find, considered offering her a contract on speculation, but other matters demanding his time failed to press the proposition.

The Forth Worth girl in this story is Florine McKinney, at the Parmount in “Miracle Man” and already seriously regarded as star material.

Florine was only 14 in the days at the Publix theater, but she had early shown promise. At 7 she was studying the piano, at 12 she began dancing and a year later she was playing the violin. Success of her week’s engagement at the Publix theater led her to plan a concert career and prior to her first trip to Hollywood she had given recitals in French, German, Italian and Spanish throughout Texas.

Curiously that first trip to the Coast netted only tests, but five weeks after she had returned to Fort Worth a director phoned an urgent summons. The second trip netted a contract which provides Florine shall receive $50 weekly for the first six months. Thereafter, provided she is considered a successful investment, her pay increases from $50 to $100 a week every six months and at the end of four and a half years she will be getting $750 a week.

Most first contracts give beginners $75 a week and many pay $100 and more. Miss McKinney’s is probably based on the 1931 salary-cutting schedule.

From Luella O. Parsons:

If I were a betting person I would put up the near diamonds against any one’s last years’ clothes that Madge Evans will play the feminine lead in “Hallelujah, I’m a Bum” opposite Al Jolson.

A hurried conference Thursday in which Joseph Schenck, Lewis Milestone, Harry D’Arrast and Charles Lederer took part, gave pretty Madge the preference.

Thursday it remained this way. Providing Madge has not obligated herself to any other producer she would play the alluring femme role in All Jolson’s next, and Madge says she hasn’t.

And what a story! I’m glad the United Artists inner circles are calling Al’s picture “Hallelujah, I’m a Bum” instead of “Happy-Go-Lucky.”

Chatter in Hollywood:

It’s getting so these film folk can’t even have a good old-fashioned family argument without someone suggesting divorce. The grocer, the baker, the candlestick-maker can row and row and everyone just says, “a little discussion such as exists in the best regulated families.”

But it’s a different story with a movie star. Sally Eilers went to New York without Hoot Gibson. He happened to be busy on a picture when she was free to take a holiday. She was besieged by reporters, who insisted that Hoot already had gone to Reno to get his freedom.

Now that she is home the divorce rumor persists. “Can you,” asks Sally, “tell everyone I would like to know it first when Hoot and I get ready to be divorced? So far neither he nor I know anything about it.” So that’s that.

Ralph Morgan has a mighty pretty daughter. So pretty that Charlie Butterworth has been taking her places. They have been dancing and dining and going to the fights, and now we hear it rumored that Charlie, the perennial bachelor, might even decide against lonesome old age.

The very last words that Norma Talmadge said to me before she said goodbye to Hollywood was “I’ll never make another picture until I get a good story.”

Armed with that knowledge, Trem Carr has had dozens of scouts on the lookout for a Norma Talmadge vehicle. He said today he would submit “The Unchastened Woman,” the play in which Emily Stevens made such a hit on the stage, and a modern version of “Tosca.”

The “For Hire” story mentioned in this column is the property of still another producer who was trying to interest Norma in a return to the screen.

These independents are forging ahead, and although Monogram (Trem Carr) is one of the youngest of these new companies, it is also one of the most active, and Norma may not do so badly making a picture for them.

Snapshots of Hollywood collected at random:

Colleen Moore and Al Scott opening the Bel Air House with a tea on Sunday;

Mary Pickford making some twenty-five of the doctors in session at Pasadena happy by stopping and greeting them. They were dining in Beverly Hills. My favorite physician and friend husband says that every one of the M. D.’s thought Mary even more charming off the screen than on.

Billie Dove is another movie favorite who received many compliments from the visiting M. D.’s.

A new wire-haired fox terrier will greet Douglas Fairbanks when he returns. Mary bought him in New York.

The W. K. Howards entertaining eight people at dinner in honor of Joan Bennett and Gene Markey.

From Wood Soanes:

As soon as final cutting is done on Clare Kummer’s “A Successful Calamity,” George Arliss is returning to England, where he will remain for the Spring and Summer.

Since Arliss was due to make another picture before starting his holiday, the usual speculation is rife. The Arliss pictures have been uniformly successful in an artistic way, but have been no great shakes at the box office. Yet Warner Brothers seems satisfied to write off the losses in favor of the tone added to their product by Arliss’ name.

In a dispatch from the New York office, no reason is given for the change in plans, but assurance is offered that the British star will return next fall to resume his screen work, and will be officially in Hollywood for two years more, during which time he will not attempt to make a stage production.

“I have a number of interesting stage proposals to consider,” he is quoted, “but it seems scarcely worth it to try a production when three or four months of my next two seasons are already occupied by motion picture engagements.”

Arliss’ present plan is to remain in New York for a couple of weeks, probably timing his arrival to coincide with the eastern premier of “A Successful Calamity.” The he and Mrs. Arliss to go France, where they will remain until June, subsequently returning to their home at St. Margaret’s Bay, in Kent.

Arliss is sixty-four now, his birthday having fallen on April 10, and should be good for many more years in his chosen profession. Otis Skinner will be celebrating his seventy-fourth birthday on June 28.

Although none of her starring pictures for Warner’s has yet been released, Kay Francis is starting work this week on her fourth, “S.S. Atlantic.” “Men Wanted,” “Street of Women,” and “The Jewel Robbery” are awaiting distribution.

After twelve years, James Fenimore Cooper’s classic of early America, “The Last of the Mohicans” is returning to the screen as a talkie serial, with Harry Carey and Edwina Booth, stars of “Trader Horn,” featured. Mascot is making it.

Irene Dunne and John Boles are to have the chief roles in “Back Street,” the film version of the Fannie Hurst novel.

Paramount has paid $7500 for talkie rights to “No Bed of Her Own;” Miriam Hopkins will star

Same studio has renamed “Merton of the Talkies” as “Gates of Hollywood”

Ann Harding’s next will be “Bed of Roses”

Mary Brian may go abroad, accepting an English talkie offer

Charlotte Greenwood is seriously ill on the coast

Paul Stein will direct Zita Johann in “Deported” for Radio

Elder Will Hayes has ruled Paramount must find a new title for “Merrily We Go to Hell”

Joe E. Brown will star in “Too Many Women” for Warners; it’s the work of Cliff Friend, songwriter

James Gleason goes Paramount via “The Challenger, ” and Evalyn Knapp allies with the same studio in “The Sporting Widow”

John Deering is a cast addition for “Forgotten Commandments”

Colleen Moore is expected to sign with M-G-M for the feminine lead in Wally Beery’s “Flesh,” a wrestling addition to the sports cycle

Tay Garnett will direct a bull fight drama for Universal

Ginger Rogers is slated to become Mrs. Mervyn LeRoy on June 2

New film romances: Loretta Young and Gilbert Roland; Billie Dove and George Raft

Dorothy Revier and George Weeks will be in Columbia’s “Widow in Scarlet”

A husky young giant from the West, Bruce Cabot has found Hollywood the end of an adventure trail. Born in Carlsbad, New Mexico, he was educated in a number of schools, including the University of Tours in France.

Out to see life, he shipped on a freighter as an able-bodied seaman, worked in the oil fields as a tool dresser and roughed it on the desert as a surveyor. Between those jobs, he sold stocks and bonds and rode for a cattle outfit. The stage fever hit him and months of stock work followed.

After a year of trouping he came to Hollywood and obtained a screen test with RKO-
Radio Pictures which won him a contract. He made his bow before the cameras in “The Roadhouse Murder.”

Cabot is six feet 1 ½ inches tall and an all-around athlete. He has many noted relatives including an uncle, Herman Harjes, of the Morgan Harjes bank in Paris, but is prouder of his RKO contract that he is of his social connections.

When death suddenly took Tyrone Power as he played the dying patriarch at the beginning of filming “The Miracle Man,” Hobart Bosworth was signed for the part. It was the third time he had followed Power in a role.

They had been friends since 1886 and shared the same stage dressing room for five years. Bosworth induced Power to enter films in 1915.

More coincidence lies in the fact that Bosworth, in real life, once cured himself of tuberculosis purely by faith after suffering from the disease for nine years. Now he plays a faith healer.

Donald Cook, in “The Trial of Vivian Ware,” manages to keep pretty much to himself in the Hollywood turmoil. “The only way to be happy out here,” he writes.

He has tried mingling freely, going the social rounds, and found it not too much to his liking. He lives in a snug cottage beside a canyon road, has a few close friends as visitors now and then, reads a great deal, but is not a hermit, nor does he pretend to be bored or disillusioned.

From TELLING ON HOLLYWOOD, By Robert Grandon

Now It’s the Woman Who Gets Paid

Over at the Club Seville the other dawning, some of us more or less speculatively and mathematically inclined cast our figures as to the salaries paid these days. It was a sort of round-robin affair, with each one contributing his part, but the result was somewhat surprising.

What feminine star drags down the biggest salary? Consensus of opinion seemed in favor of the Great Garbo. Like everything else about her, mystery shrouds her paychecks, but $10,000 a week for 52 weeks was given by one who should know.

This tops Connie Bennet’s much vaunted $450,000, which included forty $7500 weeks with Radio and an extra check from Warners reckoned at $5000 per diem.

Marie Dressler was voted the greatest screen actress of the year, but she’s way down on the list. Her $3500 a week brought her $182,000.

And Tallulah Bankhead received $375,000, making three pictures at $125,000 each. Ann Harding has a new contract, which assures her $1,000,000 in three years, or $333,333 per year.

Ruth Chatterton isn’t doing so badly, thank you, for one who had a hard time getting a break. She’s listed at $3000 a week on a forty week basis, or a yearly salary of $320,000, which is somewhat better than Norma Shearer, who is rated at $5000 a week, or $260,000 a year.

Poor little Janet Gaynor, pretty little ingénue, drags down $135,000 each twelvemonth, while Joan Crawford must content herself with $130,000.

Then somebody started to figure Mary Pickford’s income and gave it up. She makes her own pictures and is rated at $4,500,000 in her own name.

Later I’ll give you the lowdown on some of your favorite boy friends of the screenies and just how many ice cream sodas they could buy you without going into bankruptcy.

May 5, 1932

2011-04-07T23:13:00.035-04:00

PLENTY OF FIGHT IN JANET GAYNOR

And She Usually Wins Her Fights With Studio Over Pictures, Too

She’s The Main Star On Fox List

By Robin Coons – Hollywood, May 5

There is a lot of courage and fighting spirit in the tiny, starry-eyed and red-head miss called Janet Gaynor. You might not suspect that little Janet, with her sweet voice, can speak with authority and almost always have her way. But twice in the past two years she has done it.

When she didn’t want to play in “Liliom” she walked out and went to Honolulu. When she came back she got what she wanted. Recently she turned down “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm” as a vehicle, insisting on “The First Year” instead. She got it.

Underneath that disarming sweetness Janet has a good sound head. She says:

“I didn’t object to ‘Rebecca’ because it was so much the type of picture I’ve been doing. I really don’t mind being typed as the character fans know. I think it’s silly to talk about my wanting to be a ‘new’ Janet Gaynor, because I know I can’t. I know I can’t be a Garbo or Shearer ever.

“My part in ‘The First Year’ isn’t heavy or dramatic, but it has some depth to it. That’s what I want. I think all I really have is sincerity. That’s what has carried me through in the change from silents to talkies. My voice has been criticized, brutally sometimes, and I think I’ve gotten by only because I am sincere.

I couldn’t be sincere in ‘Rebecca,’ and besides it is a part for a comedienne, which I am not. That’s why I objected to playing it. But we didn’t fight about it. We just talked it over and they agreed with me.”

(Small wonder they “agreed” with Janet at that. She’s the ace of box-office attraction on the Fox lot, and that isn’t forgetting Will Rogers, either.)

Janet, I know, lost $50,000 in salary by walking out on “Liliom.” Even to a star that’s a lot of money, and Janet likes the things money buys.

On her return from Honolulu she played in “The Man Who Came Back,” in which she played a sweet girl who turned narcotic addict. She knows she wasn’t very convincing in the part, but believes it did her no harm. For then came “Daddy-Long-Legs,” a typical Gaynor role, and the contrast made it the more welcome. “Merely Mary Ann” and “Delicious” have been on the same order and she believes “Rebecca” would have been just too much.

A lot of the big stars who don’t like the way they’re treated talk about accepting salary suspension. Few of them do it. Janet, who looks like a child, had spunk enough to prove the exception. And you can believe that studio respects her for it.

ACTRESS ASKS FOR PROBATION

Los Angeles, Cal., May 5 (AP)
Having lost their first move to evade serving a thirty-day jail sentence, Mary Nolan, actress, and her husband, Wallace T. Macrery today indicated, through their attorney, that they would apply for probation, or appeal to the state supreme court.

The pair was convicted of violating the state labor laws on March 11. The appellate department of the superior court yesterday upheld the conviction and sentences.

Miss Nolan, formerly known on the New York stage as Imogene Wilson, and Macrery, were convicted of failing to pay employees of a gown shop which they operated in Hollywood.

Miss Nolan is now on a theatrical tour. She has forty-eight hours within which to surrender, and five days within which to final an appeal. Her husband is said to be accompanying her on tour. Both are at liberty on $200 bonds.

MIRIAM HOPKINS DIVORCE EXPLAINED

Hollywood, May 5 (INS)
Miriam Hopkins, who adopted a baby boy in Chicago yesterday, divorced her husband, Austin Parker, playwright, in Juarez, Mexico, by airmailing a divorce complaint from Hollywood to Juarez, her attorney, Manuel Ruiz, announced here today.

Miss Hopkins obtained the divorce through “mutual consent,” Ruiz said, but he declined to reveal the date.

HOLLYWOOD MEDIC UP ON DOPE CHARGE

Los Angeles, Calif., May 5 (AP)
Dr. R. Jesse Citron, once a physician to prominent Hollywood and Beverly Hills personages, was called into federal court today for trial on charges he illegally supplied narcotics to the late Alma Rubens, motion picture actress.

Mrs. Theresa Rubens, mother of the actress, is to be the principal prosecution witness. The case will be heard without a jury.

GILDA GRAY WON’T CONFIRM BETROTHAL

New York, May 5 (UPI)
Broadway hummed today with a rumor that Gilda Gray, the dancer, plans to marry again. Her prospective husband was described as “a wealthy Bostonian.”

At the Savoy-Plaza hotel, Miss Gray said: “I won’t confirm the report, but I won’t deny it either. Maybe I’ll say something about it in a few days.”

HOLLYWOOD SEEKS STUDIO-ACTOR TRUCE

Hollywood, Calif., May 5 (UP)
Hollywood will try to settle its own differences without resorting to courts of law.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has called a special meeting to consider what action, if any, should or must be taken in the controversies between studios and actors.

These cases involve Marlene Dietrich, Josef Von Sternberg and James Cagney, all of whom have been suspended from their studios.

The conciliation committee of the academy in the past has brought about the adjustment of numerous disputes.

MONTY BANKS MAKING TOUR

New York, May 5 (AP)
Monty Banks, divorced in California a week ago, sailed for Europe last night, waving good-bye to his former wife, standing on the pier.

In his divorce petition, the screen comic charged his wife disappeared for five days without an explanation. Following the divorce action he came East, Mrs. Banks following.

She called on him yesterday before sailing time, taking him a bunch of gardenias. Neither would discuss the matter of a reconciliation, but as the boat moved slowly from the pier it was observed he was waving to Mrs. Banks – and wearing a gardenia.

BEULAH BONDI EN ROUTE WEST, IN NEW TALKIE

Valparaiso, Ind., May 5
Miss Beulah Bondi, who has been visiting her parents, Mr. and Mrs. A. O. Bondy, for the past two weeks, en route from New York to California, left Wednesday morning for Hollywood via Denver, Colo.

Miss Bondi was the guest of honor at several functions while here. Sunday, Mrs. Garland Windle gave a tea to the mutual friends in her honor.

Upon arriving in Hollywood, Miss Bondi will begin work in the talkie, “Rain,” a United Artists picture being produced by Joseph Schenck. She will play the character of Mrs. Davidson, the missionary’s wife.

Her many friends will look forward to this production, having scored such a tremendous success in her character work in “Street Scene,” which the local people were privileged to see several months ago at the Premiere.

Miss Bondi will be in Hollywood the entire summer.

FILM COMPANY STARTS $18,000,000 PROGRAM

Los Angeles, May 5 (AP)
An $18,000,000 production program, the largest in the history of the studio, was announced today by Universal Pictures Corp.

Carl Laemmle Sr., president of the corporation, said the studio had decided that business trends were turning upward.

The program calls for 26 features, 26 two-reel comedies, 32 one-reel comedy shorts, cartoons, novelty releases and 104 news reels.

Casts will be sent to Greenland, Tahiti, Africa and the Malay archipelago during the year to make several of the feature productions.

