HOLLYWOOD IN PERSON.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18786, 15 June 1929, Page 24 (Supplement)

HOLLYWOOD IN PERSON.

DAILY LIFE IN FILMDOM. (By MOLLY MERRICK.) (Copyright bv the “Star” and the N.A-N.A.) At the Mary Pickford Premiere. Holly*wood had one of its rare rainy nights at the Mary Pickford premiere. The awning at the entry collapsed and Irving Berlin was greeted by several bucketfuls of water. The little composer hunched his shoulders and scuttled to cover, while the hundreds lined on either side of the street applauded vigorously. Cecil de Mille, spokesman of the evening, gave the audience a quick come-back when he was presenting the cast. They did not come out on the stage, but rose in the audience. A hoarse male voice cried: h>” don’t you get these people to come up on the stage or stand on a platform? To which de Mille replied: “Evidently you do not understand the egotism of a director.” George Bernard Shaw once put over one of a similar nature. At the premiere of* “Man and Superman” there were cries of “Author—author!” When Shaw appeared a voice from the gallery* cried; “Rotten!” “I think so too, my friend, but what are we two against so many?” Say’s the cynic: “What did he pay that guy?” Mary Pickford came to the premiere of her picture in a gown of watermelon colour. A hip jacket of ermine and trailing gardenias. She made a speech to her audience, emphasising the importance of the talkie and saying that she would make no more silent pictures. Soon the only way to get silence will be to visit a deaf and dumb asylum. Talkies are Silent. Clara Bow doesn’t take to talkies. Girls of her type are accustomed to the lift of music when they begin a tremendous dramatic scene. But in the new medium there is a great silence just as the dramatic moment begins. “Quiet, please,” bawls the director, and the silence of the grave ensues. Out of this silence, into which a buzzer has signalled that all is ready, the artist has to produce tremendous emotion. It is the most mechanical setting into which one could try* to put feeling. And the girls accustomed to the studio organ or the usual “heart and flowers” on the studio violin just can t become accustomed to it. llow talk

Bigger and Better Movement. There is a bigger and better movement throughout. To-day I was introduced to a chap whose name I have been familiar with on movie screens throughout the country. “Of course you knew who so-and-so was,” said our mutual friend, when the famous Hollywoodian had lelt. “Yes,” said I. blithely* and Innocently, “he’s a scenarist.” “Me no!” mv mentor look pained and shocked: “He does nothing but first treatments.” But when I heard that one of the gag men of the village was advertising himself as a “comedy constructionist” I had a light attack of the vapours. When gag writing passes the five hundred a week mark it is comedy construction. Mature reflection convinces even the most sceptical of that. Be brave for this one: Gentlemen

who regulate the emotional waves are tabbed “emotional metaphysicians.” And we thought we were smart when we had comedy and tragedy actors and actresses and writers. And one more tip: Scenario and scenarists are pronounced with an “Sh.” Herbert Brenon seems to have removed all possible doubt of Hollywood’s attitude on that score. He pronounced it roundly, with a fine flourish on the initial syllable. “Sh”—as in shenanigan. A Friendly Separation. Betty Compson, in the announcement of her “friendly seperation” from James Cruze, has set the colony wondering. For Betty told an interviewer a couple of moons back that “never, •never, never in life” would she and James Cruze be divorced. Jim Cruze, Hollywood husband, is losing out with his wife because he is too much of a stay-at-home. He wanted to sit before his own fire six nights a week, says Betty, and have half of Hollywood at his home Sunday night. And Betty Compson, blonde, triumphantly successful again after a doubtful interval which must have given her many artistic apprehensions, wants to play about a bit. The Cruze home is "ht Flintridge, a suburb of Hollywood which nestles, down in its orange groves at the base of the Pasadena foothills. It is a great Spanish dwelling with patios, swimming pool and tennis court. There is a glass-domed room with a fountain, and thousands of plants in it that have been the pride of' Betty Conipson’s heart. Every Sunday the latchstring was out. And the butlers and rriaids were in and at work. Salads were made by the barrelfuls, conservatively speaking. '1 hree or four dozen chickens were Southern fried. Hanging out the latchstring in Hollywood, where jobs are whimsical and ofttimes elusive, is a dangerous proceeding. Jim Cruze came from the world of the circus. And the law of the white tops is the law of good fellowship and hospitality. If that hospitality was abused,- Jimmy Cruze blinked his big dark eyes, shrugged, and explained; “I get something from the most persistent leech that comes here to eat my food and drink ynv drinks.” lie deals in celluloid drama, not the interpretation of life but the creation of emotion and the painting of the reaction in gelatine. With a salary one

of the largest in Hollywood, it wasn’t a drop out of the Cruze financial bucket if the Sunday night supper cost several hundred dollars.

