Hollywood (1942)

«<*' 1^I& C*° Diana Lewis hopes (hut the leading role she has in Metro's Whittling, In Dixie will break the long-time jinx that's been hovering over her. Until then, she's got her fingers crossed ■ Of all the starlets in Hollywood, you would think that the one to whom success would be served on a silver platter would be Diana Lewis. Married to Bill Powell, enjoying a social position where she swaps olives at the same dinner table with the most important picture people in town, and being extremely pretty besides, it should be duck soup for Diana to get a picture break. If that's the tune running through your mind, you'd better change it. For Diana won her first good role in Whistling in Diane with Red Skelton — by blood, sweat and tears — her own. Diana has tried to get a break in pictures since she was fifteen, but she has had so many false starts, that a less ambitious soul would have ditched the project. "Now I've got my fingers crossed." she grinned. "But if I hit the bumps again. I'll do what I've done before — brush myself off and start all over again." Diana's first contact with Hollywood came when she visited her sister Maxine. who was singing there. Fifteen-year-old Diana made a beeline for the studios, but no one would hire her. Tiny and babyfaced, she looked like a mite of thirteen. It was only after she landed a job as a chorus girl and outmugged all the other girls, that a Paramount talent scout gave her the goahead. "I thought it was my big chance," she said. "I was patted on the head and sent to the studio dramatic school with two other promising newcomers, Ray Milland and Ann Sheridan. After making several pictures, I was going along fine — when suddenly I stopped. Just like that. I never was told what happened, but there I was — out. "After I got over my hurt feelings, I joined several little theater groups and knocked myself silly in them, doing everything from adolescents to old hags. Bill Grady, M-G-M scout, sent for me. and I was sure this would be my chance. But when I went to his office he was swatting flies. For half an hour he swatted flies, then looked up and said, 'I saw the show. Thanks for coming in. Goodbye.' He went 23 back to swatting flies. I was chagrined, but not discouraged. "I joined up as singer with a band," Diana continued, "and when we got to Texas (wouldn't you know it? ) , I received a wire from Warners to report at the studio. I had been there three years ago, and someone suddenly thought of me. So I made quick tracks back to Hollywood. "My big opportunity at last! I signed a contract, even did the lead in one of their 'B' pictures, and was so excited I used to report an hour before the gateman opened the doors! I went through the works — diction, dramatics, bathing suit art and so on, which meant the studio was giving me a build-up. I couldn't have been happier. Then one day, an assistant director came up to me on the set and said. 'Your option wasn't taken up. As of tonight you're through!' Plunk— I came down to earth again. "When I picked myself up, I learned that Milton Bren was about to produce Housekeeper's Daughter and wanted me for the lead. In the book, the daughter is a fifteen-year-old love-crazy scatterbrain. I tested, Bren was sold and said the part was mine. It was just the role I dreamed of. I was walking on air. Two days before the picture was to start, old lady jinx caught up with me. Milton Bren left the studio! He was my chief booster and without him I was left high and dry. The other producer wanted a big name and the part went to Joan Bennett." Diana sighed. "Let's draw the curtain over my feelings then. I was groggy from all those knockout blows, but still punching. This time it was producer Edward Small who thought I was a find. He signed me to a long term contract and talked about putting me into My Son, My Son. I was even fitted to the costumes. Thistimenothing short of an act of God could stymie my chance. But, by heck, the act of God happened! A week before I was to report for work, the studio phoned me. 'England is now at war with Germany, so your contract is cancelled,' I was told. "There is a war clause in every contract, and it was my luck that war had to break out just then! My contract broken, there were no ties to hold the studio to their promises, and when the picture was made Laraine Day got the part. "That was the end. I was never going to face a camera. In the midst of this brooding, a call came from Bill Grady again. He had seen one of my tests and was interested. This time I got a contract. Hallelujah! "Did I play opposite Taylor? Did I push Crawford off the map? Of course not. I spent the first month posing in bathing suits. Then I met and married Bill Powell. Some people thought that my marriage to a prominent star would clinch my chances, but that was far from true. Bill has never used his influence to help me get a role, and I have never asked him to. When we married we had an understanding that I would handle my own career and do my own battling. And as for the Hollywood producers I have met as Mrs. Powell, that means nothing. If I ask them about a certain role they stop me with: 'Honey, you don't want to work, do you?' Because they know me socially, they don't take me seriously. "After my marriage," Diana related, "I was given a part [Continued on page 33]