Motion Picture Magazine (Aug 1926-Jan 1927)

The Little Girl Who Wanted to Be a Boy And the true story of how her wish almost came true because of a fairy godmother who was her really and truly grandmother (~)nce upon a time there was only ten years old who a nice little girl ten years old who lived in a bigrambling Indiana country house, with plenty of Indiana country spreading in neat yellows a'nd greens all around, and she wanted to be a boy. A Boy, really. You know, the kind of Boy who scampers gleefully over fences, throws ripe tomatoes at stewed cats, goes in swimming in the ole swimming-hole with the other boys ; runs, climbs, shinnies up big trees, jumps into orchards to steal fat juicy apples. . . . But, after all, she was only a Girl, and no matter how hard she tried, even when she put on old overalls and clambered up the rough thick branches of the sycamore-tree before the house, there was always a Mother to come out and say reprovingly : "Gene ! Come down out of that tree this instant and play with your dolls !" That was the trouble, you see. They were always giving Gene dolls when Gene wanted pistols and fishing-rods and cowboy suits. But Gene had a fairy godmother. Except that she wasn't really a fairy or a godmother, but a sweetfaced middle-aged lady who happened to be Gene's Grandmother. Her name was Gene StrattonPorter. Maybe you've heard of her. And Gene's name was Gene Stratton, after her famous grandmother, you see. Now Grandmother Porter knew Gene's wish. And Grandmother Porter should have known, because she loved Gene, and studied her and wrote lovely books, and had even put Gene into some of them. Wish and all. One was "The Keeper of the Bees." In which Little Scout was a girl who wanted awfully to be a boy. Another was "Laddie," in which Little Sister was a girl who slid down haystacks and landed on soft fresh eggs and then laughed instead of crying about it. And it happened that Grandmother Porter passed away, and little Gene, because she had lost a good friend and a comforting shoulder, was very sad. So she couldn't forget Grandmother Porter, and she couldn't forget the desire to be a boy. Then one day some men came who said, "We are going to make moving pictures out of Gene Strat By Manfred Lee When Gene Stratton used to climb trees, her mother would always call: "Gene! Come down out of that tree this instant and play with your dolls!" ton-Porter's books. Who is there to take the roles of Little Scout and Little Sister?" And that is how Gene Stratton-Porter came to be an actress. You. see how simple it was. Here was no Jackie Coogan, trained from the moment of infant intelligence to be an actor. Here was no Baby Peggy, a delightful imp of poise and aplomb. This was just Gene Stratton, one of the little girls Booth Tarkington used to love to write about before he became' interested in their big brothers and sisters ; but even more, one of Gene Stratton-Porter's little tomboys. Gene had never thought of being an actress. She had never wanted to be an actress. She had no Ambitions, no Press-Agents. She was not Cute. She was not really Pretty. She did not powder her nose in a dark corner of Mother's closet. She did not cry when a knee-panted youngster tweaked her nose; she tweaked back. She was just a girl who wanted, oh terribly ! to be a boy. And when she heard that she could really and truly be Little Scout and play in overalls and with short hair and bare feet as much as she wanted to, Gene Stratton was glad. Because, as it happened, Gene was a born actress. No, she wasn't a born actress, when you come down to it. Rather, for the first time in her life she was doing what she zvantcd to do without being fettered by girl-baby skirts. Nothing else mattered, you see. And so the screen • gained a new child star. There was no fanfare of trumpets, no wild public acclaim. A public knew her, of course. The great American public who worship and will always worship at the shrine of the sweetness and understanding that was Gene Stratton's Grandmother. But that was all. Gene made good. Gene had no longer any quarrel with the world, having been granted her heart's desire. J. Leo Meehan, her daddy and director of all the Porter pictures, understood this and gave her free rein. Gene trampled gaily over hearts in the audience and reputations in the ranks of the experienced actors on the same cast. Because, you see — and this is most important of all — Gene wasn't acting ; she was being herself: the true tombov of the American screen. Felix Certainly Is Popular Jf our postman was not very, very good-natured, he certainly would be cranky about the big bags of mail he has had to carry up-stairs lately. And most of the letters in this bag have been drawings of Felix. One clay one thousand came. And every day hundreds and hundreds came. . The prizes are here in our office waiting to be sent to the lucky artists! But, of course, we cannot mail them until the judges decide. And the judges keep asking us for more time . . . there have been thousands of drawings made by the readers of Motion Picture Junior and they want to consider every one carefully. It takes time. But we hope to announce the winners either next month or the month after that. We think mavbe it will be next month. . '. . We're as surprised as Felix looks that so many of our readers are such fine artists. We never saw so many Felix cats in all our born days as the postman has brought to our office lately