Photoplay (Jul - Dec 1936)

IN HOLLYWOOD The debonair Mr. Astaire is, however, the first Hollywood big name to demonstrate a fine spirit of independence — and get away with it — as regards the radio. Although Packard's hour on the air began officially September 8th when their contracted time over N.B.C. started, Astaire did not open the show for the simple reason that he was still vacationing in Europe! Sure, they wanted him here for the opening, but he wanted an extra week of rest and play, and very firm he was about it all. That's why you had Jack Benny with Ginger Rogers that first week. And that loud unseemly burst of audience mirth which may have cracked your ear phones the night Mr. Benny carried on so jovially in a substitution, occurred when Jack and Ginger fell down on the floor. They were doing a burlesque of an Astaire-Rogers tap number, when Mr. Benny slipped, slid and landed with a crash right on top of Ginger. It was just at the moment, if you recall, when Ginger had lines to give out over the microphone. Confusion ensued. Jack had to scramble to his feet and literally carry the flattened form of Ginger across the stage to the mike, where miraculously she summoned enough breath to deliver her lines. Incidentally, whether because of the spirit of informality which prevailed, whether because Benny is always a hit, that broadcast was what is generally and popularly known along the radio front as a pip. A LITTLE prima donna temperament had its airing when the operatic-voiced Miss Grace Moore (who, you may remember, became publicly conscious of cow mooings in her last Columbia picture and who had to flee the atmosphere of Hollywood for Europe to calm her jangled nerves) declined at the last moment to go on the Radio Theater of the Air (Lux) with Walt Disney. He was on the program too, and his Donald Duck character was scheduled to sing a song. Miss Moore made up her mind definitely one noon that both she and Mr. Disney could not be on the same program slated for five o'clock that night. . Animals again, murmured those who went through the earlier cow episode with Miss Moore. Nothing of the kind, retorted her spokesman. Miss Moore simply felt the program would run too long with Mr. Dis ney's presentation. Anyway, the Disney numbers were postponed until a week later, and quick substitution of George Hurrell, famed Hollywood portrait photographer, was made. George was yanked out of his studio at noon, told to prepare a talk about his experiences photographing the great of Hollywood — he is not only the favorite camera artist of the particular Norma Shearer, but is known for his studies of Joan Crawford, Joan Bennett, Paul Muni and many others. He gave a darned good talk, too. C^NE of the most dramatic things that happened last month — so you would have thought had you been in the broadcasting chambers — was the ovation given Gloria Swanson when she made her appearance on Shell Chateau. The audience clapped so hard the announcer had to wave it down. Gloria, you know, has had a bad time of it in Hollywood these past two years. Nobody seemingly will give her a picture job, which must be very disheartening to a woman who was once the most glamorous and exciting figure of the screen. However, as a result of her broadcast, which was excellent, I am told by her agent that negotiations are under way with a national sponsor to put her on the air with a weekly program on Hollywood styles. Wouldn't it be swell if she made such a comeback that she could laugh at the Hollywood which spurned her? Credit Dan Danker, an accomplished advertising agency executive, one of the smart-thinking figures in the Hollywood radio picture, with picking Gloria for Shell. Credit also Mr. Danker for smoothing troubled waters at the time of the Grace Moore upset and with securing Hurrell at the zero hour. Like a news reporter who can instinctively smell out a hot story, he is forever picking "hot" names, such as his hunch in lining up Ann Sothern and Roger Pryor for a certain Shell Chateau broadcast. It turned out to be the night before their marriage, which was a timely break. Another hunch of his was to book Joan Blondell for Rudy Vallee in New York as she stepped off the boat following her honeymoon. Danny keeps his alert eye on four of the big-time shows — the Bing Crosby-Bob Burns hour, the Shell Chateau, Rudy Vallee's Fleischman hour, and Radio Theater of the Air. [ please turn to page 82 ] Ralph Forbes, Peter Loire, Grace Moore, DeMille and George Hurrell on the Lux program. Grade's fit of temper over Donald Duck mixed up things no end! 47