Photoplay (Jan - Jun 1941)

gentleman farmer. He likes to look at it and be a part of it, but he hates puttering around with rakes and hoes and his agricultural knowledge could be hidden in a mustard seed. The farm-worrying is left to the caretaker and Bob is content to play the proud young landlord, pointing out the budding fruit and telling you that someday it will all be his. All new tenants have an irrepressible itch to make alterations and Bob and Vivi Cummings are not exceptions. One of these days they're going to do things to the barn-playhouse. This clapboard structure — 60 x 22 feet — has been painted green inside and out and furnished neatly into a combination office-dining-roomkitchen-rumpus-room. Eventually to be partitioned, this huge room currently houses the Cummingses' fanmail department consisting of tables, shelves and an old-fashioned roll-top desk left by Bob's father; a dining-room suite with a large refrigerator near by in which cold cuts and watermelons are kept; two Ping-pong tables and a variety of other odds and ends. Bob takes his fanmail seriously and one or two evenings a week he and Vivi work in the fanmail department in the barn-playhouse. FATE conspires in inexplicable ways to order our lives. When Billie Burke decided to produce in 1933 an edition of the Ziegfeld Follies in memoriam to her deceased husband she unwittingly determined an important event in the lives of Robert Cummings, stage juvenile, and Vivian Janis, dancing comedienne. It was in this show that they first met and, later, when their itinerary took them to Akron, Ohio, they married. Then Bob came to Hollywood and hoaxed it into discovering one of its most talented young actors. (The hoax has since become a classic: Paramount casting about for a juvenile with a native Southern accent fell hard for Bob's conveniently acquired Texas drawl and conveniently concocted story of his Southern background. He gave a memorable performance in "So Red the Rose" before the hoax was revealed and he was forgiven all.) Admiring his wife's exceptional talent for mimicry and mindful of her fine record on Broadway, Bob has been disappointed that Hollywood has overlooked Vivian Janis, but Vivi now and then satisfies her own desire for self-expression by doing things at the Pasadena Playhouse under the name of Vivi Lind. She adopted the new surname because she is of Swedish descent and Jenny Lind is one of her idols. The daily life of the Cummingses is marked by complete accord in temperament, taste and inclinations. They derive genuine enjoyment from playing with each other at parcheesi, backgammon, pick up sticks and even tiddlywinks; they spend hours together swimming, at which they're both expert. They are in complete agreement on political and philosophical viewpoints; both are vegetarians in principle and both adhere to the Unitarian Church. They don't like night clubs, golf or tennis, or big parties. They subscribe to no daily papers (getting their news from the radio and weekly Christian Science Monitor) and both are rabid flying enthusiasts. Of course, there are differences between Mr. and Mrs. Cummings, but they are minor ones: He is constantly irritated by her incurable habit of always being fifteen minutes late and she is forever admonishing him not to drink huge amounts of water with his meals. When they attend a sad movie she is annoyed by his strictly professional apathy. The Cummingses' circle of intimates in JANUARY, 1941 eludes the Jimmy Hogans (he's the Paramount director), the Billy Gilberts (the rotund sneezing comedian) and Oscar Cummins, prominent attorney and Bob's personal manager. Jointly with Billy Gilbert Bob has a full-sized wood-working shop at the former's Valley place, where they spend hours making both useful and useless gadgets. Every Friday night Bob has an inflexible standing date with Gilbert to attend the Hollywood Legion boxing matches. Their favorite fighter, for whom they root fervidly, is one George Latka, in private life a professor of psychology whose ring career is owned by George Raft. Born in Joplin, Missouri, of ScotchEnglish parentage, Bob received his public schooling there and later graduated in engineering at Carnegie Tech. Amateur and scholastic theatricals impregnated him with the footlight virus. Suddenly deciding on an acting career he was offered little resistance by his parents, Dr. Charles and Ruth Kraft Cummings. Several years ago his father died and when Bob was established in Hollywood his mother came out and settled in Los Angeles. His mother does not live with him because of her conviction that in-laws are of no help to the marital bliss of their children. Besides, she has her own world and her own interests. This tall, handsome and matronly woman is an ordained minister of the Unitarian Church and as the Right Reverend Ruth K. Cummings she presides over the Earnest Holmes Institute of Religious Science at 6th and New Hampshire streets, Los Angeles. Bob and Vivi, you see, come naturally by their spiritual leanings. Three years ago Bob was invited to reign as Orange King at the annual Orange Festival at Lindsay, California. He portrayed the symbolic monarch so well that ever since the invitation has been repeated. Finally it was decided that it might as well be a permanent reign. To cinch it the Lindsay air field was officially designated Bob Cummings Airport. And that brings us to Spinach II. Ten years ago Bob learned to fly. He took to it like a fledgling and a few years later, as soon as he accumulated enough money, bought himself his first plane. Being prejudiced in the manner of vegetables he painted the plane green and dubbed it Spinach I. Soon he met Vivi, married her, and got Spinach II. He taught Vivi how to fly; now they spend their free days roaming the skies. They fly on the slightest pretext, at nights, on Sundays, to San Diego for lunch, to Texas to visit friends, anywhere and for any reason. Bob, acknowledged one of Hollywood's most skillful flyers, has the unique distinction of being the only private pilot in the country with an instructor's license. The U. S. Army has commissioned him in the Air Corps Reserves. Hanging on the wall of the barn-playhouse are three airplanes in miniature — models of the first Spinach, the second, and the third, which will shortly be delivered to him. There you have the Cummingses — Bob and Vivi. In this narration of how they live there are no swimming pools, no night clubs or Elsa Maxwellian parties, no champagne or liveried chauffeurs — no "going Hollywood." Instead, there are four quiet acres in San Fernando Valley, a flexible vegetarian diet, a wistful-eyed monkey, tranquil evenings in a shaded patio with a few good friends, two concrete deer and hours in the sky wondering what all the fuss is about down below. A farrago of interests, sensibly approached, quietly pursued, zestfully enjoyed. Stay Glamorously Free From Shine With MINER'S LIQUID MAKEUP, you, too, can have a face which men admire . . . always velvety-smooth and exquisitely shine-free, without frequent powder-puffing. Use it as complete all-day make-up or powder base, as you prefer. 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