Modern Screen (Dec 1948 - Oct 1949)

MYTHS STARS BELIEVE ABOUT THEMSELVES (Continued from page 36) their trapezes to something solid or they fly off into space. Orson Welles still rises grandly above mere matters of money and business. As a result, he's chronically busted. He's so wrapped up in his Olympian robes he pays no one else or their feelings any mind. Once during the war Orson staged a big Bond rally in Texas, with the Secretary of the Treasury, and half of Hollywood's biggest stars, lined up to put over the show. The stars rehearsed for days, then when the program came on, Orson talked so much himself that half of them never got a chance to peep into the mike! Orson's genius is still there beneath the lordly legend he's been living for years. He's just delivered a terrific performance as Borgia in Ty Power's picture, Prince of Foxes. But he can't lose his Superman mantle. Ever since Laurence Olivier scored so brilliantly in Shakespeare's Henry V, Orson's been going to outdo him or bust. He's busted once — when he made a Macbeth so weird it may never be released. He's going to tackle Othello this summer and Heaven knows what out -of -the -world twist he'll tack on that. razzle-dazzle . . . Only the other day Orson wanted some Hollywood stars to come over and do a picture with him in Paris. They have Orson's number by now; they cabled back, "For how long and for how much?" He answered them airily, rising above these mundane matters, "Paris is beautiful in the spring." Sure it is, but I don't see how the Man from Mars can observe that from way up where he perches beyond the clouds. I do wish he'd come down to earth! Now, I'm certainly not against the stars kidding themselves if it doesn't hurt their careers and if — particularly if — it tints Hollywood with some dash and color. As far as I'm concerned, characters like Errol Flynn and Victor Mature can go ahead and stage all the razzle-dazzles they want so long as nobody is really injured. Errol rode into Hollywood on a fabulous fiction of derring-do which set the stage for all the swashbuckling parts he's played since — and maybe for the life he's lived since, too. Being Irish and blessed with a vivid imagination, Errol had everyone who quizzed him drop-jawed with bloodcurdling tales — tales starring E. Flynn as the hero, of course — even before his first Hollywood movie came out. It's true enough that young Flynn had sailed around the South Seas a bit, adventured here and there in New Guinea, Tasmania and a few wild and woolly parts. But how Errol ever lived through those death defying ordeals he used to spin out by the yard without being a nine-lived cat, it's hard to figure. To hear Errol tell it — and he could always tell it — if a head-hunter wasn't after his handsome profile, a crocodile had designs on steak a la Flynn. He was either wrestling a python in the jungle or shinnying up a waterspout in a South Sea typhoon. The Perils of Pauline had nothing on Flynn and after a session with the boy you couldn't wait until next time to see what death defying yarn he'd come up with. Sometimes he'd get his facts a little mixed, and when you'd call him he'd grin disarmingly and wiggle out with a slick excuse — or maybe a new chapter. Once, Errol showed up with a patched noggin which, he explained, was the result of racing his speedy motor dashingly but too fast. The "auto accident," in that case, was actually champagne that his French wife, Lili Damita, applied — -still bottled — to Errol's scalp during one of their love spats. But who cares about facts where Errol Flynn is concerned? He's got the dash, charm and personality to carry the act and I, for one, hope he never drops it. And I wouldn't be surprised if that fanciful mind of his doesn't believe his own gay tongue, anyway. Other day I was asking him about the picture he wants to produce and star in, too, The Great Buccaneer. "It's the kind of thing I'm perfect for, Hedda," said the Flynn. "A pirate, in a sense, a sort of nautical Robin Hood. He steals from the rich and gives to the poor." "I suppose," I mentioned, "you know all about pirates." "As a matter of fact," brightened Errol, going right into stride, "once sailing the South Seas — did I ever tell you . . . ?" he started. "Yes, Errol," I told him, "you did. But I can't wait for the new, 1949 version." Victor Mature, after he ran around in fur rugs like an antediluvian Tarzan in One Million B.C., began pulling his famous "gorgeous hunk of man" act with a vengeance. He lived in a tent, you know, he surrounded himself with huge dogs, he let his hair wave in the breeze, he never covered, when possible, the whiskers on his chest. And — it certainly was no secret that Mister Mature was a devil with the women. He would flaunt his florid affairs to be sure they didn't bloom unseen. With a couple of Hollywood publicity pals, the Mature campaign kept in high gear right up until he joined the Coast Guard and took time out to fight a war. the doghouse ... There were society girls swooning at studio gates and stage doors and lovely ladies sneaking pass keys to his hotel rooms and what-all. Vic beaued Rita Hayworth around, before and between her battles with Orson, and their sweet secrets were an open book; Vic obligingly turned the pages when anyone inquired. The walls of his studio dressing room (which he called "the doghouse") were black with scrawled telephone numbers of bundles for Victor. (He called a painter frantically, I remember, the day before he got married and hustled him to that dressing room, pointed to the numbers. "For Pete's sake," urged Vic, "paint those out right away, will you?") Vic revelled in such critical snorts as "the overripe Romeo" and "hunk of man." And his lusty lover legend paid off. Well, Vic may believe his own theme yell of "Wolf, wolf" — but I don't. Do you know where he shines — really shines? Not as Don Juan with golden keys to milady's boudoir. But as a family man, supreme, thoroughly domesticated and loving his role of foster dad. (I think he's even stopped kidding himself by now.) Speaking of Victor Mature recalls the beautiful gal who's just finished playing Delilah to his Samson for Cecil B. De Mille. Hedy Lamarr, of course. I'm not sure how much of that glamor gush Hedy herself believed when she got the age-old Hollywood vamp build-up. Maybe that siren role in Algiers did turn her head a little. At least, after meeting Charles Boyer in the Casbah, Hedy had a stretch of fancying herself quite an actress and MGM had trouble from then on getting her to take direction and to play the parts they wanted her to. 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