Photoplay (Jul - Dec 1931)

/ imm y s y 1 via The nose that has launched a thousand laughs She collects first editions and hates exercise ON February 10, 1893, Mrs. Barthelmo Durante became, at the Durante flat at 90 Catherine Street, New York, the mother of a 7-pound, 9-ounce baby boy.J Three and a half pounds of that weight, they saw, was the baby's nose. He still has it, and that's why they call him "Schnozzle" instead of his given name of James, or Jimmy. Early in life, Jimmy realized, like Cyrano dc Bergerac before him, that nobody'd ever take him seriously with a nose like that. So he became one of the greatest comedians there is. Papa Durante wanted Jimmy to follow in the barbering trade, and had him lather customers' faces. But they laughed so hard at Jimmy's beak that papa cut them here and there, so Jimmy went out into the world. He still hates to shave. And now he makes as much in one week as seventeen barbers in a row of months. He loves parties. Let him loose in one, and he steals the show. Cornflakes with milk is his favorite dish! Give him a box of flakes, a bottle of milk, and he's happy. He even entertains, now and then, at cornflake dinners. He's as nervous as a cat; does everything jerkily and quickly. Walks that way and with a slight stoop to his shoulders. Doesn't care what he wears. When he gets up he puts on the first things he lays his hands on, regardless of color combinations or appearance. Smokes cigars constantly. When he was ten, his mother started him on piano lessons at a dollar apiece. Jimmy learned that half the time he could spend the dollar on ice cream and things and make up the lesson by practicing at home. He did, and can play anything from opera to jazz on the keys. Once, in his early days, he was accompanist to a singing waiter named Eddie Cantor, in a Coney Island cafe. He never sleeps more than five hours a night and is an early riser. His wife is Jean Olsen. He met her when he was "Ragtime Jimmy" at Coney Island. Her first remark to him was, "You're the worst piano player I ever heard." That started a romance that's still hot fourteen years later. DID you happen to see a picture called "Thru Different Eyes"? Can you remember a furtive, not too attractive girl who gave a piercing scream in the courtroom? You can recall her vaguely, yes? But she left no impression on you? If you haven't already heard, what I'm about to tell you will be a shock. Maybe you'd better sit down. That little nonentity in "Thru Different Eyes," that stage actress who came to Hollywood and failed — well, that was Sylvia Sidney! The Sylvia Sidney who, later, played a melancholy tune on your heart strings in "An American Tragedy" and "Street Scene." The girl with the crinkly eyes and the sweet, fresh mouth. The young woman who is, at the moment, the outstanding sensational success of Hollywood! Your guess as to the reason why she failed first and, a few months later, became the talk of the town is as good as mine or Mahatma Gandhi's. Good parts, I suppose. Careful direction. Any number of things. The fact remains that, despite Paramount's effort to make her a second Clara Bow, Sylvia stands on her own two feet and is now considered their second biggest box-office draw. Marlene Dietrich is first. Her eyes are gray-green and change their color, but one of them has a brown birthmark that doesn't change. When she was ten (the daughter of a Bronx dentist and a dress designer at Wanamaker's, living in Greenwich Village) something happened to her. She could not talk to anybody. If someone spoke to her tears would pour down her cheeks. PUZZLED by all this, her parents insisted that she take dancing and elocution lessons — both of which she most cordially loathed. She gave up the dancing but the elocution teacher persisted. Apparently he saw in her what critics were later to discover when, at fifteen, she did the leading role in the Theater Guild School play. She collects first editions but hates all form of physical exercise. She can't stand to have anyone manicure her nails. So near-sighted she cannot see a movie without her glasses, six rows back. An exceptionally bad memory, but she's as shrewd a little business woman as Hollvwood has known.