MOTION PICTURES IN 3d DIMENSION SHOWN

San Francisco, May 4 (UP)
Motion pictures in the third dimension were screened here today.

A 35-year-old inventor, Charles Monroe Stitt, came to San Francisco from a small town in interior California and demonstrated movies possessing the long-sought stereoscopic effect of depth at a private showing to representatives of the United Press.

“With natural color and sound already added to the motion picture,” Stitt said, “we feel that in giving the dimension of depth, the illusion is complete.”

FILM DOCTOR KILLS HIMSELF

Hollywood, May 5 (INS)
Dr. George T. Boyd, physician prominent in the film colony, today committed suicide in a manner as dramatic as some of the screen plays of his celebrity patients, according to police.

Sitting in his car in a lonely spot in the Hollywood hills, and looking down on the city, he chose between two ways of death – a physician’s hypodermic needle and an automatic.

Dr. Boyd selected the needle, and while waiting for the drug to kill him used his prescription blank to write a note to his wife explaining “You will be better off without me. My insurance will tide you over until times get better…”

He died, authorities said, before completing the note.

STARS PASS MAKE-UP ROLE WHEN THE TASK IS A DIFFICULT ONE

By Robert Grandon
Recently I received a letter from an enthusiastic fan questioning as to the ways and means of studio makeups. “Do the actors apply their own makeup?” the letter went on, “or does some expert do the work? Or how is it accomplished?”

Like everything else, it all depends upon the character and the difficultly. For ordinary straight roles, the actor puts on the grease paint and wields the rabbits foot himself. But for a character part, or some difficult undertaking, it is a different story.

Veteran actor though he is, Walter Huston went under the hands of a makeup man for his role in “Abraham Lincoln.” Reproducing a noted historical character is best accomplished this way.

Lewis Stone applied his own makeup for the doctor in “Grand Hotel,” though it was a long and tiresome process.

The late Lon Chaney, specializing as he did in the grotesque roles, was his own makeup man.

Frederic March went under makeup hands in “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” as did Boris Karloff as the monster in “Frankenstein.”

Loretta Young was on the verge of despair when they gave her the part of the Chinese girl in “The Hatchet Man.” Perc Westmore, master makeup man of Warner Brothers, made her over into an Oriental. It was one of the masterpieces of the year. Russ Westmore is another of the experts who build up characters for RKO.

One of the best known of all, perhaps, due to the tremendous advertising his products have received is Max Factor. From his studios in Hollywood he goes forth to create people for the screenies and to fool the camera as well as the public – a job requiring expert talent and nice discrimination.

From Luella O. Parsons
Los Angeles, May 5

Karen Morley has never really given a bad performance. You will agree with me, I know. She is one actress who can be put into any sort of picture and she manages to make good on it.

That is why she is to play the role in “The Claw” opposite Lionel Barrymore that Irene Fenwick created on the stage.

The picture, I have heard, will be called “Washington Life,” but Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer denies any knowledge of this change of title. At any rate, much of the story will be filmed in Washington.

After seeing Lionel Barrymore in “Grand Hotel,” I am one who is willing to say here is an artist and a great one. I cannot help who played Kringelein on the stage. To me his is the greatest of them all.

You would never in the world suspect that writer of excellent comedy, Nina Wilcox Putnam, would go serious on us. Yet that’s just what she has done.

Inspired by her successes in the movies, Nina has written a book called “American Citizen.” It is an epic on the order of “Cimarron,” except that where Edna Ferber builds her story in Oklahoma and shows the opening of that vast territory, Mrs. Putnam chooses New York as her locale.

Charles Rogers has purchased the screen rights to the Putnam novel.

He bought it from a synopsis. The development of New York city from the early days when Manhattan was purchased from the Indians and later, when John Jacob Astor, founder of the Astor fortunes, was a fur trader, will be told in a drama showing the development of New York city.

Okay Chicago! You are going to get a break at last! You are going to have a story written about your town without so much as mentioning a single gangster.

Carl Laemmle, Jr., who lived in Chicago when he was a babe in arms, and his father, who is now on his way there en route to Europe, decided to give the city a break. The picture will be called “Michigan Boulevard.”

It’s an original by Eleanore Dolkart and it tells something of the beauties of this city. Most of the exteriors will be made there and it will be a romance in which Lake Michigan, Lincoln Park and other landmarks will be pictured.

A line or two concerns Dorothy Burgess, reported engaged to Clarence Brown, who has become one of our most “engaged” men. She plays opposite Monte Blue in “The Stoker.” It’s a story by Peter B. Kyne and M. H. Hoffman is bringing it to the screen. Chester Franklin, brother of Sidney and W. K. on his own, will direct.

Ralf Harolde, who is one of my favorite villains, I mean on the screen, plays a part in “Hollywood Speaks” opposite Genevieve Tobin.

John Wayne, the boy who will always be remembered in “The Big Trail,” principally because he didn’t make the goal expected of him, is at Paramount. He is playing a part in “The Challenger,” George Bancroft’s next picture.

Gilbert Roland is at First National. He will play an important role in “Life Begins” with Loretta Young.

Around the luncheon table this week we were discussing various studio phases. One writer said a star cannot be better than her director. Most of them are dependent on good direction. I don’t intend to go into that because I value my life too well. But the fact that Harry Cohn has selected Frank Capra to direct Barbara Stanwyck in “Brief Moment” means a good picture.

Barbara has had mostly good pictures at Columbia. Not all of them have been good at First National, curiously enough. Perhaps because of her directors. “Brief Moment,” by S.R. Behrman, will be put on the screen by Jo Swerling.

Snapshots of Hollywood:
Pretty titian-haired Virginia Bruce with Jack Gilbert at the Olympic Stadium. Sitting next to them was Harpo Marx, playboy of the Marx family. A dark-haired girl, this time, was the recipient of Harpo’s smiles. Marian and Zeppo Marx were also in the Gilbert party.

Ruth Roland expected this week after an absence of many months.

Eric Von Stroheim bringing 30 to the final dance of the season.

John Gilbert host to 10 people at the Mayfair Saturday night.

Gary Cooper renting a beach house.

Roscoe Ates and his pretty daughter, Dorothy, doing some special dance steps at the frolics.

From Wood Soanes:

Tomorrow Douglas Fairbanks returns from his jaunt to the South Seas on the Monowai, so his knight of the typing machine, Mark Larkin, hastens to inform me, bearing with him most of the film that will eventually be shown as “Robinson Crusoe of the South Seas.”

““Man Whom Devil Fears” is the sobriquet given Fairbanks by the South Sea Islanders,” Larkin writes.

“In Polynesian, this nom-de-plume is reverently spoken: ‘Ena matau Ta tiaforo Ita taato ora.’

Doug was curious to know how he gained this appellation and found it started when the natives learned that mosquitoes never bit or even bothered him.

“This was strange and unusual for a white man. It is probably explained by the fact that Doug is tanned, and even much darker than most Polynesians. At all events, the name had its drawbacks. A scene in the picture calls for Doug to dive from the highest mast of the yacht into the waters of the lagoon. The cameras were being placed in position and he started up the mast.

“Suddenly, there was a loud cry from the natives who occupied hundreds of boats in the water. The lagoon began to fill with man-eating sharks. Eddie Sutherland, the director, relayed the news to Doug, who promptly descended.

Then the natives, now safely on the shore, set up another howl – the sharks wouldn’t dare touch him, the man the devil feared – the sharks should be taught a lesson.”

But the Man Whom Devil Fears wisely took no chance on the sharks who may never have heard about the devil.

Plans are being made in New York to present “Grand Hotel” on the stage again at two-dollar prices, which would put it in direct opposition to the movie version. And the stage version of “Cavalcade” has been filmed to enable Frank Borzage, who will direct it for Fox eventually, to get the British atmosphere.

JACK HOLT IS STAR OF FILM AT AMERICAN

“Behind the Mask” Opening Tomorrow, Features Summer Cut in Prices

The American announces new and reduced summer prices, which will go into effect on Friday. The same type of first-run selected pictures will be screened, together with high class short subjects, it is announced.

Friday’s feature will be “Behind the Mask,” starring Jack Holt, Boris Karloff of “Frankenstein” fame, and Constance Cummings. This picture is claimed to be equal to any horror film ever made for thrills and chills. The plot concerns a dope ring that is ruled unmercifully by the unknown power, “Mr. X.”

How a private hospital, where sorceries are practiced, and which is a clearing house for enemies of the dope ring, is brought into this theme, goes to make for unparalleled shudders, it is announced.

Selected short reels and Hearst Metrotone News will also be seen. Thursday night will be marked by the final performance of “Platinum Blonde,” starring Jean Harlow and Robert Williams. Loretta Young is also seen in a leading role.

CURTAIN CALLS

2011-01-27T12:03:00.013-05:00

By Wood Soanes

May 4, 1932
There are almost as many ways of getting into the show business as there are actors, but Ginger Rogers, who is gracing the stages of the Paramount this week may lay claim to the adjective unique in her history.

She became an actress because her mother, Helen Rogers of Fort Worth, drama critic, was adamant in her decision that daughter should not get her golden locks stained with printer’s ink – and the staff of the Record, since defunct – the paper, that is to say, not the staff – agreed heartily.

It seems that Ginger’s idea of a perfectly swell way to pass the time was to stroll into the Record office armed with her ukulele and annoy the editorial staff at edition time with tunes and near-tunes. And when the instrument was wrested away, she practiced the Charleston.

So it was with a sigh of relief that the members of the fourth estate who were on the record payroll learned that Ginger had not only entered herself in a Charleston contest but that she had won the first prize and was about to make an appearance on the stage strutting her stuff.

And about this time Mother Rogers began to have serious qualms of conscience. Maybe the newspaper racket wouldn’t be so bad after all in contrast to the stage. Unfortunately for domestic peace, and fortunately for the theatergoers, Daughter Rogers had, and still has, red hair.

“I really believe I would have given in,” she confided in this cubicle yesterday, “but the fates have decided against me.

“Having won the contest, I became more or less public property. I danced at the first ‘personal appearance’ and when I tried to evade the subsequent ones, I was told that I must appear whether I danced or not. When I appeared, I danced and that was that.

“I might have remained a dancer had it not been for the interest Ed Lowry took in me. He was one of the ace masters of ceremonies for the Skouras chain in the east and it was he who taught me how to ‘sell’ a song, how to routine my dances, and how to get over comedy. Now my problem is to convince producers that I am a better comedienne than an ingénue.

“I worked on the Skouras chain for a long while, mostly with Lowry and Paul Ash, and then went into a musical revue called ‘Top Speed.’ I was hired as a dancing comedienne and thought that I was launched on a career. Imagine my disappointment when the next role I got was as leading woman in a musical comedy.

“Now leading women are all right, on the stage and the screen. You have to have them, of course, to give the tenors something to look at when they sing. But usually they are a pretty namby-pamby lot and it isn’t much fun playing them.”

The talk then shifted to the differences, distinctions and preferences of stage and screen. “If I had my choice, it would be the screen,” the youthful star replied. “One of the chief satisfactions of acting is to have an opportunity to play a variety of roles – that is particularly true of the younger player who can only find by trying many things which is best suited.

“In Hollywood, especially if you are on contract, it is not uncommon to play a different role every six weeks. On the stage, if your vehicle is any good and you always hope it will be, you are in the same role for an indefinite period, and much can happen to you in six months or a year.

“I was on a contract for a time at Paramount and more recently became a free-lance player. I was relieved of the contract at my own request because I felt that I could go ahead faster alone. It was a mistake because the studio I first went with in more important roles was taken over by another studio and I was lost in the shuffle.

“Mother and I have established our home in Hollywood now, however, and when this engagement is over, I plan to return there and start my career anew. I have enjoyed the present season but it is hard work. I don’t believe the public realizes what a try these four-shows-a-day are on the actors. Since we started on tour I have spent most of my waking hours in the theater and have been catching my meals on the fly, mostly sandwiches.”

Miss Rogers is an attractive little red-head, intelligent, pleasant and a ready conversationalist. She will be at the Paramount in “Girl Crazy” until tomorrow night giving way to the old maestro Ted Lewis who is bringing in his band for a week on Friday.

May 4, 1932

2011-01-24T11:51:00.018-05:00

HELEN KANE IN $250,000 SUIT

New York, May 4
Nobody is going to “boop-a-doop” and make money out of it if Helen Kane, screen and stage star who rode to fame on a “boop,” can help it.

She has filed suit here for $250,000 damages against the Paramount-Publix corporation, Max Fleischer, cartoonist, and the Fleischer Studios, charging that they pirated her “boop-a-doop” in a series of animated cartoons called “Betty Boop Series.”

“Plaintiff,” declared a brief submitted to the supreme court, “originated and still uses a method of singing songs in a novel manner, consisting of the interpolation at frequent intervals of the sounds “boop-a-doop,” or “boop-boop-a-doop,” or similar combinations of such sounds, or simply, “boop” alone.”

The animated cartoons, Miss Kane charges, are an imitation of this legally described “novel manner” of singing and she wants damages and an injunction.

MIRIAM HOPKINS ASSUMES MOTHER’S ROLE

Divorced Actress Adopts Baby Boy

Chicago, May 4 (AP)
Miriam Hopkins, film actress, adopted a baby boy in Chicago Wednesday and left this city in a huff because press and public were too curious.

Officials of the Cradle society, orphanage in Evanston, said they did not expect Miss Hopkins to take the child from the home for several days. The child’s last name is Wilson, a woman attendant said, but further information was not forthcoming.

“I hate all this publicity,” Miss Hopkins told reporters after a county judge had granted permission for the adoption. “I can’t give you any reason for it. It’s just a fact.” She later declared “I have nothing to say.”

The blonde actress revealed at the court hearing, however, that she has been divorced from Austin Parker, playwright. She claimed to be leaving for New York Wednesday, and the orphanage expected her to get the child on her way back to Hollywood.

In court she said she would rear the child as her own and had already set aside a trust fund for the boy.

MOVIE INDUSTRY FACING REAL STRUGGLE

Hollywood, Cal., May 4 (AP)
Hollywood today “dug in” to face a “three to five year struggle” which lies before the motion picture industry.

The screen will be lucky if it can adjust itself to new conditions within that time, Sidney R. Kent, new president of the Fox Film Corporation, last night told approximately four hundred members of the industry, at an “all-industry conference” sponsored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Handing out the sackcloth and ashes of “cold, hard facts,” Kent advised all members of the business to don them and face the situation united.

“The industry is in a very serious condition,” he declared. “The next few months in my opinion will be the most critical months the industry has ever faced. Grosses are going down and we haven’t yet been able to cut expenses enough. We have got to strike a balance, on the work of executives as well as of stars and directors. The industry must get down to brass tacks.”

There must be a general concord on the matter of adjusted salaries, Kent emphasized, for the time has passed, he said, when the misfortune of one company is the good fortune of another. Those who refuse to accept a cut in salary may find themselves holding contracts that are worthless because the companies making them have passed into receivership, he warned.

“In my opinion,” he said, “a three to five year struggle lies ahead of the industry. I too would like to see a complete recovery by August 1, but I am not sure that would be best, for it is important that the industry come back right rather than it come back in three months with a half-cure.”

Kent blamed over-expansion in prosperous years as a cause of the picture business’ present difficulties, as well as problems arising from the introduction of sound into films such as limitation of the market.

“I am optimistic in a long-range viewpoint of the industry, for there is nothing in the world that can kill the motion picture business,” he declared.

J. L. Warner of Warner Brothers-First National, corroborated Kent’s statements regarding the crisis in the picture world, told of his own company’s being overburdened with theaters, and declares the acceptance of salary cuts essential to the survival of the industry.

The exhibitor’s viewpoint was presented by M. A. Lightman, Memphis, Tenn., president of the Motion Picture Theater Owners of America, who declared for “fewer pictures but good ones.” He advocated the closing of many theaters to solve the problem of over-seating, as well as the present need for the producers to meet the surplus theaters’ demand for product with quantity rather than quality.

Many pictures have been superb, he said, but a public weary “of just sound, or wisecracks, of sophisticated vulgarity” wants above all else sincerity – “not necessarily brutal naturalism but not sentimental trash. It wants human stories told sincerely and artistically, directed by strong forces that can feel and live the parts of all the characters and can thus inspire convincing interpretations.”

Lightman’s statement that “the belief that the public wants broad indecencies is a fallacy,” brought applause.

THE BEST BETTE IN THE MOVIES

Richard Bennett, father of Joan and Constance Bennett, film stars, told charming Bette Davis that she was an exact cross between his two daughters.

So that’s why, maybe, Bette left Boston to enter films.

MOVIE STARS PRESENT AS HOLLYWOOD CLUB IS RAIDED BY DRY AGENTS

Hollywood, May 4 (UP)
Twenty Hollywood celebrities had an evening’s entertainment disrupted last night when Federal prohibition agents raided Tony Luci’s Night Club, one of the most exclusive in Hollywood. None of the guests was molested.

