Photoplay (Jan-Jun 1957)

( Continued from page 57) heeled boots and a wide-brimmed hat, he could pass for a stunt rider in a shoot’em-up Western. His square-built frame is solidly packed, his face unremarkable except when he smiles. Then a warmth shines through and one ceases to be concerned with actorish good looks and becomes content with his ingratiating friendliness backed by an inquiring mind. The beach house, for instance, poses a problem which could become more acute as Rod’s popularity soars, which it seems certain to do. “There are few moments in our menage,” says Bob Walker, “when the place isn’t jumping. The beach is an attraction, of course, but I think it’s Rod they want to see. People seem to gravitate toward him, warmed by his naturalness and lack of pose.” This has, to some extent, been a hardship on the young actor who is so unaffectedly gregarious. So, even when he would like to be alone or sit before the big front window and watch the Pacific breakers pile up on the beach, he never lets this become apparent to guests who just “drop in.” These people, it must be said, are not free loaders. They are simply young folk who like Taylor’s ingenuous boyishness, his sincerity and continuing capacity for astonishment at the big, complicated yet kindly country in which he finds himself. So he greets them with his kid-aroundthe-corner smile and, if mealtime is imminent, concocts his now-famous Australian dish which he calls Greek lamb — something with as many ingredients as a hobo’s mulligan, and twice as appetizing. “It’s the only thing I can cook well,” Rod said. “Jeff and Bob are almost visibly relieved when I pass up my turn as chef.” Taylor’s emergence upon the American scene was the direct result of a philosophy arrived at early. There being no television in Australia and few little theatre groups, he decided that the only way to become an actor was to act, so he began beating on the doors of radio studios. He got what he was looking for — work. And soon, because of his facility with accents, particularly American, he was doing A Long Way From Home twelve-hour stints, day after day over the air waves; appearing also in stage plays. It was at this juncture of his career that writer-producer Marty Rackin appeared like a good angel on his horizon. Coming to Australia with the intention of making a television series starring the late Robert Newton, Rackin heard that good actors could be had in the “down under” country for a song such as he could afford to sing. One night while listening to a radio story called “The Informer,” he heard a young fellow playing the part of a Brooklyn hoodlum. His accent was so perfect that Rackin was sure this was no Australian, but probably an American actor temporarily beached in Sydney. He quickly got in touch with the performer and found a fresh-faced youth, an' Australian, whose bright blue eyes looked at him with the wistful longing of a country pup in a big city. “I asked him the usual question: ‘How’d you like to be in pictures?’ ” Rackin said, “and he reacted exactly as if I’d offered him a million dollars. “We were doing ‘Long John Silver,’ ” Rackin went on, “actually a sequel to ‘Treasure Island,’ with Guy Dolman in the lead, playing the part of a blind man. To create the realistic effect of sightless eyes, we decided to use contact lenses with a kind of milky cloudiness in them. After a few tries, Dolman said he simply couldn’t wear the lenses and would have to withdraw from the role. At my wit’s end, I began frantically searching my mind for some actor to play the part. It was then that I thought of young Taylor. I sent for him and he jumped at the chance like a hungry trout. But right then I got the surprise of my life. Rod wouldn’t accept the assignment unless Dolman told him personally that the role was his. Being accustomed to certain Hollywood actors who’d steal a hot stove, I was dumbfounded. This was loyalty and principle beyond my experience.” Rackin went on to explain how sincerely Taylor plays any role given him. “There was a sort of chase in the picture,” he went on, “in which Rod, a completely blind man, had to run over terrain known to him only by touch, and he went at it ANSWERS TO CROSSWORD PUZZLE ON PAGE 17 Across 1. Campbell (William) 8. S M ( Sal Mineo) 10. Cha 13. O'Brien 14. God 16. End 18. M L (Mario Lanza) 19. Eyes 22. near 24. mere 26. M O (Maureen O’Hara) 27. ocean 29. in 30. Yul Brynner 32. Anita (Ekberg) 36. Deb ( Debbie Reynolds) 