The educational screen (c1922-c1956])

From Hollywood Conducted by M. T. O. "That Long Fence" HE average motion picture lot in California consists of a large num- ber of acres of assorted real estate nclosed by a long, tall fence. Sometimes is just a plain fence; more often it is a ence p<lus —surmounted by a row or two f highly efficient-looking barbed wire. If you are an ordinary human being with healthy, normal curiosity, that long, tall ence exerts for you an irresistible attrac- ion whenever you see it. As you look lown its forbidding length, you wonder md you wonder what it is they do inside. 3i course you know in a general way. Vou've read articles in the magazines on he movies and how they are made. You are familiar with all the movie stars and their salaries. You like the movies; at one time you've even gone so far as to assert that you believed you wouldn't care to visit a movie studio, because it might spoil your illusions. That was some time ago, per- haps—before you saw that fence. But now, there it is. It does intrigue you. It goes on and on; it turns an abrupt corner —and goes on and on. After a very long time, you will find, if you follow it, that the fence does one of two things. It either culminates impres- sively in a pillared and ornamented gate- way, or it terminates inconspicuously in a small, dark doorway. (This is the first time you have known there was anything small about the movies.) But whichever happens, the effect, as far as you are con- cerned, is the same: in either case you re- main outside. If you like—and in your state of mind you do like—you may watch from the shelter of a palm tree across the street, those who are privileged to pass through that magic gate. You will no doubt see curious things. You may glimpse the lovely lady star, wrapped in sables though it be August, her languid glance just touching the tops of the heads of some idle gentle- men in puttees who are grouped in conver- sation around a pepper tree. You have inferred that they are directors, but as the lovely lady does not deign to notice them, you now infer that they are perhaps only assistant directors. You may see the blond gentleman star, of the bulging chest, leap- ing from his shiny roadster with one ath- letic bound, and reaching the doorstep with another. You may see a truck back up to a great black opening that yawns unexpect- edly in a hitherto blank wall, and unload a singular assortment of meaningless stuff. But all this does not satisfy you. That fence! It still shuts you out from that strange world, that amazing mixture of the real and the make-believe—the place where they make the movies. You have only touched the edges of it; and as you turn reluctantly away, a man passes you—an ordinary sort of person, not one that you would accord a second glance. And yet— Something you can not help pulls your head around, and you look back. Why, he's gone! Did he go through that door? Did he? He must have. You wonder who he was; you thought all the time he had a sort of different look. Did he look like ? No, he must have been . You wish you had noticed him a little more closely. Oh, well, you will not make that mistake again. Nor do you! You develop a habit of staring everybody completely out of counte- nance. You take everybody all in; your neck becomes supple from much twisting; but you see the movie stars, if there are any in your vicinity. 331