From under my hat (1952)

Ever notice that when bad days come all your hard luck seems to have been waiting to fall on you like a ton of brick? Reveling in a seven-year contract at MGM, I lost it. I wasn't a star, only a featured player in support of the big shots. I was the mean woman who made the stars look good. I've slapped more children, tumbled down more houses of cards, kicked over more building blocks, and rapped more innocent knuckles than any female fiend in an old-time orphanage. In England some called me "The Major General" because I was the perennial fixer-upper. I was also the matron forever on the make; the title-hunting mama, daughter in one hand, checkbook in the other. When there were such dames in scripts, Metro formed the pleasing habit of saying, "Okay, get Hopper in here." On the screen I looked ridiculous, but the money was nice. I must have gone to L. B. Mayer no less than a score of times and said, "Why must I always play a slitch?" He'd say, "We can't have a bitch playing a bitch. A woman who looks like a lady makes those parts bearable, believable." Do you wonder why I've always said Mayer was a better actor than anyone he had under contract? "But why must I play them all?" I'd yell. I never played a good woman on the screen till after my contract with Metro was finished— and then for free in a short subject for the benefit of crippled children. Being under contract to Metro gave you a "high rating." A player on the list at the top studio was in demand everywhere. Then, if you weren't working on the home lot and another studio had a part for you, you were loaned out. You got your salary; the studio got half as much 21 229