The New Movie Magazine (Jan-Sep 1935)

Diary of a News how she and Douglas Fairbanks will make it up, now he's back from Europe. City editor excited about the idea. Mary not. Sent word by butler to come back next week. Phoned the paper and was told to go back right away. Went back and parked in front. Butler came out and said would I please go away. I said I couldn't. He said Miss Pickford thought my car looked funny parked out in front of her house. I told him it looked funny anywhere. "Rang door-bell at thirty-minute intervals. No luck. City editor irate. By 5 p.m. so was butler. Mary still sent down word she was "sorry." So was I. Stayed until 7 p.m. "August 22, 1934. "Pickfair at 7 a.m. Rang door-bell at thirty-minute intervals. Mary obdurate about interview. Douglas drove up in automobile and dashed inside. Rang door-bell at five-minute intervals. No one would admit he was there. City editor profane and impolite. Decreased door-bell ringing to former thirty-minute intervals. Butler still polite but with effort. "At 3 o'clock butler came out and said Mary would see me. Said she felt sorry for me, sitting out there. Went inside, up long, green-carpeted stairs, through spacious salon to pretty little sitting-room overlooking garden. Mary very cordial and apologetic over my carsitting marathon. Talked about the weather, books, pictures, various things having nothing to do with Douglas. "Pinned her down about him and she said she couldn't talk about him. Said it was like wearing her heart on her sleeve to do that. I asked her if she was glad Doug was back and she said: 'Of course. One always is glad to see an old friend. But please don't ask me to discuss him because I just can't.' "She was dressed in blue and looked sweet and tired and wistful. I liked her a lot. She wore a lovely string of tiny pearls and a big, square-cut sapphire on her engagement finger. When she looked at the ring, hurt would come into her eyes. I asked her about it, but she shook her head. " 'There are so many things I cannot bring myself to speak of,' she said. "She said a person never knows how much she can stand until she has to. Hollywood Hound Said life was a pattern, and heartbreak and loneliness are pieces in that pattern, mixed up like a jig-saw puzzle that maybe will make sense some day. "The butler (his name is Joseph) served us wine and little cakes. I think Douglas was in the house all the time, but Mary wouldn't say so. When I left, she walked downstairs with me and shook hands three times. Thought I had a pretty good story, but the city editor was mad because she wouldn't say whether or not she would make up with Douglas. Cut me off at three hundred words. Life is like that." Tragedy here for the lovely Carole Lombard and a thousand others, and maybe a smile, too, at the trials and tribulations of a harassed reporter "September 6, 1934. Covered Russ Columbo's funeral today. Terrible mob. Carole Lombard there in black and crying, with elderly woman comforting her. Our photog. took their picture as they were leaving. When I tried to find out name of the woman for caption some officious bystander jerked me back announcing: 'No autographs today, young lady!' By the time I got loose, Carole and the woman had gone. NOTE: Stick such oafs with a pin next time." And I think tragedy is here, too "January 10, 1935. Kind of hate to make this entry. . . . Mary Pickford got her divorce from Douglas today. Came up to Judge Ben Lindsey's court and said just three words, all told — 'Yes' when clerk asked her if she lived in Los Angeles County; 'Yes' when the judge asked her if a property settlement had been agreed upon, and 'Yes' when he asked her if the charges in her complaint were true. "She wore gray. Looked tired and sad and almost old. Posed for pictures, but I had feeling she scarcely knew photographers were shooting. Our cameraman got another picture as she was walking down city hall steps, just at sunset. She stopped and looked out toward the red horizon. This was sunset, too, for Hollywood's most glamorous romance. I wanted to cry. Guess she did, too. But she didn't. She held her head high and smiled a little as her car drove away. But I can't forget her eyes. . . ." Troubadour ob de Lawd {Continued from page 32) said he was asking every girl to marry him. "Ah wouldn't marry him," Nina said disdainfully. "When Ah marry Ah want somebody up head of me. He throw his money away. He say de Virgin goin' take care of him. Ah say, boy, some day de Virgin goin' turn on yuh." *^TNA was decidedly worldly for her years, sixteen. Her expressed ambition was to wear gowns like Miss Gloria Swanson's and have diamonds dribblin' all over her physique. The screen was but her stepping stone, she vowed. Her goal was Europe where she intended to challenge the supremacy of Josephine Baker, world's wealthiest colored entertainer and a Countess by marriage. Nina went to Europe a year or two later. While she did not exactly drag the throne from under Countess Baker, she did wriggle in the best night clubs of London, and recently returned to Hollywood, physique triumphantly adorned. During the seven years that have elapsed since those merry Apex hours, Stepin's affairs have undergone tumultuous revolution. His spiritual and artistic conscience got to acting up violently. There were detonations in his love life, too, that all but brought the Marines. The flesh and the devil seemed to have a scissors hold. As if these personal commotions were not enough, the talkies came along to bust his career wide open by displacing the medium of his silent art. Only the world depression failed to affect him. He was depressed way ahead of that. When I went to see the tempesttossed soul the other night at the (Please turn to page 58) "Oh darn! Darn! Double-darn! Every time I get him part way up, he falls down again! I'd like to break his old ladder in a trillion pieces! I will not be quiet — and Itvon't be good! I'm mad!" "Bathtime? . . . Oh . . . Well, that's different. Will you let me spank the water — and poke a hole in the soap? And do I get some soft, smooth Johnson's Baby Powder all over me afterward?" "Hurray! When I'm under that dandy powder shoiver I could just squeal for joy. And I never have a rash or a prickle or a chafe, do I? What do I care if things go wrong in my work!" "I'm Johnson's Baby Powder . . . and wherever I go, babies forget their troubles! For I keep their skins smooth and soft as satin — I'm satin-soft myself! I'm made of finest Italian talc — no gritty particles as in some powders. No zinc stearate or orris-root either. Your baby will appreciate Johnson's Baby Soap and Baby Cream, too!" (krvvvvixrvi/ a-Q-txivmon' The Nerv Movie Magazine, June, 1935 57 L