The New Movie Magazine (Jan-Sep 1935)

Why I'd Hate to be a Movie Star A tear-jerking, heart-throbbing wail, from that embittered youth known as— JACK JAMISON D R A W I V G S BY HENRI \V E I N E It "Autograph hunters would besiege me. Most of them would think I was Boris Karloff." Why is an autograph fiend, anyhow? I HAVE lived in Hollywood for fifteen years, off and on. Mostly on. On ten cents a week! I have lived in Hollywood for fifteen years, for which I am going to have to answer some day to my Maker, and it has taught me one thing. I should hate to be a star. I should hate it from start to finish. I think I might even hate the start worse than the finish. I should hate to wake up some bright morning (it would probably be raining) and see in the newspapers, "Street-sweeper becomes star! Jack Jamison, poor but honest young street-sweeper, zooms overnight to fame and a contract with Awful Pictures Corporation. Mr. Jamison, Cinderella Boy of 1935, is a gay, carefree lad with teeth like pearls and eyes of cornflower blue." The story would go on: "While pushing his little wagon along the curb late yesterday afternoon, Jamison was noticed by a scout for Awful Pictures, Mr. Herman Doopelknappel, who was instantly struck by his resemblance to Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Anna Sten and the scout's own grandmother, Mrs. Sadie Doopelknappel. Mr. Doopelknappel has been struck more than once, and deserved it. A contract followed. I should not like to read: "Mr. Jamison, interviewed at his suite at the Waldorf-Astoria this morning while toying with a dainty breakfast of sauerkraut and pheasant on toast, smiled a boyish smile. T am simply thrilled to tears!' he cried. Our Jackie is still the same, unspoiled boy he was yesterday, without the least sign of high hat. 'How,' he asks, 'could you fit a high hat on my low brow?' " Yes, I should hate all that. I shouldn't like it a bit. It would take away all my appetite for my dainty breakfast in my suite at the Waldorf-Astoria. I should be inclined to yell "Bunk." These discoveries, that you're always How reading about in the papers! to act in three oveyoulloveyoullov — , Nine-tenths of them never get beyond playing a bit in one picture, if they even get that far! But supposing I did click, and become a star. I shouldn't like any of the things that go with it. I shouldn't like the lack of privacy. My mother didn't raise me to be a goldfish. If I wanted to be a goldfish I would be swimming around in a globe somewhere right now instead of sitting here at a typewriter telling you all this and ruining your illusions. Oh, I know — the public give you your stardom and your nice salary, they tell you, so you owe it to the public to let them know how many hours you sleep, how you brush your teeth, what you eat, how many times you've been married, just when you plan to get your next divorce, everything. I don't say a star oughtn't to do it, I just say / shouldn't like it. If I happen to have a weakness for underwear with pink and green stripes, I don't want to have a photographer take a picture of me in it, sitting on the rail of a liner waving my hand at the Statue of Liberty. I don't want to have to stop doing things for fear of publicity, either. Suppose I am a star married to another star, and she eats crackers in bed and forgets to put the cap back on the toothpaste. Ordinarily, if I had a fiend like that for a wife, I would beat her with a baseball bat, or maybe lock her down in the cellar with the rats until she went crazy and strangled herself with her own garter-belt. (The Jamisons are just a regular bunch of Laughtons and Karloff s.) But could I do it if she and I were both stars? No, I couldn't! I should have to pose for photographs with her, rubbing noses and calling her Boojums. Every newspaper in the country would print stories telling how we adored each other and called each other Boojums, when really we loathed the sight of each other. That would make me very disconsolate. And, speaking of marriage, supposing I was one of those quaint old-fashioned people who try to stay married, in Hollywood ! Suppose I earned seven hundred dollars a week (ha, ha) and my wife earned (a very loud ha, ha) seven thousand. Bang — divorce! Suppose she made the seven hundred and I made the seven thousand. Then she'd divorce me, for interfering with her career. Suppose we both made the Jamison, the Boy Wonder, enjoys a light breakfast. essons: same salary, but the producers forgot me for a year, and she made a lot of pictures. Then they'd say I was through, and she'd divorce me for that. Every time one of us went to the studio and the other stayed at home to tend little Hobart, the baby, all the newspapers would print extras saying we had separated. And then, of course, every new leading woman I had would make goo-goo eyes at me. Mostly it would be because I was so devilishly handsome, of course, with my marcelled hair and my luscious cupid's-bow lips. Oh, Jamison! Yoo-hoo! But part of it would be because she wanted to use me for a stepping-stone to stardom for herself. And then my wife would hear her call me You Great Big Babykins one day on the set — and she'd divorce me for that! Trying to stay married in Hollywood is like turning a ten-year-old boy loose in a candy store and telling him sugar will give him worms. After a while he just doesn't care. I shouldn't like to be bossed by a studio, either. Five-year contracts, they call them. Seven-year contracts. Ninety-nine year leases. Oh, is that so? Way down at the bottom of page 68, in small type, is a cute little clause which says you can be fired at the end of any six-month term. When you're a star you can look ahead and be sure of your corn-bread and drippings for just six months, and that's all! Other clauses say you can be fired if you get one pound overweight, if you grow a beard, if you wear plush hats, if you admit in public that your Uncle Louie is a dope, if you get into street fights with policemen. Maybe I like plush hats! Maybe I even like to fight with policemen, if they're not too big! Why, I know some contracts — and I'm not kidding — that tell a star how much he has to pay for his automobile and how many suits a year he must order from his tailor. To say nothing of the rent he must pay for a swank apartment to keep up his (and the studio's) front! If the only good thing you can say for being a star is the big salary you get — what about your big salary if your contract, plus your social obligations, insists that you spend nine-tenths of it before you get it? More than one star works like a dog for five years at a "big" salary and ends up with nothing to show for it but a hundred suits of clothes, with shiny pants. Or a set of false teeth. The stars themselves tell you five years is the longest time they can hope to stay at the top in pictures. Well — not for Papa! I don't want any job where I'm dead by the time I'm thirty and have to walk around for another thirty or forty years in the same old body. I don't want anybody to call me a has-been when I've hardly gotten my diploma from grammar school. I shouldn't mind (Please turn to page 67) 44 The New Movie Magazine, February, 193.5