The establishment, in the heart of the film studio district, catered only to film celebrities.

The agents seized 500 bottles of choice wines and liquors and arrested two men and a woman on charges of violating the prohibition act.

From Luella O. Parsons:

My favorite boy friend, Jackie Cooper, writes to say that he is having a swell time on his vaudeville tour. “Chicago is a keen town,” writes Jackie. “I went to a play where they tell you about the moon and I saw it in a picture, too.”

Jackie says he is working hard but he misses Hollywood and “please,” he says “write me and tell me what is doing there.” He spells “Holly Wood” in two words with a capital H and a capital W. We miss him, too.

If Jackie hasn’t heard, I can tell him he is due to make a circus story with Wallace Beery. The name is “O’Shaughnessey’s Boy,” and Sam Wood will direct it. Wally sent him a message over the radio at the “Grand Hotel” opening.

One sure way to get in right with the movies seems to be to knock them often and to retell rumors that nine times out of ten are based on fiction.

Walter Winchell, whose radio talks roused great ire in Hollywood, has had nine offers to play in the movies. Winchell, who broadcast many rumors that were resented in film circles, is being sought after by the very people he publicized in this fashion.

Felix Young of Universal studios went to Santa Barbara to try to get Winchell to play a lead in a picture. Winchell is too smart to listen to any of these offers. He is smarter, it would seem to me, than the people who are making the offers.

Three cheers and a tiger for Colleen Moore! She had to prove to these screen producers that she is no amateur when it comes to movies. They were colder than the proverbial iceberg to Colleen after the advent of the talkies, but now they are all on her trail and want to sign her. “Church Mouse,” a stage play, did it.

Chatter in Hollywood:

Germany has been watching the Dietrich-Von Sternberg-Schulberg discussion with interest. It wouldn’t hurt the feeling of U. F. A. if Marlene didn’t make any more pictures in America, because they’d like to have her back.

She received a cable, I hear on excellent authority, asking her to return and assuring her of everything she wants in the way of story, cast and direction.

I asked Marlene if she were going back to Germany with her husband. She said no, she hadn’t made any such decision. But I shouldn’t be surprised if, after she talks over the matter with Josef Von Sternberg, she did return to make a picture.

Snapshots of Hollywood:

Edgar Allen Woolf, the local Beau Brummel, illustrating what the well-dressed man wears at the opening of the play Ruth Chatterton directed. He was escorting Mrs. Jack Warner, wearing a New York creation of blue, and Mrs. Harry Rapf in white.

Ruth Chatterton slipping into a back seat with Laura Hope Crews to hear the last act of the English play. Ralph Forbes, one of the stars, bringing Ruth out on the stage in response to repeated calls.

John Gilbert host to ten people at the Mayfair Saturday night. Eric von Stroheim bringing thirty to the final dance of the season.

Maurice Chevalier, sunning himself on the beach with Marlene Dietrich and her husband.

Barbara Bebe Lyon calling on Maria Sieber. Marlene’s young daughter had the distinction of having Chevalier sing “One Hour With You” for her sole benefit. Irving Berlin, Jr., accompanied by his father and mother, who are also well known, called on Barbara. Irving Jr. was so indifferent to her charms she retaliated by pulling on his blonde curls.

TWO ALL-STAR TALKIES, PLAN OF PARAMOUNT

“Song of Eagle” and “If I Had Million” Are Scheduled

By Chester B. Bahn
Following the example set by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer with “Grand Hotel,” Paramount will produce two all-star features for its 1932-33 program.

The schedule, as it now stands, calls for a total of 45 features. Helen Hayes will appear in one, Maurice Chevalier in two, Harold Lloyd in one, and if the Marlene Dietrich controversy is adjusted, the German star will make three talkies.

“The Song of the Eagle” and “If I Had a Million” will be the all-star productions.

Present schedule calls for Miss Dietrich to appear in “Blonde Venus,” “Deep Night” and “Promised.” “Love Me Tonight” and “The Way to Love” are the Chevalier features. “Horse Feathers” and “Movie Crazy” are the titles for the Four Marx Brothers and Harold Lloyd comedies, respectively.

Titles for the remaining features are:

“The Mirrors of Washington,” “R U R,” “I Can’t Go Home,” “Blood and Sand,” “Madame Butterfly,” “Anything for Sale,” “Not Married,” “The Glass Key,” “The Phantom President,” “The Girl Without a Room,” “A Farewell to Arms,” “The West Pointer,” “Lives of a Bengal Lancer,” “Madison Square Garden,” “70,000 Witnesses,” “Dream Without Ending,” “Riddle Me This,” “The Big Broadcast,” “The Trouble With Women,” “The Song of Songs,” “Lone Cowboy,” “Hot Ice,” “Fires of Spring,” “The Sign of the Cross,” three outdoor specials, “Hot Saturday,” “No Bed of Her Own,” “The Island of Lost Souls,” “The Red Temptation,” “Pick-Up,” “Connecting Rooms,” “The Lusitania Secret.”

Universal’s schedule for the new film year calls for 26 features, including two co-starring Slim Summerville and ZaSu Pitts.

Other titles include “Counsellor at Law,” “Laughter in Hell,” “The Old Dark House” with Boris Karloff, “The Prison Doctor,” “Manna,” “Cagliosstro,” “Once in a Lifetime,” “The Flight Commander,” “Laughing Boy,” “Left Bank,” “The Invisible Man” and “Iceberg,”

Tabloid review of the split-week feature –

“Racing Youth” is the usual hoke mixture of race thrills and romance, scarcely convincing and certainly not for critical cinemagoers. Heart interest falls to Frank Albertson as a young mechanic and June Clyde as the masquerading auto factory heiress. Louise Fazenda and Slim Summerville supply the laughs.

Last minute Rialto news –

James Cagney has offered to make three talkies for Warner Brothers without salary if the studio will cancel his five-year contract; Warners has rejected the proposition...

Arthur Caesar may adapt “Once in a Lifetime” for Universal...

Helen Coburn, legit actress, has been signed by M-G-M...

Irv. Cummings will direct six more talkies for Columbia...

Paul Muni will star for Warners in “Lawyer Man.”

Norma Talmadge has gone abroad...

Al Jolson’s talkie will be “Heart of New York.”

Emil Jannings will do a stage play in London...

Mitzi Green will star in “Little Orphan Annie.”

Hank Mann joins Jack Oakie in that Olympic games comedy...

Bob Montgomery will be opposite Marion Davies in “Two Blondes.”

Casting assignments: Kent Taylor for “Forgotten Commandments,” Joseph Cawthorne for “Love Me Tonight,” Robert McWade for “The Sporting Widow.”

Will Rogers visits the Sahara Desert in his latest starring production, “Business and Pleasure.” The story has been adapted from the novel, “The Plutocrat,” by Booth Tarkington...

“The Roadhouse Murder” will introduce Bruce Cabot to cinemagoers. He’s a husky young giant from the West.

From Wood Soanes:

Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell started work this week on “The First Year” for Fox.

Fox, by the way, announces this picture as the last of the forty-eight scheduled for release during the theater season ending July 31. Seven other pictures, two for next season’s release, are now in the work.

The ones for next season are Elissa Landi’s “Burnt Offering” and Will Rogers’ “Down to Earth.”

Another item in the Fox bulletin that may please theatergoers is about the signing of Clara Bow to a contract calling for her return to the screen in Tiffany Thayer’s “Call Her Savage.” Production will start in a few weeks.

George Arliss’ next may be “The Rise and Fall of Rothschild” a story similar, in characterization at least, to his famous “Disraeli.”

Charlie Chaplin’s next is tentatively titled “The Jester” in which he plays a deaf and dumb circus performer.

Wallace Berry with a new contract in his pocket starts work on a Russian story with George Hill as director. It was Hill who handled Beery in “Hell Divers,” “The Big House,” “Min and Bill” and “The Secret Six.” Beery’s latest work is in “Grand Hotel.”

May 3, 1932

2011-01-19T11:58:00.018-05:00

NANCY CARROLL AT ODDS WITH MOVIE PRODUCERS

Red-haired Actress Is Fourth Artist in Insurgent Ranks

Hollywood, Cal., May 3 (AP)
The ranks of indigent motion picture artists to-day included Nancy Carroll, red-haired actress. The nature of Miss Carroll’s differences with Paramount Studios was not disclosed, although she has been off salary from the studio for several weeks as a result of disagreements.

Miss Carroll is the latest of four film artists at odds with their employers.

Marlene Dietrich, James Cagney and Josef Von Sternberg previously announced severance of relations with their studios.

Von Sternberg, returning to Hollywood from New York last night, said he would never again direct a picture for Paramount. The director and Miss Dietrich were suspended by the studio for failure to produce a story provided them. They said they considered the story “unsuitable.”

“I am quite positive I will not direct again for Paramount and that Miss Dietrich will not appear in another picture for the company,” said Von Sternberg.

Miss Dietrich met Von Sternberg at the railroad station and left with him in his automobile. She refused to make a statement, allowing the director to talk for both of them. Von Sternberg said he had several offers for his services, but that “there are several legal aspects to be gone over before I will accept any of them.”

Cagney, star of Warner Brothers-First National studios, said he would leave for New York within the next few days, quitting his film career for the study of medicine. He had been holding out for a $2400 weekly increase in salary, although his contract already called for $1600 weekly. The studio suspended him when he refused to work.

Miss Carroll, in private life Mrs. Bolton Mallory, was reported to be en route to Hollywood from New York to discuss her differences with Paramount.

DOUG AND MARY WILL BE REUNITED IN S. F.

Hollywood, May 3 (UP)
Doug Fairbanks and Mary Pickford, Hollywood’s most famous couple, will be reunited in San Francisco Thursday when Fairbanks and his company return from Papeete, in the South Sea Islands.

Miss Pickford is due here from New York Wednesday and will go to San Francisco to meet her husband.

The Fairbanks party sailed February 17 for Papeete. Included in the party are William Farnum, Maria Alba, Ed Sutherland, director, and several technicians and business representatives.

FATTY ARBUCKLE TO TRY COME-BACK

New York, May 3 (INS)
Roscoe (“Fatty”) Arbuckle, rotund comedian, who formerly thrilled world-wide audiences by his clowning antics for the silent screen, to-day prepared to achieve a comeback.

Arbuckle, with his fiancée, slender titian-haired Addie McPhail, will open in a vaudeville engagement in New York Friday night. If it is successful, he hopes to appear again in the movies.

LOUIS MERCANTON, FILM DIRECTOR, DIES

London, May 3 (UP)
Louis Mercanton, film director, died to-day. He directed “Mothers of France,” said to have been the first foreign film exhibited in the United States.

Film and stage stars who worked under Mercanton’s direction include Sarah Bernhardt, Constance Talmadge, Betty Balfour, Gaby Deslys, Fay Compton and Ivor Novello.

STUDIOS EXPECT STARS WILL TAKE PAY CUTS

Hollywood, May 3
General reduction of stars’ salaries among other companies as well as its own is expected by Warner Brothers as a result of the voluntary cut taken by Richard Barthelmess. They rely on the influence of his example in recognizing present economic conditions and will suggest cuts to players.

Under his former contract, Barthelmess received $150,000 each for two pictures yearly. Under the new two-year agreement he will receive $100,000 each for three pictures yearly, which is practically a 33 1-3 per cent cut.

ACTOR’S PASSPORT CASE IS CONTINUED

Los Angeles, May 3 (UP)
The case of Duncan Renaldo, motion picture actor, charged with making a false affidavit to obtain a passport, was continued today until the September calendar of the United States District Court.

From Luella O. Parsons:

Unrelenting in his fight with the New York censor board, Howard Hughes tells me he is going to battle and battle to a finish for the release of “Scarface.”

“It did a grand business in Los Angeles,” he told me, “and I didn’t hear people criticize it, did you? We didn’t show gangsters in any glorified light.”

All of this brings back the performance of Paul Muni in “Scarface.”

Winfield Sheehan brought Muni out here two years ago, and I looked at marvelous tests and prophesied a future for him. Fox apparently didn’t give him the right stories, and he went back to New York.

Now he is coming out again, and watch what he will do. He has been signed to play the lead in “Lawyer Man” for First National. The story is by Mark S. Potkin.

You couldn’t expect anybody on the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer lot to verify anything the day before the opening of “Grand Hotel.”

Ethel Barrymore is due here June 1. A long time ago we printed a story that Ethel would appear with her brothers, Lionel and John Barrymore, in a production to be selected by M-G-M or perhaps Radio. There seems to be an exchange of Barrymores between these two companies.

Saturday we heard in a New York wire that the picture will be made for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, but as I said you just couldn’t verify anything after all the excitement of the premier of “Grand Hotel.” Nobody was in his office, and those who were didn’t want to talk about anything but the opening.

Chatter in Hollywood:

Marlene Dietrich, slender, wearing black and on the arm of her husband attracting as much attention as any star at the “Grand Hotel” opening. She looked happy and seemed unruffled by all the publicity she has received on her broken contract.

“Every time my husband comes here he arrives just when we are having trouble,” she said. “I am glad to be here to help her, “ he answered. He is a good looking young German and he seems devoted to Marlene. When he reached here for the first time, Mrs. Von Sternberg was trying to involve Marlene in her domestic troubles. Now it’s the contract.

John Barrymore, at the last minute, got stage fright and did not attend the premier of “Grand Hotel.” His wife, Dolores Costello, however, soon to become a mother, slipped into the theater to see what everyone says is John’s most charming role. Later I saw her having supper quietly with a couple of friends at the Roosevelt hotel.

Hoot Gibson fortified himself against this recent, uncertain California weather.

Last year his rodeo was spoiled by a downpour and he lost thousands of dollars. This year he didn’t take a chance. He took out an insurance policy with Harvey Priester, local insurance man, which calls for a return of the money invested in case of rain during the hours of nine and three in the afternoon of the day of the rodeo.

All the lads who play in westerns were at the rodeo. Wonder if Ken Maynard was there? His next picture is “Hell-Fire Austin.” If Mr. Maynard was there he didn’t fly. He signed for eight pictures and while he is making them his contract says he must not do any traveling by airplane. The leading lady scheduled to play opposite him is Ivy Merton, erstwhile stage actress.

Snapshots of Hollywood:
Marion Davies, home again after a vacation in the country, held an open house. Gertrude Michael of the New York stage, a guest, had just had a test made for an important role.

Gary Cooper in a very English tweed suit, just back from South Africa, told us all about that fascinating country. Randolph Scott, supposed to look like Gary, was also a guest at Marion’s.

Eileen Percy, still very tanned, Constance Talmadge Netcher in white pajamas trimmed in chinchilla, Bebe Daniels, Ben Lyon, Frances Marion, Charles Lederer, Howard Hughes and others dined at Marion’s house.

From Wood Soanes:

Down in Hollywood there is another hub-bub over the walk-out of Josef Von Sternberg and the refusal of Marlene Dietrich to work under a substitute director.

From this distance it looks like a grand publicity scheme, but of course it may be a repetition of the old “Wolf, Wolf” fable. Every time there is a contract to be renewed or a picture to be released, the press agents make a special effort to land copy on the front pages.

If it be a legitimate quarrel, however, I am inclined to side with Von Sternberg and Miss Dietrich and applaud them for their effort to improve the picture product. They accepted a story only to have it returned, after another executive conference, with changes they believed were detrimental.

Robert Montgomery has been given a new contract by M-G-M. His picture “But the Flesh is Weak” will be followed by “Letty Lynton,” in which he appears with Joan Crawford. Montgomery made his picture debut in “So This Is College.”

Clarence Brown, who directed “Letty Lynton,” was also given a new contract just after he received a special transport license from the government. He celebrated both items with a flying trip east where he will buy a new plane and then make a brief tour of Europe.

LAST MINUTE RIALTO NEWS:

By Chester B. Bahn

Louise Fazenda is working in Universal’s “Tonight’s the Night.”

Helen Coburn of the Theater Guild has been signed for M-G-M films.

William Faulkner, author of “Sanctuary,” has been signed to write M-G-M originals, dialog and adaptations.

Paramount has kissed Nancy Carroll goodbye.

Peggy Shannon and Allen Davis (friend husband) are maintaining separate ménages.

Watch for a film merger with William Fox back in harness.

Doug Fairbanks docks in Frisco Thursday and Mary Pickford will be there to greet him.

M-G-M is bidding for the film rights to “Dancing Lady” by James Warner Bellah.

Leslie Banks, signed by Radio, will make his film bow via Columbia, being loaned for the “heavy” role in “The Bitter Tea of General Yen.” Herbert Brenon will direct and the femme leads will be Anna May Wong and Connie Cummings.

George Brent will be Opposite Loretta Young in “They Call It Sin.”

