The New Movie Magazine (Jan-Sep 1935)

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BABY PATTERNS No. Ja . . . 15c Includes : Crib spread and pillow case with animal applique design • Floor cushion of glazed chintz • Bathing apron made from a bath towel • Crocheted beret for the two-year old • Reversible crocheted afghan • Crocheted thumbless mittens for infants • Eiderdown carriage bootee. BABY PATTERNS No. Ap . . . 15c Includes: Animal floor pad of glazed chintz • Bird and animal applique patterns • Directions for making baby cap • Sewing and embroidery pattern for baby jacket • Knitted rompers • Colorful pads for nursery chairs • A coat hanger and cap stand for the baby. Send 15c for each complete set to FRANCES COWLES Tower Magazines, Inc. 55 Fifth Avenue New York, N. Y. Can Actors Be Themselves? bloodshed that can honorably be evaded and planes are more or less synonymous with warfare. So Jimmy can take a big bow for being a plenty swell actor when you recall how convincing he is with goggles strapped on his Irish pan. Incidentally, the screen's most unafraid guy, the same James Cagney, has one other fear, and this is of "Hollywood pals." He's been misused by plenty of people he was barely acquainted with, and his widely known generosity has attracted '"pals" in droves. And that's a sensible fear for any picture luminary to possess. XJORMA SHEARER'S position of ■*■ ^ leadership on the screen has given her fame, fortune and fear. If ever a star felt a debt to the public that keeps her name in lights, that star is Norma. On the screen she's more often sophisticated than sweet, is more frequently sinning than simple — but no free soul is she! Because of her ability and the thousands of fans to whom La Shearer can do no wrong, she's been definitely placed on the spot. Intelligent, she realizes that her simplest action could be misconstrued if the opportunity arose. Her position as the social queen in the local scheme of things, as well as her being the criterion of cinema standards, necessitates her being most circumspect. On one occasion that I know she deliberately disobeyed her doctor's orders to attend a party given for a newcomer from the stage. If she hadn't come at all it would have been called a "snub"; if she hadn't stayed to the bitter end all Hollywood would have talked over its breakfast coffee of the fact that she'd "snubbed" this newcomer. Uneasy lies the head on which rests a crown, you know. Then, too, Norma is hypersensitive about the fact that her mate, Irving Thalberg, is a major executive on her lot. She won her stardom on her own and has kept it only by Norma Shearer's ability, but the little green-eyed monsters that dwell in Hollywood, like any other town, still whisper, "Who couldn't be a star if they were in her shoes?" Akin to Norma Shearer in her fear of the accusation of succeeding because of her husband is Ruby Keeler, whose greatest pride and fear is in being Al Jolson's wife. Until recently she would not even discuss their marriage, afraid of adding fresh fuel for envious tongues. But she courageously put fear aside and played the lead opposite Al in "Go Into Your Dance," so her fear must be slowly receding. Ruby says this of her fear, "Marriage is a two person proposition and it's unfair to either one to use it to his professional advantage. I haven't and I wouldn't. I've never played with Al before because I thought it would add to the gossip that he'd sponsored my career. The truth is that he was none too anxious to have me work in pictures!" And Hollywood will admit now that Ruby Keeler has made her success on her own, both as a wife and a screen star. Clark Gable, who was teamed with Norma Shearer in "A Free Soul," can't live up to the title of that picture by a long ways! Clark has a reticent, decent man's aversion to anyone prying into his domestic life. The one time that he is known to have lost his easygoing disposition was when a feminine interviewer coaxed that she "should have (Continued from page 32) the exclusive story when he got his divorce!" Another little devil that torments this rugged gent is that the guys in the old home town may think that he's "gone soft or actorish." Hopedale, Ohio, may be just a spot on the map to you, but to Clark it's his early stamping ground, and he doesn't want the kids who used to think that he was a "reg'lar fellow" to feel differently about him now that he's America's rage. Kent Taylor, who has been teamed with Evelyn Venable so much that some people think they're married, has one of Hollywood's most unusual complexes — a fear of awnings ! It's the truth! Before Kent donned greasepaint he was an awning salesman and one day, while on a demonstration call, a heavy awning that had been temporarily rigged up fell on Kent's buddy, killing him instantly. That's why you'll see young Taylor sticking so close to the curb when he walks down the boulevard. Mae West has as many taboos as she has curves. She doesn't like black cats, the numbers thirteen or twenty-three, and wouldn't walk under a ladder on a bet. But her greatest fear was