Motion Picture (Feb-Jul 1941)

are not chic. There is no excuse for them — except laziness. And laziness is an alibi, not an excuse. And alibis are the lace trimmings worn by dishonest women. "There's no excuse for them. Why, I could have remained a little fat girl, wearing the wrong clothes, my hair all over the place. I didn't know how to dress. I didn't know how to do my hair. I didn't know how, or when, or where, to make up. "But . . . 'Ahhhh' the whiners will now whine — 'you are in the Movies ! You are in the hands of experts ! You are in the hands of an Adrian who does your clothes for you ! You are in the hands of a Guilaroff who does your hair for you ! You are in the hands of make-up artists and the like . . . !' "Well, Little Miss Winner, right back at you — so are you! You can get expert advice for ten cents the copy. I mean, women today have the movies, the newsreels, the radio, the magazines to show them how to dress, how to do their hair, walk, how to be attractive in every way it's possible for a woman to be attractive, if they want to learn. They are in the hands of experts, too, because the same experts who handle us tell them what to do, in the magazines and on the air, show them what to do through what they do for us on the screen. They get exactly the same benefits we get, in exactly the same ways, from exactly the same people. "Even money isn't essential. Things that come out of the exclusive and most expensive shops today, you know, you can buy, next week, same things, in a department store basement. I know women who earn $50 a week and are just as chic as women who earn from $500 to $5,000. I know girls who make $25.00 and look as well as the girls who make $50.00. But these are the women who are enterprising enough to work for what they want!" I said . . . "But playing this part, in this picture, the part of a woman with a scarred, a horribly scarred face," (wait until you SEE her ! ) "hasn't that made you pity women, plain women, ugly women? After all, and pardon the compliment, but you've always been beautiful, Joan, have never known, until now, until you wore this dreadful scar, what it's like to look in a mirror — ■ and — shudder — " "No," said Miss C, "no, it has not made me feel sorry for women. It has deepened my feeling of compassion for all human beings, women and men, who are mutilated, ugly — but, if anything, it has made me feel less sorry for plain women because playing this character made me realize that it wasn't her outward scar that made her hateful and hated, but what she had let the scar do to her, to her Heart, to her mind, to her soul. "Did I ever tell you, by the way," Joan broke off, laughing, "that I wanted terribly to play this part? I did . . . and I got a laugh out of George Cukor when we were talking it over. I said to him, 'Give an actor a cape and he'll ham all over the place — give an actress a scar and she'll outham all hams.' So George gave me four or five 'try-out' scenes to do, let me ham 'em up something elegant. I got it out of my system, and then we went to work . . . ! "No, I don't feel sorry for women. The only women I might feel sorry for are the women who don't feel sorry for themselves because they have too much to do to sit around being Poor Me . . . . "Honest women," said Joan, "fill their lives with many, richly many things. Dishonest women feel they haven't anything in their lives unless they have men, flattery and attentions from men, dates with men, scalps on their charm bracelets. I don't say that this isn't, or even that it shouldn't be, a part of every woman's life. Heaven knows, I'd be the last to say it. It should be, of course, but not ALL of life. Honest women use all their faculties and abilities, their hands as well as their brains — dishonest women nearly fall in a faint when they rinse out a pair of hose. "One Monday morning on the set," grinned Crawford, "one of the Frailer Sisters came up to me and, in a weak and gasping voice said, 'What DO you think I did yesterday ? I washed out my lace hankies MYSELF, I'm simply DEAD V "Now, betw:een you and me, it's too bad she wasn't, I'd say — and I wasn't the one to say that to, because," said Joan, sturdily, "I spend my week-ends scrubbing myself and anything else around the place that needs scrubbing. I couldn't resist the temptation of saying to Miss Fainty-Pants, 'Don't be silly, darling, I gave myself a manicure and a pedicure, washed my hair, washed out my blouses, gloves, slips, a few nighties, the baby's sweaters and socks, upon completion of which I went forth and hung them, and myself, upon the line in the backyard, to dry !' "... I shouldn't have — but when things are that sick-making . . ." Joan made a face no photographer will ever catch . . . "besides, it's my opinion that honest women like to do a woman's work. Even an office-wife on her days off, likes to swap the typewriter and the boss forthewashtub and the husband, I bet. I have a real love for doing folksy, domestic things. I love to scrub and rinse and hang out, I love to make beds and scour and polish. I don't have to do these things. It would be ridiculous and no one would believe me if I tried to pretend that I do have to. But just because I don't have to, and do, should prove that I love to, if you follow me . . . "I'm a clipper-outer, too," laughed Joan, (mind you, she was knitting like mad every minute she was talking) . "I cut out poems I like and paste them in scrap-books. I paste things in Christina's Growing-Up Book . . . how old she was when she said her first word, the date of each tooth as it comes in, when she had her diphtheria and whoopingcough shots, and so on . . . "It seems to me," Joan said, then, her eyes finding the baby Christina's eyes in the framed picture, "that that's the best of having babies, the things you can do for them, the fact that you are necessary to them. I mean, it's wonderful being an actress, it's fascinating, colorful, glamorous and exciting . . . and it gives something to the world, I hope, in entertainment, sometimes in enlightment, in 'escape.' "But as an actress, I'm not necessary. Not necessary as bread is necessary. The world could totter along without me as an actress. But Christina couldn't get along without me. As a mother, I am necessary — that's the way mothers are necessary, as bread is, and warmth and shelter. That's the loveliest," said Joan . . . and looked the loveliest, as she spoke, that I have ever seen her. "But back to our dishonest women again — one further little example of the dishonest damsel occurs to me, a nasty, little one. When I was in New York last Autumn, I went to a charity thing at one of the smart cafes. During the evening, a very uppity socialite was asked to pose with me for some pictures which could be sold for the charity. She refused, saying she couldn't, she r'ally couldn't, you know, pose with 'an actress.' They can't come through, these women, you see, must always serve themselves no matter what dis-service they do others. Before she left I sent a little note to her table. It said: 'When you get home tonight, look up the word "Charity" in the dictionary. Joan Crawford.' That was all . . . "And that is the 'plus' to the other instances I've given you of why I do like women, honest women like my friends, and detest dishonest women." 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