The Barrymore threesome talkie probably will be under the M-G-M banner.

Joan Blondell, Bette Davis and Ann Dvorak will have the leads in “Three On a Match.”

From Robert Grandon:

Oodles and oodles of real romance of the studio...

A fact which was brought to my attention the other noon as we met for luncheon at the Brown Derby. The romance of Leslie Fenton and Ann Dvorak, with the attendant breach-of-promise action, started the conversation.

“Do you know,” somebody said, “Their romance was one of holidays. They were introduced on New Year’s Eve. Next they met on the set on St. Valentine’s Day. Then they flew to Yuma and wed on St. Patrick’s Day.”

“Yes, and don’t forget that their love affair started when they were screen lovers, as have so many other romances,” was the retort.

Which is quite true. John Barrymore fell in love with Dolores Costello when they played in “The Sea Beast.”

It was after William Powell and Carole Lombard were together in “Man of the World” that she decided she loved him.

When “The Virtuous Sin” was being done Kay Francis said “yes” to Kenneth McKenna.

And Harold Lloyd fell for Mildred Davis when she played his leads.

Joan Crawford and Doug (Junior) Fairbanks middle-aisled in the studio and went right on to the church. The picture was “Our Modern Maidens.”

Sally Eilers galloped like all fury through westerns until Hoot Gibson caught up with her and took her away to his ranch.

Jimmy Dunn announced his engagement after “Dance Team.” It was June Knight whom he had met when she doubled in some of the scenes.

Donald Dilaway and Dorothy Jordan have been pairing it since in “Min and Bill.” And Wesley Ruggles wed Arline Judge after directing her in a picture.

And there are several other romances budding in a like way, though they may fall and wither before too long.They are too incipient, as yet, to report .

UNDER EIGHTEEN IS LYRIC ATTRACTION

Marian Marsh in “Under Eighteen” is the feature attraction at the Lyric Theater for Tuesday and Wednesday. Miss Marsh portrays a poor girl who tries with misguided enthusiasm to lift herself into the society of the rich. Others in the cast are Regis Toomey, Warren William, Anita Page, Emma Dunn and Joyce Compton.

NANCY CARROLL IS STAR AT NATIONAL

Nancy Carroll’s new picture, “Personal Maid” from the novel by Grace Perkins, is the attraction at the National Theater for Tuesday and Wednesday.

Glimpses of high life behind doors of Park Avenue are shown in the film. It is a modern story of a maid who finds that money doesn’t bring happiness but whose cleverness, wit, beauty and brains create a sensation in society’s foremost family.

George Fawcett and Nancy Carroll’s sister, Terry Carroll, are included in the cast. A comedy, “The Girl in the Tonneau,” and a travel talk will be shown.

May 2, 1932

2011-01-12T15:18:00.023-05:00

CAGNEY DECIDES TO QUIT FILMS

Hollywood, Calif. May 2 (AP)
James Cagney, red-haired star of the Warner Brothers-First National studios, says he has definitely decided to quit films, take another turn at vaudeville in Europe and then study medicine.

Cagney recently “walked out” of the studio because of his failure to get $4000 weekly, more than double the amount his contract stipulated.

CHARGE HUSBAND OF ACTRESS BIGAMIST

White Plains, N. Y., May2 (AP)
District Attorney Frank Coyne was in possession today of an affidavit charging that Theodore Stewart, or Spector, committed bigamy when he married Olive Borden, the actress. The affidavit was made by Pearl Marie Haworth, beauty shop proprietor of Buffalo, who said she married Spector in March, 1919.

She attached a marriage certificate to the affidavit.

WORRIED?

If Greta Garbo looks a bit anxious in her latest photos, lay it to the bad news just received from home. It is that she has lost two thirds of her fortune in the Swedish depression. For that reason, Hollywood believes that she will return to make more pictures, her reported engagement to a European financier notwithstanding.

HIS FUTURE IS PROBLEM FOR JANNEY

Leon Must Decide Upon College or Studio Before Fall

By Chester B. Bahn
That blonde mop of thick curly hair which is one of young Leon Janney’s chief stocks in trade, thatches a shrewd head. The little boy who clutched at the heart strings in “Father and Son,” his own favorite picture, by the way, is just growing up and faces a real problem. Shall he in the fall enter the University of Southern California, for which he has passed entrance exams, or remain in the stage and picture field?

Leon, who has lived in Hollywood six or seven years, has observed the short memory of the public and the long, hard struggle of a forgotten star to come-back.

“In just two years, an actor can be completely forgotten,” Leon remarks. “If I retire now to go through college I’ll have to re-establish myself all over again. I want terribly to be a great actor, to do such roles as Shylock.”

Leon, who was 17 on April 1, considers his role in “Father and Son” his best. Lewis Stone he terms a “peach.” His favorite actresses are Dorothy Mackaill and Fifi Dorsay.

He has a deep admiration for little Jackie Searle and declares the youngster who plays the sissy is the most regular of fellows, the third best runner in his school and the best of his own grade. Jackie is a real baseball player, too, and incidentally the national pastime is one of Leon’s own chief interests in life.

Between shows, the 17-year-old fan spends a part of his leisure catching up with what has been happening in the big leagues. He has four favorites, with the Hollywood team of a Coast League right up in front. Next come the Yankees in the American League, and the Giants in the National. Newark, a fourth choice, is his favorite in the International.

Robert Montgomery plays the part of an Englishman for the third consecutive time in “Lovers Courageous.” Madge Evans plays opposite, and the cast includes Roland Young, Frederick Kerr, Reginald Owen and Beryl Mercer.

“Police Court,” drama of life behind the scenes in Hollywood, is seen today and tomorrow. In the cast are Leon Janney, Henry B. Walthall and Aileen Pringle.

Shown on the same bill is George Gershwin’s all-star comedy “Girl Crazy,” with Wheeler and Woolsey, Eddie Quillan, Mitzie Green and Dorothy Lee.

What Clark Gable would like to know is this – who put the cedar shavings of a pencil sharpener in his pet jar of pipe tobacco in his dressing room at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios.

From Luella O. Parsons:

Leslie Banks will have to give an exceptional performance on the screen to measure up to all the expectations. He was brought out here by Radio from the New York stage, but he has been loaned to Columbia to play the part of the general in “The Bitter Tea of General Yen.” He is the only “heavy” in captivity whose coming to Hollywood has been heralded in capital letters.

Herbert Brennon, who is very good on stories of this kind, will direct. Anna May Wong and Constance Cummings have the two feminine roles and production will be started immediately, according to Harry Cohn, who should know.

Snapshots of Hollwyood:
Jean Harlow, platinum locks dyed a nice red, creating somewhat of a sensation at the opening of “Grand Hotel.” She tried it on the first-nighters before she plays the role in “The Red Headed Woman” and it was not unbecoming.

Clark Gable getting the ropes broken by ambitious fans who craved autographs. Marion Davies in a white, fur-trimmed frock, signing her name for many fans. Michael Curtiz giving a farewell party to the Zanucks after the opening.

Estelle Taylor in brown, dancing with a handsome stranger at the Roosevelt.

TARZAN HAILED BEST SINCE TRADER

By Sam Woolford
Not since “Trader Horn” has there been such a picture as “Tarzan, the Ape Man,” now packing them in. This is another African picture by Van Dyke, the director who knows how to put thrills into pictures and leave hokum out.

The favorite old story comes to life with Johnny Weissmuller, the swimming champ, in the title role, and he is just new enough to the screen to act like an ape man.

Maureen O’Sullivan, C. Aubrey Smith and Neil Hamilton assist admirably.

Scenes which you will like (the ladies hiding their faces meanwhile) are:

Tarzan’s race across a lake with crocodiles.

The elephant stampede

Tarzan swinging through the trees.

The hippopotamus battle.

Tarzan rassling lions and stabbing them to death.

The entire picture is good with only the discordant note of the pygmies, who turn out to be midgets. However, these little fellows do a fine job of subbing.

Whatever you do, don’t fail to see this picture. It is one of the best of the year.

And then there is Charley Chase cavorting with a crazy man in a bathtub.

And lest you forget, “Grand Hotel” is coming Friday, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s bid for best picture of 1932.

If you like big he-men, logging camps, falling pine trees, go to see Ginger Rogers, Bill (“Movie”) Boyd and Hobart Bosworth in “Carnival Boat.”

A scene which will make you sway in your seat is the wild runaway lumber train going down the mountain side, taking curves at 50 miles an hour.

There is a big log jam, a dynamiting scene, and some good comedy furnished by a pair of comedians.

Another fine piece of entertainment, (there seems to be a lot of it this week,) is “Monsters of the Deep,” a deep sea fishing picture showing with the main film.
These daring fisherman pull in sharks, deep sea bass, tuna and lastly one of the biggest devil fish ever caught, ending a battle of 11 hours.

Joan Bennett and John Boles are appearing in “Careless Lady,” this being the story, “Widow’s Might.” Joan plays the role of a simple American girl who goes to Paris to get experience and then home to conquer males. Similar roles have been played by some of the screen’s leading stars, but this is the best job so far done.

John Boles meets Joan in Paris, where she has adopted his name. Complications follow.

Arthur Stone appears in another comedy in which he does some sleep-walking, getting into wrong rooms and beds. If you like Arthur, you will enjoy this.

Edmund Lowe and Claudette Colbert are playing in “Misleading Lady,” being a story of a society flirt who gets all tangled up with a big game hunter, who handles her like a wild zebra.

Stuart Erwin also has a role. It is all quite funny.

To cap off the comedy program George Sidney and Charlie Murray appear in a comedy short. There is a screen souvenir program and screen song.

WHO’S WHO ON THE SCREEN

2011-01-11T10:19:00.008-05:00

May 1, 1932

Zasu Pitts, who has a habit of popping out of unexpected corners in films, is contributing her latest comedy bit to “The Trial of Vivienne Ware,” now at the Roxy.

Although Miss Pitts is only a meek 32 years of age, she is one of the real veterans among the Hollywood troupers. She drew her first laugh in Parsons, Kan., on a bleak January day in 1900, and she was still a tiny tot when the family migrated to Santa Cruz, Cal.

Her introduction to the pictures was auspicious enough – a role in support of Mary Pickford in “The Little Princess.” That was in 1917.

Miss Pitts is married and has one child of her own, a daughter. When Barbara La Marr died, Zasu Pitts adopted her son.

At the moment, two of her films are awaiting release. The first is a comedy, “The Unexpected Father,” in which Miss Pitts is featured with Slim Summerville. The second is “Destry Rides Again,” Tom Mix’s first talking picture.

When Boris Karloff was enrolled to play the unctuous religious editor in “Five Star Final” he made the part one of the most disagreeable characterizations of the year.

Then he entered the cast of James Whale’s “Frankenstein” and interpreted the monster of that nightmarish story in a way that made the picture houses of the land ring with startled screams.

His new role in “Behind the Mask,” is in the same tradition. This is all by way of introduction to the interesting fact that Mr. Karloff in private life is an Englishman of excellent education.

His birthplace was London and the year was 1887. He took his schooling successively at Uppingham, Merchant Taylor School, and Kings College, London University.

Arriving in America after appearing on numerous London and European stages, he played stock for a time and finally attracted the attention of Hollywood with his stage performances in “The Virginian” and “Kongo.”

Before he blossomed out cinematically in “Five Star Final” he appeared in such films as “The Deadlier Sex,” “Criminal Code,” “Graft,” “Donovan’s Kid” and “The Public Defender.”

Robert Montgomery, who surmounted the handicap of a silver spoon in the process of becoming one of Metro-Goldwyn’s bright young men, is making his latest bow in “Letty Lynton” with Joan Crawford.

He was born in Beacon, N. Y. in 1904, and educated at the Pawling School and became accustomed at an early age to traveling in style on the Continent. The death of his father, Henry Montgomery, a vice president of the New York Rubber Company, when Robert was about 16, brought the discovery that the family fortune had shrunk.

The lad first went to work with his brother as a mechanic’s helper on a railroad. Four months later he sailed on a Standard Oil tanker as a deck hand. On his return he roomed with a lad who was getting his start in show business, and the two set out to buck the theater together.

After seventy-two weeks of stock, young Mr. Montgomery reached Broadway and appeared in “Arleen O’Dare,” “Dawn,” “Garden of Eden,” and other plays.

His first cinema role was in M-G-M’s “So This Is College” in 1929, and he has been with that company ever since. Subsequently, he played with Wallace Beery in “The Big House,” with Norma Shearer in “The Divorcee,” with Greta Garbo in “Inspiration,” with Constance Bennett in “The Easiest Way,” and with Joan Crawford in “Our Blushing Brides.”

Last Spring he was featured in his own right in “Shipmates.” The young man’s recent appearances have been in “Private Lives,” “Lovers Courageous” and “But the Flesh Is Weak.”

Now that he has arrived at the mature age of 6, Master Dickie Moore can explain his proficiency as an actor on the basis of an experience of five years.

The mite, who is to be observed in “So Big” this week at the Strand, made his film debut at the age of 11 months with a part in John Barrymore’s picture “The Beloved Rogue.”

Not long after that first plunge into dramatics he played with Richard Barthelmess in “Son of the Gods,” appearing as a Chinese infant, with make-up and all.

John Richard Moore, Jr. is his real name in private life and he was born right in Los Angeles in 1925. Dickie has a French-Irish background.

His present ambition, or one of them, is to take his part home with him at night and learn it for the next day’s shooting the way the big folks do. The system now is for the director to read the lines to him. Dickie memorizes them and then toddles out in front of the cameras.

He is three feet four inches tall, has brown eyes and blonde hair. He is under contract to Warner Brothers and has recently appeared in “The Star Witness,” “Union Depot,” “Manhattan Parade” and “Old Man Minick.”

Roscoe Ates has stuttered his way through yards of celluloid and sound track in recent years. His educated stutter is to be listened to at the Mayfair this week in “Roadhouse Murder.”

A native of Hattiesburg, Miss., he started out in life as a soda fountain attendant at 50 cents a week and, being an ambitious lad, worked himself up to motion picture operator at $1.50 a week.

The orchestra leader took a fancy to young Roscoe and sent him to Dana Musical Institute, where he graduated as a violinist. His facility with a bow won him a billing on the Keith Orpheum circuit, where for many years he was a familiar and merry figure,

His stuttering finally reached the ears of film executives and Mr. Ates was induced to enter films. One of his most successful characterizations was in “Cimarron” last year. Recently he has been seen in “Politics,” “Too Many Cooks,” “The Champ” and “Ladies of the Jury.”

GLIMMERINGS FROM THE CINEMA CITADEL

2011-01-07T10:10:00.013-05:00

Hollywood, Cal., May 1, 1932
By Chapin Hall

Under the title to which rather strenuous objection was made in 1928 when the picture was made as a silent, shooting of “Rain” will begin during the coming week on Catalina Island. Lewis Milestone is directing Joan Crawford and Walter Huston in this audible version of the W. Somerset Maugham story and the Joseph Colton play.

Fresh in the public mind as a play, it was necessary for the cinema to disguise the story as “Sadie Thompson” when Gloria Swanson did it. To that objecting public “Rain” had a sinister meaning. But audiences and censors change and today the title is regarded as perfectly harmless.

Other difficulties, however, have been encountered. Some five years ago Paul Kelly, a rising young actor, engaged in a fist fight with Ray Raymond of the musical stage. Raymond died as a result of the battle and Kelly was sent to San Quentin. Out, rehabilitated, the past forgotten he hoped, Kelly returned to Hollywood. After a struggle to overcome obvious objections to his return to the screen, he was signed by Universal.

Mr. Milestone remembered the actor’s work, liked it, and engaged him to play the part of the marine in “Rain.” Joseph Schenck, head of United Artists, became somewhat fearful, however, and in spite of the attitude of the Hays office, which was that the man’s crime had been expiated, Mr. Schenck ordered him removed from the cast.

The “Rain” company is to shoot at the isthmus on Catalina, where the island village of the story has been built. A camera track runs from the beach around the village, by which outstanding photographic effects will be secured. This is the first time that a company has gone on location to film both interiors and exteriors of a production. A great financial saving will be effected, it being possible to work players and non-union technicians any number of hours without over-time if they are on location. Shooting will take five weeks, inclusive of rehearsals.

The trouble that Paramount is having with Josef Von Sternberg and Marlene Dietrich over “The Blonde Venus” is not the first difficulty the studio has had with the pair over stories.

It was necessary virtually to force the director to accept “Shanghai Express,” which is Paramount’s best box office bet this year. After Mr. Von Sternberg agreed to the script, additional friction was experienced when he changed the story during the making.

The history of the present unpleasantness dates back to a script written by the director some months ago. The studio believed it to be unsuitable to the screen, having to do with a woman of the streets who went about her “profession” leading her small child by the hand. The director agreed to a re-writing, and when this was done he refused to accept it, according to the studio.

