HOLLYWOOD IN PERSON.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 88, 15 April 1933, Page 5 (Supplement)

HOLLYWOOD IN PERSON.

GOSSIP OF THE STUDIOS.

(By MOLLIE MERRICK.)

HOLLYWOOD (Calif.), March 14.

Refusal on the part of producers to accept cheques from, or to extend credit to, exhibitors has created a difficult situation with theatre managers, who have liad their funds tied up throughout the country with the enforced bank holidays. Movie moguls will meet soon to decide on their course of action for the next few weeks. It is assumed that partial payment of large salaries will be made—2s per cent in cash—and the remainder in promissory notes from the company. Producing companies who have box office stars under contract—stars known to tie restless and seeking an opportunity to break eaid contracts—will try to pay those huge salaries in full so as to permit no opportunity for breach of contract to come in. It would be difficult to assimilate the idea of a star on a national situation and using it as a lever to obtain a muchfreedom, but the ways of a star are weird and wonderful sometimes.

John Gilbert's last picture will be entitled "Fast Workers." It will do nothing for this once great name in the cinematic heavens, for the same dismal fate which has followed all other recent Gilbert releases was on the job to bring talkie career to a wretched finish. It is the most slipshod picture his studio has put out for many months, with sound recording so poor that the opening of the picture is almost lost, ■and you wonder what the whole thing is about. This is also due to poor cutting and indifferent direction. The story, one of brother love, might hold up were it not for the fantastic way the social life of iron-workers is presented.

Mae Clarke stands out as the one brilliant moment in an otherwise dull routine. Into this picture comes Muriel Kirkland, the Broadway stage star who scintillated in "Strictly Dishonourable" and in "The Greeks Had a Word for It." If you look carefully for her you will find her, and it will amaze you to see how a thoroughly capable and attractive actress who scores with critics and metropolitan audiences may become lost in the camera unless particular pains are taken in presenting her and lighting her. That Kirkland voice which thrilled all New York doesn't wake a tremor. But this girl has a lot of ability, and, given a real chance in pictures, should be able to bring genuine quality to the screen.

Considering the state of mind of producers, the state of finances of motion pictures, and the state of John Gilbert's

art at the present time, this should be a long au revoir for the man who was once the sex-appeal idol of the feminine world. To console his "fans" it is only fair to say that he has conserved his money—a trust fund of 1,000,000 dollars will care for him and buy him his beer and skittles when he resumes private, life. Also he has very good talent as an author.

Helen Twelvetrees is a versatile girl. She had asked 20 friends in to Sunday night supper when bank holidays were declared and she found herself with the minimum of cash. It was too late to call the party off, so she compromised with the innovation of a "soup supper." Three huge tureens carried soups of different kinds. One a cream variety,

another a peasant potage to be served with plenty of grated cheese, and the third good old German soup with dumplings. There were all sorts of hot breads, toast, etc. Soup was followed by a simple green salad served in huge bowls and mixed informally at the tables in true peasant style, and by the time the guests reached the black coffee they declared they hadn't had so much fun or such a good supper in their lives.

The earthquake which spread death, horror, misery and left thousands injured and homeless among-the civilian population of this part of California passed Hollywood by with but a gentle nudge of its shoulder —a faint reminder of its bottled-up power and a hint as to its sobering effects. To the motion picture colony it became, personally, an experience in which fright and amusement were almost evenly blended until they heard the record of disaster on the radio. A most peculiar predicament was the one in which Edward Butcher, production manager of Fox Studios, found himself, for ho was in the barber's chair on the "lot," and the barber, razor in hand, was hovering with the nicely-sharpened blade, at his throat. One sickening lurch of the building and the barber, with a yell, was through the door, over a three-foot vailing—razor in hand —and down to a flower bed, with, it must be admitted, Manager Butcher very close on his heels and very, very pale beneath his lather. Lilian Harvey was coming out of a tea party at the Ambassador Hotel when the world went crazy. "What's that?" she screamed, feeling the earth careen beneath her feet.

"That's the banks openin'," said a wag who was clinging to one of the hotel pillars for support. Janet Gaynor and Henri Garat, her newest leading man, were looking at the advance photographs for the film "Adorable." When the shake was over, Garat explained, "I didnt know my first song in English would cause such a commotion." Herbert Mundin didn't realise what it was all about until it was over. But he has felt all the minor shocks which followed. Marian Nixon ran out of her house with dishes in her arms—things which fell from shelves and which she picked up in her hasty exit. John Boles says his antique clock stopped at 5.59. Elissa Landi and her mother stayed out in the garden until midnight as they were fearful to return ■indoors. Norma# Foster, driving along Sunset Boulevard in his car, heard the bells ringing in the tower of the Mission Church and glanced up to see the steeple swaying. A like experience happened to me. I was driving rapidly along Wilshire Boulevard and suddenly all the populace rushed madly into the street. It was like a mob scene in a motion picture with the tall buildings swinging crazily against the sky and everyone screaming in terror. Frank Joyce, a Hollywood agent, saw a woman fall in a dead faint in the street in front of his office and ran out with a bottle of stimulants. There were a dozen heart attacks on the pavement insido of as many minutes, and Joyce gave first aid until the bottle ran dry. Mr. and Mrs. Roland Young went, to the Chester Morris home for a cocktail and were shaken out of that. Hurrying home to be with Mrs. Kummer, their guest, they consoled her, then went on to Clemence Dane's for dinner. The second shock came just as they were about to sit down to the table. Home once more—that time to stay. Una O'Connor had played bridge all the afternoon with very bad luck. Then she drew a nice spade hand. Came the 'quake, and her three friends ran from the house never to return. The Ken Maynards laughed and said, "It's nothing," for the first three hours —and five 'quakes—then got in their aeroplane and camped in the desert all night. Dorothy Peterson was alone in her house, so she called up Helen Chandler. They sat up all night in terror and outlined a plot for a picture, to keep their minds off the shakes. Walter Byron lives on the fourth floor of the Hollywood Athletic Club. He went out to a farmhouse in the San Fernando Valley and spent the night close to Mother Earth. The most exquisite study in eurhythmies was the way my eleventh storey apartment swayed all the evening as I listened to the radio reports on the disaster. But the building is done on the Frank Lloyd Wright plan, copied from construction on the Tokyo Hotel, so I felt seasick, but safe.