Motion Picture Classic (Jul-Dec 1930)

Psyching the Hollywood Blonde This seemed like a good start, considering June had only spoken three words. But I knew Mrs. Castberg wasn t talking through her hat. I had had a sample, and it had struck home, .■\lready I was deciding to give my fixations a severe talking to when I got the chance. "You're a small-town girl, aren't you, Miss Clyde? " Mrs. Castberg went on. "I thought so. That's a good beginning for a simple type of girl like yourself. What made you become an actress?" June was fairly cool and collected. 'I went on the stage when I was nine years old," she said. "I had quite a remarkable voice, they thought, so ... " "I can tell you something more," Mrs. Castberg said. "You can do anything at all you want to do — but you'll have to want to, deep down. You will never want to do the wrong things, even for the sake of an adventure — in fact, you don't care for a lot of adventure. You're not an actress for the glamour of the glaring lights, but because you have an urge, and also because you have to make money. Otherwise, you'd much prefer marr>-ing the man you loved. You wouldn't marr> for a lot of worldly things." June was beginning to think there was a trick somewhere. "That's ver> true — oh, how true that is!" she rep)eated as each revelation came out. Mrs. Castberg turned and spoke confidentially into my ear. "Miss Clyde is romantic. Is that a terrible thing to say? "You have a deep inner feeling that life is good, " she pursued, turning back toward June. "You don't exactly believe in fairies, but you could. Life is easy for you because of your belief in good angels. Not exactly good angels, but your guiding star, you might call it. You're quite safe to keep your illusions in the movies, which is a good thing for you. "Frankly, Miss Clyde, I'm glad, surprised, to find you as you are. I was expecting something — well, different — when they asked me to psycho-analyze a motion picture blonde. I like this about you, especially; that unlike most people, you wouldn't strike the hand that helped you to success, if there has been any such hand. But most of your success you have made yourself. "The only thing that will ever stop you from success in your profession will be love. "Your love life, I should say, is very simple. You have not had any love affairs. You have loves, but not love afifairs. Isn't that right?" 'Exactly," said' June. "So few people interest me enough to love them." "Your loves," Mrs. Castberg pursued relentlessly, "are ideal. You are in love with an ideal man. Your employers need not worr>' about your breaking the marriage clause in your contract, I should say, because the chance of your meeting the ideal is remote. But if you do meet him, then nothing will stand in the way of your marry ing him, and ... to yse the vernacular . . . your contract will be flooey." {Continued from page jj) She paused a moment. Then, "Miss Clyde, did you ever feel any difference between your lo\e for your father and for your mother?" "I loved my mother best," said June. "Ah, you see," Mrs. Castberg exclaimed triumphantly; "she has no CEdipus complex. That's why she isn't likely to give the studio trouble on the marriage clause. Those who have the father fixation are the ones most likely to fall for a man at any moment. But Nliss Clyde is not the type who is crazy to fall in love. Eventually, if she fails to meet her ideal man, she will "They also serve who only stand and wait": a scene behind the lines in any large theater in any large city on any large Sunday evening idealize a man who falls short of the ideal." "What are the specifications of your ideal man. Miss Clyde?" I put in. He Must Be Real " T DON'T care how he looks," she replied X. without a moment's hesitation. "I don't care if he hasn't a penny, so long as he earns his money honestly. He would have to be real — someone who wasn't always acting. So Mrs. Castberg is right in saying I'm not very likely to meet him just yet — there aren't many like that in Hollywood." "As to money," Mrs. Castberg said, "I can see that Miss Clyde wants it, but she is not, and never will, be money-mad." "That is true," said June. "I would like to have money so that I can make those I love happy. For myself, I want only enough to live comfortably." "VVhen did you first fall in love?" asked Mrs. Castberg. "Schoolgirl love, I mean." "When I was fourteen," replied June. "He was captain of the basketball team and president of the student body. He was Very poor, and worked nights to pay for his schooling. I admired that. I don't think I loved him — I just admired him enormously. I never kissed him . . . that sounds silly, doesn'fit? He's in San Francisco now, and I still see him whenever I go there. We're ver> good friends." Mrs. Castberg whispered in my ear: "I'm going to see if she has a Narcissus fixation. "Did you ever sit and look at yourself in the mirror when you were a child?" she asked June. June shook her head. "Only when I used to try on costumes," she said. " I loved doing that." Mrs. Castberg looked her straight in the eyes for a few moments. No Narcissus "She has no Narcissus complex," she said, turning at last to me. "We mean by that, she is not and never has been in love with herself. That, you see, would have been one reason for her failure to fall really in love with a man, for if you are in love with yourself there's no room for anybody else. When she tried costumes on before the mirror, it was her urge to act coming out, and fortunately the urge was never frustrated. There has been no inhibition for her to overcome. Excuse the affected -sounding phrase, but in technical parlance we would say there has been no frustration or inhibition in the central stream of her drive. "Another thing. Miss Clyde, isn't there a tune running in your head nearly all the time? A sort of harmonic background in your brain? " "Yes, there is," said June. "It's mar^'elous that you could tell me that. Nearly always, except when I am asleep, there is a tune in my head." "I thought so. Do you know what that means? You have intuitively contacted your inner rhythm. I am sure your directors never had to teach you to move gracefully. You have harmony and rhythm in your head, although, as you told me just now, there was not much music in your family. " Now about your dreams. Did you ever dream of being on a desolate plain?" "No," answered June. "But I have dreamed so often of laughing and crying — just laughing and crying all by myself." "You see," explained Mrs. Castberg, "her dreams are emotional, as you would expect for an actress, but they do not depend on anyone. She is self-sufficient. She IS in touch with the cosmic emotions, joy and sorrow, that have existed since the beginning of the world; but in her dreams there is no one there inspiring those emotions. Miss Clyde is a very lucky girl, because she is simple, life to her is simple, she knows what she wants, and yet her instincts are infallibly right. "Miss Clyde," concluded Mrs. Castberg, "is not modern, nor is she mid-\'ictorian, nor anything else of the kind. She would be herself in any age. She does not adapt herself; she knows what she wants out of life and she is not influenced by what the age thinks she ought to do, or by what any individual thinks she ought to do." 82