The international photographer (Jan-Dec 1935)

Eight The INTERNATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER January, 1935 CINEMACARONI By ROBERT TOBEY (With sauce for those who like it.) HOLLYWOOD HONEYMOON A novel novel of a thousand and one nights in a dace. by R. THRIT1S The characters: Phooey on you. Read last issue. Or wait for next month's install incut. Synopsis of preceding chapters. All you need to know for this installment is that Perrizvether Murgle, press-agent for the beautiful screen star, Lili Liverblossom, is hanging from a pipe outside Lili's apartment house. The situation isn't what you're thinking at all, as you'll find out if you read the back installments. Nevertheless, Perri is in a tough spot. A large eagle has come to inspect him, and Pern is endeavoring to cajole the eagle into carrying him to the ground. The eagle is a little dubious. But isn't that life for yout CHAPTER III. — Wings of Vengeance, or Something. "I don't know that 1 should help you down," said the Eagle. "You look like a pretty heavy dish. Besides, 1 might get in trouble with the Carrier Pigeons' Union — Local No. 3 7, if I remember correctly," he murmured. He looked at Perri's cocked hat and that gave him an idea; he cocked his eye speculatively toward Perri. "What is there in it for me?" he said slyly. "Just a minute," said Perri, "I'll look." With some difficulty he took off his hat. After a moment of pondering, he said, dubiously, "About all I see is a couple of telephone numbers and a sign reading 'THIS HAT STOLEN FROM ME." I think it says 'Artificially Colored and Flavored," too," he added brightly. "Is that any help to you?" The Eagle started to wheel away again, curling its beak in a sneer — no small feat for a full grown eagle. Perri was still staring into his hat. He had begun to evolve an idea. The Eagle, he had noticed, was of the family Haliaeetus Leucocephalus — a Bald Eagle. "My grandfather," reminisced Perri softly, but not too softly, "was an inventor. He concocted a fluid that would cure baldness." Hastily uncurling its beak the Eagle turned about with pathetic eagerness. "That," said Perri, "was fair play." "What was fair play?" inquired the Eagle. "Turn about," said Perri brightly. "Come, what about that cure?" snapped the Eagle, tired of all this nonsense. "I happen to have a small phial of it with me," replied Perri, whipping out a pint of pre-repeal Scotch. "This," he remarked, gazing fondly at the object in his hand, "will raise hair on a billiard ball." The Eagle's face fell, but with a quick motion he scooped it up again. "What has that to do with me," he asked plaintively. "1 can't turn myself into a billiard ball just to accommodate your grandfather." "You can pretend you're a billiard ball, can't you?" said Perri severely. "Not only that," he added, pressing his point (and Perri always kept his points well pressed), "but if I am not taken down from here pretty soon, otherwise known as pronto, I am going to whip out another eagle mating call and let the devil take the hindmost, willy-nilly." A little startled at being so rapidly recognized, Willy Nilly suddenly relented. "I'll take you down, Perri," he said, "but please don't tell my wife." "Of course 1 won't, Willy," said Perri magnanimously, knowing full well he couldn't tell the Eagle's wife from a hole in the ground, or from a hole-in-one, or from any old port in a storm. Or, for that matter, even from any old sherry. With one fell swoop, the Eagle dropped toward Perri. Perri closed one eye slowly and gazed at the talons outstretched toward him. "A very talonted fellow, I might guess," said Perri, tongue in cheek — and a silly place to keep it, 1 must say. With a shriek of hysteria, or perhaps even of apple blossoms, Willy Nilly buried his claws in Murgle's vest and, with a tremendous flapping of wings, tore him loose from the pipe and carried him off across the desert. As he flew, the Eagle looked down upon Perri with a malignant gleam in his eye. Another gleam in each eye, and that would have been a malignant two-more. (ll'liaf will the Eagle do with Peril? Is our hero destined for a fate worse than death? Or will everything be hunky-dory, as Perriwether predicted? And what will become of lovely Lili, still marooned on the mantelpiece? See next issue right away. Or wait till it's published — what's it to me!) . There has been tremendous speculation over the sea monster found recently in British Columbia. Scientists are toiling to reconstruct the remains of the frightful creature, dead for many weeks. Fishermen and ships' captains shake their heads in bewilderment. Scientific societies send delegates to ponder over the find. * * * Much ado about nothing. Probably just a film censor that took up swimming. On current theatre marquees : SHE LOVES ME NOT SHE LEARNED ABOUT SAILORS * * * ONE NIGHT OF LOVE THAT'S GRATITUDE Have you ever noticed when two cameramen are talking together on the set they are never discussing cinematography? I recently overheard Joe Walker and George Kelley thoroughly dissecting the subject of corn-cures. George had an idea and Joe didn't seem to think so much of it. "Well',' said George. "I ought to know what I'm talking about — one of my ancestors traveled with William the Corn-curer." "And 1 suppose," said Joe, "he was the one that wrote the first book on Phoot-ographv!" NEW ROAD TO SUCCESS. (From a current periodical.) Mr. Henry Waxman, portraitist supreme, claims that many motion picture stars go dead