Modern Screen (Dec 1938 - Nov 1939 (assorted issues))

MODERN SCREEN trouble. Or "blessings in disguise," as Dick grinned. An abscessed ear had kept him home three days from his very first picture. It was just a danger signal from a pair of badly infected tonsils. Under the strain of making the next two pictures at once —"The Hound of the Baskervilles" and "Stanley and Livingstone" — the septic throat sent him home to bed. An operation was the doctors' verdict, but by now the tonsils were far too swollen to take out. When they quieted down, Dick finished "The Hound of the Baskervilles," then went into the hospital. He had hemorrhages of the throat that no doctor in town could stem for three days. Along toward the end, his life hung in the balance. A couple more hours of bleeding and Dick wouldn't have had to worry about himself or his career for a long, long time. He rallied, however, and finally pulled through. But Dick was still as weak as an anemic cat when he went into "Here I Am A Stranger." He worked six days. On the seventh he drew a bye and stayed home to fool around his car. Dick lives in a hillside place and the garage driveway tilts at a sharp angle. He was fixing the front bumper on his car when another up the hill slipped its emergency brake. It rolled down on him, crushing Dick between the two cars. In the hospital again, the report on Dick's mangled leg was serious. All the ligaments had been ripped from the bones, the mashed flesh was a dark mass of bursted blood vessels. Quickly the leg ballooned to thrice its normal size and turned a ghastly black and blue. If it had become infected, Dick would have lost it. Luckily it didn't. As it was, he lay for a solid month with the leg hoisted up in a sling. It was another month before he could hobble on crutches. He still wears his steel brace and spends every lunch hour taking diathermy. He can't stand for more than a few minutes in a scene. Doctors tell him his leg won't be fully sound for another two years. That means the tennis, riding, hunting and other active sports Dick loves will be out, because any undue strain on the weak muscles might cripple him for good. On the financial side, the whole business has run into important money, and Dick isn't in the four-figure pay check class yet by any means. His salary stopped, too, the minute the picture shut down. But if you think any of these things has made Richard Greene downhearted in the slightest degree, you have several more guesses coming. His face is a little drawn, it's true; perhaps he's not quite so pretty. But his grin is just as ready Millions of people keep Alka-Seltzer in their homes because it is ONE remedy that is good for many common ailments. It is so pleasant to take — so prompt in action — so effective for headache, upset stomach, muscular fatigue, acid indigestion or the discomforts of a cold. Just get a package of Alka-Seltzer, and you'll be prepared for the relief Alka-Seltzer gives from pain and discomfort in any of these common troubles. Always keep a large package of Alka Seltzer in YOUR home. Every member of your family will use it — and like it, AT ALL DRUG STORES and sincere and the dimples are deeper, when he states that in his humble opinion Mr. Greene is a lucky guy — and for the very things that are bringing him sympathy. "I learned plenty mentally that more than compensates me for the physical crackups," explained Dick. "I had long days to read and plenty of nights to think, and believe me I used them. I used them to think back on the various phases of my life, and the Hollywood phase of last year particularly. My ambition has always been to live so that when I'm sixty years old I can look back on every part of my life and put a personal okay on what I did. I think I can now; I couldn't before. I think I know what I'm doing now, and I didn't before. I was in a daze, You know, if things had gone on as they were without these bad breaks, I might have become insufferably stuffy. I might have wandered around in a fool's paradise. "But now — well, for one thing," he continued, "I think I know now what I want out of life. I want to act, of course. I know I'm still pretty raw, and I want to get better. But more than that I want to be capable of enjoying life and living it to the fullest. I don't ever want to grow soft or tired. I don't ever want to forget my fifteen-dollar-a-week days. In a way, I'm sorry my Hollywood break came so early in my life. I would like to have been hard up a little longer. I mean that. The days when a little money in the pocket meant a week in Paris, a binge and some pretty girls, are the days I don't want to forget. I want to get a thrill out of buying a new suit of clothes, a hat, a new tie. I want to stay interesting to myself. "And to someone else? You mean romance?" Dick grinned. "Sure — all I can find! But marriage — not for five or six years anyway. I'm not that mature! "I want to see as much of the world as I can first, meet as many people as I can and find out as much as I can about them. I like Hollywood and I like making pictures. But if I lost my job tomorrow I wouldn't let it throw me for a minute. I know where I stand now and where I'm going. I'm relaxed about myself and confident. "And that knowledge, or philosophy or maturity or whatever you want to call it, that I found when I was laid up is a fair exchange for a bit of pain and danger and the discomfort of having to watch out for myself a while." Dick Greene rose to shuffle off into his scene and banged his game leg against the chair. "Ouchl" he yelped. Then he grinned. "I take it all back, I didn't mean a word I said," laughed Dick. But I think he was fooling. 87