Motion Picture Magazine (Feb-Jul 1927)

Russell Ball Ramon thinks one trouble with the screen is that the leading characters must always be young and beautiful. While it is age that is admirable . . . youth, for the most part, being inspid, empty of life BEFORE the curtain rises, permit me to make an announcement for the benefit of those of you who haven't programs. The following scene is laid in Santa Monica, California, nine years before the abduction of Aimee Semple McPherson. Or, for those of you who still reckon time by the birth of Our Lord, it is the year 1917 A. D. It is Amateur Night at the Bijou Theater. I wonder what that means to many of you, if at all. Peanuts are chirping, hot dogs are snapping, and the orchestra wails "Poor Butterfly" ! Electric fans beat waspish wings against the soggy heat. The audience is large, with susceptible pores, and perfume fills the air in Nature's own inimitable way. The manager appears with his collar on, for this is Amateur Night. His voice is clear and golden, due to several Sunkist orange drinks, and he announces, just as 56 With By Herbert Howe I do, "Laydees 'n Genlmum, I take pleshur t'night 'n 'ntradoosn' the flower of Lus Anjulus an' Sant' Monica local talent. . . ." There issues a local favorite who renders "Poor Butterfly." A saxophone artist renders it further. A juggler misses only three balls out of seven. A disciple of Booth doe; Kipling in a green spotlight. Two ballroom dancers (local society favorites) execute the Castle steps that won them three loving-cups and a shotgun in the Dreamland dance hall. Then a boy appears, bows gravely with unheeding smile, and sits down at the piano which two huskies have just lurched on. He sits motionless for seconds. . . . "Looks like he was prayin'," sniggers some one. His fingers touch the keys, and slowly out into that crackling din rolls Liszt's "Hungarian Rhapsody No. 8." . . . Pteiffer's "Inquietude" . . . "Etudes" of Chopin ... a Beethoven sonata. . . . The boy arises and gravely bows. There is numbed applause. . . . The manager bustles on. . . . Each talented performer of the evening will kindly pass before him, and, as he lays a hand on the head of each talented performer, the audience will kindly burst into applause according to their liking for the performance of said him or her. . . . The performers file by. Each in his (or her) turn receives a burst of applause, now rising, now falling. The boy appears, he smiles, and the audience forsaking gum and peanuts suddenly lets go with applause and roars of "Give him the prize !" . . . The manager beams and lifts the boy's hand to the audience. "This young genlmun," he howls, "wins the handsome prize of two dollars and a half — in cash." When Ramon was playing in "The Prisoner of Zenda," a carpenter ambled over to where he was standing on the set. "Say, ain't you the kid that rattled the ivories down at Santa Monica a few summers back?" "Yes," said Ramon. "Some entertainer you are," said the carpenter with respectful eyes. "Sonic entertainer." Hearing this, I thought of the many who worry about going over the heads of the public. Ramon, preoccupied in his own sense of beauty, never stops to think that other heads may not be as high as his. . . . There is a blind faith that never stops to question, but goes right over the head of reason. And we are told it works miracles. . . . The pity is that so few of us ever have a faith great enough to put to this test.