B. P. Schulberg, Paramount head, then delivered an ultimatum that the pair must begin immediate work on the studio’s version or be subject to legal action, and that night Mr. Von Sternberg left for New York.

According to studio officials, the director has been at loggerheads over stories for some time. He contends that poor stories have been forced on him and that the studio has relied on his directorial ability to turn them into good pictures. The studio says that the director has permitted his temperament to outweigh his story judgment and that the time has come to call a halt to the whole business.

Paramount is credited with having a find in Wynne Gibson, whose first starring picture, “The Strange Case of Clara Deane,” was previewed the other evening. Another find in the picture is Cora Sue Collins, a four-year-old child, and a list of the year’s best scenes will undoubtedly include that in which Miss Gibson parts with the baby in an orphanage as she is sent to prison.

“The Ten Commandments” has been changed in title to “Forgotten Commandments” and will be the first starring picture for Paramount’s recent importation, Sari Maritza. With her will be Gene Raymond and Marguerite Churchill. The new film will use the spectacle of the original as an illustrated lecture by a Russian scientist and a modern portion will be a Russian story.

Today’s best Garbo rumor: Miss Garbo will sign with M. C. Levee in his Screen Guild. Just before Mr. Levee left for New York, Harry Eddington, Miss Garbo’s manager, was frequently in conference with Mr. Levee, and the report is given considerable credence along the boulevard.

With the purchase of “Animal Kingdom” by RKO-Radio for Ann Harding, “Just a Woman” has been switched as a vehicle for Irene Dunne.

“Animal Kingdom” was secured at a reported price of $50,000 and it came with the services of Leslie Howard, who will play opposite Miss Harding.

However, immediate production of the play is improbable, as an untitled story by Humphrey Pearson is now being prepared for Miss Harding to be directed by Gregory La Cava, who did “Symphony of Six Million.”

Considerable secrecy surrounds “The Eighth Wonder,” now being made on the same lot.
It is from a story by the late Edgar Wallace and is being shot on a locked stage to which no one but technicians have thus far been admitted. The little information available indicates it will be a mechanical mystery thriller of some sort depending largely on trick photography.

RKO still pursues the younger and reputedly wilder generation. Eric Linden and Arline Judge have been cast in “Crossroads” by Martin Flavin, which is to be filmed as “Fraternity House.”

Rufus King has arrived on the same lot to write the script for “Mysteries of the French Secret Police.” There is still talk on the lot of a “super-duper” production with John Barrymore and Dolores Del Rio. The indications are now that “Moon and Sixpence” will be the vehicle for the pair, with George Archainbaud directing.

The Fox company on location at Santa Cruz, 400 miles north of here, has completed the exteriors of “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.” This is the picture Janet Gaynor walked out on when she decided she wanted more worldly parts than the sweet things the studio had been giving her. Marian Nixon was not adverse to taking Miss Gaynor’s place, for the saccharine road of unsophistication in the films is paved with sugar, as Broadway understands the meaning of the word.

While Miss Nixon is making the world sweeter with Aunt Jane and other Kate Douglas Wiggin characters, Miss Gaynor is in rehearsal with “The First Year,” her initial sally into the grown up ranks.

The difficulties over “Red Headed Woman” seem to be nearing the ironing-out stage at MGM with indications that Jean Harlow will be given the part. Miss Harlow has specialized on the screen in distasteful women and the fear of the average star that she will suffer from an unsympathetic part is just so much cream in Miss Harlow’s coffee.

She says that wives don’t like her anyway – professionally speaking, of course – and even if she played the orphan in “Daddy Long Legs,” they would still suspect her, so why not “Red Headed Woman?”

“Prosperity,” the Marie Dressler-Polly Moran comedy, is nearing completion on the same lot, as is the all-time record breaker, “Strange Interlude.”

The same concern has engaged Ralph Graves to act, write and direct, an unusual contractual combination. Helene Barclay, wife of McLelland Barclay, the artist, has arrived on the lot from New York.

At Universal, five pictures are in work and eight are being prepared. Those on which shooting is still taking place are “The Good Bad Man,” Tom Mix’s second; “Back Street,” the Fannie Hurst Yarn with Irene Dunne and John Boles; “Brown of Culver,” on which the company has just left for location scenes at the Culver Academy in Indiana; “The Old Dark House,” by J. B. Priestley, featuring Boris Karloff; “Heroes of the West,” a serial with Noah Beery Jr., Diane Duval and Onslow Stevens.

Hollywood is still quite upset by the defy hurled by Howard Hughes over “Scarface” when he said he would show it in spite of the censors. Now word comes from Ohio that Colonel Jason Joy of the local Hays office has secured the approval of the film in that State.

Local wiseacres point out that while Mr. Hughes did the defying the Hays office representative went into Ohio with a smile on his face and sweetness in his heart and got the film O. K.’d.

FLASHES FROM STUDIOS

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Harold Lloyd in “Movie Crazy,” His First in Two Years

New York, May 1, 1932

Harold Lloyd’s first picture in nearly two years is nearing the end of its production grind in what, for Mr. Lloyd, is jig time. “Movie Crazy” has been shooting at the United Artists studio for eight weeks, and the spectacled one, who is producer as well as star, expects to be able to start assembling and cutting his comedy this week.

It is not unusual for him to take as long as six months to shoot one of his films. He explains his present celerity on the ground that he is working for the first time from a script that outlined each day’s work.

“Movie Crazy” shows what can happen to a timorous laddie between the time he breaks into the picture industry and the time he finally comes out on top of the pack. It may be another month before Mr. Lloyd gets a first preview of his film, but he is in no special hurry, as he does not plan to release “Movie Crazy” until September.

The latest of the New York young women to adopt the screen is Irene Ware, who leaves for the Coast this week with a Fox contract under her arm. Miss Ware is strictly a local product. She left Theodore Roosevelt High School in the Bronx in 1929 for a part in the “Sketch Book” and then went on to a place in the “Vanities,” When the Carroll show closed she took a talking-picture test with Fox and the contract resulted.

Leslie Banks, the Broadway player who has been drawing laughter on behalf of “Springtime for Henry,” consigned his destiny to films last week by signing a contract with RKO Radio Pictures. If his plans have not changed since Tuesday, he will be leaving New York today for Hollywood.

A native of Liverpool, Mr. Banks was a passably familiar sight to road-show audiences in Canada and the United States before he ever appeared on the London stage. New York had its first look at the young Englishman in 1924 as Captain Hook in “Peter Pan.” Mr. Banks is equally at home in light comedy and the more ominous roles of the drama. Last season he played on Broadway in “The Man in Possession” and, before “Springtime for Henry,” he was in “Lean Harvest.”

Genevieve Tobin, last seen in “One Hour With You,” has been engaged by Columbia for the feminine lead in its “Hollywood Speaks,” the behind-the-scenes narrative which will shortly go into production. Eddy Buzzell will direct the film, from the story by Norman Krasna and Jo Swerling.

When First National puts “Life Begins” into production, Herbert Mundin will be on hand to take a part in the film. Mr. Mundin is the British comedian who made his American debut in the first of the imported “Charlot’s Revues.”

Loretta Young and Eric Linden are to have the featured roles in this production, which is scheduled for early shooting.

On the same lot Edward G. Robinson’s new venture, “Tiger Shark,” is ready to begin work after a short delay.

A burst of cooperative speed has resulted in the completion of “The Jewel Robbery” at the Warner plant some ten days ahead of schedule. Kay Francis, who is featured in the picture with William Powell, is off for a brief vacation before turning her attention to “S. S. Atlantic,” which will be her next endeavor. James Ashmore Creelman and Robert Lord collaborated in this latter story.

Edmund Goulding, director of “Grand Hotel,” will next take charge of Marion Davies and cast in “Good Time Girl.” Frances Marion wrote the scenario for this one, and Anita Loos, the “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” author, has penned additional dialogue.

Back from a lengthy vacation of bearding African big game with gun and camera, Gary Cooper left Manhattan for Hollywood last week. His first role will be with Tallulah Bankhead in a romantic adventure called “The Devil and the Deep,” which has a submarine disaster for a background. Benn W. Levy, who writes plays between scenarios and scenarios between plays, is at work with Harry Hervey on the script.

PICTURES AND PLAYERS

Douglas Fairbanks and his South Seas expedition are on the bounding blue Pacific at this minute, one day out from the shores of California. The picture they have been making around Tahiti has been appropriately christened “Robinson Crusoe of the South Seas,” and is all finished except for the tie-in shots which must be made in Hollywood.

An unusually healthy demand for tickets to the opening of “State’s Attorney” at the Mayfair this Thursday evening will be for the benefit of the Emergency Unemployment Relief Committee, has made it advisable to hold twin premieres for the John Barrymore RKO picture.

The benefit showing, at 9:30, will be followed by an 11 o’clock performance, when the theater will be opened to the general public. The relief committee reports an encouraging advance sale of seats for its showing. Mrs. Kermit Roosevelt, chairman, has arranged for distribution of tickets in Washington under the supervision of Mrs. Ogden L. Mills and Congresswoman Ruth Pratt, and a goodly delegation from the capital will be on hand.

While James Cagney and his employers continue to stand adamantly on their respective sides of the salary question, Mr. Cagney’s latest picture, “Winner Takes All,” is awaiting a New York showing, probably at the Winter Garden. The ex-public enemy is a professional fighter in the new film. Marian Nixon, Dickie Moore, Guy Kibbee and Alan Mowbray are in the cast of “Winner Takes All.”

The title for the new Jackie Cooper-Chic Sale film which began as “Limpy,” and was converted last week into “When a Feller Needs a Friend,” has undergone a second operation. Now it is “Limpy Makes Good.” This will probably be the final, as the picture is just around the corner from the Capitol and likely to set up shop in that theater very shortly.

Sally Eilers is back in California after a two weeks’ vacation in this fair city. Her next picture will get under way at once, with James Dunn once more teamed with Miss Eilers.

Among other things, the young woman returned with some early-morning snapshots of the local skyline photographed from her hotel windows and a fresh picture of the theatrical district which she obtained first hand by the simple process of walking up and down Broadway. This incidentally was combining business with pleasure, as her new film will be intimately related to the Broadway scene.

“New York Town,” Ward Morehouse’s unproduced play, has been completed in film form at the Warner studios. Joan Blondell is the star, with Eric Linden, Inez Courtney, Evalyn Knapp and Guy Kibbee in the supporting cast. Mr. Morehouse was on hand during the production to take care of the Manhattan atmosphere. Mervyn LeRoy, the director, will sail shortly for his first look at Europe after a busy season on the Warner sets.

“Brief Moment” is preparing to make its introduction to motion pictures without the assistance of Alexander Woollcott, who was in its New York stage engagement. This is the S. N. Behrman comedy about a night club queen who loses her heart to an idealistic young Manhattanite of conservative pedigree. The script is being mapped out at the moment, while Columbia executives are searching for a suitable cast.

Edmund Lowe and Constance Cummings are ready to lead a production before the Columbia cameras. The name of the film is “Attorney for the Defense,” formerly identified as “Criminal Court.”

Projection Jottings

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May 1, 1932

Production has been started at the Paramount shop on Maurice Chevalier’s next film, “Love Me Tonight,” a musical romance, with lyrics and music by Richard Rogers and Lorenz Hart.

The screen play represents a collaboration by Samuel Hoffenstein, Waldemar Young and George Marion, Jr. from the original Continental play by Leopold Marchand and Paul Armont.

Supporting M. Chevalier are Jeanette MacDonald, Charles Ruggles, Charles E. Butterworth, Myrna Loy, C. Aubrey Smith, Elizabeth Patterson and Blanche Frederici. Rouben Mamoulian is in charge of the film.

Isabel Jewell has arrived in Hollywood to play in the approaching screen version of “Blessed Event.” She is the third member of the Broadway cast to be summoned to duplicate their original parts in front of the talking cameras.

Milton Wallace and Allen Jenkins preceded her by two weeks. Lee Tracy, who will play the lead in this comedy of a tabloid columnist, has signed a new contract with the Warners and seems likely to continue in pictures for some time.

Larry Baretto, author of “Children of Pleasure,” is now on the Coast collaborating with Courtenay Terrett on the screen adaptation of his book. This script will soon enter production, under the same title, as Ruth Chatterton’s second film for First National.

In addition to Miss Chatterton, George Brent and Paul Cavanaugh have already been announced for the cast.

Frances Dee, one of Paramount’s comely young women, has signed a new contract with the company. Her next appearance will be with Wynne Gibson and Pat O’Brien in ”The Strange Case of Clara Deane,” which is awaiting release.

Miss Dee is preparing to begin work with Stuart Erwin in “Merton of the Talkies,” an up-to-date microphonic version of Harry Leon Wilson’s romance of Hollywood. This will probably be one of the Summer releases.

Norma Shearer’s next enterprise will be “Smilin’ Through,” an up-to-date version of Allan Langdon Martin’s stage piece. The film will go into production at the MGM studios as soon as Miss Shearer completes work in “Strange Interlude.” Sidney Franklin, who supervised Miss Shearer in “Private Lives” last Winter, will make “Smilin’ Through.”

Two directors will guide the destinies of “Forgotten Commandment,” Paramount’s drama of modern Russia, in which Irving Pichel, Gene Raymond and Sari Maritza will appear.

Louis Gasnier, one of the pioneer directors of the films, and William W. Schorr, Russian stage director, will divide the supervision of the new picture.

Episodes from Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Ten Commandments” are to be incorporated in “Forgotten Commandments,” which is from a story by James B. Fagan and Agnes Brand Leahy.

Ralph Graves is the latest of the screen players to take up writing and directing as a sideline. Under his new contract with MGM he will distribute his talents in three directions. For this company Mr. Graves has already completed roles in “Huddle,” with Ramon Novarro, and in Jackie Cooper’s new film, as yet un-titled.

Bing Crosby, who has taken his croon to the Paramount lot for a series of features, will probably get started on his first full-length picture in the next fortnight. In these anxious times, the company intends to make as few commercial mistakes as possible with their pet songbird.

Milton Feld, of the releasing organization has been assigned to bring the theater point of view to the Crosby set. The plan now is to feature Mr. Crosby in five pictures over a period of three years.

“Merrily We Go to Hell” is the frisky title for the Paramount version of “Jerry and Joan,” the college prize novel which originally went under the title of “I, Jerry, Take Thee, Joan.” Fredric March and Sylvia Sidney will be the principal personages in the story, and Florence Britton, who was a co-ed at the University of California not so long ago, has also been enrolled in the cast.

The “Scarface” situation is still bristling. Howard Hughes, militant producer of the gangster picture, believes that an organized conspiracy is on foot to keep the film out of those states with censor boards. He announced from his Hollywood mélange last week that his attorneys will fight the censors in the courts, and added that he has invited Clarence Darrow, Samuel Untermeyer, Garfield Hays and Morris L. Ernst to help in the battle for motion-picture liberty.

The young producer is now exhibiting his film in some of the States that are without censorship boards. The Ohio board broke the ice a fortnight ago by passing “Scarface,” but the remaining groups, led by the New York and Pennsylvania bodies, continue to frown on some of the more spectacular phases of the film.

Mr. Hughes issued a statement on the situation last week which read in part:

“It becomes a serious threat to the freedom of honest expression in America when self-styled guardians of the public welfare, as personified by our film censor boards, lend their aid and influence to the abortive efforts of selfish and vicious interests to suppress a motion picture simply because it depicts the truths about conditions in the United States which have been front-page news since the advent of prohibition.

“In order to obtain justice in the case of ‘Scarface’ I intend to file suit immediately in the New York State courts to restrain the New York censors from further interference with the exhibition of the picture in its original version. Similar action will be taken in other States and cities if necessary.”

Paramount will take advantage of the Olympic Games festivities to make a comedy with the international contests for a background. Jack Oakie will be the leading fun-maker and W. C. Fields, who hasn’t been on a motion picture set since he appeared with Marilyn Miller last year in “Her Majesty, Love,” was engaged last week to help matters along.

This production is still in the tentative stage, with not even a working title to guide it.

When he has completed “Revolt,” Mary C. McCall’s story of the Russian Revolution, Douglas Fairbanks Jr. will be featured in a film to be titled “Some Call It Love.”

Rian James is writing the story. Mr. James has already supplied the younger Fairbanks with one picture, “Love Is a Racket,” which is to be released shortly. “Some Call It Love” is about an aviator and a parachute jumper and will probably go into production in June.

HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS HAVE 63 CANDIDATES FOR STARDOM IN TALKIES

2010-12-23T09:13:00.035-05:00

Drive For Recruits Is Pressed

Producers Also Move to Train Newcomers for Stellar Honors

By Chester B. Bahn
May 1, 1932

Caught between the devil and the deep blue sea – that is to say, between the Dickstein bill which would ban further importation of other than exceptional foreign players, and demands by established stars for increased salaries and the right to dictate vehicles – Hollywood’s major studios today are engaged in an unprecedented talent recruiting drive.

