Motion Picture Classic (Jan-Jun 1929)

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With all their exclusive features, Conns cost no more. Perfect scale, reliable mechanism, beautiful tone, make Conns choice of foremost professionals. Send the coupon now for free literature and details of free trial offer. No obligation. Mention instrument. BAND INSTRUMENTS C. G. CONN, JCld., 1254 Conn Bldg., Elkhart, Ind. Gentlemen : Please send literature and details of free trial offer on (Instrument) Name _ St.orR.F.D _ City State, County .. White Shadows and Sable (Conliiiued from page 6j) of a friend who lived outside, she wrote a letter to Rudolph Valentino, asking for his picture. "But I don' get it. They tell me I mus' gotta send twenty-five cents. It burn me up. \\'hassamatter? Ain't he got lotsa money. An' me jus' a little convent girl, an' a half-, orphian too? It burn me up. So 1 write a letter to Ramon Xovarro in Spanish, his native tongue an' mine. "But he don' answer, either." And there were others just as cruel: — Ronald Colman, Jack Gilbert, Doug Fairbanks, and Jack Pickford. \\'hat was a poor girl to do? This is what she did: "I acted a movie scenes by myself alone. An' then got friends in, too. "One night, at a party at my boy friend 's Kouse, I suggest we do a love scenes. I am to be the girl, so I mus' pick my lover. But I couldn't pick my boy friend because his mother was there, an' I was scared. So I look aroun ' for the han 'somest man, an ' we do it — an' it was gran'." Her father moved her a second time. From Tucson, to a convent in Los Angeles. But here it was even worse. Here, she was in the very city of her dreams. On her vacations she played in the very streets where movie companies make their exteriors. Could it be long before she would run into one? It wasn't. Testy About the Test THAT was when 1 was fourteen. An' the director ask me would I like to act in pictures. I say: 'Would I! Oh, hahy!' So he take a test. He liked it, an ' go to talk with my father. But my father almos' throw him out of the house." Yet during the very next vacation she played a bit in Harold Lloyd 's " Dr. Jack. " "An ' — oh! what a bawling out I get when my father learn. It burn me up. But it scare me, too." Seemingly, for it was two years before she dared broach that subject again. And when she did, she was surprised, for he did not forbid her. But the stand that he did take stopped her far more effectively than any flat refusal could have. He told her what he had read of life in the movie colony, and what he thought her chances to remain the little girl he loved would be. He did not forbid her to try; he only asked her to wait until he was dead, so that he might not see the shame that he was so afraid would be her lot. This attitude stopped her short. What could she say against it? It was so effective, in fact, that she began to look to dancing rather than the screen as the field for her career. It was not long before she received an offer from a professional dancer to tour the country in vaudeville. She told her father. She was happy that this offer was not from the sullied screen. "What! Never. You think that I would let you travel alone with any man? Why mus' you always bother your head with working in the movies, or with dancing? \\ hy do you think you need to work? Don ' I give you enough money? You need only to ask for more, then." And so on — even when three more offers of the same sort were made her. Christened at Christie's SO when she found that it was impossible to hope for his permission to dance, her mind naturally returned once again to her first love — the movies. A friend offered to Introduce her to Al Christie, and she jumped at the chance. But she said nothing to iicr father. "We went to the studio and started up the stairs to Mr. Christie's office, an' then stopped when we were half-way. What name? What name? Guillermina Ostermann was no good. My friend say: Quick; think of some real Spanish name. I think hard, and then choose Raquel Torres. "But my frien ', he cannot pronounce it. So when we are introduce to \lr. Christie, I speak my name myself, 'My name, it is R-rac-c-ckayl Tor-r-rays. ' He say: 'Ah! A little Spanish pepper?' I toss my head an' roll my eyes, an' he laugh. He ask me can 1 dance. I say, 'Can I? Oh, bahyl' He say that is fine because they are having a barbecue at the informal opening of a new real estate subdivision, an ' I can dance for them. "So I tell my father I am going to a fiesta. But I do not say what kind, nor what I am to do. I dance the Argentine tango, Jarare, La Horta. An ' am a wow. Ever 'body like me. 'Raquel Torres. Raquel Torres. Raquel Torres. ' They all call me back again an ' again. So much that even Mr. Christie, begin to think may be there is something in me. So he give me parts in the comedies with Neil Burns. I mus' go so much to the studio that 1 mus' after a while tell my father." So the conversation reported in the beginning took place. The first one that had ever ended with the father giving his consent. Grudgingly, yes; but e,ii'en. So now she was safely launched on the career of her dreams. All that remained was to win the electric lights, the gala openings to which she had promised to take her father instead of a boy-friend. Looking Native But Pretty AND this, also, came to her without effort _ on her part. Nor is this so strange. Who could expect a girl who had received four offers from the screen, and a like number from the stage, to remain submerged in comedies forever? Searching high and low for someone who could fill the requirements of the leading feminine role in "White Shadows in the South Seas," M-G-M hailed her like a taxi on a rainy night. Here was a girl who could play the part of a Polynesian native without make-up. And also look attractive. Her father was happy for her. And he also began to hope that perhaps things were working out for the best, after all — as an established player, the pressure that could be brought on his daughter would not be much. But there were still more tests, and other arrangements, to be gone through before she could be absolutely certain of the part. Both knew that Hollywood often does no more than pro^.ise. The great day came. All the vague fog, the maybe-yes-and-maybe-no resolved itself into a final decisive yes in ink uj3on a contract. This was the ultimate answer to all questions and all doubts upon the rightness of her course. It settled in her mind for once and all that in her estimate of her ability and of the chances of convincing others of that ability, she had been correct. During the thrilling tedium of signing the papers, she was so excited she could hardly restrain herself. Her one thought was to hurry home and tell her father. .She knew that he had been anxious during all the four hours that she had been away, for he, too, knew that this was to be the day. When she arrived she found him dead. 1 r I 86