Movieland. (1950)

These young fans won’t forget meeting Richard Widmark while he was on location in Miami for “Slattery’s Hurricane.” This picture marks his first romantic movie role. said and he always managed to somehow. I haven’t the faintest notion what he is like at breakfast time, before he has his first cup of coffee. I barely catch a glimpse of him then. He usually has his first cup of coffee sent up, wherever he is working. He is sometimes impulsive when it comes to making decisions. He . liked the role of Tommy Udo in his first pic¬ ture, “Kiss of Death,” so much that he signed a seven-year contract just to get that role. Then he was afraid to tell me how long he’d signed for. I found out about it for the first time when a news¬ paperwoman asked me, “You’re going to be in Hollywood for seven years, aren’t you?” Just as impulsively, Dick rented our first house in Hollywood. The house itself was terrible. Dick was impressed by the stable, the horses and the view. To me the house looked like the most heaven-forsaken, isolated place I’d ever seen. Sure, the view was fine, but it didn’t make up for the snakes around the house and the coyotes which howled at night. We finally succeeded in renting a house which was just what we both wanted — in Brentwood — a white brick, low, rambling, ranch-style house, with wide boards in the kitchen. Dick said, “Why live in California unless you can feel at home there?” So we sent for our own furniture and books from back East. The furniture is a mixture of French provincial and Victorian, with an “antiquey” flavor. Dick built his own bookcases for the house. He always does. There are few things he likes better than building bookcases, but for some reason, the shelves usually turn out crooked. We have left a trail of crooked bookcases in every apartment or house in which we have ever lived. Dick is Mr. Fix-It around the house. Whenever anything goes wrong, he says never mind calling in the plumber, the painter or the plasterer, he’ll fix it. One day the washbasin in the kitchen was clogged. Dick went into his never-mindcalling-the-plumber routine, and took the washbasin apart all over the floor. Into the room wandered our daughter Ann, three years old. “What are you doing, daddy?” she asked sweetly. “I think,” Dick said to me, “you’d bet¬ ter get her out of the room.” Out she went, and he blew his top. He’d worked for hours trying to put the washbasin together again, and it simply wouldn’t go. We had to call jn the plumber after all. Whenever something needs to be fixed, Dick starts the job humming and whis¬ tling. But when he fails to get it fixed, there’s an ominous silence — and people head for storm cellars. From the time he first knew I was going to have Ann, he started spoiling me. After she was born, he started spoiling her. No expectant mother ever got more attention that I did before the arrival of Ann. When Ann signified that she was actually going to arrive, it was war¬ time, and the use of gasoline was greatly restricted. We got into our little Crosley, which was bought because we could get about 30 miles to a gallon, and Dick headed in the direction of Bronxville. The . Crosley sputtered — it was quite a poke — and tempus was fugiting. Dick got terribly worried. By the time we got to the hospital, he wanted to have me rushed right into a bed. The receptionist in charge was much more calm and said, “There’s a long list of questions you’ll have to answer first.” Dick looked at me in dismay and said, “Are you sure the baby will wait till you finish your list?” They assured Dick the baby wouldn’t come until the next day, and made him go home. That night a friend, who had just been discharged from the Army and had been celebrating his discharge, came to visit Dick to inquire how I was. He’d obviously had a little too much to drink. Furiously, Dick said, “How could you get drunk on a night like this?” The next morning Dick had to go to work. The baby still hadn’t been born, and the hospital assured him she wasn’t likely to be born during his radio show. But Ann double-crossed Dick. She ar¬ rived right in the middle of the re¬ hearsal. He treats her more like a friend than like a daughter. Once when I had to go to New York for a couple of weeks and Dick took charge of Ann, I returned to hear her saying, “Let’s go and get the ice cream cones now.” For two weeks she had been ordering Dick about. He had taken her to the Zoo, the circus and every other place she commanded. He bought ice cream cones at any time of the day she specified; and the whole household revolved around her whims. I asked Dick why he’d let Ann run him ragged. He said, “I can’t say no to her.” The greatest bone of contention be¬ tween Dick and myself is that he never notices what I am wearing or how I do my hair. I could walk around the house in a gunny-sack, and he’d never say a word. And that isn’t all! I could wear the latest Schiaparelli model, and he wouldn’t notice that either. Recently, I had my hair done in the newest short bob. I wondered how Dick would react to the new hairdo. All eve¬ ning I kept leaning toward him, flinging my hair and my head in his direction. He didn’t notice a thing. Finally a friend joined us and said, “Why, Jean, what a lovely new hairdo. Don’t you like it, Dick?” “What new hairdo?” he said blindly. But don’t get me wrong. The argu¬ ments between us are very minor. There are so many wonderful things about Dick. I still treasure his first gift to me. It was a little bracelet with the word “Jean” on one side, and his initials “R.H.W.” on the other. Don’t ask me what the “H” stands for. I don’t know. Dick’s father sometimes used that middle initial, so Dick did, too. Dick couldn’t afford a gold bracelet in those days. It has turned green and black and purple, but I still keep it — a cherished memento of the days when I succeeded in winning the heart of the grandest man on the campus. He likes the outdoors, and is crazy about riding, tennis and swimming. I share all those sports with him except riding. He likes movies, particularly old silents. We have a home projector, and he runs the old silent pictures umpteen times, detecting in them techniques which have been hailed as brand new in 1949. He hasn’t let his head be turned by Hollywood or anything else. We sneaked into a drive-in to see his first picture, “Kiss of Death.” The audience seemed to like him, and we were both rather surprised. Dick turned to me and said, “If they like this character, maybe Hollywood is going to be easy.” Lots of fans have written to Dick to say that they hope he isn’t going to be typed as a menace; that they feel he can do other kinds of performances. Taking heed of all these letters, 20th CenturyFox recently cast Dick in his first hero role in “Down to the Sea in Ships.” In it he looks more like himself than he’s ever looked before. Of course, he’s been a hero to me all along. I hope that he’s now going to be a hero to you, too. The End 72