Modern Screen (Dec 1954 - Dec 1955)

FALSE START Pity poor Miss Ally son, all dressed up with nowhere to go and all those people giggling! PERIODIC PAIN Menstruation is natural and necessary but menstrual suffering is not. Just take a Midol tablet, Mary, and go your way in comfort. Midol brings faster relief from menstrual pain— it relieves cramps, eases head ■ June Allyson can paint some of her most heartbreaking experiences with the lightest of brushes, and she does it so artfully that the worst of them become hilariously funny in the telling. One of the most embarrassing moments she ever lived through was her first night on the Broadway stage. The beginning of her career was the result of the dare of one of her classmates. A devoted fan of Astaire and Rogers, June had boasted that she could dance as well as they, and one plump-faced adolescent finally revolted. "Yah!" she said. "If you're so good, go get a job on the stage!" So June had gone to an audition where she was hardly visible among the tall, willowy veterans of the chorus line. For some reason beyond her ken, she was hired to fill in. The show was Sing Out The News, and for long weeks June rehearsed, or perhaps we should say "trained" with the chorus, for she had had only two dancing lessons in her life. The family was excited, of course. No less hysterical than June, her mother scraped the sugar bowl to buy a seat for herself (front balcony). In addition, she badgered all their friends into being present on the magic night when June made her Broadway debut. It was bad enough, being opening night. The jitters were prevalent backstage. June stood in a corner, going over the routine in her mind and hearing, as if from a distance, the persistent knocking of her knees. When the curtain went up the chorus line bounced front and center and began the intricate drill that opened the show. Once she got used to the lights, June happily realized the dance had been going on for two full minutes and she was not only still upright, but was actually in step. Then the music crescendoed for the finish. The line came together in the middle of the stage, advanced, then retreated. All but June. Missing her cue, she danced forward. And the curtain came down behind her. The dumbfounded orchestra leader signaled his men to begin the music again, and June desperately summed up her situation. It meant a solo — that much was certain — but it had to be a solo that would get her off the accursed stage. She cast a frantic look behind her and confirmed the suspicion that the separation in the curtain was invisible. She couldn't back off, so she figured a trip to the left might do it. The buck-and-wing was the only step she had really mastered, so hopefully she bucked and winged to the left. The curtain was the foremost one of the stage, and she couldn't get through. So she bucked and winged all the way to the right and found herself in the same predicament. Out front, the audience at first was hushed. Then as it began to realize something was wrong, a few titters turned into a roar. June's mother, surrounded by her friends in the balcony, was the shade of an overripe plum. And June, bucking and winging like a mighty mite, finally backed gratefully through the curtain as it mercifully parted to swallow her. Why she wasn't fired then and there, no one will ever know. Perhaps the director suspected that this diminutive bit of comedy relief had the makings of a star.