Often Betty Compson looked about her at a group of unfamiliar faces. Feople would arrive at that hospitable latchstring and greet her effusively. Vet she could have sworn she had never laid eyes on them before —much less met them.

There is' a bowl near- the entrance door. Guests were supposed, according to Spanish custom, to drop a bill or two in there. And the less fortunate of the guests were entitled to help themselves to enough to tide them over m carfare and necessities of life for the interval until the next Sunday night It was Utopian. Birt can you be Utopian with any but gods and goddesses? On the lot Jim Cruze works at terrific speed. He shoots and cuts at the same time. Which means that instead of photographing all the footage the script calls for he, with his experienced brain, eliminates the things he knows will fall on the cutting room floor and takes only those sequences he is certain will survive. Two careers have come to full flower in that Spanish house. But success has been the very conductor of failure. Had Betty Compson never had her latest flare-back into popularity, hostessing it in the Hollywood foothills might have held its charm. If some star wants to do something novel she should announce an "unfriendly separation.” The recent ones are all so deucedly happy and mutually agreeable. Stars Pine for Secrecy. Stars who heretofore went out of their way to megaphone their doings, to bray and ballyhoo their every move, begin to pine for secrecy. Olga Baclanova and Nicholas Soussanin took out their three days’ announcement of intention to wed required by the California law some time ago. Then, when everyone had forgotten to watch them every moment of the time, they slipped off and were married, and said not a thing at all about it. It all came out in Court when Olga told a sympathetic jury that she didn’t understand sufficient English to know the contract she was signing was for five years instead of three. Stars’ Love Confessions. A lady’s love life should be sacred to

herself alone, it would seem. And probably is in places other than movieland. But here in the village of celluloid beauties love lives are publicised along with beauty secrets, recipes of great stars, preferences in colours, literature, motors. dogs and all the other paraphernalia of publicity. Time was when a certain reticence was regarded as an asset in cinematics. That was back in the days when players maintained a degree of mystery about themselves. When men were married, but their dear public were not allowed to know of it. And ladies often reached the dignified state of grandmotherhood without the boys out in front being any the wiser. Not so today. It all started about a year ago when a certain interviewer got the brilliant idea of having a movie star write her love confessions. Joan Crawford told the story of her romances. Beginning with the first boy who had carried her books home from school, and ending finally—and very ecstastically—with Doug Fairbanks, Junr. It was full of heart interest, teeming with realism and was quite the talk of the village. Soon followed Clara Bow, with the startling announcement that the fair Gilbert Roland would still be hers, perhaps, if another had not ruthlessly snatched him from her eager arms. This was the very tri-nitro-tiluol of emotion. For Gilbert was only one of the village boys who had caught the vibrant Clara’s attentions. She bared the entire list to the thirsting public. She went Joan Crawford one better in ecstasy. in realism, and in heart interest. Alice White gave out a story which made the printing presses hum. The Mergenthaler operative stood in his tracks, blushing for the gorgeous young things out Hoolywood way who were not fully appreciated by the men to whom they gave their youthful loves. Then the telephones began to ring. The love life expert was besieged. Ladies wanted to tell the stories of their lives. To catch the writer’s attention they regaled her with titbits of the coming confessions. No Hollywood lady, it would seem, wanted any secrecy or privacy. -She merely wanted the world to know that such and such a star hadn’t been the only one to try to steer a straight course through the most terrible pitfalls and temptations of which human imagination is capable. Ladies told lively tales of dinners at the homes of various stars high in the celluloid firmament. And blushing editors sighed afid blue-pencilled and regretted that the dear public was a ; bit squeamish at times. Husbands opened magazines and read of their wives’ multiple romances before meeting with their fates, and walked into the ladies’ boudoirs to rave with empurpled countenances. “What does this mean? The whole town will be laughing at me ” And the calm reply: “Sorry, old dear, but I just had to go the other girls one better.”

Mary Nolan, she who was Imogene Wilson, as the rocking-chair brigade so picturesquely says, bursts into print with the full story of many misunderstandings which have culminated in her salvaging a wrecked career in Hollywood. As Imogene Wilson she represents herself as being the victim or publicity. The cruel, heartless, unfeeling press.. And now that it has quite forgotten Imogene Wilson—Mary N~*«n she revives the publicity by going oyer every gruelling detail in a public interview, and adding more than one colourful fillip to the tale which escaped reporters when the story was at its height. Mary throws in a few Hollywood romances by way of good measure. Cranking up the gossip-waggon now that the petrol of public interest is running low! But Hollywood ladies must live, and publicity is legal tender in the celluloid village.