Why Athletes Fail in Pictures

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 538, 15 December 1928, Page 5 (Supplement)

Why Athletes Fail in Pictures

Sporting Celebrities are Not Successful in Films

Celebrities are not successful in the cinema. No hero from another field of endeavour has proved a successful star in motion pictures. Few of these celebrities have made money out of the movies and none of them has established a permanent niche in filmland. Even such operatic stars as Mary Garden, Geraldine Farrar and Lina Cavalieri; great idols and famous beauties, could not become permanent picture heroines, though they entered into films with a tremendous following. With pulchritude and ability to recommend them it seems incredible that they should have been surpassed bv unknown girls of mediocre and unproved worth. Yet such was the case, tome may say the reason they did not succeed was because they were singers

unquestionably the property of Gertrude Ederle, the greatest swimmer in all the world, the conqueror of the English Channel. The day after she had set a new world’s record,'"making faster time than any man who had preceded -her and when she stood out as the only woman who had been successful in that supreme test, the world and all that was in it was hers. She could have named her own terms iD vaudeville “Trudie” went to Germany instead. Days passed and weeks. Her record was broken by first a German and then a Frenchman. Another woman swam the channel. Still Trudie received a tremendous ovation when she reached New York and she signed a worth while vaudeville contract. Bebe Daniels was about to make a swimming picture. It was to be the story of a little girl in college who won her man by swimming and, in the course of college events, got herself entangled in a channel race which she thought she had won. The producers together with Miss Daniels decided that the picture could be greatly strengthened by adding Gertrude Ederle to the cast. Like most champions Gertrude Ederle gambled when she accepted that proposition, gambled with the future. She hoped that this might lead to stardom. Yet this was not the case. The public was interested in Gertrude Ederle the swimmer and not in Gertrude Ederle the actress. If she was to succeed in filmdom she would have to start at the beginning, learn the art of acting and take her chance with those countless others who one day had been unknown and the next leaped to fortune and to fame. Duke Paoa Kahanamoku, most perfect specimen of his race, well over

and their voices were lost on the screen, so that those who had loved them in opera and concert work were not interested when they could see but could not hear them. This sounds like a plausible theory. But it cannot account for the similar failure of Dempsey, Tunney and Leonard; of Ruth and Tilden and Grange; of Ederle and Kahanamoku. The public had the opportunity to watch these celebrities do on the screen what they had been doing before limited audiences. It was also possible to make boxing, baseball, tennis, football and swimming far more dramatic in pictures than in real life. Yet again the public was not interested.

For many months following the summer of 19-6 the most famous woman in the world was not Mary Pickford or Mary Garden. The honours were

six feet in height, well over 200 pounds in weight, with a picturesque and splendid face and the carriage of an athlete, cam© to the screen already famous. He found that his name meant nothing. He had to start all over again. He had to build up with the extras. He was courageous in his efforts. He worked long hours. And his labours went unrewarded. Now and then his name would be given

his salary was commensurate with the roles that; he played. It is doubtful if Duke ever got more than 100 dollars a week and certainly there were plenty of weeks when he got less, and many others when he was idle. Johnny Weismuller, who followed Kahanamoku as champion, also turned his eyes toward pictures. But he saw no beckoning fingers and he refused to make the sacrifices that Duke had done, with no goal in sight. His teammate, Stubby Kruger, almost as famous as himself, a handsome fellow with a flare for comedy, did try pictures. He played with Douglas Fairbanks in “The Black Pirate.” But it was extra work and it was not possible to pick him out from the other swimmers who were used in the production. The golden chance did not come his way so Stubby checked out of Hollywood at last. Then there is Bill Tilden, once the greatest tennis player in the world. Tilden starred in a play on Broadway. It was thought that the acting experience he gamed in this maner, together with his fame, which was world-wide, would njake him a picture stai. Everybody seemed to think so—except the picture producers. They only gave him small parts and paid him as thev paid their other small-part people. So Tilden made a picture of his own. with outside backing. But that did not startle the industry either. Athletic names which have attracted more interest than any others in the last few years have been Benny Leonard, the undefeated light-weight champion of the world; Babe Ruth, basball champion; Jack Dempsey, Charles Paddock, champion sprinter. Annette Kellerman (famous swimmer) and Georges Carpentier. Each of these has at one time or another gone into motion pictures with varying degrees of luck, similar in one respect, in that it was all bad. When Joseph Schildkraut finishes his work as Ravenal in “Show Boat,” for Universal, he has been cast to play the leading role in “The Devil,” which promises to be one of Universal’s biggest productions next season. It is based on the novel. “The Devil,” by Alfred Neumann, which created quite a furore in Europe a while ago.

screen credit. But in such fashion that few associated Duke Kahanamoku, the greatest swimmer, with Duke Kahanamoku, the petty chieftain of a native group, or Kahanamoku the pirate, or Kahanamoku the soldier, or Kahanamoku the bodyguard of the hero. And