Coupled with it, and perhaps of even greater importance, is the almost universal decision by producers to train the more promising of the newcomers for future stardom.

A telegraphic survey by The Herald resulted in the disclosure that there are no less than 63 actors and actresses regarded by the six major film companies as star material. Here they are:

METRO-GOLDWYN-MAYER

Virginia Bruce, Mary Carlisle, Madge Evans, Nora Gregor, Joan Marsh, Karen Morley, Maureen O’Sullivan, Margaret Perry, Robert Young, William Bakewell and Kane Richmond.

PARAMOUNT

Carole Lombard, Sylvia Sidney, Miriam Hopkins, Sari Maritza, Fredric March, Randolph Scott, Adrienne Ames, Frances Dee, Claire Dodd, Kent Taylor, Cary Grant and Florine McKinney.

FOX

Warner Baxter, Sally Eilers, Peggy Shannon, Marion Nixon, Elissa Landi, Joan Bennett, Charles Farrell, John Boles, George O’Brien, James Dunn, Ralph Bellamy and Spencer Tracy.

UNIVERSAL

Andy Devine, June Clyde, Russell Hopton, Tom Brown, Arletta Duncan, Gloria Stuart, William Daly, Onslow Stevens, Diane Duval and Margaret Lindsay.

WARNERS – FIRST NATIONAL

Joan Blondell, George Brent, Loretta Young, Warren William, Betty Gillette, Gloria Shea, and Sheila Terry.

RADIO

Ricardo Cortez, Irene Dunne, Eric Linden, Joel McCrea, Jill Esmond, Laurence Olivier, Arline Judge, Gregory Ratoff, Bruce Cabot, Gwili Andre and Phyllis Clair.

Of course, many of those whose names are accorded the dignity of stellar candidates are familiar to fandom; the Fox list especially runs to well-known players, while the others all include some actors and actresses who have made distinct progress during the last year.

Universal has the largest percentage of so-called “unknowns,” with Paramount probably rating second in this respect. These two studios, incidentally, are leaders in the present movement to develop stars, not merely by means of ballyhoo, but through the medium of careful schooling.

The concept of a “stardom school,” to be sure, is not exactly new. Paramount in the comparatively long ago conducted an “academy” for beginners; it lasted a single “semester” and its graduation class had Charles “Buddy” Rogers as valedictorian.

A year or so ago, Warners adopted the plan, but with some changes, and appointed George Jenner, I believe, as coach. Fox, too, took a fling at it in a more modest way, assigning Minna Gombel to “polish” some of its younger “rough diamonds.”

Radio, while not exactly conducting a school, does have a new course of sprouts for worthy candidates as a preliminary to camera tests. Albert Lovejoy, dramatic coach, gives the youngsters intensive training in diction, reading, and poise. Ern Westmore, head of the make-up department, studies their facial contours to arrive at the best make-up possible, then Lynn Shores, director, and head of the new talent department, takes them in hand for instructive dramatic training.

Universal’s present idea is a “junior stock company” rather than a school, whereas Paramount prefers the latter format, but it will differ widely from the original model. Experienced players rather than verdant newcomers will receive a “P.G.” course, as ‘twere, under “Prof.” Stuart Walker, stage and screen director. His assignment is to see that they earn diplomas as full-fledged stars.

Not all of Paramount’s potential luminaries will receive individual coaching from Walker; Carole Lombard, Sylvia Sidney, Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March are considered beyond the need of such tutoring. This leaves Walker with the Misses Ames, Dee, Dodd, McKinney and Maritza and the Messrs. Scott, Taylor and Grant.

“I haven’t yet worked out a definite plan as to just how I will handle these youngsters,” Walker writes. “In fact, judging from past experience, there isn’t any definite plan that would prove suitable. Each individual requires training of a special nature. I intend to give each one such coaching as I believe will be the most beneficial.

“Of course, all will continue their work in pictures. Occasionally I may be able to help them develop their characterizations. And whenever any of them have sufficient time between pictures I will attempt to secure suitable roles for them in Los Angeles stage plays.”

Failure to develop adequate stellar material has been a fundamental weakness of the Fourth Industry in the past. Ballyhoo rather than painstaking training has been depended upon to establish players as outstanding “names;” there are notable exceptions, of course, but that statement generally holds true, I believe.

For that matter, the selection of stellar candidates itself has been haphazard; directorial “hunches,” likes and dislikes frequently have been ruling factors in determining players’ fates. Establishment of cinematic/astronomical observatories on every “lot,” large and small, really deserves serious consideration in home offices.

Of the M-G-M stellar candidates, six are essentially newcomers. Virginia Bruce is the lovely blonde whose beauty first attracted the expert eye of Florenz Ziegfeld, the producer of the Ziegfeld Follies.

After a time glorifying the American girl on the stage, Miss Bruce went to Hollywood where her success has been as consistent and steady as it was in front of the footlights. She was loaned to Paramount for “Sky Bride.”

Mary Carlisle, one of the youngest players in the ingénue class, brings a new type of charm to the screen. She fairly bubbles with youth and animation, being a dancer of fine talent in spite of her extreme youth. Miss Carlisle, who comes from Boston, has been loaned out lately for short subjects but has found time enough to appear in bits in some recent productions, among them, “Grand Hotel,” in which even Garbo commented on her youthful charm.

Nora Gregor, who came to America originally to play in foreign versions but wound up, finally, as leading lady to Robert Montgomery in “- But the Flesh is Weak,” is one of the few foreign players now at the Culver City studio. Miss Gregor is Viennese with brown eyes and blonde hair, an unusual type of beauty.

One of the most surprising things about that outstanding picture, “The Sin of Madelon Claudet,” was the fine acting of Robert Young in the part of the doctor. Overnight people were talking about him and if he keeps up with the splendid performances he gave in “The Wet Parade” and “New Morals for Old,” he certainly is on the road to stardom.

In Ramon Novarro’s latest picture, “Huddle,” a story of the gridiron, Kane Richmond makes his debut to the screen. He is tall, dark and handsome in a rugged fashion and a football picture is believed to be ideally suited to his talents.

Margaret Perry played the same role on stage that she does on the screen in “New Morals for Old,” the picture from the play, “After All.” So fine was her acting in the play that she was immediately drafted to Hollywood. You’ll see her in Radio’s “The Most Dangerous Game; that studio’s borrowing her from M-G-M.

I shall tell you something about the other newcomers among the 63 another Sunday.

BRENT, NEW FILM “FIND,” SEEN IN STANWYCK TALKIE

Actor’s Early Screen Tests Failed to Attract Attention

Out at Burbank, Calif., not so long ago, they took a test of one George Brent, Irish, young, tall and handsome. Ruth Chatterton, newly a Warner star, viewed the test film, was amazed, gasped the Chattertonian equivalent of “Where has that actor been all my screen life?” and waved her stellar wand.

And Brent becomes her leading man in “The Rich Are Always With Us” – but only after he did similar honors opposite Barbara Stanwyck in the current “So Big.” Now there’s an auspicious beginning for a new leading man in pictures. Playing opposite two such stars as Barbara Stanwyck and Ruth Chatterton almost guarantees attention from fans.

But this same George Brent, a year or so ago, was at Fox, an inconspicuous contract player, brought from the stage for a trial. If he did any camera work it was too little for general notice. He was soon released.

Several months ago he was at Universal. He had the brief part of the police chief’s son in “The Homicide Squad” – a character murdered in the first reel. Another lapse of time, another test at another studio, and presto! George Brent is “a new sensation.”

Brent’s case is typical of many that emphasize how frequently the process known as the screen test fails to reveal what the talent seekers crave even when it is there. Greta Granstedt, the little “May Jones” of “Street Scene,” knocked around Hollywood as a bit-player and extra, little more, for two or three years before this part brought her conspicuously to the fore.

Frances Dee, the extra, had had an unsuccessful screen test before a second started her career auspiciously. Clark Gable had tests, too, during his extra days and was told to quit trying. Elda Vokel had a bit in “The Vagabond King,” but it took a test at Fox to win her a contract and new opportunities. But Sylvia Sidney actually played a part there without result, and left Hollywood – permanently, the thought.

Barbara Stanwyck failed at one studio before being “rediscovered.” And Greta Garbo was poorly regarded, even laughed at, at M-G-M for months before it was startlingly apparent that this “little Swede” was going to mean a flood of gold for them.

Yes, there are tests, and there are tests – and no wonder players are superstitious.

YOU ASKED IF –

The Herald Dramatic Editor Answers the Questions of Curious Fans

Vera Axtman – Johnny Weissmuller is married; his wife is Bobbe Arnst, dancer.

Harry Thomas – June Knight was born Rose Vallihette

James R. Martin – Phillips Holmes’ middle initial is “R.”

Western Fan – George O’Brien was born in San Francisco, Cal., during the month of April, 1900. He is 6 feet ½ tall.

H. K. B., Liverpool – Tom Brown, who will be seen in “Tom Brown of Culver,” has been an actor since he was 2 years old. He is the son of professionals.

Maryann – Joel McCrea was born in Los Angeles, Nov. 5, 1905

Inquisitive – Ricardo Cortez was born in Vienna. He is 6 feet 1 inch tall; has black hair and brown eyes; weighs 175 pounds. His hobbies are beach and gymnasium sports, horseback riding and polo. Mr. Cortez began his career as a contract player with Paramount.

Dora Peterson – Leon Janney was born in Ogden, Utah.

SPEAKING VERY CANDIDLY---

By Chester B. Bahn
May 1 –

You safely may add a Russian story cycle to those enumerated in the Herald a few Sundays ago.

Paramount, with “The World and the Flesh” completed, during the week announced a successor in “Forgotten Commandments.” The former, as you know, serves George Bancroft as a starring picture; Miriam Hopkins is the feminine lead. The latter will introduce Sari Maritza to American talkies; Irving Pichel and Gene Raymond will have the principal male roles.

M-G-M, already having spent $100,000 upon the preparation of an untitled Soviet story, will start production within two months, George Hill directing. Wallace Beery and Clark Gable are slated to team, with the feminine lead yet to be chosen. The frequently revised script is now being completed by Boris Ingster and John Monk Saunders.

United Artists will picturize “Way of a Lancer,” starring Ronald Colman. Opposite him will be Anna Sten, Russian star. It is a vivid story of a Polish cavalry regiment that fought for Russia in the World War.

Universal has two stories with a Russian background – “Moscow,” by Elynore Dolkart, and “The Red Terror” by Allen Rivkin and P. J. Wolfson.

Fox has “Red Dancer,” but reports in this case conflict. One affirms it is to be a talkie version of the silent film of that title; the other says that it will be an adaptation of a German play by Victor Keleman.

If Broadway and Main Street are a million or so miles apart in their amusement tastes, as leaders of the Fourth Industry affirm, why are quotations from the New York critics stressed in trade journal advertisements designed to “sell” to hinterland exhibitors?

If you have been moved to the verge of tears as you contemplated the cinematic exile of Colleen Moore, Norma Talmadge and Clara Bow, it may interest you to know that the young women are not exactly candidates for the bread line.

I base that on their pick-and-choose attitude, as expressed when film contracts are tendered.

Miss Moore, who retired from the screen at the expiration of her $12,500 per week First National contract three years ago, is cold to a reported offer by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to substitute her for Jean Harlow in “The Red Headed Woman,” and this despite the fact Chester Morris will be the male lead.

Miss Talmadge, who faded as a United Artists star in 1930, is not adverse to another screen try via an independent studio, but insists that she rule the production with an iron hand; even to re-takes. The studio has conceded supervisory rights on a story, director, cast and cameraman.

Miss Bow, who departed from Paramount studio after a spectacular career, refused to consider “The Red Headed Woman” as a Metro vehicle, and she has been deaf to several other offers. She may sign with Fox, but is said to be insistent that the studio also hand her husband, Rex Bell, a contract.

There is, it seems to me, at least a chuckle in the fact that the picture chosen by Warner Brothers to replace “The Mouthpiece” last week was another with a hero obviously derived from real life.

Presentation last week of “It’s Tough to be Famous,” starring Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., serves to direct attention to anew to Hollywood’s growing practice of blending newsreel footage with the studio variety. Obviously, the welcome parade shots, highly important to the story, were gleaned from the newsreel libraries.

There can be, of course, no objection to that. Re-staging such scenes for a picture would be exceedingly difficult, if not wholly impossible, and the cost would be almost prohibitive.

If expertly done, I favor this fusion of real and synthetic drama; it seems to me that there is a neat gain in authenticity.

Incidentally, if Hollywood gossip can really be relied upon, Douglas Faribanks Sr. in much the same fashion will introduce Guatemalan footage in his South Seas picture. There is more than a suspicion, too that he was not above embroidering his “Around the World in 80 Minutes” with library footage.

Use of stock scenes, for that matter, is as old as the Fourth Industry itself. In the past, however, the practice has been more or less restricted to the smaller studios.

TALKIES END POPULARITY ABROAD

2010-12-20T09:26:00.009-05:00

By Luella O. Parsons
Hollywood, May 1

No more glamorous screen personalities to Europe~ No more favorites who have all the foreign-speaking countries paying homage to their art! Gone are the days when Germany knelt at the small feet of Gloria Swanson and Norma Talmadge and Italy cried “Viva la Marion Davies” and a few more good old Italian phrases for Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks. The talkies are responsible for this change to movie topography.

The war, in other words, changed the map of the world, but the talkies did more. They changed the entertainment for people from Jericho to Timbucktoo. Gloria Swanson, who used to travel with a whole bodyguard of protectors, walked into St. Moritz for the winter sports and nary a soul knew our glorious Gloria. New faces and new stars had been seen at the local theaters.

I talked over this very situation with Adolphe Menjou. He is back from picture-making in London, and no one is more observant than Mr. Menjou, who is one of the most intelligent men in pictures.

He had a breakfast-luncheon of wheat cakes and sausage at my house and in between times we talked of the conditions abroad since the talkies changed everything.

I asked him if London is developing its own stars to meet the talking picture exigencies.

“Only two British stars stand out as favorites,” said Mr. Menjou, “and they are comics. Ralph Lynn and Tom Walls, he told me, are to London what Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy are to America. The English public adores them and if you have seen them you can understand this popularity.

Adolph paid homage, also, to the art of Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich. “London,” he told me, “is flocking to see ‘The Shanghai Express’ Dietrich is, today, one of the greatest drawing cards abroad. As for Garbo, if she plans to travel about Paris incognito, she is doomed to bitter disappointment. Garbo is today a figure as great as any national hero. She will be mobbed in Paris.”

Mr. Menjou is too modest to admit that he is one of the few stars who have survived the talkies. He speaks all languages fluently and for that reason is today as popular in Spain, France and Germany, as he was before the talkies made so many dramatic changes.

“This dubbing-in business,” said Mr. Menjou, “will not work out satisfactorily. You cannot get a $100 a week girl to speak the lines for our $5000 a week stars. The personality of the voice cannot be ignored. Norma Shearer’s voice has its own appeal, so has Marion Davies’ and Mary Picford’s. To put someone on to speak foreign lines for them is exceedingly foolish.”

I asked Mr. Menjou to tell me if this English invasion into motion pictures needs to be taken seriously.

“England,” he told me, “is making more pictures than at any time since the beginning of the movies. But the studios are not equipped to handle big productions. There is only one stage to a studio, and you that won’t go far in today’s screen production.”

Mr. Menjou is authority for the story that Rex Ingram, handsome Irishman and director, is playing the lead in his own picture, “Baronne.” Ingram, said Mr. Menjou, is spending $400,000 on this picture. He needed tanned characters, so he sent his whole company to Nice to acquire a natural sunburn before the picture went into production.

Chaliapin, noted opera singer, is being starred in a foreign picture to cost an enormous amount of money. France is sponsoring this number and the bookings are already pouring in, according to Mr. Menjou, who talked with the producers of this big number.

One of the biggest successes among the English-made pictures is a labor drama produced to show the conditions in the coal mines.

LUMINARIES OF SCREEN FORSAKE HOLLYWOOD FOR THEIR RURAL RETREATS

2010-12-17T09:08:00.016-05:00

Mountains and Beaches Call to Performers and Producers, Directors and Writers, and Cafes Have Little Left to Satisfy Tourist Interest

By A. L. Wooldridge
Hollywood, April 30

Actors, actresses, directors, producers, writers – all who can get away – are headed for their retreats in the mountains or at the shore and Hollywood boulevard and the cafes now offer few to be pointed out to strangers.

To Malibu beach have gone Constance Bennett, Marlene Dietrich, Clara Bow, Marion Davies, Leila Hyams, Evelyn Brent, John Gilbert and George Bancroft.

