HOLLYWOOD IN PERSON.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 260, 2 November 1929, Page 5 (Supplement)

HOLLYWOOD IN PERSON.

GOSSIP OF THE STUDIOS.

(By MOLLIE MERRICK.)

HOLLYWOOD (Cal.), October 5. Lon Chaney's next film has been indefinitely postponed. Since this sadfaced actor, whose gift for weird and unusual make-up has made him a favourite with audiences of _ all types declared himself against talkies, gossip about his future has been rife in the colony.

111-health, not- talkie arguments, is the given cause for Chaney's postponement of activities. Chaney a contortionist in the days of early theatrical struggles, enjoys fame, money, the fruits of ambition gratified, in fact everything but health. Due to a spinal injury in his contortionist days he is seldom free from pain. Complications from a recent siege of influenza have added further to his physical burdens. Although Chaney cares nothing for personal glory, rarely makes a personal appearance and reads neither Press notices nor fan mail, he is the one in the colony in greatest demand by visitors. An executive on the lot tells me that the usual Wall Street magnate will visit movieland, see the rarest beauties in filmdom, look them over with conservative admiration, and then, with a light in his eye, say: "If you want to do me a favour; show me Lon Chaney."

Every celebrity longs for a taste of life as the average layman knows it. Thus is it that Charlie Chaplin, standing on the kerb before a shop waiting for his chauffeur's arrival, fell into talk with a pert little girl. Traffic, the weather, and the girl who was tc join her for dinner were the subjects in question. They were to dine in a cafeteria, it seemed. An impulse seized Chaplin. "Wouldn't you both like to have dinner with me, at the Biltmore?" he asked. "You wouldn't fool us, would you mister?" the girl said. Decided that they both should accept they started out. At the hotel they were obviously amazed at the service accorded their random friend. Head waiters hurried forward, and they got the best table. Chaplin, at a loss to produce a name, had called himself "Mr. Jones." Talk progressed. The comedian, listening, was delighted at the Haroun-al Baschid impulse which had prompted him to take two little city sparrows into the confines of a smart hotel and accord them the dignity and chivalry reserved for their more fortunate sisters. All went well until Gloria Swanson entered with a party of people. "Hello, Charlie," she said, as she passed. Bounder and rounder grew the eyes of one little protege.

"Say,", she said, "you wouldn't be Charlie Chaplin, would you?" "I'm afraid I am," said Chaplin, mentally bidding adieu to the poise of his little guests. He had seen the socially established at a loss for words in his presence. But he was due for a surprise. "Well, that being the case," said the personality-plus member of the duo, "I can speak my mind about your pictures, Mr. Chaplin." And there followed one of the keenest analyses of the Chaplin brand of humour the comedian had ever heard. Chaplin bought them orchids after dinner and sent them home in his town car. He didn't hear from them again until "The Circus" was produced. Then he received a letter from little person-ality-plus again outlining the leading qualifications of his work. The comedian rates it as among the most interesting evenings of his life— that night he played Caliph to two little city sparrows cafeteria bound. Willie Collier, in Hollywood, is i talker de luxe. But it was not always so. That is why the colony is chort ling over the revival of a tale anent hi: beginnings.

It seems that the then young Collier was "walk-on" in a show with George Drew, Georgie Drew and other notables. He was a likable chap with great ambitions and beloved by everyone in the company. There was a small part of butler for which he yearned. It carried only one speech, "Professor Absalom." But that had to be said with precise dignity and impressiveness. Young Collier got the butler's role and was in a haze of delight. There followed rehearsals—and difficulties. "Professor Absalom!" shouted young Collier, determined to make the most°of his brief opportunity. •'Rotten!" shouted back the stage director, making the most of his opportunity. There was dire distress on the part of the youth which George Drew tried to help out. "You must speak the line," said he, "not shout it. And you must make them realise that it is a professor who is entering the room." Collier didn't tell Drew that Georgie Drew, in the fullness of her heart, had already told him to stress the word "Absalom," as the room would need to know the name of the man entering. Next rehearsal he squared himself and said "Professor Absalom."

"Soft-pedal that professor, will you?" roared the heartless stage director. The opening night came. Collier, racked with alternate chills and fever, was pacing the back-stage muttering "Professor Absalom" in every inflection ami tone that can be thought of. "(jet out of the way—go say that line where we can't hear you!" Bandied about on every hand the boy took to the lower level smoking room, where over and over again he repeated his one speech. He was still repeating it when the cue for his entrance came. "Get that fool," roared the stage director, and a stage hand scurried about and found Collier down in the smoking i room.

"Get on stage," he yelled. "They're waiting for you-they've improvised one speech already." ' The boy flew to the stairs, dashed to the flies, and marched on to the stage in stately mien. Threw back his head and boomed impressively: "Profalom. Of all Manhattan's invasions into the motion picture industry, its absorption of the entire business of musical comedy and revue making has been most thorough. With few exceptions the village nas had to give way to Broadway, its song writers and routine directors. *or \ T ew York has long led the world in the musical show. And this branch of sound pictures is destined to be one of the greatest money-making departures of the new technique. For some years now it has been impossible to make much money on a hi" musical show in Manhattan. Rivalry in°stao-e sets and costume design has become so keen that the thousands upon thousands of dollars poured into a show before the doors of the theatre open eat devastatingly into the seasons ticket sales.

But the motion picture, once made, travels to thousands of cities and reaps a tremendous harvest of profit—such a harvest that movieland can well afford to lure a man of the type of Sammy Lee, dance director for Florenz Ziegfeld, out to this gold coast to direct the routines for its biggest revue of the season. . When I met the irrepressible Sammy Lee on a movie lot nothing would do but that I ask this Manhattanite a few. questions about his methods of procedure with celluloid revues. It took only a few moments to convince me that the erstwhile devotee of the granite canyons of Gotham has been converted to California most thoroughly. A Sammy Lee in a henna coloured lamb's wool slipover sweater and white flannels tossed back a mop of thick black hair and went into action that was as characteristic as it was vigorous. Shirt opened at the throat in the best movie fashion and sleeves rolled almost to the shoulder, Sammy Lee outlined the routine of an interview in less time than it takes to tell.

I learned interesting things in the fewmoments we talked. I already knew Sammy was brilliant. He has had as many as five successful shows on Broad" way at the same time, musical shows in which the : dance routines were all conceived and executed by him. And no two were ever the same. He was part and parcel of the old New York burlesque theatre, and George Gershwin swore by. him long _ before Florenz Ziegfeld "discovered" him. I knew he had been doing the Ziegfeld shows for years. That he had been called into the Metropolitan Opera House to do the routines for "Skyscrapers." As I said before, I was aware this young man was a genius. . What I learned as I talked with Sammy Lee was this: During his brief experience in movieland he has learned more about cameras and what may be done with them than most movie' directors have accomplished in years of working with the clicking eye. Perhaps not even Sammy Lee is aware of this; he is, for all his enthusiasm, sufficiently modest to be admirable, but not so self-effacing as to be annoying. He knows his worth and he brings fresh vitality of surety to it. He has used positive and negative film in stunning alternation. He has capitalised on reflections—« those things which movie directors avoided as if they were the plague, for some weird reason. He has brought overhead shots to the musical revue and

thereby done the one original thing the stage producer cannot do with long lines of dancing figures. He has assimilated both the restrictions and the advantages of the camera so thoroughly as to be able to minimise the first and capitalise on the increased field provided by the second.