Should He Take His Wife Along ?

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 September 1928, Page 9

Should He Take His Wife Along ?

Hollywood Discusses Problem of Separate Marital Vacations

BHE beautiful Vilma Banky left Los Angeles for Hungary, on vacation, her husband, Rod La Roque went back to work. The nights that he wasn't on call at the Studio he spent in his projection room running Vilma’s pictures from “The Dark Angel” to “Two Lovers.’ But the shadow could not compensate for the substance. Before Vilma had reached her fatherland her husband had thrown a few things into a bag, ordered his trunks to be shipped after him and boarded a transcontinental train and then a transatlantic boat. “No marital vacations for us!” he cried, when he and the girl he mairied a year ago wandered together in the storied streets of Budapest. Being separated is like deliberately throwing away chunks of happiness. “It seems to me that when a couple needs a marital vacation love is gone, argues Norma Shearer, who has just returned from a belated honeymoon with her producer-husband, Irving Thalberg. “Surely two persons decide upon separate vacations only after a series of quarrels or unpleasantness, and I believe that each time there is a quarrel something of understanding and sympathy is gone. Marital vacations are only a makeshift; they simply postpone an inevitable divorce.” With which notion Wallace Beery takes issue. “Most men enjoy fishing, camping or shooting, roughing it in a big why, not having to shave and dress; and most woinen hate it. I’ve seen p. good many marriages go on the rocks because the wife insisted on trotting along into the wilderness to keep her husband company and then ruined the whole works by screaming at sight of a bug and complaining about the tent and so on.” Adolphe Menjou believes a vacation should be a change, which means a change of companionship, among other

things, and if one feels the need of this, by all means leave the wife at home. Richard Arlen is of the opinion that a vacation together will often patch up small misunderstandings and bring back romance to the humdrum routine of married life.

Pola Negri’s idea is that the bloom on the rose of romance is best preserved by short separations. Clive Brook says that “a bit of separation adds flavour to marriage.” And Dorothy Mackaill feels that marital vacations are the best tonics for marriages.

“If a husband and wife go their own ways once a year, doing exactly what he and she desire, they will return with a new zest for life,” she insists. “Too many families exhaust tempers and spoil holidays trying to move in a group.” Esther Ralston says: “I’m just leaving for Hawaii. If my husband couldn’t go with me, I’d stay home. There are selfish reasons besides sentimental ones. He’s so marvellous about taking care of reservations, baggage and, all that.” “I know a couple who separate regularly twice a year,” says Conrad Nagel. “Whether they really want to go away or not, they do it as a matter of principle and they say their plan works. It’s very efficient, but it seems to me that they are putting marriage on a business basis, making it a cold thing that has nothing to do with love.” “When people begin to get on each other’s nerves, a short separation is the quickest remedy,” according to Hoot Gibson.

“It’s human nature for people who are tied together to feel the galling of the chains and to resent their enforced companionship. At some time or another, they will weary-of each other. This doesn’t mean that love is lost. Perhaps the girl is in a rut and ,her husband’s .alleged jokes are driving her mad. Perhaps he is overworked and the people she asks in to play bridge annoy him. At another time, these things couldn t raise a ripple. Right then, the right remedy is a change of scenery for each one. They’ll come back new. Lajos Biro, noted Hungarian playwright, whose “Hotel Imperial is translated into many tongues, observes that it ik not the custoni in Europe

for husbands and wives to spend their holidays together.

“Our wives are bound by convention. They go here when it is fashionable and there when it is the season and elsewhere at the correct time. The man does not bother with customs of society. When he can find time, he goes where his mood dictates. So it is rare for husband and wife to pass their holidays together.”

However, the bachelors of Hollywood have their own ideas. While admitting that they have never been married and so can’t speak from experience, they nevertheless unite in voting in favour of marital vacations.

“Heaven knows I’m bored with my own society sometimes,” cries Ben Lyon. “I should think separate vacations would be like getting away from one’s self. I pity the poor wife who has to play up day after day to the fancies of a husband. The same applies to the husband who must be sick of forever considering whether or his wife will approve of this or that. The shoes are on both feet. “A short separation gives them a chance to live their own lives for a period, an opportunity to forget petty differences and come back ready to start ove^. ,, “You’re right there,” assents Richard Dix. “I have several friends who are really very suitably mated, but they are continually finding fault with one another. For no good reason, one will criticise the other’s dress or conversation or manners. They are unloading on each other the worst side of their natures, because they know no one else would stand for it and subconsciously they believe a husband or wife must bear such treatment or get out. “If they had a rest period away from each othen, they’d probably be restored to the plane of affection where they really belong. They’d miss the decent things about the other one and forget the flaws and be darned glad to get together once more.”