From under my hat (1952)

From under my Hat I still treasure his note which came with the tickets. In Sherlock Holmes I had no love scenes with Jack, but I was thrilled to the marrow just being in the same picture with him. I played a heavy. After he had treated me brutally in a scene, he'd say, "I'm sorry, Hedda." I'm able to understand those fans who worship stars of today. To the day he died I was that way over Jack Barrymore. During the making of Sherlock Holmes we became acquainted with the battle of the profiles. One side of Barry more's face was photogenically perfect. When Carol Dempster discovered that, she decided her perfect profile was the same side. In close-ups it didn't matter; but in a two-shot, one profile had to give way to the other. One whole day was devoted to this problem. Need you ask who won? Barrymore, naturally. Barrymore, Powell, and I used to eat our lunch at a little delicatessen on Forty-fourth Street and Ninth Avenue. Among others who ate there was Norma Shearer. The first time I met her she was a model for Tecla pearls and at the same time playing with Reginald Denny in his picture The heather 'pushers. That was Norma's first screen experience. After that she got a contract with Louis B. Mayer and beat me to Hollywood by three months. I don't know how she met him or how she got her contract. I know how I got mine. Six Cylinder Love had closed when I heard that L. B. Mayer was on one of his regular trips to New York. I made a date to see him. "I shouldn't even talk to you," was his greeting. "Why not?" I asked. "I've wired you three picture offers— you turned me down." "And you know why. How could I leave a home, a husband, and a son? "Well, you haven't got a husband now." "True. So now I can come to Hollywood." "Oh, but now you're too rich for my blood. I can't afford your thousand dollars a week." "All right. Can you afford to pay my expenses?" "What are they?" I picked up pad and pencil, figured out what I had to have in 124