Photoplay (Jul - Dec 1939)

What Kind of Shoes Does Charles Make You Think of, Photoplay Asked Irene. THEY would be shoes with a foreign look. I don't know exactly how to describe them, except that they would not look like just any pair of shoes walking down the street; you would suspect that an English or French bootmaker had made them at a fancy price. They would be slightly worn; the heels would be leather, not rubber, because it would be more important to the wearer that the heels last than that they break the shock of walking. They would not always be shined, except for a very special function. What Kind of Architecture? A French chateau, I think. Not the grand, too large kind, nor would it be provincial. It would have a subtle kind of charm, an elegance you would discover after you had been there a while. At first, you would think the rooms were not quite in order, or tidy, but later you would sense the casual flair of the rooms and then you would be glad everything was not too neat. There would be an absolutely fabulous wine cellar, a connoisseur's cellar, and it would contain a fortune in champagne. There would, of course, be a music room. I don't believe the piano or the violin would be used often, but there would be a phonograph — the latest type phonograph on which the music of old masters would be played. The house would sit well back from the road, hidden from the eyes of prying people by a well-planted screen of trees and shrubs. There would be an extensive library, and every time you put your hand out it would touch a cigarette box. The cigarette boxes would always be full. What Kind of Car? Conservative. High-powered. One of the big ones. Black, or a dull green in color. But it would not be new. The motor would be kept in perfect condition, scrupulously. Nothing would ever stop that motor, and there would never be a ping-noise or a knock. But the wax job might get shabby. There would be an air horn hidden under the hood, a horn that on occasions, I suspect, would come right out and blast at a road hog or a driver who got in the way. Food? A superlative ragout. Cherries Romanoff, with an occasional cherry pit. Tree? Well, a tree called a curly-leaf oak came up in my garden a few years ago. I don't know what started it — it just popped up. It was an attractive tree, with a certain quality about it, so the gardener let it stay. Once it looked wilted and sick and the tree surgeon came and gave it a shot in a twig or something, and it perked right up again. Finally, an afternoon came when a friend of mine was walking through the garden; when he saw the tree he broke into little cries of admiration, said it was a very rare and wonderful variety, and offered me a great deal of money if I would sell it to him for his own garden. Mr. Boyer is very like that tree. Book? He's a collection of books. A play by Maxwell Anderson — some French classics, of course —a touch of modern writing, like Bernstein — Pierre Louys — with perhaps a page or two from the "Satyricon." Famous Street? Charles Boyer would be the Champs Elysees in Paris, with an awning over it. In New York I think he would be Fifty-ninth Street by the Park, near the St. Moritz at the cocktail hour. Painting? A portrait of an actor — naturally — and of a gentleman, painted by Mattisse. The background would be by Monet, and Degas would contribute some dim figures in a corner, for balance. Are busts ever carved by sculptors out of quartz? Charles could be a Rodin bust in black quartz. Sport? He is skeet shooting from the deck of the Normandie; a flashing doubles set of championship tennis played on a supermodern tennis court smack — and incongruously — in the middle of an Old-World walled garden; any subtle indoor sport; dart throwing in the formal study of a duke. Song or Music? I cannot resist it: To most women, he is "L'Apres-midi d'xin Faune," by Claude Debussy. But I feel that melody would fade at times, to be superimposed by a Bach Fugue, very contrapuntal, for (Continued on page 87)