Ready for occupancy but temporarily vacant because their owners are away, are the homes of Raquel Torres, Louise Fazenda, Bebe Daniels and Lilyan Tashman.

A broad-shouldered man climbed into a plane at Culver City the other day and flew over the Tehachapi mountains to the north.

“Wally Beery’s gone to his cabin,” envious observers remarked as the hero of “The Champ” drove his plane over the big “hog-back” ridge. Had one been able to follow he would have seen Beery arrive at a private landing field, two miles from Silver Lake.

He would have seen the actor climb in a dilapidated automobile and drive to a spot on the shore where a rowboat was tied, then complete his journey to a small island – the “Wally Beery island,” which is occupied by no other human being. Complete isolation alone with a dog as a companion.

“I derive two great benefits from my island shack,” Beery said. “First, relaxation. I can sit on the back steps of my little pine house and catch rainbow trout. Second, I can ‘take stock’ of myself and my problems – which is the greater of the two.

Every man is better off going away by himself at times to assay his work in the world, to figure out his faults and shortcomings and to study his possibilities.”

Screen players frankly say they get “fed up” on Hollywood with all its tinsel and papier mache, and weary of the struggle among clans and classes and the hectic uncertain life.

It will be remembered that when William S. “Bill” Hart gave up picture work, he moved bag and baggage to a ranch near Newhall and there he now passes all his time;

that Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford have purchased a large tract of land down the coast from Los Angeles and are establishing a hacienda on which definitely to remain when they have retired, and that

Harry Carey lives at an Indian trading post near Saugus.

Cecil B. De Mille has three ranches north of Los Angeles. One of these, which he calls “Paradise,” lies in a narrow valley, where he raises pheasants. When the gates are closed and locked De Mille cannot be reached by any one. There is no telephone. There is no nearby road. Once, a year or two ago, when it was urgent that he return to the city on business, an effort was made to drop a message to him from an airplane, but the effort failed.

In the San Bernardino mountains, Reginald Denny has a log cabin well off the beaten path of travel. He goes there to pass summer days whipping the streams for trout; In the fall to shoot ducks, in the winter to revel in the snows; in the spring just to get out of town. A few weeks ago he took Robert Montgomery to the cabin to pass the week-end.

Richard Dix passes most of his time on a farm in the San Fernando valley. Fred Kohler has a chicken ranch near Owensmouth. Warner Oland has five ranches set to fruit and lives on one near Ventura.

Walter Huston was looking over some crude house plans at the Universal studios recently. “I’m building a log cabin at Lake Arrowhead,” he explained, “just to get away from the city. It’ll cost a few hundred dollars. Big fireplace, rough chairs, good bunk to sleep in. I don’t hunt, but I want to get up into the pine woods. It’s the first home I’ve ever owned.”

Lois Weber, who has said “goodbye” to picture business, lives on an orange ranch near Fullerton.

George Hill, director, former husband of Frances Marion, has his “hideout” at Lake Arrowhead. Anita Page owns a cabin near Lake Hughes in the Angelus national forest.

Mary Astor has a cabin between Big Bear lake and Arrowhead, in the San Bernardino mountains.

“My ‘hideout’ is very simple,” she says. “A small cabin with cacti for garden plants, some live-oak trees and bushes. My mother and I go there. We haven’t a radio or telephone, not even a phonograph.”

Dorothy Devore lives on a five-acre ranch far back in the redwood country of central California. Greta Garbo joins no beach colony in the summer, but she always rents a home from which she can have a view of the sea. She moves often. Ronald Colman for years had a house in a canyon which led into the Pacific ocean, but now has a home high on a hill overlooking Hollywood.

Fredric March is at Laguna Beach the year round. Laguna has a colony of writers and is a sort of center for the intelligentsia of films. It’s a sleepy little town without railroad or car line, but one of the prettiest spots on the west coast.

SCREEN LIFE IN HOLLYWOOD

2010-12-15T09:08:00.013-05:00

By Hubbard Keavy

Hollywood, May 1, 1932
No one lives in hotels in Hollywood. Folks stay in them temporarily, make them their homes when they expect to be here a short time, say, for one or two pictures.

Aline MacMahon took a hotel suite, expected to return to New York after her first film, “Five Star Final.”

Then came another picture, “Heart of New York,” and then “The Mouthpiece,” which was followed by “Week-end Marriage.”

She decided after six months, when she was cast as the head nurse in “Life Begins” (a story set in a maternity ward,) that it was high time she moved to a house.

No, she didn’t decide to go home the day after she signed the lease. She thinks she’ll stay here.

THE RIGHT NICHE

You’ll probably be seeing a lot of this young Irish-Jewish girl who made her debut as Edward G. Robinson’s wise-cracking secretary in the tabloid newspaper story.

She seems to have been made for a niche that was unfilled until she happened along in the coast production of “Once in a Lifetime.”

Incidentally, Aline may play her same role in that famous satire on the movies when, and if, the producer who owns it ever gets an adaptation that retains the spirit of the play without treating his brothers too caustically.

Miss MacMahon is a Brooklynite who “recited pieces” when she was young. Being a pretty good reciter, she was encouraged to try the stage. And after she attended Columbia University she did with much success.

Her father, Bill MacMahon, was a newspaperman for years. Her mother is Jewish. Aline has been married for four years to a New York architect.

PERHAPS SO

On the day they had been married a month, Gene Markey sent Joan Bennett three boxes of flowers – gardenias, roses and gladioli.

In the largest box was a card saying:

“With sincerest sympathy to Mrs. Markey from Mr. Markey.”

Spencer Tracy’s wife and son bought him a polo pony for a birthday present the other day.

Spencer says when he gets three or four more horses he’ll be able to get in a game.

Tracy and many others who are just learning the gentleman’s sport usually play on the basis of so much for the use of a horse, equipment and the field. Even playing that way it’s an expensive pastime.

COLLEGIATE MINORITY

Approximately only one-third of the 210 actors and actresses among the great and near great in Hollywood, a survey shows, have attended college.

Seventy-six went to college, 73 have but a grammar school education and 61 have a high school training or its equivalent.

This might indicate that a sorority pin is no pass to movie success, nor a fraternity emblem a stepping stone to stardom.

But for the majority, amateur or actual stage training was a prerequisite of their picture careers.

ARLISS LOOKS ABROAD

There is a possibility that George Arliss’ next picture will be made in his native England.

The film quota laws require each company releasing pictures in England to produce a certain number of them there.

Few of the American-produced British movies are released in this country, however, since usually they are of inferior quality or have no American box office names. An Arliss picture could be shown successfully in both countries.

The star has tentatively agreed to the plan, provided as much effort and money are put into the picture as would be here.

As Arliss might have put it, but didn’t, “no cheating.”

Rotund Eugene Pallette has played 640 movie roles, which much be a record.

Johnny Mack Brown, who has been conspicuous by his absence from the screen the last few months, will be in a series of six westerns after he finishes “The Fatal Alarm,” a mellow melodrama.

BOX OFFICE TITLES

The title-changing activities of movie men sometimes have an effect opposite that intended. There is the case of “Old Man Minnick,” “Chic” Sale picture.

It was changed to “The Expert” for a two-fold reason. Warners hoped its similarity to a title Sale made famous, “The Specialist,” would help the picture. And they thought “Old Man” might keep young people away.

“The Expert” attracted men in great numbers; women stayed away.

It’s really a delightful story of an old man, one the whole family would enjoy.

O. K. WITH PARENTS

One can’t help admiring James Force’s nerve and confidence.

He’s the amateur actor whose friends are financing his assault on the movies.

Here a little more than a month, he still is looking for his first job. There’s no indication of downheartedness.

“I didn’t expect to get any kind of break in so short a time,” he says.

“I’m going to give this proposition a year or two, or maybe three if necessary.”

Force, 30-year-old insurance salesman in St. Louis, sold “stock” to 35 of his friends, most of them fraternity brothers. Each sends him from $5 to $25 a month, a total of $250.

The contract with each specifies he will share, in proportion to the amount he contributes, half of all Force makes as an actor during the next 10 years.

If Force is successful, each sponsor is guaranteed a maximum return of 2,000 per cent – or $20 for each $1 invested.

When Force conceived the idea of an organized, well financed trip to Movieland last December he quit his job to devote all his time to his campaign.

In less than a month he had explained it to 100 persons; 33 were “sold.”

I asked Force what his parents thought about his “proposition.”

“Father just grinned when I told him,” he answered, “and said: ‘Well, I guess it don’t hurt to try anything once.’ Mother’s different. She’s as sure as I am that I’ll succeed.”

“She seems to be concerned about only one thing now. She’s afraid I’ll marry some Hollywood girl and get divorced right away, like, as she says, ‘Everyone else does out there.’

“She also advises me in every letter to keep away from the wild parties.

“I’ve been to a couple of parties, but there weren’t any picture people there. Nor were they very wild.”

Force specialized in amateur shows and in occasional stock company appearances as a character player, but he’ll take anything in the movies to get started.

Extra? Sure, he says: “I’m not proud. I’ll be atmosphere, background or spear carrier.”

He thinks he’ll have to get over a natural reticence that is keeping him from “muscling in” at the studios and talking about himself and what he can do.

“In fact,” he added, “I’ve got to get rid of what I think at times is an inferiority complex. I understand no one in Hollywood feels inferior.”

HOLLYWOOD FOLK

Real happenings and unreel matters:

Reginald Denny has given up flying, Ben Lyon says, because Mrs. Denny worried every time he left the ground.

Ben, the only actor in the air division of the R. O. T. C. averages an hour’s flying every week without worrying Bebe Daniels Lyon. He has nearly 550 hours to his credit.

Just back from a vaudeville tour, Ben says the biggest laugh of the whole trip occurred in St. Louis.

The theater he played in seats 5,600, and plays to capacity only on Sundays. The rest of the week the house is seldom more than a third full – or at least, Ben added, it was so when he was there.

One night an actor glanced over the many empty seats and exclaimed: “I’ve played towns smaller than this theater.”

ROMANTIC JIMMY

Joan Crawford’s brother’s ex-wife, Jeanne Le Sueur, has become a “stand-in” for movie players. Currently she is standing up while Peggy Shannon sits down.

James Dunn met Mrs. Le Sueur on the set and the next thing James knew he was reported going places with Jeanne, and then the romance rumors started.
Dunn denied all and said his flame is still June Knight, dancing in New York, and that he phones and writes daily.

Charles Bickford, who heretofore would rather have his own way than a steady job at $2,500 per in the movies, has changed his mind.

He read Jim Tully’s “Laughter in Hell,” a story of brutality in prison camps, and mentioned that he’d like to play the murdering hero-convict in it.

Universal’s Carl Laemmle has been trying to get Bickford’s name on a long-termer for two years, since Charlie helped make “Hell’s Heroes” an outstanding picture.

When Bickford learned he could have “Laughter in Hell” provided he signed a contract he considered only a few minutes before saying “yes.”

“Bad Boy” Bickford, as he has been called, usually has trouble of some kind with his movie employers, the base of it being his objection to roles for which he thinks he’s unsuited.

TENDER HEARTED HAROLD

When one of 20 ducks being used in a “gag” in Harold Lloyd’s “Movie Crazy” was killed accidentally, Harold decided the rest should be spared from possible similar fates in the future.

He pensioned the 19, taking them to a big pond on his estate where they’ll spend the rest of their days.

A FAMILY AFFAIR

Because so few are able to say her name the way she would like it, Ann Dvorak has adopted the popular pronunciation.

Ann is the slender, dark-eyed young girl who sprang to prominence after playing in “Scarface.”

“Dvor-shak” is the way she has been saying it, giving it the same sounds as the Czecho-Slovakian composer’s name. But everyone insisted on “Devor-ak.”

Now even Ann is pronouncing it the way it is spelled.

The history of Ann’s name is almost as involved as the solution of the ancient puzzler, “How old is Ann?”

Her real name is McKim. Her mother, who was Anna Lehr in pictures several years ago (and who has remarried since separating from Ann’s father) wanted Ann to use her name.

Daughter demurred because she wanted to start out altogether on her own.

A family conference resulted in the selection of Dvorak, a family name from her mother’s side. Howard Hughes, who picked her for “Scarface,” wanted to change it to something easier to say, but a newspaperman argued against it.

According to Ann, he said it’s unusual enough to be interesting “and when she’s famous she can drop the Ann and be just Dvorak.”

Of course you know she’s legally Mrs. Leslie Fenton now.

It would take too many words to explain the family history of Lysle Talbot, a Nebraskan who gained his experience in stock companies in Texas, Ohio, South Dakota and Iowa. But his real name is Lysle Hollywood.

He’s here for pictures and luckily, says he, he took the family name of Talbot years ago. His mother’s family name is Warner and he almost used that.

It would look like more than a coincidence if he had, because he’s in Warner pictures now.

HIS ROLES TRAIL HIM

A lonesome man on the night of a movie premier is “Chic” Sale.

Sale has as many fans as the next one, but they don’t know him without his whiskers, mustachios and the spectacles of the characters he has made famous.

Even children, who have an uncanny perception about such matters, seldom recognize this thin, slightly stopped young man with the sharp nose and the pleasant eyes.

He’s one man on the screen, another off. No other actor, not even Lon Chaney, was ever so completely sold to the public as a character rather than an individual.

ART AND MECHANICS

Charlie Ruggles has sent a servant or two to Setauket, Long Island to prepare his home for occupancy because he expects to return there.

Inquiry by your curious reporter seemed in order when Charlie made this statement.

Here is a comedian engaged successfully and regularly in his business returning to a residence too far from filmland for commuting.

And we learn that Charlie’s contract expires in a few weeks and he doesn’t expect to say “yes” to another agreement, although it is probable he will be offered one.

The answer to the “why” interrogation is that (like numerous others of greater and lesser importance,) Charlie will be asked to take a cut if his contract is renewed – something Charlie says he will not do.

“I think it is a mistake for any player to lower his salary,” Ruggles told me. “Rather than take a cut, I’ll go back to my first love, the stage.

“Anyway, I don’t want to stay away from the stage too long or I’ll forget what I’ve been learning during all these years.”

Charlie regards the theater as art and the movies as something entirely mechanical.

Said he with frankness:

“Motion pictures, from the actor’s standpoint, are entirely a monetary business. They have no heart, no romance, no traditions, as has the stage.

“Most people are in this business in Hollywood to make a lot of money and get out. Some keep collecting money.”

He had much else to say on the same subject, none of which sounded to me like the “beefing” of one disappointed because his boss isn’t raising his salary.

WHY DO THEY?

Every time I hear a motion picture player, accustomed to the comparative leisurely life of working in the movies, complaining about the hardships of vaudeville (as most who have made “personal appearances” do) I feel like asking “Why do you do it, then?”

Any movie “name” can collect twice as much per week in vaudeville as he ever did in pictures.

The gentlemen who hire the Montgomerys and Tracys and Gables and others who play polo won’t object until one of them cracks a collar bone while a picture is in production. One day there’ll be a lot of good ponies for sale cheap.

CENTER OF ATTRACTION FOR CELEBRITIES SHIFTS TO HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS

2010-12-13T12:43:00.008-05:00

Wayfarer May See All He Ever Knew or Heard of Among Them If He Gets by Outer Portals to Holy of Holies and Has Patience to Wait

By Wood Soanes, May 1, 1932

The Rue de la Paix in Paris and Forty-second and Broadway in New York were at one time supposed to be the two places in the world where you would see everyone you ever knew – if you waited long enough.

Today you may not see everyone you know in Hollywood’s studios, but you will at least come across most of the celebrities of the world. The only trick is to get entrée to the studios, because it requires much more than the price of an aperitif in a French sidewalk café, or the stamina of bucking the Broadway crowds to worm your way past the ogres of the outer offices.

At Radio I ran into Jack Sheehan, once of Oakland and more recently of New York, emerging from a successful interview with George Archainbaud, who was looking for a certain type of player to appear in support of John Barrymore in “State’s Attorney,” then in the making. A few moments later I saw Irving Pichel, returning from a stage where he had been at work with Ann Harding in “Westward Passage.”

Pichel is up in the money now, but I think that when his heart gets the best of his head it is not in Hollywood at all but in the ramshackle old church in Berkley that he converted into the Berkley Playhouse.

As we were talking Captain Jack Robertson appeared, lean and hardy in appearance and bubbling over with vitality. Time was when Robertson was a dreamy-eyed ticket clerk for the Western Pacific here, thinking of daring deeds. He nearly lost his life getting pictures of an eruption on Lassen peak. Later he came into prominence with his motion pictures of the Arctic. Now he is photographer-explorer de luxe.

The day before I had had a similar experience at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and First National. I was watching chubby Archie Mayo try to make a picture and experiment with a new practical joke handshaking device at one and the same time when Allan Vincent appeared. Local theatergoers will remember him from a memorable season when he appeared in ‘The Vortex” and other dramas.

