Picture Play Magazine (Mar-Jul 1929)

64 The shy newcomer from Budapest has been transformed into an active American girl. Vilma Banky at home is just the gracious mistress of the La Rocque household. BESIDES her rise to stardom, and the success she has achieved within the last four years, Vilma Banky deserves credit for at least two or three other laudable virtues she is already known to possess. Where other European importations flared over the cinema horizon, flashing temperamental wings of egotism, Vilma remained quiet and essayed to learn the manners and ways of the people she had come to live among. Because it is supposed to be good business to startle the public with sensations of one kind or another, and to dazzle the film colony in general, stars have lived in an artificial atmosphere even when away from the studios. Vilma has avoided all that. She is one of the few who refuse to glitter. The first time I met her was at Santa Monica. I had gone to spend a Sunday with the Victor Varconis at their beach club. Vilma accompanied Mrs. Varconi. She was dressed in white, which made her look Ske Refuses Though a full-fledged star, Vilma Banky avoids the usual innate simplicity of her tastes, and because of her rare when she finishes the B? William wraithlike. The sun lit up her golden hair, and the whole effect caused my poor senses to swim and swim. Vilma was quiet at first. She had little to say. It was obvious that this shyness was natural with her. I was quiet, too. But I had been stricken dumb by her ethereal loveliness. She gradually spoke of Europe, then of America, and how strange the place seemed to her. I cannot remember what she said, word for word, but the purport of it was the bewilderment she felt at everything around her. She was also a little homesick. Her brother Julius might come for a visit. She would like to see him. She wished her parents were with her, too. Wise to the ways of cinematic Hollywood, my thoughts ran something like this. "You are quite new to Hollywood. Will you become like the rest — go in for show and pomp, and lose your innate simplicity?" Thus the philosopher philosophized, although such thoughts seemed like sacrilege. When she arrived in New York, the press took no notice of this unknown, young beauty. She was a pleasant, but slightly plump, girl. Many scribes had their doubts as to how she would fit into pictures. Some even maliciously expressed their doubts in print. Vilma rarely went to parties. One hardly ever saw her in the nightly spotlight. Nevertheless, when "The Dark Angel" was released, she was acclaimed one of the screen's most dazzling figures. The events leading up to her marriage with Rod La Rocque are well known, and need not be mentioned here. Every fan was interested, because the fair Vilma's name had never been connected with that of any one else — a startling thing in Hollywood. Vilma and Rod are the ideal couple of the fantastic cinemetropolis. In time I came across Vilma at various i times — at the Varconi home, or elsewhere. Her shyness had disappeared, but not her reserve. She was always bright and humorous, and would make fun of many things in her work. Since her marriage I did not see her to speak to, until just after she had completed her latest picture, "This Is Heaven." No one was to blame for this oversight but myself. She came swiftly into the room. "Hello there, what's the news?" was her greeting. I raised my brows. The same shy Vilma — a strange newcomer from Budapest? Rather a young American just from New York. No longer was there a homesick person before me, but a very-much-at-home individual.