Photoplay (Jul - Dec 1931)

Hollywood Statio n — N-E-W-S back-in-HolIywood Pola Negri. Dave's a cousin of Lady Diana Manners, you know, and Pola likes 'em attached to the peerage somehow. . . . Lloyd Hamilton owes his wife $12,500 alimony, but goes into bankruptcy court and says he's broke and can't pay that, and a lot of other things. . . . Bull Montana has a tiff with his wife, makes up with her, and feels so happy about it that he drives his auto through a stop signal and gets fined $2 and doesn't know whether it was worth it. . . . Ona Munson and Ernst Lubitsch going places together and wedding bells being readied for when divorces are final. . . . The Reginald Dennys expect 01' Doc Stork this fall, and the former Mrs. Denny sues him for the balance of a property settlement she says he hasn't paid. TRY these two little items on your Depressionola: Ann Harding's new RKO-Pathe contract will bring her $960,000 in the next three years. . . . And John Barrymore's price to any producer who wants to sign him is $17,500 a week. IF this sort of thing keeps up Dorothy Mackaill will be known as the Cleopatra of Hollywood. Engaged three times in eight weeks, Dot, after a brief stay in Hollywood, sailed for Honolulu and told reporters, "Here is the man I'm going to marry." With a gesture she indicated Horace Hough, an assistant director at Fox. The reporters swooned. Four engagements and four different men! But the laugh was on them. Hough already has a fond wife and Dorothy was just ribbing the press. Horace has come in for his share of plain and fancy kidding. Dot denied that she and Walter Byron were that way about each other. "Just good friends," she said, "but I feel that I ought to make my next picture in Reno, so I'll have a chance to divorce all the men I'm supposed to have married in Honolulu." POLA NEGRI had no contract when she came to Hollywood. Nothing was signed with Radio. She took a gamble and won. Radio had told her if the tests were okay, they'd give her three pictures. When they saw them, they signed her for three years. One up for Pola! YOU'D think she would be somewhat chastened by her long absence from the screen, wouldn't you? Not a bit! She still wears the queenly crown. A writer went to interview her. Pola kept her waiting, and when she entered she held out her hand — palm downward. But it didn't get kissed. This is an old trick of la Negri. Once before she kept two famous interviewers waiting while she took an hour's nap. But, even so, it's good to have her back. She puts the ooh! la! la! into the old town. NOW, here's the way our old pal Pola Negri feels about her work. "I will not," she says, "play the type of siren that Garbo is on the screen. I admire Garbo and think she is a great actress, but I want to be different. I will not play the woman who coaxes men with her voice and the beauty of her body. I have a different idea." Well, Pola, we're waiting with bated breath to see your different ideas. A T a very large and formal masquerade •**-party given recently, Billie Dove and millionaire-producer Howard Hughes were not speaking. Mr. Hughes flew — after this party — to a house party in the Northern part of the state without Billie. He returned to Los Angeles on business and flew to the party again — still without her. We understand Mr. Hughes was a bit burned up when Billie went walking in the garden with Remember when Slippy had to put on a show and rob his bank to get Sooky's dog out of the pound? Well, those days are over. Here's Jackie Cooper being shown his contract with M-G-M by Louis B. Mayer, production head of that company. He gets $75,000 a year, and it's a five year plan, too Stage royalty Hollywood bound. Alfred Lunt and his wife, Lynne Fontanne, New York Theater Guild stars, snapped en route. Their reputations, which preceded them, have awed the film capital another gentleman. He's kinda funny that way. We also know Billie was going to announce her plans for the wedding about this time. But she hasn't. However, it will, no doubt, be love and kisses again by the time you read this. GRANT WITHERS, Loretta Young's castoff hubby, is Hollywood's outstanding broken heart. Though he's been out places much with Betty Compson — so much so that Hollywoodheads not in the know have thought he's not much bothered by Loretta's attitude — Grant is really taking the separation "big." Withers is still deeply in love with Loretta. Yes, he has been out with Betty Compson. They think a lot of each other — Betty and Grant. But Betty's big crush is really Hugh Trevor, even though she does fight with him occasionally. And Grant's is still Loretta, even though she'll have none of him. AND so, when people twit Grant about Loretta and Betty and himself, you can understand why he gets mad. That's what happened in a Hollywood — well, call it a night club — the other evening. A certain ex-screenjuvenile brother-in-law of one of the better known directors was in a loud state of being. He concentrated on making audible remarks about Grant, who was in the room, and Grant's affairs. Grant got tired of it. He walked over to the loud one and told him to put 'em up. There was a flurry, a couple of smacks and the talker was on the floor dreaming of birds. So people aren't talking about Grant to Grant any more. [ PLEASE TURN TO PAGE 84 ] 37