37. Nigel 38. oil 39. Danny (Kaye) 40. Dream 42. MG's 43. A G (Alec Guinness) 44. No 45. E A (Eddie Albert) 46. P D (Paul Douglas) 48. My 49. D D (Doris Day) 50. N R (Nicholas Ray) 51. R E (Richard Egan) 52. Tavern 53. Aga (Khan) 56. Nader (George) 60. S E (Southeast) 61. Kerrs (Deborah, John) 63. Bean (Jack) 64. Silken 67. Ira 68. B G (Betty Grable) 69. Wide 70. Victor (Mature) 71. Fred (MacMurray) 73. Ray (Milland) 74. E T (Elizabeth Taylor) 75. Widmark (Richard) Down 1. Commandments (The Ten) 2. Able 3. Mr. 4. Pine 5. Be 6. enemy 7. Lee (Peggy) 8. S G (Stewart Granger) 9. Money 11. More 12. A N (Anna Neagle) 15. Dean (James) 17. Dan (Dailey) 20. You 21. sob 23. Ann (Blyth) 25. reigns 28. C R (Cesar Romero) 29. Ireland 31. Edie ( Edythe Marrener) 33. “Niagara” 34. Ten 35. Aly (Khan) 38. orgy 40. Damon (Runyon) 41. Modern 46. Presley (Elvis) 47. Derek (John) 53. A E 54. grit 55. Arrow 57. A B (Anne Bancroft) 58. Debra (Paget) 59. eager 61. knit 62. sari 64. Sir 65. “Ida” (Eddie Cantor’s wife) 66. Eve 71. F M (Fredric March) 72. D K exactly as if he were sightless. Once he banged into a tree and another time fell over a boulder, cutting his hands and gashing an arm. When I protested, he said quite calmly: ‘A blind man gripped by terror would run into trees and stumble over rocks.’ Well, that stopped me. The fact that he had injured himself didn’t count at all.” Having watched young Taylor turn in a remarkably professional performance, Rackin was more than ever convinced that the youth was entitled to his chance in greener pastures. It was at this point that a lucky incident occurred. Rod won the Macquarrie Award, given by newspapers to worthy young actors, enabling them to go to England for further study and experience. Rackin, while not disparaging the opportunities awaiting Rod in the tight little island, managed by subtle suggestions to point out alluring pictures of America, mentioning a couple of other Taylors, Bob and Elizabeth, who had done pretty well for themselves in Hollywood. This, coupled with the magic names of Clift and Brando, convinced Rod that heaven began and maybe ended in Hollywood, where everyone is supposed to ride around in solid gold Cadillacs. Now that Rod’s future seems comfortably established, he is inclined to look with a touch of nostalgia to the hard, work-filled scenes of his adolescence. Reared as the only child of comfortably well-off parents in Sydney — his father is a construction engineer and his mother a successful novelist and short story writer— Rod started out to be an artist, studying in the Sydney Technical and Fine Arts College. “I was a show-off, an arty brat of a kid,” he said, “and believed myself to be the possessor of an outstanding talent. Then I took a flier in amateur theatricals and got bitten by the bug for which there seems to be no known cure. When Laurence Olivier and the Old Vic Company visited Sydney, I knew for sure that I wanted to be an actor. It was then that I began to get rid of that phony attitude and discovered that there is no substitute for a sincere, honest approach to a job. Not at first, though. I got work scrubbing floors at night so I could walk around daytimes looking like an actor. I must have been an awful pain in the neck.” About that time, when he was twentyone, the actor met, fell in love with and married a pretty model who was just a little younger than he. Neither of them being burdened with much marital wisdom, career jealousy soon reared its ugly head. They were both miserable through two and a half years, at the end of which time they were divorced. Now twenty-six, Rod views marriage, at least for him in the foreseeable future, with a somewhat skeptical eye. Because he’s still fearful that he might not measure up to the high expectations which the officials at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where he is under contract, have for him. “More than anything else,” he says, “I want to make good as an actor. No, not just make good, either. That isn’t enough. I want to get up there with a couple of stars I used to dream about when I was trying to get my foot on the first rung of the ladder back in Sydney — Brando and Clift. Maybe I haven’t got what it takes; only time will reveal that. But if I don’t make it — and there are a lot of fine actors around who haven’t — I wouldn’t want a wife to share the bitterness of failure.” In talking to directors who have worked with him in pictures, it would seem that 98