Movie Classic (Mar-Aug 1936)

Most people don't know that polo-playing is one of Leslie Howard's favorite sports. And most people don't know the things about him that this story reveals. In private life, he is a striking contrast to the character he plays in The Petrified Forest — a man who thinks he is tired of living. (And then he meets Bette Davis. And this time they both discover what great love is like — in a picture you aren't likely to forget.) By William Anthony LESLIE HOWARD is the suppressed desire of at least ten million women. Maybe fifty million. He has a i subtle something that other screen heroes lack — or did lack, until he appeared on the screen. He broke a rule and became something new in screen lovers. He made the caveman type of love-making look coarse, shallow and common. Without any obvious effort, he could approach a delicate situation delicately, not demonstrating every romantic impulse he was supposed to feel, but giving every woman who saw him the sensation of seeing a man heart-breakinglv in love. Women wanted to know more about this sensitive, finefeatured, blond chap who spoke the King's English. And the very discovery that he was from far-off England gave him added allure. There are legends in America to the effect that every Englishman is a gentleman. And when one Englishman after another came to the American screen, and their love-making was in the Howard pattern, the suspicion grew that Leslie must be the epitome of the typical Englishman. Leslie Howard Breaks the Rules He doesn't do things that Hollywood expect of stars. But he enjoys life! But in his latest picture, The Petrified Forest, he plays a modern American — a world-weary Easterner who has to wander all the way to Arizona to find a girl like Bette Davis and to live one of the strangest (and strongest) love stories ever filmed. Next lie is to play Romeo on the screen — to Norma Shearer's Juliet. And Romeo is not one specific kind of lover; he is a combination of all sensitive lovers, the world over, as long as the world lasts. So, obviously, Leslie can't be the typical Englishman. In fact, he denies that any such type exists. He probably wouldn't go out of his way to deny it, but put him on the spot and pin him down, as I did at a recent dressing-room luncheon, and he will deliver. He told me : "There is no such being as a typical Englishman. Or a typical American, either. I've played in every major town of the States, I think, but I've never yet met the chap that I could point to with pride and say, 'Ah! Eureka! The typical homo Americanns!' I've met the New England Yankee who would have drawn blood in Georgia, had he been proposed for the title of representing the American male — and vice versa ! "Now we Britons," he continued, "are a singularly unconventional lot, in a manner of speaking. We don't conform to any pattern. We have as many distinct types as you'd find here. Moreover, our colonials are as different, say, from a Yorkshire man as a tabby cat differs from a cheetah. I suppose we're susceptible to the influence of whatever region we're living in. They've always been great colonizers, the British. Look at the 'English colony' in Hollywood !" • "By the way, what do you think of this town?" "Eh?" commented Mr. Howard as a great apathy descended upon him. Leslie Howard has a reputation hereabouts for wandering. Ele likes [Continued on page 86 1 43