Vincent, like the others, is unchanged. He still regards the world with a jaundiced eye, and can see little that is momentous in Hollywood’s hurly-burly. He had been imported from New York for a line of roles at Paramount, found he wasn’t getting them, and departed. When the contract difficulties were settled he began to free lance. He plans to do two or three pictures and then return to Broadway, where a new play awaits him.

The man who provided him with so many good roles and whom he replaced on several occasions for road tours, Noel Coward, was, perhaps at that very moment, telling the bigwigs at Fox that he didn’t care to have any part of Hollywood as a working arena. He had sold them three plays for the screen, and he would be glad to answer any technical questions, but, really, he had to be going.

It was all quite shocking to the smaller fry at Fox Hills because, after all, here was a man who had been given an exorbitant price for his product, who had been furnished with a handsome limousine and a liveried chauffer, and who could have made a tidy sum by acting as adviser or something. But no, all he could think of was the appalling state of affairs that demanded that an artist begin to work at his art at 7 a. m. and keep at it all day.

The morning I arrived at M-G-M my first sight was of Clark Gable, who had just steamed from the studio with a handsome patch over his left eye that made him look like Captain Kidd Junior. It was, so the oculists told him, nothing more serious than a foreign body in the eye, collected either while driving his car, riding a polo pony, or walking along Hollywood boulevard.

“It’s so small, they can’t see it with a magnifying glass,” Gable complained, but it feels like a load of coal to me.”

Well, as small as it was, this foreign body in right eye of famous leading man – as the entry may read in the log book of the “Strange Interlude” efficiency expert – was costing M-G-M plenty of money. Gable was willing to go on with rehearsals but neither the directors or Norma Shearer would hear to it. So the company was dismissed and the production waited, while the star and leading man went to their several homes.

Gable has gone further into the money since I interviewed him last October, but if he wore a hat I am satisfied that it would be the same size. Even if you don’t like his acting, you must give him credit for keeping his balance in a distinctly trying situation. It is not an easy chore to have feminine stars literally fighting for your histrionic services, and raising bob if they don’t get you.

Yet it was less than two years ago that I happened on a set where this recruit from the stage was working in a picture with Anita Page. His face was similar and I asked the press agent accompanying me what his name was. The press agent didn’t know, and, strange as it seems, the director when questioned couldn’t remember it either. I really ought to expose these two indifferent prophets, but they are good fellows at heart, so I’ll close the books.

Robert Montgomery was also in evidence on the M-G-M lot, not a whit changed over the six months, although he, too, has been elevated to starring proportions. He was a work on “Letty Lynton” with Norma Shearer and was putting in his spare time listening to the reminiscences of May Robson and Louise Closser Hale, who had been having a grand time of it for days talking about the stage as it existed in pre-movie era.

Montgomery, like Gable, is a stage recruit who has been catapulted into fame by the movies. But he never has lost his hankering for the stage. Gable, a different type, feels that he had enough hard knocks in the theater to do him for a while and is quite content to be a picture star for the duration of his contract, which is one of those seven-year ones.

“I was just thinking the other day,” he told me, “with one eye closed, that in seven years I may be an old man with a gray beard and there won’t be any stage jobs for me, just as in the past. So I should worry about that part of it. I like this work, I like the money, and I like my leisure and comfort.”

That was the day – March 24, if I remember – that Joan Crawford had a surprise birthday party. She had been working all morning and into the early afternoon on a scene in “Letty Lynton,” wherein Montgomery, as the gay young blade, outwits Lewis Stone, as the stern but wise District Attorney, and in which Miss Robson and Miss Hale appear in important roles with Emmet Corigan and Edward Hearn in smaller parts.

Finally, Brown dismissed Miss Crawford with a suggestion that she go to her portable dressing room and get ready for the close ups on the crying scenes. Obediently, she left while the studio orchestra ground out its routine of sentimental tunes, and the rest of the company rehearsed the scenes to be shot. Presently, Brown left for the Crawford dressing room, on the set, and there was great activity.

Actors began to dash about on their tip toes getting tables and chairs, electricians and mechanics showed more signs of life than they had all day, a table bearing a huge cake was carried over from the commissary and adorned with candles. Coffee and ice cream were carried in by the studio waiters. All this paraphernalia was placed on the darkened stage in front of the dressing room.

Finally Brown emerged, the candles were lighted, and a hue and cry went up for the star. She stepped down from her dressing room all prepared to do some first class crying and was startled into a real exhibition of joyful tears. I imagine that Brown secretly cursed the ill luck that prevented him from having a camera there for his desired close-up. The spectacle of Joan Crawford crying over a birthday cake would have been an ideal substitute for Letty Lynton crying over an averted murder trial.

May 1, 1932

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DAISY DE VOE MUST SERVE YEAR MORE

Los Angeles, April 30 (AP)
Blonde Daisy De Voe, former secretary to Clara Bow, film actress, who was convicted of charges of grand theft from her employer, must serve the remaining 12 months of an 18 month county jail sentence, conditional to five years probation.

The district court of appeal today denied Miss De Voe a new trial of the charge. Her attorney, however, said he would file a motion for a re-hearing.

ARLISS TO START FOR EUROPE SOON

Now that “A Successful Calamity” has been completed, George Arliss has decided to start from Hollywood for Europe at an early date, to remain abroad for the spring and summer, returning to California and the Warner Bros. Studios for the resumption of his picture work next fall.

This decision is a change of plan on Mr. Arliss’ part, as he had expected to make another film in Hollywood before going overseas for his annual vacation. According to advices from the West Coast, Mr. Arliss declares that in all probability he will not return to the stage for at least two years. “I have a number of interesting proposals to consider, “ said the actor, “but it seems scarcely worth while to try a stage production when three or four months of my next two seasons are already occupied by motion picture engagements.”

Mr. and Mrs. Arliss will spend about two weeks in New York before sailing for France, where they will remain until June, at which time they will cross the Channel to England, to spend the summer at their home in St. Margaret’s Bay, Kent.

In “A Successful Calamity,” which will probably have its world premiere in New York next month, Mr. Arliss is supported by a large cast including Mary Astor, Evalyn Knapp, Grant Mitchell, David Torrence, William Janney, Hardie Albright, Hale Hamilton, Fortunie Bonanova, Richard Tucker and Barbara Leonard.

“FIRST ACTRESS” GAVE BREAK TO SPENCER TRACY

Actor Played With Ethel Barrymore in “Royal Fandango”

Spencer Tracy, who returns to the sound-screen in “Young America,” was born in Milwaukee on April 5, 1900. He learned his A-B-C’s in the public schools of that city and then went to Marquette University to discover the “hows, whys and whens” of medicine.

Half way though college he suddenly decided he wanted to be an actor, shut his textbook with a bang, grabbed his hat and boarded the first train for New York. There he studied dramatic art, joined a stock company, played in Theater Guild productions and got his first break with Ethel Barrymore in “The Royal Fandango.”

When that show finally closed he hopped to Cincinnati for a season of stock with Stuart Walker. Then back to New York for a three-year contract and diversified roles with George M. Cohan.

While he thought at the time he was making strides along the path to fame, he now realizes that he was only toddling and learning to walk. Bigger things were yet to come. The first was his role in “The Last Mile,” which won him acclaim on Broadway and a contract with Fox Films.

FORMER ARTIST

Myrna Loy was a commercial artist when “discovered” as a screen possibility by Mr. and Mrs. Rudolph Valentino. Since then she has vamped her way to success and a contract.

LEADING MALE ROLE

Nils Asther will have the leading male role in “Letty Lynton,” Joan Crawford’s next starring picture for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Clarence Brown, who recently directed “Emma,” will direct the new film.

WEARS OLD COSTUMES

Dorothy Jordan wears costumes dating way back before the war on into modern times in “The Wet Parade” in which she is appearing at the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios. She “grows up” from a little girl by the use of her costumes alone, without any recourse to makeup.

NOAH BEERY JUNIOR

Noah Beery, Jr., making his film debut in “Heroes of the West,” a Universal picture, will not follow in the footsteps of his “villainous” dad, but will assume the character of a frontier youth seeing adventure.

GARDENING HOBBY

Gardening is the main interest of H. B. Warner, famous English film actor, when not engaged in making pictures, and he has won many prizes at flower shows with his rare and exotic entries, which have been developed in the hothouses at his Beverly Hills estate.

GARBO’S BARBER BOSS RIVALS FILM STAR’S RETICENCE

Stockholm, April 30 (AP)
Einar Widebaeck, owner of a suburban barber shop, declined a Stockholm movie house’s offer to tell about his employment of Greta Garbo to the first night audience of one of her films.

Greta started to earn her living by lathering customers in Widebaeck’s shop.
Like the movie star, Widebaeck has prospered; like her, too, he is reticent about the days she spent in his shop.

UP AND DOWN THE RIALTOS

“Grand Hotel,” with its multiplicity of stars, cost Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer $970,000 to make, and it is expected to gross approximately $2,000,000; the net profit thus will be slightly more than a million.

But before you call “Grand Hotel” an example of smart showmanship, give heed to the fact that in the same production period M-G-M might have made at least three other features with Lionel Barrymore, Joan Crawford and Wallace Beery had not their services been drafted for what originally was announced as a Greta Garbo starring film.

Fifty thousand British film fans, replying to a questionnaire, have “elected” Ronald Colman, Englishman, and Norma Shearer, native of Canada, as their favorite cinema players.

The poll, the first taken in four years, has these runners-up, in order of their popularity:

Women – Constance Bennett, Marie Dressler, Ruth Chatterton, Janet Gaynor, Greta Garbo.

Men – Clive Brook, George Arliss, Robert Montgomery, Maurice Chevalier, John Boles.

The stellar turnover in four years is indicated by the absence in 1932 of these names from the first 30:

Dolores del Rio, Betty Balfour, Clara Bow, Vilma Banky, John Gilbert, Harold Lloyd, Norma Talmadge and Laura La Plante.

MOVIE GO ROUND

By Luella O. Parsons
Hollywood Calif., April 30

The report current in Hollywood is that B. P. Schulberg purposely precipitated the battle between Marlene Dietrich-Josef Von Sternberg and Paramount.

His reason for so doing is thought to be because he felt that Miss Dietrich would be much better with another director, that she would be less an automaton and would be much more natural and easy on the screen.

Anyway, it’s interesting conjecture although we can hardly believe Mr. Schulberg would deliberately hold up production to get Miss Dietrich to make a picture with another director. Yet B. P. may have had just that idea in his mind.

DEMPSEYS TOGETHER

Will the Dempseys kiss and make up? A group of newspaper folk, discussing the matter, were agreed that it was more than likely that a reconciliation would take place. No two people could have had as emotional an outburst at the time of the separation if they had not been interested in each other. It’s only when love is dead and cold that a divorce is sought quietly without a few things said on each side. Jack and Estelle had dinner at Stare’s café one night last week and a little later appeared at the frolics. No less than 10 people called to tell this writer the news for said one “if they do make up it’s front page copy.”

A DIFFERENT OFFER

They are putting down a red velvet carpet for Richard Barthelmess at Warner Brothers and turning over all the best facilities of the studio for him.

Dick is in pretty right now because he voluntarily offered to take a cut in salary when he heard that conditions were not what they were last year. His cut is equivalent to the price of one picture, in other words he gives Warner Brothers three pictures for the price of two.

If other stars would do as Dick has done it might save embarrassment all around. Who knows where the ax will fall and where it won’t fall? Drastic changes are being made in all the studios and salaries are being cut.

MALIBU SEASON OPENS

The red buckram lampshades and the simple prints chosen by Constance Bennett for her Malibu house promise to make her beach house outstanding. William Haines, who is one swell interior decorator when he isn’t acting, has been in daily conference with Connie over her new house. She is determined to keep the furnishings simple and inexpensive and for that reason has chosen charming prints, beautiful in their simplicity.

The Malibu season has opened with a vengeance. Shutters are open and furniture is being put in place. Wynne Gibson has rented a beach house 10 miles north of Malibu. She is using unpainted furniture and her friends say it is effective.

THOSE JIGSAW PUZZLES

The Jigsaw puzzle companies must sell a lot of their product right in Hollywood. This town is that interested in putting the intricate bits of these puzzles together. I have watched Marion Davies try piece by piece to find a part of a garden flower or a bit of a lady’s gown or part of the stone steps of a medieval castle and she never rests until she succeeds.

Vivienne Osborne Is another jigsaw puzzle fan. Bess Meredyth, Louis B. Mayer, and Sylvia Thalberg are others who find this the greatest diversion in the world.

Believe me, you have to have steady nerves and be able to concentrate to fit these hundreds of small pieces.

WHO ADVISED GRETA

Just who first started Greta Garbo on the big mystery act has often been a matter of conjecture. One of the magazine writers, Gladys Hall, says that Lon Chaney told her before he died that he had advised Miss Garbo to live in seclusion and to refuse to be on public parade.

“I have never gone in for big premiers,” he told her, “nor have I ever been seen at café openings.” Miss Garbo, up to that time, saw every interviewer and was just a good-natured girl from Sweden. She used to laugh and be one of the most friendly of the foreign players – but that was before she became famous.

CHATTER IN HOLLYWOOD

Adrienne Ames’ millionaire husband came out here to take her back to New York. She was perfectly willing to go and had packed her trunks and was bidding Hollywood a temporary adieu when she was summoned to make a test for Richard Barthelmess’ picture, “Cabin in the Cotton.” She has been under contract to Paramount and has made excellent strides in the year she has been here.

Nancy Carroll’s red head is very apt to be missing from the screen at Paramount. She is having troubles, I am told, and her option has not yet been taken up.

Junior Laemmle celebrated his twenty-fourth birthday Thursday at Universal City. His chief diversion was having a birthday luncheon with the executives.

REVIVE WESTERNS TO ASSURE TOMORROW’S CINEMAGOERS

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Children Now Lost to Films

Industry Must Build Future Audiences on Juvenile Patronage

Action Movies Vital

Sophisticated Dialog Has Driven Youngsters From Picture Theaters

Hollywood, Calif., April 30
The Fourth Industry, fighting desperately for patronage, must revive the old-time Western – the lowly horse op’ry – if it is to escape even a worse plight a decade or two hence.

So warns Buck Jones, Indiana born cowboy star, basing his belief upon observations made first-hand on his recent personal appearance tour.

Westerns – and by Westerns, Mr. Jones means any variety of action films – are the only positive means of insuring a future audience for Hollywood’s product; which is to say, that these pictures alone nurture juvenile clientele, so-called “children’s pictures” failing dismally to do so.

There’s a logical sound to the words of the youngsters’ idol when he tells you:

“Lose one generation of picture fans and you break the picture-going tradition.

Children will look to other fields for their hero-worship. The boy of 10 years ago enthused over any number of film favorites. Today’s stars – with the exception of the few cowboys carrying on the Western formula – appeal solely to adult audiences. The next generation of picturegoers has little or nothing on which to grow up.

“Audiences of today are largely made up of yesterday’s youth who developed the habit of picture patronage during the silent days. Any child can understand pantomime. That’s his or her language. He or she doesn’t want to stop and dope out the dialog written for older people. High hat talk drove the kids into the streets to play. The only way to win them back to the cinema is to give them plenty of action mixed with simple talk.

“The younger generation is intolerant of actionless drama and comedy. Children lack the patience to heed long stretches of dialog; they’re bored with the sophistication the screen has tried to attain. Children’s programs, so-called, leave them cold – they smack too much of the school-room to be entertainment. The youngster’s failure to support juvenile stories, with all-child casts, further indicates that the form of talker presentation, rather than its subject matter, does not strike their fancy.”

When Westerns were in their heyday, cowboys Tom Mix, William S. Hart, Hoot Gibson and Buck Jones were turning out approximately 30 combined annual releases. Independent studios buzzed with activity dedicated to Western melodramas.

Instead of maintaining this Western average, in the face of depreciated child response to the talkies, the total for this year will be 22 films. Independent production has been greatly curtailed by the tendency of the smaller studios to copy the sophisticated trends of the major organizations. The type of picture that could best combat one phase of audience apathy apparently is underestimated by companies that fail to recognize the importance of Western films.

“Bring in the children and you enlarge your audience” adds Mr. Jones. “At least one adult must accompany the child to the theater. On tour, I played to just as many grownups as children. Stimulate the interest of the kids, the most enthusiastic boosters in the world, and you have a healthy home circle attitude toward the picture industry.”

Westerns, Mr. Jones points out, need not necessarily have a cowboy locale. Society, police, racing, aviation, gangster and practically any type of story may be worked into the Western formula. Nor need dialog complicate the production. On the contrary, Mr. Jones finds that it speeds things along doing away with time-losing close-ups and caption cutting. Simple speeches, moreover, detail exposition of the plot and build suspense.