unconsciously revealed one day by her when she told a mutual friend, "The thing that worries me most, young fella, is the reformers likin' me. When they do I'll know I'm slippin'!" Mary Pickford's one fear that amounts to a complex is poverty. She had more than her share of it in the days when she was plain Gladys Smith. Until quite recently she was reported to have saved every, pair of shoes that she had owned since she became a star; not so much as a hobby but as positive evidence that the wolf was no longer at her door. And even Hollywood sees a touch of pathos in the secret fear that has haunted Mary. Hollywood hasn't forgotten the day that she first saw her name in lights and said in an awed whisper, "Now I can buy silk stockings." Gene Raymond and David Manners have their little nightmares quite like any prosperous business man. They're afraid of putting on more poundage. They diet, exercise and ride strenuously to keep their weight near par while Janet Gaynor and Ginger Rogers are just as diligently drinking malted milks in their efforts to gain weight. Wotta life ! Lew Ayres' sensitive personality that is his greatest screen asset is also his private life bugaboo. A star for five long years, Lew still cannot stand to have anyone watch him emote ! He's not pulling a Garbo, either, for with just one horselaugh from a bystander Lew would flee to his banjo and never darken the screen again if he had his way about it! Only a couple of years ago when he was making "Impatient Maiden" Lew became so upset at extras watching him work that he insisted that a black screen be placed between him and the mobworkers. Lew probably possesses Hollywood's most highly developed inferiority complex and yet it is that very diffidence that haunts him that has made Lew a star ! The blondes seem to have a stranglehold on not being free souls, as witness Alice Faye's little-known terror. Alice was badly scarred in an automobile accident while she was an entertainer with Rudy Vallee's orchestra. To this day she becomes nauseated in a car that is driven more rapidly than a snail's gait. I know, too! For one night Alice and I drove out into San Fernando valley and she practically leaped right out of the vehicle whenever the speedometer registered more than thirty. Jean Harlow has been a free soul on the screen more often than not, but in real life she has one great fear. No personal jinxes worry her, but just mention publicity! So much newsprint has threatened her career at one time and another that it has made the platinum blonde Hollywood's most cautious young actress. What use is it to have adulation and dollars if you daren't be your own self? She's a girl that naturally attracts attention and provokes comment and Jean must be certain that it's favorable comment. She acquired her fear undeservedly — but that doesn't lessen it. Spencer Tracy, fine actor that he is, has one of the screen's strangest fears — that of "being an actor"! He dreads insincerity more than any man I know, and to his mind "becoming an actor" in the usual sense means to rely on technique rather than understanding, to walk through a part rather than be it. He once said to me, "Believe me, kid, the only difference between a good actor and a ham is that a good actor knows when he's acting!" His career is laid on sincerity in portrayals as there is no overabundance of sex appeal or manly beauty in the Tracy makeup. And if Spencer ever hears any rumors that he's becoming a matinee idol he'll feel certain that he's done for! So all that glitters is not gold, nor are screen stars the free souls you've been led to believe! They've their fears, their jinxes, their own little horrors and hairraising complexes. Free souls in Hollywood? There are plenty of them when they're playing parts on the silver screen. Off screen they have the same scaredycat bugaboos that we all share. By the way, what's yours? HOLLYWOOD GOSSIP TXJE HAVE a lot of comedians out W in Hollywood, but, David Chasen, fresh from the New York stage, gets all the prizes we've been saving for the Marx brothers. Because why? Because Davie had accomplished the impossible and succeeded in being so doggone funny that even the props, grips and electricians on the set are laughing their heads off. And when you can make that hardboiled gang even crack a reluctant smile — well, Davie, you must be good. r^ICK ARLEN'S youngster is a trouper ■LJ already at the ripe old age of three! When Dick and the Missus took him back to St. Paul in honor of Dick's parents' golden wedding anniversary, Junior posed nicely for the newspaper photographers. When he'd had enough posing, however, he merely waved his hand and announced: "Dat's all. Ricky froo now!" And "froo" he was, too! Which makes two of us. FREDRIC MARCH is probably the happiest man in the world, right this minute ! For the first time since "Good Dame," Freddie is playing a role that permits a daily shave and neck clip, and after months of ducking around behind long beards and beetling eyebrows, he chuckles: "Some fun, eh, kid?" 62 The New Movie Magazine, September, 1935