PEEPING AT FILMDOM.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 235, 3 October 1936, Page 5 (Supplement)

PEEPING AT FILMDOM.

RICHES NO OPEN SESAME. SOCIETY WOMEN WHO FAILED. (By SHEILAPI GRAHAM.) HOLLYWOOD, September 12. You can't buy your way into the "movies." Some of the richest bluebloods have tried—and most of tliem have failed. The beautiful brunette, Countess of Warwick, chatelaine of historic Warwick Castle, is the latest: of a long line of aristocrats with ambitions to storm the film citadel. She is now being tested by Twentieth Century-Fox. If she makes good she, will join the chosen few society favourites to emerge from a tilt at pictures with more than disillusionment. Seventeen-year-old society debutante Gloria Baker was tested by four studios during her visit to Alfred Vanderbilt, her millionaire half-brother, last winter, but she failed to impress "movie" impresarios with her picture potentialities, Rosamund Pinchot, niece of Pennsylvania's ex-Governor, was considered good enough for the most important role in the New York production of Max Reinliardt's "The Miracle." But Hollywood failed to do more than give her a contract. After wasting several months in the film city Miss Pinchot departed for New York, leaving behind the parting message she would never return. Virginia Pine—real name Virginia Pine Lelimann—born in Chicago, educated in exclusive Knox School for Girls, Cooperstown, New York—believed she had hurdled the obstacles between society girl and motion pictures when given a role in "Dr. Monica," Warners' production starring Kay Francis. But she has done liotliing since and the chances - of a

comeback are rendered remote by the fact of her approaching marriage to George Raft. Two Foreign Countesses. Elizabeth Young, graduate of the fashionable Miss Spence's School, New York City, is another "socialite" content to leave screen honours to her mate. But even before her marriage to Producer Joe Mankiewicz, it was believed that the career she had begun in 1933 in "Big Executive," followed by a sizeable role in "Queen Christina," would never reach stardom heights. Birth of a son a few weeks ago makes the possibility of her return to the screen a question of doubt. Mary Taylor, niece of the Countess di Frasso, is adjudged the most beautiful of all the society girls who pose for magazine fashion stills. Her screen debut in Hecht and Mac Arthur's "Soak the Rich" was preceded by an unusual avalanche of "ballyhoo," but nothing has been heard of her screen activities since. The Countess Liev de Maigret was in Hollywood a long while before she was entrusted with a role in "One Rainy Afternoon," starring Francis Lederer, son of a Prague shoemaker, and featuring Ida Lupino, whose forebears were prominent acrobats. The picture gave the Countess a good opportunity to display histrionic ability, but the reviews dealt more with her beauty than the quality of her acting. Lady of Royal Associations. The usual practice of society film "crashers" is to give a series of dazzling entertainments, to which all the bigwigs of Hollywood are invited. Elizabeth Jenns, friend of King Edward VIII., rented a large house in Beverly Hills, gave several large dinner parties, and waited for a producer to bite on the line of her screen aspirations. David O. Selznick gave her a screen test, the results of which were witnessed by your correspondent. Miss Jenns' photographic self is a mixture of Joan Crawford and every beautiful star you have seen. She was given a contract. Six months have passed since then, but for some unexplained reason Miss Jenns has yet to make her screen debut. Society leader Kitty O'Dare outshone all Hollywood with the brilliance and expense of her parties held in the Beverly Hills home she had leased from Alfred Vanderbilt. When that failed to open the gates of the studios Miss O'Dare created the "Shim-Sham" dance in the hope of attracting attention. When that "flopped" she packed her . belongings and returned,to the more appreciative people of her own class.