Photoplay (Jan-Jun 1948)

Keenan Tells His Story (Continued from page 35) Broadway for three years. “Evie answered, ‘I’ll tell you who I am. I’ve been on Broadway with Katharine Cornell, and I’ve been with fine actors and in great plays and have learned a great deal too!’ “From this a double thing occurred and I not only fell in love with a beautiful gal with a sensational figure, but a girl who also piqued my interest. Through Evie I became interested in the theater for the first time. I improved my diction which at the time was garbled and awh-fully Long Island. I actually sounded like my butler. Evie made me go from producer to producer, which I had never done, looking for just the right part. I ended up working for the more tasteful theatrical producers such as Guthrie McClintic. “From this mutual interest in the theater, a big thing got started. Evie had been going with Tyrone Power for two and a half years, but he had gone to Hollywood. She was unattached and so was I. It just happened. After that Evie forsook her own career which she never should have done for she was a darn good comedienne. She made me her career. She came to all my rehearsals and between the two of us, I got somewhere. Believe me, Evie straightened me out. “DUT after awhile, we realized that my D career was our only mutual interest. We had no personal interests together. I love motorcycles, building cars, speedboats, and I hated the things Evie loved . . . healthy things like golf, tennis, even a home. I take absolutely no interest in a home. I don’t notice new lamps or drapes and I don’t care about them. “As time went on, due to Evie’s teachings, I could handle my own career, so her interest in the thing that had brought us together diminished. There just wasn’t enough left to hold her interest. When I went to Hollywood, due to the physical set-up of the town and the industry, I had to learn about making pictures by myself. Evie couldn’t see my work until the finished product, so the division became even wider. My spare time was spent with my motorcycle club or building my cars, and despite our love for each other, with a life like that the interest must pall sooner or later. “Because of my lack of interest in the things Evie loved, I was placing her in the position of looking for people who liked these things. So, into the picture came our great, mutual friend, Van. I had known Van since 1937 and he took my place in all the things I hated to do and Evie loved. It’s too bad that what was a constant companionship and no more, was misconstrued because they were together somuch. Theirs was a truly platonic friendship, corny as it sounds. People all over have misunderstood and said to me with a pat on the back, ‘Poor Keenan.’ It wasn’t ‘Poor Keenan’ at all. I am selfish and I was doing exactly what I wanted to do. “You know, our separation was not sudden. It goes back as far as January of 1945 when I applied to get into the Navy. We had agreed that when I got into the service, we would separate. On my day of entrance I was in a motorcycle accident and in a coma for eleven days. The results were a lot more serious than most people knew, so Evie wouldn’t leave me. After I got out of the hospital, due to the head injury, I was warned not to drink. I ignored it and had unfortunate results — she stayed to take care of me. I finally went to church and took the pledge and I haven’t had a drink for eleven months. I don’t think I’ll ever have another, but Evie now r ve heard everything! jeered the little woman. Maybe you think all tissues are Kleenex*, but my skin says different! If you had a faceful of makeup you’d insist on a soft tissue — and you’d know there’s no other kind of Kleenex! Clowning again snorted Sue’s mother. And with me sneezing cold germs all over. Young man, to hear you talk a body’d think Kleenex was just like any tissue. Well, my nose knows there’s only one Kleenex. You’ll learn ! It’s a greenhorn you are about tissues, sir! smiled our Nora. What other tissues comes poppin’ up so handv-like • — one at a time? None but Kleenex! ’Tis by that Kleenex box you’d be knowin’ there’s only one Kleenex. But whish-h-t! There’s still another way . . . Your eyes tell you! Hold a Kleenex Tissue up to a light. See any lumps, or weak spots ? Divil a bit ! You see Kleenex quality smilin’ through —so you’re sure Kleenex must be heavenly soft. And husky! Faith, your own eyes tell you there’s no tissue just like Kleenex! Now I know better... There is only one KLEENEX pat U.= «T • America’s Favorite Tissue p