when they pose for the still camera. Mr. Waxman had to bump Helen Hayes under the nose with his finger to bring her to life. That made her mad. Being mad made her vivacious. That was how he wanted her. * * * Puckish Mr. Waxman. GEMS FROM STUDIO PRODUCTION SCHEDULES: THE GIRL FRIEND, No. 3 Another Hollvzvood Romance. * * * LADY OF NEW YORK (If You Could Only Cook) * * * Our daily puzzle. SURE FIRE Shelved. * * * ONCE A GENTLEMAN $25.00 AN HOUR Not bad for these times. * * * UNKNOWN WOMAN I'LL LOVE YOU ALWAYS Seems like a waste of effort. * * * MAN PROOF A FEATHER IN HER HAT But little in her stomach. * * * GRACE MOORE No. 2 Well, imitation is the sincerest flattery. KNEE-CAP REVIEWS (No space left on my thumb-nails) Get out your diving suits. Gentlemen and Ladies of the Cracker Barrel, and go to see two of the greatest tear-jerkers since Eliza scurried across the ice with the chee-ild in her arms. The two I mean, in order of perfection, are "The White Parade" and "Imitation of Life."' Tears will flow copiously, the sobbing all around you will be nerve-wracking, and you'll have the sniffles for a week, but you'll love them. "Imitation of Life" does an excellent job of dissecting one phase of the negro, or race, "problem." The film offers no panaceas, but it does show us a bit of the little hell we whites have made for those negroes who long for the equality so blithely promised all who bask in the benign shadow of the American Constitution. Claudette Colbert gives her customary delightful, breathtakingly real performance. Warren William, although he has not yet comb ed out the last vestiges of his staginess, is excellent. Louise Beavers is priceless as the faithful colored mammy, and Fredi Washington, technically the true heroine of the story, performs excellently and certainly does not deserve to be ignored in the billing as she is. Neither does Rochelle Hudson deserve to be mentioned last like this, as she is quite scrumptious, a splendid little actress, and within a year may easily become, as that noted commentator Louella O. Parsons recently remarked, one of our outstanding film actresses. As for "White Parade," I cannot say too much for it. It is superb. The picture is put together like a fine piece of mosaic. For every sob there is a chuckle, and the story is human and real throughout. Loretta Young's is the outstanding performance. Loretta is beautiful enough to get by in a deaf-mute's country, but she gives a performance here that definitely stamps her as a fine actress. John Boles does as well as possible with a necessarily thankless and inconsequential role. The photography is notable. Both of these pictures arc playing to capacity houses. And when John Public pays to go in a theatre and cry, prosperity is with us again. Mr. Samuel Bayuk, omniscient manufacturer of cigars, visits fair Hollywood and assures us that progressive womanhood has taken up cigar smoking in earnest; he eloquently describes how cigars are poised adroitly in well-manicured hands as women converse in Eastern drawing rooms. t * * Mr. Bayuk, I have not doubt, is a man of integrity. It should scarcely be conjectured that the zvish fosters the tale. But the movies will never go for the idea. The dear public couldn't single out the villain in a picture if it weren't for his big black cigar. * * * Besides, think of dainty Lilian Harvey pushing a big cigar along with her 87 lbs. Or Mary Pickford, or Janet Gaynor. * * * But then, of course, there is Mae West. THE MACARONI BOWL— Mickey Rooney, even at his tender age, has bald spots above his forehead. But it is not due to the California sun. Mickey has to wear two horns for his part of "Puck" in "Midsummer Night's Dream" for the Related Warner Boys, and his hair has to be shaved off where the horns are attached * * * June Knight is suing Paul Ames for half his income after twelve days of marriage. She should have been a little more patient, suffered along for another twelve days — and then sued for the whole salary * * * Mary Carlisle's outstanding characteristic is her effervescence. She bounds around like an animated rubber ball. Bounce up and see us sometime. * * * Even on these brisk days, the Apollo Health Club is popular with the movie stars. They go to the club, zvhich is on top of a tweh'e-story building, to exercise and keep in trim. * * * The other day Mitchell and Durant were up there, practising gags. Those tzvo really take a lot of punishment in working out their routines. * * ', * Creighton Chaney zvas doing back-bends and tzvists that only one athlete in five hundred can do. * * * Super-athlete Harry G.reen got himself all set in a sun-bathing costume (consisting of just shorts) — and then found himself a shady spot and played cards! * * * Joe E. Brown, Albert Conti, and Paul Kelly spend most of their time playing handball. * * * El Brendel got himself all tangled up in a rubber skip-rope for the benefit of a nezvsrcel. You wouldn't think a comedian had to keep fit. But El Brendel is in tiptop shape. I picked up the skip-rope and couldn't even stretch it. * * * Of course you know about the small-town bright boy who thought he could crash Hollywood as a sound engineer, because he'd always been such a good mixer at home. And then there was the case of the new director who wanted to put a camera on waterwings to make a running insert of a duck swimming. But the joke of the season zvas on the hungry extra who drank from the nitro-glycerinc can because someone told him it zvas "soup."