Modern Screen (Dec 1949 - Nov 1950)

Advertisement Heard? JOAN LANSING June nights are made for spooning and manin-the-mooning, but morning hours mean dishes and dusting — and time out for the SUPER SEVEN! Yes, ma'am, that's what you hear on your local ABC station — SEVEN SUPER SHOWS full of exciting entertainment to make the housework fly. Fresh as a June bud is our favorite man-of-the-morning, DON McNEILL, the lad who makes "THE BREAKFAST CLUB" (sponsored by Swift, General Mills and Philco, 9-10 AM, EDT) a cheerful way to start every weekday. DON and the BREAKFAST CLUB GANG skip around the breakfast table with the greatest of ease ... all of which pleases the gals who like a merry program pick-up in the morning. Incidentally, DON and his cute wife KAY are off to Europe for six weeks of seein' the sights . . . and that means we'll be getting first-hand news of what's going on in England, France, Switzerland and all the other countries through which the McNEILLS travel. At 10:30 AM, EDT, America's favorite homemaker, BETTY CROCKER, gives food, fashion and decorating hints on her famous "MAGAZINE OF THE AIR." BETTY is always sure to have tips that make housekeeping lighter and brighter. General Mills sponsors the "BETTY CROCKER MAGAZINE OF THE AIR." Another highlight of the SUPER SEVEN ABC programming is Serutan's VICTOR LlNDLAHR heard every day at 10:45 AM, EDT, giving expert advice and comment on nutrition and good living through good health. The modern miss enjoys ABC's "MODERN ROMANCES" at 11 AM, EDT. This half hour of romance combines all the features of dramatic heart-throb, suspense and thrills. AUNT JEMIMA'S boy, BILL CULLEN, comes around with "QUICK AS A FLASH" at 11:30 AM, EDT, with questions and prizes and cash ... a breezy audienceparticipation show that's a real honey. At high noon, EDT, ohJOHNNY OLSEN says "LADIES BE SEATED" for music, fun, and audience and listener frolic (for Philip Morris Cigarettes) . . . and at 12:25 PM, EDT, lovelv CAROL DOUGLAS makes "BEAUTY AND FASHIONS" a daily five-minute twin delight for the Toni Company. Yes, ma'am, any day in June (or July or any month) tune to your local American Broadcasting Company station and hear marvelous morning shows . . the kind of wonderful entertainment and variety that rate as the SUPER SEVEN! ebon Laosioop "Do you think this will be all right for London?" A customer came in and Ava ducked for the rear of the shop. "Wasn't that Ava Gardner?" the lady asked. "Gosh no," I replied. "That's sort of an idiot cousin of mine. She likes to come in and pretend she looks like a movie star." Ava came back in a few minutes and I went out for a coke. When I came back she was struggling to get a size forty into a size fourteen dress. After we lost the customer I said, "How much can you kid anybody?" She shrugged. "Poor gal, I didn't want to hurt her feelings. I hope that sometime when I'm twenty years older somebody will flatter me like that." Funny thing about Ava. She can call up a producer and talk to him right smack out in language that would give pause to a truck driver. She'll face up to the big shots and make them back down. I've seen her go out of her way to be friendly with outspoken people in the industry and watched them warm up to her in a flash. Usually their attitude toward stars is an unspoken you-stay-on-your-side-of-thefence-and-I'll-stay-on-mine. They seem to sense in her a person who wants to be liked. But she seeks friends outside of the industry, people who'll accept her as just another girl. When Ava finally reads this she's liable to bat me right over the head with her copy of Modern Screen. I haven't meant to make it appear as though she's wandering around like a lost doll in a sea of bitterness and confusion. She is a completely competent actress and confident in the knowledge that she has developed a craftsmanship second to few in her profession. The nice part of it is that unlike many another top star her eminence in the profession doesn't cause her to look on other people as though they were termites crawling out of the woodwork. who, me? . . . One day I stopped to say hello as she sat in the studio commissary. She was at a secluded table with Howard Duff, and at her most beautiful best. Her Irene gown was the clinging kind that seemed to know it had something worthwhile to cling to. Her hair was smartly set in an upsweep and her only