The New Movie Magazine (Jan-Sep 1935)

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FRENCH ECRU CURTAINS Rit is a convenient scored wafer; easier to measure; won't sift out of the package Troubadour ob de Lawd {Continued from page 57) Albee Theatre in Brooklyn where he was dragging himself on to the stage five times a day I was prepared to commiserate on his failure to achieve his exalted destiny, little guessing that through him the screen had been cleansed. I knew he had sought refuge in wedlock with disastrous results. I was under the impression there had been a divorce. No, it seems his wife did suggest it soon after nuptials but the idea struck horror to Stepin's orthodox soul. "It would make terrible scandal, me gittin' a divorce," said Stepin. "Scandal not fo' me only. Scandal fo' mah religion. Scandal all ovah de world foh mah religion." The horror of it made Stepin writhe almost upright. His vehemence conveyed the idea the Church would have been rocked worse than by Henry Eighth's divorce. "We jis separated," he said. "She was a good lil gul but she wasn't a showman. She didn't understan'. She finally git sick. Ah sent her to Arizona." He paused and his eyes glowed with glory. "She died a beautiful death." She left him a four-year-old son. DY this time his movie career had *-* blown up due to his internal seethings. He couldn't get a job in pictures. Studios had him down as a problem child. Theaters refused to book him for personal appearances. In this, his hour of travail, he conceived a daring evangelical plan. He went back to New Orleans. He made a novena to Our Lady of Perpetual Help. Then he courageously set forth to wangle his way into legitimate theaters closed to negro entertainers. Managers refused to consider him. One night he went to a small theater with a poster he had had printed. "Ah ax de manager could Ah please put it up in the lobby. Ah says, 'Jis let me stick it way back where nobody see it. Den if nobody git mad Ah will move it out jis lil bit every day til it's out front.' De poster say, 'Stepin Fetchit Coming.' Well, the manager he let me. He was good, cause like Ah say there is a law. Police can stop colored folks appearin' at legitimate theatahs in legitimate hours. Understan'? At other hours it's all right but not at regular legitimate hours. Well, nobody git mad. De police pay no attention. Folks want to see me cause day had seed me in pictures. Ah plays all de lil theatahs in N'Orlns." After Stepin's southern crusade he went to New York. He dumbfounded managers of the big movie theaters by showing them the route he had opened up. Winnie Sheehan, Fox film producer, was in the city at the time. "When Ah sees him he ax first thing, jis like yuh, 'Stepin is yuh still goin' toh mass?' He didn't ax cause mah religion mattered tuh him pusnlly, understan'. Ah doan know if he is religious. Yit Ah does know he is cause he live religion, alius doin' good fo' folks. He ax 'bout me cause he want to know am Ah steady. Am Ah stickin' by mah beliefs. So he take me back. Ah go back tuh de Fox studio. Ah nevah complains no moh. Dey aint no reason for complainin'. Nobody want nobody to speak impurities. Cause why? Cause de Legion of Decency. See how it all works out? Ah starts de power rollin' — unhunh — an' de power bring me back." (f I wonder!" "I wonder if it would end all regular pain for me, and end it for all time?" * To the woman who is asking herself that question, the makers of Midol make an emphatic answer: It will not. * But they make another statement just as emphatic, and just as true: Midol always relieves periodic pain to some degree, and will for you. * Understand, this extraordinary medicine may bring you complete relief. It has done this for many. And some of these women had always had the severest pain. But others report only an easier time. Even so, isn't the measure of relief you are sure to receive well worth while? Midol means great comfort in any case — compared with unchecked suffering at this time of the month! * Any sufferer who experiences no relief from Midol should consult a physician. * "Yes, but won't it form some habit?" Only the habit of avoiding suffering which is needless! There is no "habit forming" drug in Midol. It is not a narcotic. * So, don't let the speed with which this remarkable medicine takes hold cause you any apprehension. Don't keep it for "emergencies" or wait for the pain to reach its height before you take it. Let it keep you comfortable throughout the period. Learn to rely on it completely. Just follow the simple directions found inside the box. * And speaking of boxes, you'll appreciate the slim aluminum case in which you get Midol. It's so thin and light — and dainty — you can give it a permanent place in your purse and always be prepared. It is a tremendous relief, mental and physical, to be able to approach this time without any misgivings, and to pass serenely through it. * Your druggist has these tablets. You'll probably see them on the counter. If not, just ask for Midol. Fifty cents is the most you'll pay — for comfort that is worth almost anything. * When it has given you back those days once given over to suffering, will you do this? If you know someone who still suffers, tell her of your discovery — that Midol does bring definite and decided relief from "regular" pain. When I told him some of his admirers complained that his vocal delivery was not as distinct as it might be, he became more animated. He said that in transferring his art from silent pictures to sound he was confronted with the same problem as Chaplin, only difference being he solved it. "Ah solved the problem whereas Chaplin he couldn't. Ah solved it like dis. Ah make sounds but Ah make sounds what you can't understan'. Dat way, see, Ah don't destroy de illusion. Ah calls it audible pantomime. Da's right, audible pantomime." Stepin added that he intended to become intelligible little by little until, I gathered, he would be enunciating with the clarity of Mr. George Arliss. lV/fR. STEPIN FETCHIT is not the ■!■'•* mumbling sloth you see on the screen. His screen character is as much pure creation as Miss Mae West's. He strives to maintain the illusion in person but when the subject of religion is switched on he is electrified. He is slender, wiry, youthful and good looking. While his diction is negroid, spurning the elegance affected by many of his brethren, and his education has come mostly from "absolving," he is honest in saying he is bright. He has the intuitive precociousness of so many of his race. He has especially the racial gift of rapture. His religion, like that of St. Francis of Assisi who called himself a troubadour of Christ, is not incompatible with humor and gayety. With all respect, Stepin might be called the troubadour of de Lawd. "Ah is thuty-three dis yeah," he said significantly. "Ah feels dis is mah big yeah. It is foh every man. Know why?" "The crucial year," I said. "The year of the crucifixion." His mother died when he was a child, a no good little darky, he says, alius shootin' crap an' stealin' an' crazy 'bout race horses, from one of which he eventually took his name. His mother was a seamstress in the employ of a southern lady. When she passed away the southern mistress took the young desperado into her home and gave him a mother's care. She sent him to school in Montgomery, Alabama. There he became a convert to the Catholic faith. Grace did not instantly descend upon the young colored sport. He flew school one night and joined a carnival. His career had the breathless ups and downs of a roller coaster. Jails yawned for him. Once the law laid hands on him, took off his pants and found missing valuables sewed in his belt. He managed to fly the coop with a thirteenyear-old girl who had been implicated with him. They struggled through swamps all night. After seeing her to safety and admonishing her to say her prayers regularly he hurried on his versatile way. He didn't forget her. When he came into Hollywood affluence he purchased a trunkful of dresses and sent them to her down Mississippi way. He never forgot the southern lady who mothered him. The wheel of fortune spun round. His benefactress lost all she possessed. Recently he found her working in a New York department store for fifteen dollars a week. Today she is in Hollywood with a home, fifty dollars a week, tending the four-year-old son of the no-good little darky she mothered. "Yuh see how everythin' works out?" said Stepin softly, erect and luminous with exaltation. "It's all so beautiful. Seek ye the Kingdom of Heaven and all things thereof will be given unto yuh." His eyes shone like Easter shrines, De troubadour ob de Lawd was seeing the Green Pastures. 58 The New Movie Magazine, June, 1935 tmMf