Tracy is Changed Man

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22540, 3 October 1936, Page 16 (Supplement)

Tracy is Changed Man

Enthusiasm Replaces

CHANCE OF WINNING ACADEMY AWARD

Spencer Tracy is a changed man. And for once in the history of Hollywood the transformation is neither a publicity stunt nor a triumph of make-up wizardry. It has come in spite of, rather than because of, Hollywood influence. Tracy has done it all himself. He will not mind my telling you about it in the least, writes W. H. Mooring, in Film Weekly. f

EVERY time we have talked about his work, his private life and of how one might affect the other, I have found him so self-critical that sometimes I have even suspected him of nursing an inferiority complex. Most of the earlier Spencer Tracy screen roles suggested the complete "tough." But if you think you saw in tho hard-hitting, hard-driving young rough-neck a complete and sharply reflected impression of the real Spencer Tracy, you aro mistaken. His greatest weakness has never yet showed through his work one hundred per cent. He is an almost hopeless sentimentalist. Under the surface, the real Tracy is as soft as the boiled turnip we sometimes hear about; only in a different soi't of way. Success came, to him, .as he often used to tell me, "just like that." Ho snaps his fingers as he says it. "This acting business." he declared, "is the world's biggest racket. Anyone could stand before a camera and do what I do, and if he happened to liavo tho right kind of pan" < meaning face!) "and could smile and frown a bit, tho results might be much about the same. Tracy meant it. He used to be as casual as that about his work. For quite a while, in fact, he was far too casual. He became an easy victim for the vicious Hollywood undercurrent which often sweeps the feet from under a new star. The early flush of success, the blinding light of a new halo, were almost too much for Spencer. Essentially a friendly fellow —almost spontaneous in his affections —he enjoyed the warmth of the adulation Hollywood heaped upon him. He almost enjoyed it too well. Then he came up against tho trouble which sooner or later confronts every star. Story trouble. Spencer Tracy is far too intelligent to relish submission to the typing system. He hated playing the same kind of role in each succeeding picture. He cried out to the studio jk?oplo to experiment. They did, and such pictures as " Power

Academy Award, which he is determined to have before long. I know he is working for it. Underneath his new air of nonchalance there smoulders a determination yon can only half guess at by studying the Tracy jaw. So I think he will get it. A year or so ago Tracy's fan mail would pile up in tho studio until someone carted it away. Secretaries would do the necessary. To-day, Tracy himself takes an active interest in the messages ho gets from his admirers . . . and critics. "So far," ho told-me, "I've had only one letter protesting against my characterisation of the Roman Catholic priest in "San Francisco." It came from a Washington critic, who told me I never should have played the part. My life hadn't been right for it. He went on to say that the private life and habits of the actor should always conform to

and Glory'" were the result. They were not what Tracy had asked and hoped for. Almost distracted with disappointment and anxiety—Tracy takes everything to heart that way—ho tried to paint his prospects in more roseate hues. Ho often went near to painting the wholo town red. He admits it. "I know I went off the deep end," lie told me the other day. "I took drink; plenty of it, and then I always wanted to fight." "You don't want me to print that, do you?" I asked in astonishment. "Sure I do," was his frank reply. never have had to apologise to anyone, except perhaps my family, because it was myself and no one else who got hurt. If ever you quote me to the public, just quote mo right, because you know just how it all happened." That is Spencer Tracy in a nutshell. He is the most truthful man I have met in Hollywood. Of course, I did know how it happened. I remembered how Spencer, after many "incidents," sought to discipline himself. He hired a bodyguard, not to protect him from gangsters, but from himself. This fellow would gc> everywhere with Tracy, and if by chance the Irish came uppermost after the Scotch, it was the bodyguard's job to knock him out before any kind of nasty scene could develop. You see, in Hollywood, a fight is ordinarily not news, but if a film star so much' as knocks his own knuckles against a doorpost—well, that is "headlilies." Soon there came a time when Tracy was really up against it. He did not like the films he had been making. The Fox Company, by whom lie was then employed, did not like some of his social ideas either. There was a split. All Hollywood wondered what would happen to Spencer Tracy. Only ho knew the answer. Tracy was going to do better screen work than he had ever done before. Metro-Goldwyn-Maver had said they would either mako or break him. Ho had told himself that nobody was going to break him. Ho would show them. And, hasn't lie? - Think back over the past year. He has not made a bad picturo since "Dante's Inferno." In "San Francisco" and "Fury"—his most recent efforts—ho lias done some of the most brilliant work of his bright acting career. Either performance might win him the

those of the characters he tried to portray on the stage or screen. Well, that seems to me to wash up —not merely clean up—the whole Hollywood system. Carried to its logical conclusion, the argument would send Hollywood producers to the death house for actors to portray homicidal characters . . . "I sat down to reply to the man. My wife looked over my shoulder. I started by admitting that I hadn't lived the kind of life the average priest would live . . . not by a long chalk. 'Don't write that way,' Mrs. Tracy said. 'You're apologising to him. Why should you? You've lived your own life in your own way . . . sometimes one way . . . sometimes another. You never hurt anyone who hasn't already accepted your apologies, so just you sail into that man and tell him what you know!' " "I liked playing that priest," he explained, "because it was so different from anything I ever did before. I know several priests and they are darned good friends of mine. The role seemed to me to be a lovely spot in a thoroughgoing picture, and, as a Roman Catholic, I felt a natural urge to play it. There's been no kick from the Church people who know me best, so I hope the public by and large will take it for what it is, a sincere effort on the part of an average man to portray a good man. "I enjoyed making 'Fury' pretty well, too, although it kept us hard at work for a long time. I'm absolutely delighted with the way London received the picture." A year ago Spencer Tracy would not have discussed his work with half this enthusiasm. Any day you would have found him among the studio workmen talking racing; giving out tips—and often paying out resultant losses for men who could not afford the gamble. They all knew Spencer. He still is "one of the boys" when he is at the studio. But to-day, instead of playing about, he works hard every moment. When he is through with work he grabs his fishing tackle and travels miles out of Hollywood to an isolated beach where an old salt keeps a boat in readiness. He stays there fishing until the studio calls him back.