Hollywood (Jan - Mar 1943)

vent him from skipping out of his present set-up with the Messrs. Pine and Thomas, but it's not in his code to do so. "A handshake has a stronger hold on me than a legal piece of paper," Dick explains. Although Dick isn't the big name he once was, he has more fun now than he's ever had, and that's saying a lot. He's eliminating all the fuss and red tape that makes life complicated. He moved out of his large ranch house in San Fernando because it was too much trouble to maintain it, and now lives in what is probably the largest one-room apartment on top of Hollywood's leading hotel. Dick's as handsome today as he was during the days when he was cutting film capers with Clara Bow, and his sly whimsey plus a resistance to worry have made him one of the best-liked gentlemen in Hollywood. ■ He Knows His Business [Continued from page 49] "My father was a horse-breeder," he says. "And as soon as I could sit up, I was on a nag." After his parent died (Lynne was eleven), the boy ran away from home. "I've never been back since — except on a visit," he goes on. "I started to earn my living at that point. I began riding for money on what they called 'The Leaky Roof Circuit' — a series of half-mile tracks around the Middle West. Then I rode snow horses. I finally ended up in the Gentry Brothers Dog and Pony Show, riding 'Roman.' That's where a guy stands on two horses, with a pink ribbon in his hair." "I also blacked up and did an act in one of the troupe's side shows. I sang and danced and told jokes. (I'm still telling the same jokes!) This led to my first real professional job: as endman in the Ward and Wade Mastodon Minstrels. "In the meantime, I had gotten an education of sorts. I had put myself through grammar school, gone to Blees Military Academy in Menkon, Missouri, and had one year at the state university. Of course, I was a brilliant student!" he says, fixing you with an unflinching eye. The Mastodons were the beginning. After that Lynne really got his training. And, true to tradition, he got it the hard way. He played four years in musicals, doing one-night stands through the provinces around Chicago. During this period, he did every kind of a part. Then, came the revolution. "I turned square. I went into light comedy and began doing leading men in stock, supporting 'name' stars. And, at last," he continues, "in the parlance of the trade, I was 'taken notice of.' I was twenty-four years old when Oh, Boy! came along. I was what they laughingly call a 'hit.'" In the middle of the attendant festivities came the war. Lynne went into the Navy. He was an ensign on submarine patrol from Fire Island to Cape Hatteras, and later in the Azores. Alter the .armistice, of course, he went back to the theater. "For eight years," he says, "it seemed I could do no wrong. There is always a period like that in everyone's life, when you're so lucky that you begin to think you're infallible. Everything turns to gold. Then the holocaust hits you!" But try to find a holocaust in Lynne's life. For after a series of shows, he was brought out to Hollywood to-do Little Miss Marker with Shirley Temple. That was eight years ago. He's made five or six pictures a year ever since, has a "life contract" with Cecil B. DeMille, is scheduled for Paramount's Dixie with Bing Crosby, and will probably keep on working until the ripe old age of ninety-two. Lynne is about to do his first motion picture musical. He made his stage success as a song-and-dance man, but the moguls in the studios are now worried whether he can handle the assignment! This worry and any worry is laughable to Lynne. Not because he thinks he's so tremendous, but because he doesn't believe in it. "Worry only gets you ulcers," he says. "And my prime ambition in life is to avoid 'em. What good does it do to get all upset about things?" That's his philosophy, and he shows it on the screen. Because he is a quiet, simple guy, he stands out in the madhouse that is Hollywood. To him, acting is a serious business. When a troubled director sends for Overman, he knows that from then on the production is as good as colossal. ] ■ nd along with best wishes ... a Christmas suggestion: on your gift list, put lots of PHILIP MORRIS Cigarettes in gay Holiday packages . . . fine to give, fine to get, America's Finest Cigarette. Call for Philip Morris ! 57