jewelry was a pair of diamond earrings, the graceful, dangling kind. During our chat I asked if she had seen one of our mutual friends. "Oh, her," Ava said. "I refuse to talk about her." "What happened? An argument? Did you steal one of her men?" "Are you kidding, Leslie?" she laughed. "Why, I'm terribly fond of her. It's just that she's so beautiful I'm afraid to sit in the same room with her." She was joking, but not completely. Ava Gardner has never thought she possessed incredible charm and she hates to have people tell her she's beautiful. To understand, you'd have to come with me to her home early some morning and find her sitting in the tiny dining room, hair piled frumpily on top of her head^ sipping coffee, answering the phone and waiting for the daily barrage of requests from newspapermen and photographers. Tell her she's beautiful. Go ahead. She'll laugh in your face. She'll probably tell you the truth— that her first date back in high school never called again. That almost any girl can be beautiful when she has high style clothes and years of polish as the result of being educated by studio makeup men. You'll listen to her, but you won't believe her even when you know that she believes it herself. When the cameramen come, she'll pour herself into a ravishing gown and earnesth work with them to preserve what sh< thinks is an illusion. Then she'll tell yoi that this glamour is just window dressing —that the night before she didn't have ; date. That in the middle of the night she went hiking alone in the hills. Ava, having skipped the normal socia life that comes to most girls, now can' enjoy cronies. She doesn't know how tc loaf around with friends. She has toe many defenses to ever relax her guard She's glamour plus and she's lonely with i loneliness that can't be cured by jumping across the subtle lines of social distinctior in Hollywood. "You see," she said recently, "this business of acting takes up a murderous amoun of time and I'll admit that I'm paid wel enough for it. Still, I seldom have the opportunity to develop friendships witr other girls. I don't have time for luncheons and card parties." That's why she finds companionship ir places like the dress shop. At one time she looked at a stunning dress hanging in the window. "I'd like to buy that creation and wear it to Mocambo tonight," she said "that is, if I had a date." "Too bad," I jeered. "I'll bet your phone rings twenty times tonight." "Maybe," she admitted, "but the man I d like to call me won't. He'll be like that friend of yours who thought I had too much money. Then there'll be a couple of the other kind who'd like to get their hands on the bankroll I haven't got." "Uh-huh," I agreed. "And the good old tired business man who wants to be seen with a celebrity and get his name in the columns." "Not to speak of the monster type," Ava added. "There'll be about six of those. They ve been turned down seventeen times by names beginning with A in their little black books. Along about seven-thirty they'll get down to the G's, and about that time I'll get into my slacks and take a hike into the hills." "I get your point," I said, "but you'll hit the right type one of these days. All you have to do is keep on breathing. What gets me is will you know him when you do?" She thought that over. "I've never been hard to please. The thing I want most is companionship and loyalty— a man who'll always be in my corner. I'm tired of going through life afraid of displeasing someone I love." Ava is not really afraid of men. She's afraid of failing them. She'd rather not marry than risk another divorce. Men aren't afraid to take that risk with her. Give a smart man two dates and he'll propose. He figures that with a girl as reasonable and intelligent as Ava they can make a go of it together. What he doesn't realize is that this enchanting girl has spoiled his tuning. He'd have to know her for a couple of years before he, himself, would be able to handle her emotionally. But let's not be ridiculous. Somewhere there's a man for Ava— and she'll find him. When she does, she wants to have three children and a house in Pasadena. -And right now I'll go out on a sturdy limb to say that all of her fears will fade away with the sound of the wedding bells, because none of her fears are strong enough to beat real love. The End Paid Notice AFRAID you'll be an OLD MAID? SEE PAGE 69